You're My Belated Happiness - Chapter 21 Part 1

Translated by Team DHH at http://dhh-workshop.blogspot.com.

You’re My Belated Happiness

Chapter 21 Part 1

Ruan Yu made plans to accompany her mom to visit the old house in Su City before the court date.

Two days before the trip, she received a call from Liu Mao. Liu Mao told her that he needed to go to Su City for a case and asked her whether they would like to go with him.

Ruan Yu knew right away that it was her father who was trying to get her and Liu Mao closer but she couldn’t refuse him though she truly wanted to.

Liu Mao explained that the invitation was because of her mother’s health condition since it would be too tiring to travel by high speed train.

Therefore, even if Ruan Yu didn’t care to travel with him, she had to be considerate to her mother.

On the day of the trip, Liu Mao came to pick up Ruan Yu and her mother, Qu Lan, early in the morning. He focused on driving along the way and didn’t talk too much to them except for the initial greeting when they first met up.

After they got off the freeway and entered the Su City limit, Ruan Yu gave him the location of her old house. Liu Mao said: “Your place is quite close to Haisong’s grandma’s place.”

Ruan Yu didn’t expect that he would even know the address of Xu Huaisong’s grandma. She was a little surprised and subconsciously turned to take a look at her mom.

Qu Lan was a teacher at First High School of Su City back then as well. Before the class was divided into liberal arts and science classes[1], she had taught one semester of Chinese language for Xu Huaisong’s class. 

Qu Lan didn’t give much of a reaction when she heard Xu Huaisong’s name. It looked like she didn’t remember this student. Ruan Yu quickly replied: “Oh, really? What a coincidence. Hehe.”

Ruan Yu soon forgot about this incident. She accompanied her mother as they walked around the neighborhood of their old house and took a few pictures. At lunch time, she asked her mom where she wanted to go for lunch.

Qu Lan said since they were nearby, why not go back to the First High School for a visit and eat in the cafeteria there.

Ruan Yu got nervous all of a sudden.

It was a Tuesday and Xu Huaishi would for sure be at school. If they happened to run into her at school and she told Xu Huaisong about it, then Ruan Yu would be very close to exposing herself.

But, was there any reason she could refuse to go there?

There was none.

Around 12 noon, Ruan Yu and her mother arrived near the school cafeteria.

Qu Lan didn’t let any of her old colleagues know about her visit and deliberately avoided going to the teacher’s lounge. But they happened to arrive at the peak of the students’ lunch hour.

Ruan Yu watched students, wearing the blue and white uniforms, coming and going here and there full of vigour and vitality. She couldn’t help but become sentimental.

She looked down at the dress she was wearing and felt quite out of place here. She told Qu Lan: “It’s so nice to be young, mom, look, I’m old already.”

Qu Lan took a glance at her: “If you’re old already, what about mom?”

“I’ll go borrow a uniform to let you put on. Then someone can ask you ‘fellow student, could you tell me how to get to the arts building’.”

“You’re talking nonsense.”

Ruan Yu smiled and put her arm around her mom’s arm and kept walking. When they were close to the cafeteria, there were a row of buckets to dump leftovers. She heard one girl asking another girl: “You didn’t even finish eating this chicken drumstick. Isn’t that too wasteful?”

The girl being questioned gave the other a stare and said: “What do you know?”

Ruan Yu’s mind suddenly driftly off.

What the other girl didn’t understand, Ruan Yu felt, she probably knew.-- --Chicken drumsticks tasted good but if the boy she had a crush on happened to be in the cafeteria as well, then all the good tasting chicken drumsticks could only go to waste.

She was like that before.

Back in those days, she had a pair of radar-like eyes, searching for him all the time. But once she found him, she had to quickly turn her head away and pretend that she didn’t see him. Then she had to make sure every movement she made would be perfectly lady-like.

“Chicken drumsticks are indeed my favorites. Xu Huaisong is also my favorite. When I can’t have both at the same time, I’ll discard the chicken drumsticks for Xu Huaisong.”-- --Thinking back, Ruan Yu felt her crush at the time was so simple and pure.

The most romantic thing was placing the ladder near the school back gate for him to climb over the wall. The most fervent show of her feelings was being willing to give up her most favorite food for him.

And all the romantic gestures and feelings didn’t need to be responded to. She didn’t even need him to recognize her.

[1]: In China, students have to decide between a STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) track or a liberal arts track at the start of their 2nd year of high school (which is 3 years total).This’ll decide the coursework they’ll take in their 2nd and 3rd years of high school.

Translated by Team DHH at http://dhh-workshop.blogspot.com.