MTMIO Chapter 98

Chapter 98: If Sweet Nothings Had a Flavor

That night, before going to bed, Lu You found the class monitor’s account and saw the “little essay” Yun Zhu had mentioned.

【The class fund wasn’t stolen by Yue Yunxi. It was my grandma who was afraid I’d lose so much money, so she sewed a hidden pocket in my schoolbag but forgot to tell me. I only found the money when I changed schoolbags at the end of the semester and returned it to the teacher during vacation tutoring.

Maybe she was afraid everyone would spread rumors that I stole it and deliberately framed Yue Yunxi, or maybe because the matter had been over for a long time, the teacher didn’t mention it again.

And at that time, I was young, timid, and cowardly, so I didn’t dare to stand up and clarify. With a lucky mentality, I let the matter pass.

Later, after experiencing being wronged myself and watching some TV dramas about exonerating people, I always thought about this matter, about the bullying the other person endured because of my negligence.

I can’t imagine how much despair she experienced during that time.

As much as I regret my weakness, I am grateful that she lived so strong.

I admire her strong heart and am sincerely happy that she is living well now.

Now, I have built a Hope Primary School in my hometown. I don’t want my children to be like I was. At the same time, I hope that if they encounter such a thing, they can be as resilient as Yue Yunxi.

I want to tell my children that it’s okay to make mistakes, but you must be brave to admit them.

It’s okay to encounter life’s lows, don’t look back, just stride forward.

Finally, I want to say a belated sorry to Yue Yunxi.】

Attached to the little essay was a group photo of the elementary school.

Lu You zoomed in on the photo and immediately noticed the slender, fair-skinned girl in the corner of the second row, looking at the camera expressionlessly, as if she were in a different layer from the others who were full of smiles.

“Is this you?” She held the phone out to Yue Yunxi, pointing to the little girl she thought was Yue Yunxi in the photo. “This one, the little girl with the cold face.”

Yue Yunxi widened her eyes slightly, took the phone from her hand, and said in surprise, “Where did you get this photo?”

“Never mind that for now.” Lu You pressed, “Is it?”

Yue Yunxi looked up, seeing her eager expression, and parted her red lips slightly: “You think this is me?”

“Isn’t it?” Lu You bit her lip. Was she mistaken?

It shouldn’t be.

Lu You leaned over and looked carefully at the little Yue Yunxi in the photo again. The blue and white school uniform and shoulder-length curly hair made her look like a frizzy, cold-faced doll.

Looking at the people next to her, there was still some resemblance in their eyebrows and eyes.

“Your hair is so curly, are you really not?”

“Really—” Yue Yunxi drawled, “It’s me.”

Lu You pinched her face playfully and kneaded it hard. “You were so cute when you were little, but you’re so bad when you grow up!”

Yue Yunxi laughed: “You’ve got it backwards. No one praised me for being cute when I was little.”

Lu You released her cheeks and poked the little Yunxi’s face in the photo with her index finger: “Little Ice Queen.”

It was as if she could feel the softness and elasticity that should be there beneath the cold, hard touch.

Yue Yunxi stared at her fingertips stroking the screen, and cupped her face with both hands, the remaining touch flowing from her palms into her heart.

“Which one is your class monitor?” Lu You asked.

“Right in the middle of the first row.”

A petite and refined girl with a comfortable face.

Lu You slid her finger across the screen, switched to the interface with the little essay, and then answered her question: “She posted the group photo. This is the clarification and apology she wrote for you.”

Yue Yunxi read patiently, and at the end, she suddenly recalled: “No wonder Yun Zhu said before that she sponsored a girls’ Hope Primary School and wanted all the girls who were interested in music to join the band so they could go out and have fun with the band’s team-building activities.”

“Yun Zhu told me that she wanted the children to learn piano, so she was willing to help clarify.” Lu You paused. “Her apology is quite sincere.”

Yue Yunxi just smiled, noncommittal.

“I thought she was talking about her own children when she said ‘children,’ but she meant the children at the Hope Primary School,” Lu You said. “Looking at it this way, your class monitor is quite outstanding.”

Yue Yunxi raised her eyelids and stared at her with a leisurely expression.

“You’re even more outstanding!” Lu You immediately said.

Yue Yunxi chuckled: “She is quite outstanding now.”

“Wasn’t she good before?” Lu You asked tentatively.

“She was young before.” Yue Yunxi didn’t say much.

“Will you forgive her?” Lu You asked.

Yue Yunxi asked in return: “If I don’t forgive her, will it make me seem petty?”

“No,” Lu You said. “It’s your right, and besides, she doesn’t even know if you forgive her or not.”

At this point, Lu You suddenly understood why Yue Yunxi’s attitude was so ambiguous.

The class monitor’s apology wasn’t based on getting her forgiveness.

It was just to put her own mind at ease.

Yue Yunxi glanced at Lu You’s account homepage, a small account that had just been created, too lazy even to change the system name.

When Lu You came back to her senses, Yue Yunxi had already exited the homepage and clicked into the comment section.

Leaving a comment: It’s okay.

“It’s okay” isn’t “I forgive you,” but “I’ve already let go.”

A belated apology may not heal the wound, but it can fade the scar.

Lu You curved her lips, happy that Yue Yunxi’s old scars had faded a bit more.

After a moment, she suddenly remembered: “Hey, wait, this is my account.”

Responding to her was Yue Yunxi’s low laugh, knowing what she was doing.

ˉ

The next day, the class monitor’s little essay was reposted on various platforms. Lu You spent a lot of money on advertising and hired marketing accounts to promote it.

But the effect wasn’t very good.

It’s easy to spread rumors, but hard to debunk them.

The truth was already laid bare, but the ignorant people just didn’t believe it. Not only did they not believe it, they also questioned its authenticity.

And Li Rui’s rumors that Yue Yunxi pushed him down the stairs and accused him of peeking into the women’s restroom easily incited a siege.

Lu You sat cross-legged on the bed, her fingers almost rubbing the phone screen until it smoked.

She had originally been collecting evidence, but she was just getting more and more angry. She couldn’t help it and started arguing with the people on the other side.

“Damn it! They actually blocked me? They block you when they can’t win an argument, so shameless!” Lu You was so angry that she threw her phone out.

The “brick,” warmed by her hands, landed in the soft bedding.

Yue Yunxi had just finished calling the teacher and returned to the room when she heard Lu You burst out with this sentence.

Turning her head in the direction of the sound.

She saw Lu You kneeling on the bed, crawling towards the phone, and said triumphantly, “Hmph, I have another account~”

Yue Yunxi couldn’t help but laugh. She walked over and picked up the phone before she could, saying, “Forget it, don’t argue with fools.”

Already angry, and then splashed with such a bucket of cold water, Lu You frowned, raised her face, and squinted at her, dissatisfied: “I thought you would thank me for going into battle for you.”

“I’m worried about you.” Yue Yunxi sat down opposite her and ruffled her hair like she was smoothing it down.

Lu You knelt down, shaking off her ruffled hair, still not very happy: “Worried about what? What’s there to worry about?”

“Worried that you’ll develop mammary hyperplasia and nodules from looking at too much of this stuff,” Yue Yunxi said very seriously, as if she was really worried about her health, with no other meaning at all.

As a result, Lu You’s expression was briefly blank. She began to reflect on the fact that her mind was full of yellow trash, which was really bad.

Look at how serious elder sister is, a serious health-conscious person.

“Then how do you usually prevent it?” Lu You asked, “Massage it?”

“…Mm,” Yue Yunxi said. “Get less angry, massage it more.”

After a long silence, Lu You swallowed and asked, “How do you massage it?”

In her field of vision, Yue Yunxi’s expression hardly changed, and her hand, touching her waist, hesitated briefly before supporting it upward.

Lu You lowered her eyes, slowly widened them, and lightened her breathing.

She remembered that when she was at Chen Feifei’s house, Chen Feifei had taken out a stress-relieving toy for her.

A snow-white steamed bun-shaped thing that you could pinch. When you pinched it hard through the transparent bag, it would deform between your fingers, and when you released it, it would bounce back.

From the association produced by stress relief, Lu You had completely forgotten about arguing with people at this moment.

Yue Yunxi’s serious demonstration had completely deviated from the proper track in her feelings.

She squinted her eyes, bit her lower lip, and involuntarily supported herself on the bed, leaning her body forward to get closer.

Like a little animal begging humans for a touch.

Yue Yunxi tilted her head and kissed her lips, her palm moving slightly, grabbing it from the front.

Lu You shivered, waking up from the stimulating dizziness, kneeling back in place, immediately pulling the distance between the two, “Thank you, Teacher Yue, I’ve failed to learn.”

As she spoke, she tucked herself into her quilt nimbly, raising her head to look.

Yue Yunxi was looking down at her wound with some annoyance.

Lu You lay down, laughing hysterically.

Yue Yunxi moved over and breathed lightly into her ear.

Lu You went numb all over and lifted the quilt to cover her head as well.

She heard Yue Yunxi laugh outside the quilt and ask, “Isn’t it stuffy?”

“It’s not stuffy!” she said muffledly inside, “There’s a man-eating monster outside.”

In less than two minutes, she couldn’t stand the heat in the quilt and lifted the quilt to show her head.

A shadow fell in front of her. Lu You closed her eyes, resigned to accepting the warm weight on her lips.

Amidst the tingling in her tongue, she heard Yue Yunxi chuckle and say, “It tastes good.”

ˉ

On the third day, a netizen claiming to be Yue Yunxi’s classmate posted a photo.

The photo showed the moment when a little boy fell down the stairs by himself, and Yue Yunxi’s figure was several steps away in the picture.

The classmate also posted a little essay: 【When I was little, my family bought me a camera. I liked it very much, so I carried the camera around and took pictures everywhere. I didn’t know how to use it very well, so I would often accidentally press the shutter button and take inexplicable pictures.

Quite by chance, I captured this one.

At that time, there were a lot of rumors about Yue Yunxi’s family. Many children didn’t like her and often bullied her. Although I never bullied her, as a bystander, I was also like an accomplice.

My child came back from school last week and told me very coldly that so-and-so in the class bullied so-and-so. In the moment I felt uncomfortable with her indifference, I suddenly thought of my past self.

Today, seeing the past being dug up again, I want to be a good example for my child.

All the rumors about Yue Yunxi are false!

If Yue Yunxi needs to file a lawsuit, she can contact me at any time.】

Lu You found this netizen, asked for the original photo, and sent it along with the collected evidence to the lawyer, entrusting the lawyer to handle everything.

At the same time, the video of Li Rui peeking into the women’s restroom was also exposed.

Although not many people had seen the video yet, the direction of public opinion had begun to change.

Lu You was in a great mood. She practiced piano in the afternoon, and Golden Hour almost sounded like jazz.

Yue Yunxi teased her: “If Teacher Zhong were here, she’d probably be in a bad mood.”

Speak of the devil.

“Well, she’s not here,” Lu You struck the last note, noticed that the green bubble on the tablet used as sheet music flashed twice, clicked on it, and couldn’t help but sigh, “It’s really speak of the devil.”

Yue Yunxi peeled an orange and took it to her, taking the opportunity to take a look.

Zhong Shuyun: 【The repertoire has been submitted. Tell her, although it’s an entertainment-based competition, she has to take it seriously.

This is a competition to increase your confidence. In my prediction, you can only be second at worst. You absolutely can’t be careless and drop to third.】

Zhong Shuyun: 【If you happen to drop down, don’t say I taught you when you’re out. Say Zhang Wenyin taught you.】

Lu You: “…”

Zhong Shuyun: 【Don’t just focus on playing when you’re abroad. The competition isn’t far away. Spend 6 hours practicing piano every day.】

“Playing around indeed.” Lu You said aggrievedly, “I can’t even leave the house.”

Yue Yunxi fed her a segment of orange and said, “It’s my fault.”

“Uh-huh. I need to mention it more often, so you won’t be so reckless next time,” Lu You obediently replied to Zhong Shuyun, telling her to rest assured.

She suddenly realized that Zhong Shuyun didn’t seem to know about Yue Yunxi’s injury. When Li Can and Jian Yanzhi came to visit them the other day, they didn’t seem to know about it either.

Lu You asked Yue Yunxi, “You didn’t mention your injury to them, did you?”

Yue Yunxi shook her head: “Telling them would only make them worry.”

Lu You made a “tsk” sound: “Why aren’t you like that with me? You even had Yun Zhu specifically notify me.”

“I wanted you to worry about me.” Yue Yunxi handed her another segment of orange. “I wanted to see you anxious for me.”

Her voice was very soft, misty and ethereal.

“There is a shadow of your love for me.”

She had heard Yue Yunxi say sweet nothings, many times, but she was still not immune to them.

Her eardrums were bulging, as if to seal off these sweet nothings.

Lu You opened her lips, and took a bite of the orange from Yue Yunxi’s hand.

Orange juice splashed on her fingertips, licked away by her soft tongue.

If sweet nothings had a flavor.

She thought, it would be the fragrance of oranges.

ˉ

On the fifth day, while practicing piano, she received a message of concern from Bo Mingyan.

Lu You chatted with her for a few words, suddenly noticing a message notification in the Big Dipper group.

Clicking in, she saw that Li Can had sent a screenshot.

The screenshot was a comment making obscene rumors.

Li Can: 【Damn it, I can’t report it. Sisters, get online! Let’s spray him to death!】

Jian Yanzhi: 【@Li Can elder sister, you sent it to the wrong group.】

Immediately afterwards, all the messages were retracted.

Lu You had originally intended to ask what was going on in the group, but after thinking for a moment, she privately messaged Chen Feifei instead.

Chen Feifei: 【Everyone is quite concerned about you guys, but they’re afraid that too much concern will put pressure on you. They also can’t stand the things they see online, so they created a small group. When they encounter something particularly outrageous, they focus their firepower and go online together.】

Chen Feifei: 【Let me tell you, you’ll never guess. Zhong Mi got into a fight at school yesterday. The teacher said to call the parents, so she called Jian Yanzhi. The teacher didn’t accept it, so she called Li Can. In the end, Yun Zhu and I also went. The teacher was speechless.】

[Lu]: 【Why did she get into a fight?】

Chen Feifei: 【It wasn’t really a fight. That kid is a Tao Xin fan. Recently, she was surfing the Internet and believed those rumors, so she was slandering you two in class. Mi Mi argued with her and made her cry. The little girl’s friends came to push Mi Mi and wanted her to apologize, so Mi Mi just knocked them down [sweating]】

Lu You suddenly had an indescribable feeling.

Her feelings for Zhong Mi were quite complicated. She knew that Zhong Mi was innocent in the matter of being divided by maternal love. She was even a victim as her “replacement.”

But she was also very envious, even jealous, that Zhong Mi easily possessed the maternal love that she yearned for but could not obtain.

She asked Yue Yunxi, “Why does Zhong Mi like me so much?”

After a moment of silence, Yue Yunxi opened her mouth and said, “I think it’s probably because—she grew up listening to your life story. Mi Mi used to say that your name was like Auntie Zhang’s mantra.”

Lu You’s hand resting on the piano clenched suddenly.

“Auntie would often mention you to Mi Mi, not in a way that compared the two of you, but more like telling a bedtime story. Mi Mi said that Auntie’s tone of voice was particularly gentle when she told stories.”

Lu You’s throat felt blocked. She knew, she had heard it.

Although the memory had been washed away by time, she always remembered that feeling, like the light at the head of the bed.

It was a soft and warm color.

“Every bedtime story she told Mi Mi was about you. I don’t know exactly what she said. But once, I read Mi Mi’s composition. The topic of the composition was ‘The Sister I Have Never Met.’ There was a sentence in it that left a deep impression on me.”

“What?”

Yue Yunxi recalled: “The memories of elder sister are few. She’s the medicine that Mom has to drink every day. I’ve heard it over and over again, like watching Princess Elsa over and over again. I like elder sister as much as I like Elsa.”

Lu You sat blankly in front of the piano, falling into silence.

Yue Yunxi got up from the sofa, walked forward, and stopped beside Lu You.

Lu You wrapped her arms around her waist, buried her head in her arms, “After we go back… help me ask her out.”

“Okay.”

ˉ

On the sixth day, Lu You took some time to make a video call to grandma.

The first video call she made was not answered by grandma.

Lu You calculated the time difference, confirmed that it wasn’t grandma’s rest time yet, and called Auntie Liu instead.

The call was quickly connected. Auntie Liu seemed to be covering her mouth as she spoke, “The old lady is on the phone with Boss Lu.”

“Lu Huai’an?” Lu You frowned. “What is he calling for?”

In between words, she faintly heard grandma’s voice.

Lu You turned the phone volume to the maximum.

She heard grandma raise her voice and scold Lu Huai’an: “What did you tell me in the beginning? What did you do?! How could you send A-Yin to that kind of place! You still want to lie to me… you still want to lie to me! I’m telling you, this house belongs to Yoyo, don’t even think about taking it away… how dare you! How could I give birth to such a mixed-up thing as you!”

The doctor had specifically instructed that the old lady’s emotional fluctuations should not be too great.

Lu You quickly said to Auntie Liu, “Quickly hang up the phone! Don’t let her get upset anymore.”

Auntie Liu was also anxious and hung up the phone directly.

Soon after, a text message came: 【The old lady’s blood pressure soared. She took antihypertensive medication but still felt uncomfortable. I called 120 and we’re sending her to the hospital to take a look. I’ll make a video call to you when we get back, don’t worry.】

Lu You waited for Auntie Liu to report her safety. A song that she could play backwards was played messily by her, the last note echoing locally in the quiet space, making her heart beat wildly.

Just as she couldn’t sit still, a cup of water was handed to her, steam rising from the rim.

“Don’t play anymore, and don’t overthink things.”

Lu You held the water cup with both hands, absorbing the heat that radiated from inside, feeling Yue Yunxi’s soft, cool hand passing through her ash brown long hair, massaging her scalp.

Her restless heartbeat gradually calmed down.

The afterglow of the sunset streamed into the room from the terrace, pale yellow light climbing onto the piano, the boundary between light and shadow at the end pressing on the phone that was still inactive.

Suddenly, it vibrated twice.

Lu You quickly took it out to look.

Auntie Liu: 【Just got home.】

Auntie Liu: 【This afternoon’s phone call, Boss Lu revealed everything about you and Teacher Yue.】

Lu You paused, uncertain of the attitude grandma held behind this reminder.

Before she could reply, the phone vibrated in her palm, grandma’s lotus flower avatar jumping on the top of the screen—the old lady was making a video call.

Lu You pressed to answer.

Grandma wore a thick cotton nightgown and sat on the head of the bed, a layer of fatigue in between her eyebrows and eyes, the brown eyes staring into the small window filled with sparkling lights.

The quality of the video was not very clear, making it difficult to tell whether it was water light or the projection of the ceiling lamp.

“Still at Feifei’s house?” Grandma asked in a hoarse voice.

Lu You chuckled twice, honestly confessing: “I’m in Italy now, Florence, Italy, which I told you about, the place where the whole city is shrouded in sunlight at sunset.”

Grandma was surprised: “Why did you run so far? Are you alone? Or with Feifei?”

“I’m with…” Lu You moved with the phone to Yue Yunxi’s side, aiming the camera at her, the empty hand below the phone tightly grasping Yue Yunxi’s hand, she said, “I’m with Jiaojiao.”

In the video, Yue Yunxi blinked her eyes gently, stunned for two seconds, before regaining her composure and politely greeting grandma.

Grandma nodded with a smile, repeatedly saying “good,” not asking much about the two of them, not saying much, just asking Lu You: “When did you go over?”

Feeling the hand she was holding tighten a bit, Lu You rubbed Yue Yunxi’s knuckles twice, responding to grandma: “A few days ago.”

Grandma pursed her lips, sulking unhappily: “You ran so far without telling grandma.”

Lu You coaxed: “I was wrong.”

Grandma hummed like a child and asked, “When are you coming back?”

“…There are some things here that need to be taken care of before I go back.” Lu You moved the camera away, looked at Yue Yunxi, her gaze moving down, quickly sweeping over her injured area.

Yue Yunxi held up one index finger to her.

Lu You added: “About a week or so.”

Grandma said: “It’s going to be that long?”

Lu You joked: “Yo, is Little Flower missing me?”

Ms. Wanhua was amused and smiled, “Yes, I miss you.”

“A day apart is like three autumns, isn’t it?”

Ms. Wanhua admitted with a chuckle: “Yes.”

“I’ll try my best, try to go back sooner.”

At the end of the video call, Ms. Wanhua said, “Be good.”

After a pause, the old lady added, “You, be good together.”

Not too surprising, Ms. Wanhua was still the grandma who supported her the most.

Lu You gave a strong “mm” sound, tilted her head, and gently bumped Yue Yunxi’s head.

Yue Yunxi curved her lips into a shallow arc, “Mm.”

With a resounding sound, she felt something in her heart, with this sound, landed steadily.