I have few friends, but many childhood sweethearts.

Chapter 132. Xia Xiaoxiao invites you to take a bath together?
After Xia Xiao finished eating the noodles, her emotions gradually stabilized.

Seeing the other person let out a comfortable burp, Xu Qingfan smiled gently and asked, "Where's your mother?"

Xia Xiaoxiao put down the stainless steel bowl in her hand, wiped her mouth with a tissue, and said, "Mom said she's going to see if Dad is actually going to work."

"Your mother went after her?" Xu Qingfan's eyes widened in surprise. "Tickets to leave the province are hard to get these days!"

In the early 2000s, train stations were extremely unsafe. Black cabs, pickpockets, and brothels were relatively safe, but the worst thing was encountering someone who would become friendly with you on the train and then, after you got off, a few people would grab you by the arms and shove you into a van.

Moreover, train stations are always crowded with all sorts of people during the Lunar New Year, and cases of trafficking women to remote mountain villages have been common during this time.

Anyone who has flown in the Yunnan-Guizhou area will understand. The Wumeng Mountains stretch endlessly, and even after flying for more than an hour, you still can't see the end of the mountain. If you were taken to such a place, even if you could find your phone to call the police, you wouldn't be able to explain where you are.

Thinking about escaping is just wishful thinking. There's only one way out of the mountains, and you might be discovered and caught by the villagers before you've even walked for half an hour.

"What's your mother's phone number? Call her right now and ask!" Xu Qingfan couldn't sit still and got up to call Lin Jing to check on her.

Xia Xiaoxiao was a little confused as to why Xu Qingfan was suddenly so agitated and making such a fuss. "My mother called me around 7 o'clock. They've already left the province."

"Them? Your mother has relatives going with her?" Xu Qingfan tilted his head in confusion.

"No, it's Uncle Xu and Aunt Yao, you don't know them?" Xia Xiaoxiao asked in surprise.

"My dad drove there?"

"Ah."

Xu Qingfan:
He looked hesitant, "No... how come I didn't know?"

"Who told you not to come back sooner!" Xia Xiaoxiao walked into the kitchen, holding the bowl of noodle soup she had just finished drinking, her voice coming from inside.

As Xu Qingfan breathed a sigh of relief, he couldn't help but think to himself: So it turns out I'm the outsider now!

[These parents are really easy to take care of.] He shook his head helplessly.

Since his family suddenly became rich, Xu Aiguo has been living a semi-retired life. When it's hot, he drives a taxi and fishes. When it's time to eat, he goes straight to the fishing spot, opens the trunk, takes out his tools, and starts fishing.

Yao Jinping was no less adept at this, enjoying a comfortable life playing mahjong and watching TV dramas.

Xu Qingfan suddenly realized that Huang Bo's famous yin-yang song, "My Demands Aren't High," wasn't actually that high when applied to his own father.

He was extremely envious.

"Do you know where they're going?" Xu Qingfan asked Xia Xiaoxiao, leaning against the kitchen door frame.

"do not know."

Do you know how many days you'll be gone?

"do not know."

"Alright, are you sleeping here alone tonight? Aren't you afraid of the dark?"

Xia Xiaoxiao put down the bowls and chopsticks, turned off the tap, glanced at him, and shook her hand, trying to get the water droplets on his face.

The two spent every day together, and in the local dialect of Hong Kong, it was said that "you could tell she was pooping or peeing just by looking at her." Xu Qingfan turned around and successfully dodged the water droplet attack, then bumped into Xia Xiaoxiao with a hard lean.

"I think you're the one who's afraid of the dark!" Xia Xiaoxiao retorted arrogantly, not annoyed at all.

Seeing the little girl's usual proud and arrogant expression reappear on her face, Xu Qingfan smiled slightly, "Ah, right, right, right."

"Hmph~ I want to play Bubble Fighter!" Xia Xiaoxiao jumped onto Xu Qingfan's back and held him like an octopus with her hands and feet.

Xu Qingfan narrowly escaped a stumble, but managed to steady himself and reached out to support her bottom. "Hmph~ I want to play Bubble Fighter!" he said in a coquettish tone, mimicking Xia Xiaoxiao's manner.

"I'll bite you to death!" Xia Xiaoxiao bared her little tiger teeth and bit at his neck. She felt Xu Qingfan's skin was salty and subconsciously stuck out her tongue to lick it.

"Ouch~ You're toxic! Hurry up and wipe your drool off!" Xu Qingfan shuddered, and after regaining his senses, he bumped Xia Xiaoxiao's forehead with the back of his head.

"Hmph~" Xia Xiaoxiao pouted haughtily and slumped her head on Xu Qingfan's shoulder, "Hurry up and carry me!"

Xu Qingfan wiped the drool off his neck with his collar and asked disdainfully, "Did you bring your keys?"

"On the table in my room."

Xu Qingfan carried her to the room, got the key, turned off the lights, locked the door, and returned to his own home.

Once in his room, he disdainfully tossed Xia Xiaoxiao onto the bed.

"You don't even make the bed." Xia Xiaoxiao complained.

After turning on the camera, Xu Qingfan said, "What's the point of folding blankets? The reason we folded blankets in the past was because living space was small, and the bed was placed in the living room. So we needed to fold the blankets and put them away in the morning so that people would have a place to sit. We oppose ineffective customs and join our army of not folding blankets!"

“You have a whole set of ideas, go tell Aunt Yao!” Xia Xiaoxiao sat cross-legged on the bed, glancing at him sideways.

Xu Qingfan:
There's a kind of laziness called "your mom thinks you're not making your bed."

"Whether you play games or not, come and log into your account!"

"Oh!"

After entering their usernames and passwords, the two entered a room randomly, and the game started quickly.

At the start of the game, a flying bomber darts around the entire screen, instantly killing any player who touches it. The game starts quickly and ends even faster.

"Xu Qingfan cheated!" Xia Xiaoxiao said angrily.

Bubble Fighter has only been out for less than a year, and the game in China is already rife with cheats. This cheat is considered good; Xu Qingfan has even encountered cheaters who showed up on the results screen the moment the game loaded.

"Let's go do a dungeon." Xu Qingfan left the room and created a monster dungeon for himself.

After defeating the Squidward BOSS, the map was filled with gold coins. Xia Xiaoxiao couldn't wait to control her character to pick them up. "Xu Qingfan, don't eat the gold coins! I'm almost ready to buy clothes!"

"You can eat it first!" Xu Qingfan didn't try to take the lower half of the gold coins from her, and instead controlled his character to move in the upper half of the map.

The boss of the second level is a bad penguin. You can use angles to silence the monster and kill it on the spot. Xu Qingfan and Xia Xiaoxiao have played it many times. The two cooperated perfectly, one fighting the boss and the other clearing out the troublesome monsters.

There's also a sea lion boss that you have to kick at just before the bomb explodes, like kicking a soccer ball; a robot boss that looks like a rice cooker with two parts, yellow and green, that can combine; and a green turtle boss that spins at red-hot temperatures.
With no adults at home, the two lost track of time and had a great time playing.

"Ah! It's so late." Xia Xiaoxiao glanced at the time on the computer screen and realized it was almost midnight.

Xu Qingfan stood up and stretched. "Want to keep playing? It's almost midnight."

Xia Xiaoxiao glanced at the time, then at the game, then at Xu Qingfan. After hesitating for a moment, she said, "Let's take a shower first!"

"Okay." Xu Qingfan got up and went to the wardrobe to find a change of clothes.

Seeing Xia Xiaoxiao still standing there looking at him, he asked in confusion, "Weren't you going back to take a shower? Why are you still looking at me?"

Xia Xiaoxiao bit her lip and stared at him quietly, looking like she wanted to say something but couldn't.

"If you don't say anything, I'm going to take a shower."

"Xu Qingfan!" Xia Xiaoxiao called out to Xu Qingfan as he was about to leave the room.

"What?" He turned around, puzzled.

"Can you take a bath with me?" Xia Xiaoxiao asked, her face flushed red.

"Pfft~" Xu Qingfan spat out a spray of saliva. "Isn't it...inappropriate? How old are we? Are we still going to take a bath together?" Although he didn't mind, Xu Qingfan was worried that he wouldn't be able to control himself in front of the children and that some little incidents might happen, ruining his reputation.

"Get out of here! Who wants to shower with you?! You pervert!!!" Xia Xiaoxiao blurted out.

Xu Qingfan: ? ? ?

"How dare you turn the tables on me! You were the one who asked me to take a bath with you!"

"What I mean is that you have to stay with me at the bathroom door and talk to me. I won't let you in!" Xia Xiaoxiao said, blushing.

"Oh, oh." Xu Qingfan nodded, feeling relieved but also with a slight sense of melancholy that he couldn't share with others.

"Afraid of the dark? This little guy is such a loser!" he mocked.

"Hmph~" Xia Xiaoxiao pouted angrily, tilting her head to the side to avoid looking at him, but she still remembered to hold Xu Qingfan's hand when she left.

"It's all your fault, making me watch that eccentric detective."

"The Detective" is a recent prime-time drama series on TVB Jade. During a case investigation, the protagonist is struck on the head by lightning and suffers a severe blow, which grants him "psychic abilities." Whenever Yu Zilang comes into contact with the deceased, he senses some clues to solve the case.

This kind of TV series combining special abilities, suspense, and detectives would still be relevant even twenty years later. Xia Xiaoxiao was immediately drawn to the plot, but because of the explicit content of Hong Kong films, many scenes involving corpses were incredibly frightening. The little girl was both scared and eager to watch.

However, the aftereffect is that I'm afraid to take a shower, go up and down stairs, or sleep alone at night.

"Xu Qingfan?" The sound of running water came from the bathroom. Seeing that Xu Qingfan hadn't moved for a while, Xia Xiaoxiao was worried that he had run away, so she couldn't help but call out. "Hey, hurry up and wash, it's almost midnight." Xu Qingfan yawned in front of the bathroom door.

"It'll be ready soon, don't sneak away!"

"I'm really impressed with you. You're so scared by watching a 'Detective Conan' movie that you're afraid to take a shower alone. What would you do if you watched a horror movie?" Xu Qingfan mocked.

Hearing the sounds outside the door, Xia Xiaoxiao felt calmer and smiled sweetly at herself in the mirror.

"Thank you."

"What did you say?"

"Fine, if you can't hear me, then so be it!"

"The riddle teller every day".

Xia Xiaoxiao finished her shower and came out of the bathroom shortly after, and it was Xu Qingfan's turn to take a shower.

“I’ll stay with you at the door too, so we’re even!” After Xu Qingfan closed the door, Xia Xiaoxiao sat on the stool where Xu Qingfan had been sitting, drying her hair as she spoke.

"Haha! Go dry your hair first, I don't need you to keep me company." Xu Qingfan laughed.

"The TV said that using a hairdryer to dry your hair is bad, and you should let your hair air dry!"

"No wonder my hair is so smooth; I've been taking care of it since I was a child," Xu Qingfan thought to himself.

He glanced at Xia Xiaoxiao's pink cartoon underwear soaking in the basin of water. "Your mother isn't home. Don't you wash your own underwear?"

Xia Xiaoxiao blushed: "It's all because you urged me, I'll wash it tomorrow!"

Xu Qingfan himself always throws his underwear into the washing machine, but he has noticed that many girls hand-wash theirs, saying that machine washing makes it easier for bacteria to grow.

For a while, he read some alarmist marketing articles and decided to hand wash all his underwear from now on. However, because he didn't rinse them thoroughly and there was detergent residue, he developed a lot of small bumps on his buttocks. From then on, all of Xu Qingfan's underwear was machine washed.

When he came out of the shower, Xia Xiaoxiao was still blocking the doorway. Xu Qingfan held some dirty clothes in his hand, reached out and patted her head, "Are you hungry?"

"I'm hungry!" Xia Xiaoxiao nodded repeatedly.

"Would you like instant noodles or..."

Before Xu Qingfan could finish speaking, Xia Xiaoxiao interrupted, "Instant noodles!!!"

"We'll have to go out to buy instant noodles. Get dressed and come out with me." Xu Qingfan thought to himself that Xia Xiaoxiao was too scared to take a shower alone, so he was even less likely to dare to do it alone at home.

"Okay!" Xia Xiaoxiao ran to the living room to put on her shoes with delight.

Because the adults weren't home, Xia Xiaoxiao experienced the feeling of freedom for the first time.

After putting on their coats, the two went downstairs hand in hand. Although it was past midnight, many households in the Lotus Courtyard still had their lights on.

The nightlife in Licheng lasts until two or three in the morning, so going out at midnight is nothing unusual.

Of course, this was Xu Qingfan's idea.

This was the first time Xia Xiaoxiao had stepped out of the Lotus Courtyard late at night without an adult. She felt like a Sailor Moon from an anime, an ordinary elementary school student during the day, who would transform into a world-saving hero when the night was quiet.

The little girl naturally wouldn't tell Xu Qingfan about such a childish idea. She held Xu Qingfan's hand tightly and looked around excitedly.

The convenience store across from Lotus Courtyard was still open, shattering Xia Xiaoxiao's adventure plans.

After Xu Qingfan picked out a Kangshifu braised beef noodle soup for himself, he gestured for Xia Xiaoxiao to choose one herself.

Xia Xiaoxiao chose a seafood noodle dish, while Xu Qingfan spent money to buy two starch sausages and two bottles of iced tea, totaling fifteen yuan, which could be considered the ultimate childhood treat.

When I was a kid, I can't imagine how happy I would be to have a meal of instant noodles, ham sausage, and iced tea.

After paying, the two held hands and jogged back home.

Because Xu Qingfan had already boiled water before they left, the two of them could start making instant noodles as soon as they got home.

"I want to try yours!" Xia Xiaoxiao said, her mouth watering as she saw him eating with relish.

"Mine's a bit spicy." Xu Qingfan took a sip of iced tea to cool down the spiciness and pushed his instant noodles towards him.

When the braised beef noodles were first launched, they were spicy. The spiciness might be considered very mild for people from Sichuan and Chongqing, but for people from the port city, it was considered medium spicy.

However, the braised beef noodles in Gangcheng were later changed to a non-spicy recipe, and Xu Qingfan never tasted that flavor again.

He will always remember the astonishment he felt when he first ate braised beef noodles, and the nausea he felt the last time he ate them.

Even though it's the same packet of instant noodles, I can never taste the same flavor as I did when I was a child.

"It's not as good as mine. Do you want to try mine?" Xia Xiao took a bite and then pushed her instant noodles towards him.

"I'll finish yours in one bite," Xu Qingfan threatened her.

"Whatever, go buy me more after you finish eating!"

Xu Qingfan took a casual bite, just to be polite, "Aren't all instant noodles the same?"

"No, mine is really fresh, okay!" Xia Xiaoxiao said while changing the channel with the remote.

However, many TV stations are displaying colorful circles and blocks, and it seems that only commercials are still being broadcast.

"What is this Xu Qingfan thing?" Xia Xiaoxiao asked, pointing at the television.

"How would I know? The TV station just shows this picture when there are no TV programs. Don't bother looking for it. We don't live in a small town with late-night shows."

"Okay." Xia Xiaoxiao obediently turned off the TV.

As a well-behaved child who goes to bed on time before 10:30, this was the first time Xia Xiaoxiao had ever known that there were no programs on TV late at night.

After having a late-night snack, the two of them were very excited and went back to their room to continue their Bubble Fighter battle.

Three o'clock in the morning.

Xu Qingfan finally couldn't take it anymore. "I'm going to sleep. Are you still playing? If you want to play, then play by yourself." After saying that, he crawled into his blanket.

"I'm not playing anymore either." Xia Xiaoxiao skillfully pressed Ctrl+u+u to shut down the computer.

"Turn off the lights!"

"Xu Qingfan, I need a pillow and a blanket. Go get them for me." Xia Xiaoxiao turned off the computer and nudged Xu Qingfan, who was curled up in bed.

"It's in my mom's room, go by yourself." Xu Qingfan had already taken off his clothes and lay down, too lazy to move.

Xia Xiaoxiao glanced at the dark living room. She was afraid to take a shower alone, let alone go to get the blanket. "I don't dare to go by myself."

"Hey~" Seeing that Xu Qingfan was ignoring her again, Xia Xiaoxiao nudged him.

"I'm all warm in bed and don't want to move. Try to overcome your fear. No matter what difficulties you encounter, don't be afraid. Face them with a smile. The best way to eliminate fear is to face it. Keep going!" Xu Qingfan said, snuggled in the blankets.

Xia Xiaoxiao clenched her fists, took a deep breath, and then decided that she still didn't dare.

[I'll push you off!]
Without hesitation, Xia Xiaoxiao turned off the lights and crawled directly into Xu Qingfan's warm bed. It was so cozy, like being near a heater, that she suddenly didn't want to move.

Xu Qingfan was slightly taken aback, but thought to himself, "Let's sleep together then, since we're still just kids anyway."

After giving her some pillows, Xu Qingfan turned his head and pressed his face against Xia Xiaoxiao's.

"Go to sleep, don't take my blanket."

"Mmm." Xia Xiaoxiao felt her face burning hot and dared not move.

night.

The room was pitch black, and time seemed to slow down all of a sudden.

"Xu Qingfan?" Xia Xiaoxiao called out to him softly after some time had passed.

"What?" Xu Qingfan was almost asleep, but he vaguely heard the voice and responded.

"What if my parents get divorced?" After lying down, Xia Xiaoxiao couldn't help but start to have wild thoughts, and she said sadly.

"I'll take care of you. Get some sleep, and everything will be alright when you wake up." Xu Qingfan felt like he was dreaming, and his brain answered instinctively. After saying that, he hugged Xia Xiaoxiao in his arms.

"Um"

(End of this chapter)