Chapter 54: Good Afternoon

His hand was scorching hot, and Ming Can’s wrist felt like it had been branded. She quickly pulled away, retreating.

“An eyelash fell into my eye,” she explained. “It’s just a bit uncomfortable.”

Chi Xiao: “Aren’t you going to get it out?”

Ming Can kept her head down. “It’ll fall out on its own in a bit.”

She hastily rubbed on some hand soap, rinsed it off, and turned to grab the utensils.

Chi Xiao silently observed her.

In his memory, Ming Can had always been straightforward and confident. No matter how awkward or embarrassing the situation, she would face it head-on, unapologetic even when she was in the wrong. The word “avoidance” didn’t exist in her dictionary.

It seemed he had never seen her like this before—keeping her eyes downcast as if she had encountered something so difficult to face that even someone with her personality felt at a loss.

Unfortunately.

As long as she didn’t want to talk about it, he would never know what was on her mind.

Before Ming Can could leave the kitchen, Chi Xiao asked again, “What did you do this morning?”

Ming Can paused, then calmly replied, “Nothing much. I came straight here after leaving the house.”

Chi Xiao: “Really?”

His tone was teasing, as if he was up to something.

Ming Can turned her head to glare at him. “Do you have a problem with that?”

Her glare was as fierce as ever, her eyes just as bright as usual, which meant her mood wasn’t too bad. She probably hadn’t encountered anything particularly unpleasant.

Chi Xiao felt a bit more at ease and looked at her, saying, “No problem.”

After a pause, he added, “It’s just that you look especially beautiful today.”

Having grown used to her eccentric outfits, seeing her dressed so elegantly today was a refreshing change. She wore a cashmere coat, a woolen skirt with high socks, her long hair half-up and half-down, tied into a loose braid with a flowing ribbon at the back. Her makeup was light and natural, making her look like a model straight out of a Japanese fashion magazine—stunning and eye-catching.

Ming Can was stunned, her ears burning, unsure how to respond.

She had dressed up carefully today to meet Teacher Leting, but she had just told him she came straight here after leaving the house. Would he misunderstand and think she had dressed up specifically to see him?

“I look this good every day.”

Ming Can tossed out this line, didn’t look at him again, and quickly walked out with the utensils.

On her way out, she slid the kitchen door shut, closing it tightly.

When she reached the dining room.

She set down the utensils, let out a breath, and felt her heart pounding uncontrollably in her chest.

A few minutes later, Ming Can’s noodles were ready. The three of them sat around the table, each picking their favorite toppings to add to their soup bowls, mixing them with the noodles.

Miaomiao held his small bowl, eating noodles while glancing up at his dad, then at his mom.

It was so strange. They weren’t talking today, so he couldn’t hear their thoughts.

Normally at the dinner table, Mom liked to talk—more accurately, she liked to give orders, assigning Dad this or that task, and scheduling various activities and lessons for him, the little one.

But today, Mom was unusually quiet.

She had already eaten several bites of the noodles Dad had cooked but hadn’t commented on how they tasted.

Ming Can slowly slurped her noodles, her long lashes lowered, her expression somewhat somber.

Back in her first year of high school, when Chi Xiao had confessed to her, he must have been carrying a violin case on his back.

Not a tennis racket bag.

It was probably a cream-colored triangular violin case, very similar to the one she had been using for years.

Not just that.

Ming Can tried hard to recall, piecing together fragments of memory. She seemed to remember Chi Xiao saying something about having a gift for her that day.

Was it the violin he had made himself?

But.

Why did she only find out about this after she had decided to give up the violin?

Once Ming Can made a decision, she rarely changed her mind.

She was a firm believer in her own will and wouldn’t change her mind just because of someone’s affection or efforts.

After leaving Teacher Leting’s house, Ming Can said she had something to do at school and had the driver drop her off at the gates of University B.

Once the driver left, she also left the university, walking two kilometers alone in the biting cold to get here.

The cold wind had turned her cheeks red and stiffened her limbs, but her mind remained anything but clear—still a tangled mess.

She truly didn’t know what to do.

Her heart was filled with shock, sadness, nervousness, but most of all, uncertainty.

It was like an ancient shipwreck, laden with treasures, had suddenly been salvaged and brought ashore. The owner of the ship had previously claimed that the ship didn’t exist, that what had been floating on the sea was just an illusion. And now, the destination the ship was meant to reach no longer needed the priceless treasures it carried.

So, what was the point of this ship?

And what about that childhood promise?

Did it still hold any meaning?

“I’m done eating,” Ming Can put down her chopsticks, grabbed a wet wipe to clean her mouth, and saw that Miaomiao had also finished eating. She stood up directly, collected her and Miaomiao’s bowls and chopsticks, and took them into the kitchen.

Miaomiao looked up, blinking hard, trying his best to swallow the words, “I still want a sip of soup.”

Across the table.

Chi Xiao had been the first to finish. His noodle bowl was empty, and his chopsticks had been set aside long ago, but Ming Can seemed to completely overlook him, walking past him without a word.

Chi Xiao grabbed a wet wipe to clean Miaomiao’s mouth, then took his own dishes into the kitchen and placed them in the dishwasher.

Ming Can was currently washing a cloth, preparing to go out and wipe the table.

Chi Xiao fiddled with the dishwasher, making quite a bit of noise. Ming Can stood right next to the dishwasher but acted as if she didn’t hear him, treating him like air.

Chi Xiao felt that after lunch, the sense that she was avoiding something had grown even stronger.

Surely, after all this time.

The eyelash in her eye hadn’t fallen out yet.

Chi Xiao stayed in the kitchen to tidy up the utensils. Ming Can came back after wiping the table and finally said something to him: “I’m going to take a nap.”

Chi Xiao: “What?”

He turned to look at her, and Ming Can flinched slightly at his question, her lips parting. “What’s wrong?”

At that moment.

Chi Xiao suddenly realized.

She wasn’t ignoring him—on the contrary, she was overly sensitive to his every move, which was why she was deliberately suppressing the urge to look at him.

“You’re going to take a nap?” Chi Xiao straightened up a bit, his gaze dropping from above, following the distinct lashes to her face, carrying a hint of confusion.

Ming Can met his gaze and suddenly remembered that when she had let him stay at her place, she had implied that he could only stay when she wasn’t there. If she came back to stay, he would have to leave.

This “stay” mainly referred to sleeping at night, but whether it included napping during the day hadn’t been clearly defined.

Ming Can hesitated for a long time.

Kicking him out outright would be too harsh.

But saying something like, “No, it’s fine,” after he asked, “Should I move out?“—such an open invitation—felt a bit hard for her to say.

The atmosphere grew quiet.

In the end.

Chi Xiao didn’t ask anything.

As if he had gotten the answer he wanted from her silence.

Ming Can also realized that with her personality, not outright refusing clearly meant acceptance.

Her eyes widened slightly, her cheeks warming as she watched the man in front of her calmly turn back to wash the pot, the corner of his lips lifting almost imperceptibly. He said softly to her, “Good afternoon.”

Ming Can quickly turned and walked out.

It wasn’t the first time they had slept under the same roof, after all.

It was just a nap. She could close the door to the master bedroom, and it would be like a separate space from the outside. There was nothing to be nervous about.

Miaomiao also had a habit of napping. Ming Can first took him back to his children’s room, made sure he fell asleep, and then returned to her own room. She took off her outer clothes, removed her makeup, changed into a long-sleeved cotton pajama set, and flopped onto the bed she hadn’t seen in a long time.

The housekeeper came twice a week to clean, and her bedsheets and pillowcases had been freshly changed, fluffy and soft, with a faint lavender scent.

Ming Can hugged the blanket and rolled around on the bed a couple of times, then closed her eyes, trying to fall asleep.

At this moment.

Even if only her body or her brain felt sleepy, she could force herself to fall asleep.

However, her heart was pounding heavily in her chest, and her mind kept replaying the old stories she had heard from Teacher Leting, along with the fragmented memories from high school. Forget sleeping—Ming Can was now so alert she could jump up and do a workout.

For what felt like the hundredth time today, she tried to untangle the chaotic thoughts in her mind.

Suddenly, she found a new angle.

Chi Xiao.

Ming Can opened her eyes and glared at the ceiling, her gaze filled with dissatisfaction.

Why did he lie to her, saying that the violin case was a tennis racket bag?

Even though she had completely forgotten the childhood promise, had harshly rejected him in her first year of high school, and had clearly expressed that she no longer liked the violin, taking a step back, wasn’t Chi Xiao also at fault?

The childhood promise was something he had always remembered, and it was his dream to make a violin for her. That day, when she finally recalled a bit of it and mustered the courage to ask him, wasn’t that fulfilling his wish? Instead of seizing the opportunity, he chose to lie, covering up everything from the past.

In this world!

How could there be!

Someone as reserved and repressed as him!

Ming Can threw off the blanket and sat up, her blood boiling and her cheeks burning. She took deep breaths, and following this line of thought, she figured out many things.

She really didn’t plan to continue playing the violin in the future.

But that didn’t mean the childhood promise and everything Chi Xiao had done over the years were meaningless.

Whether she needed a violin or not was one thing; whether she wanted one was another.

At this moment, Ming Can carefully sorted out her thoughts—

It seemed like she actually wanted to receive the gift she had rejected in her first year of high school.

As for the eight million…

She might not be able to come up with that much cash all at once, so she’d start an account and save up. Ming Can always kept her promises, and when it came to money, she definitely wouldn’t shortchange him.

Ming Can climbed out of bed, went to the bathroom, and wiped her face with a cold, damp towel.

In the mirror, her cheeks were tinged with a light pink, her lips a bright red, as if she were wearing makeup. There was also a hint of a charm in the corners of her eyes that she couldn’t see herself.

Ming Can shuffled in her slippers, slowly walking to the door and slipping out.

In the hallway, her eyes fixed on the guest bedroom diagonally ahead. The door was tightly shut, and not a sound came from inside.

Chi Xiao must be napping.

Ming Can still felt a bit unsure about how to face him.

Pretending she hadn’t met Teacher Leting and acting oblivious to his heavy, melancholic past seemed like the best way to handle things.

But then, how was she supposed to get the violin she wanted from him?

Sigh.

Couldn’t he just be more open and give her the gift he had prepared long ago?

Ming Can tiptoed into Miaomiao’s room, and when she saw the adorable sleeping face of her little one, her tense nerves relaxed a lot.

She quickly walked to the bed, lifted the blanket, and climbed in beside Miaomiao, gently hugging him and whispering, “Baby, sleep with Mommy for a nap, okay?”

Miaomiao didn’t wake up, but his nose caught the familiar, comforting scent of his mom. Subconsciously, he murmured, “Mommy.”

“Yes,” Ming Can leaned in and nuzzled his cheek, softly complaining, “Even when you’re asleep, you know how to respond to Mommy. But your dad, that silent gourd, won’t even answer when I talk to him. So boring, he’s just a total repression freak.”

Miaomiao usually slept deeply and wasn’t easily woken up. As Ming Can buzzed softly in his ear, he seemed to sleep even more soundly, his little mouth smacking as if responding to her in his dreams.

Ming Can took it as her baby agreeing with her. She lightly kicked the blanket and cursed more vigorously, “Repression freaks, get out of the universe!”

“Ahem.”

A low, restrained cough suddenly echoed in the quiet room.

…

Ming Can’s eyelids twitched, and she sat up abruptly.

“Who’s there?”

“Who else could it be?” A man’s soft laughter came from the direction of the small study. “The repression freak.”