A Young Woman's Heart

The plane was fast enough, but it still took so long to arrive.

"It's almost like... I've already been abroad." Mo Xueyao muttered, touching her cheek. She subconsciously reached for her down jacket and put it on, but when she stepped out of the cabin, she found that the warm breeze carrying a hint of night was blowing in her face—compared to Changchun.

The relatively humid air made her take a deep breath.

She felt more comfortable in the place where she had lived since childhood.

"Phew, the south is still more comfortable," Hua Yinyin muttered from the side, provided, of course, that the temperature wouldn't drop any further.

Otherwise, when winter comes, due to the lack of sufficient cold-weather gear, winters in the south will actually feel colder than those in the north.

It is said that even in very southern places like Guangdong, people consider the Zhejiang area to be completely outside the south.

It doesn't snow in the real South!

—Some people would jokingly say that.

Jianqiao Airport will be completely shut down by the end of this year, and Xiaoshan Airport will be put into use. Although the new airport will have more flights and be more spacious, it will also be farther away from the city.

Unlike getting off the plane here, it's not as convenient to go back.

It was very late, the buses had long since stopped running, and there weren't many taxis left either.

"Alright, our family has to go back now. Let's get together again next time." Hua Jiankai said to Mo Wenli with a smile.

"Okay, come sit at the fruit shop sometime. I probably won't have time to go out." Mo Wenli patted his pockets and realized he had finished all his cigarettes, so he awkwardly put his hands back in his pockets.

"Dad! I want to go back with Xiaoyao!"

Where are you going?

"Hey, tomorrow's the weekend, so I'll stay at her place for a couple of days and go home after school on Monday."

"Tsk tsk." Hua Jiankai stared at Hua Yinyin for a few moments, then pulled her arm and walked aside. "Hey, daughter."

"what?"

Hanami lowered her voice, making sure Mo Xueyao and the others weren't looking this way, before whispering in her ear, "I'm warning you, it's fine to draw those kinds of comics with girls together, but don't mess around in real life."

"What? You don't agree?"

"Well, whether you agree or not is another matter, but most people wouldn't like this, right?"

"Dad, isn't that what you like?"

"I'm different, aren't I?" Hanami Kai said smugly. "Besides, I'm just a hypocrite—"

"Hey, Dad, don't use that Taiwanese accent, it sounds weird," Hua Yinyin said, deliberately mimicking his tone.

"Hey, what I mean is, don't scare people, understand? I've noticed you've been hanging out with Xiaoyao these past few days, it's not like you're just ordinary girlfriends."

"Of course they're not just ordinary girlfriends, they're really best friends! Seriously, Dad, that's how friendships between girls are, you're just getting the wrong idea, okay?" Hua Yinyin pouted and pushed Hua Jiankai aside. "Xiao Yaoyao, my dad agrees!"

Mo Xueyao wasn't fully awake yet. She mumbled a response and then looked down at the floor tiles at her feet.

"Bye-bye, Dad!"

"...Bring your own change of clothes."

"I brought it with me!"

"Okay, have fun." Hanami winked at Hanami Yinyin as a final reminder, then put his arm around his wife and got into the taxi that had just stopped.

"Yinyin, don't cause trouble for others." When Hua Yinyin's mother is out in public, she is a virtuous and loving mother, which makes Hua Yinyin very uncomfortable - she prefers her mother who is a bit spoiled and cute.

"Don't worry, don't worry! I won't cause any trouble!"

Mo Xueyao kept her eyes drooping and didn't say anything. She finally realized what had happened.

"You're just causing trouble here..." she muttered under her breath, but no one around her heard her.

Although she said that, she was actually happy about it.

Mo Xueyao, who used to do her own thing at home by herself, has become someone who enjoys being around people.

When she got home, there were only a few lights on in the entire community. There was also a broken motion-sensor light in the stairwell. Mo Xueyao stomped on it several times but it didn't turn on. Instead, the lights on the floors above hers turned on first.

"I'll shower first, I can shower quickly." Mo Wenli was the first to push open the door, as if she couldn't wait, and rushed into the bathroom.

Through the lower half of the dilapidated wooden door, you could still see his thick, hairy calves.

It's strange, though. Mo Xueyao didn't inherit her father's thick hair. Perhaps she inherited genes from her mother's side?

Is Wanyan sleeping?

"He should be here." Mo Xueyao cautiously pushed open the door and glanced into the dark room.

It took a few seconds for the eyes to adjust to the dim light in the dark environment.

There was a bulge in the bedding, and you could clearly see someone lying there.

"She's sleeping soundly... Yinyin, don't wake her up later."

"Hmph, I'm jealous that Yaoyao is so nice to Wanyan."

"Being jealous won't help, keep your voice down."

"Can three people fit in?"

"My bed is big enough... we should be able to squeeze in."

"Then I'll sleep outside?"

"I'm afraid I'll die of heat if I sleep in the middle, I'd better sleep on the outside." Mo Xueyao gently closed the door again, boiled two kettles of water outside, and then her father came out of the bathroom.

He dried his wet hair with a towel, smiled sheepishly at Hua Yinyin with his bare chest, and then quickly walked back to the main room. Faintly, he could hear Mo Xueyao's mother complaining inside.

She is a light sleeper; even the slightest sound of a door opening can wake her.

Hua Yinyin seemed sleepy too. She hadn't slept on the plane and was now yawning repeatedly.

"Yinyin, why don't you wash first?"

"it is good……"

"Hurry up and wash."

"By the way, Yaoyao, which is the hot water switch in your house?"

What hot water switch?

"It's for turning on the hot water."

"...Where would I get such a thing?" Mo Xueyao handed her a thermos filled with boiling water. "Here, take it and wash yourself with cold water!"

"Huh, how do I wash this?"

"Soak a towel in water, don't wring it out, then wipe your body, then pour it out in the sink, then apply soap, and finally fill several basins with water and wash several times, right?" Mo Xueyao looked at her in surprise, "Is there a problem?"

"Little Yaoyao, your life is really too hard."

"Stop complaining and go wash up!"

"Want to come to my place to shower sometime? My bathroom is quite big!"

"Go play somewhere else." Mo Xueyao rolled her eyes. "When I'm at the fruit shop, I go to my godfather's house to shower; I can even take a bath there!"

"Wow, I want to try it next time!"

After Hua Yinyin finished speaking, she darted into the washroom, then suddenly squatted down and stretched out a hand from the bottom half of the dilapidated wooden door, beckoning to her: "Pfft, Xiao Yaoyao... your little one, haha—"

"Stop laughing, okay? What's so funny?"

"It's already half broken down."

"You're only just realizing this?"

"Won't the water splash out?"

"It's okay, we can delay it for a bit, just don't spray it out on purpose."

"Okay, okay, I'll wash quickly..."

Perhaps sleepiness finally overwhelmed her, because Hua Yinyin took a quick shower today. However, she didn't feel refreshed afterward; instead, she felt even more drowsy. Shivering and saying "It's so cold," she crawled into the small room, not knowing whether she had woken Li Wanyan up.

When Mo Xueyao returned after taking a shower, she found that she and Li Wanyan had fallen asleep close together.

Li Wanyan didn't wake up from her sleep; she just instinctively clung to the person next to her like an octopus.

Hua Yinyin might feel even better to hug than Mo Xueyao; she's soft and bouncy, like a bouncy pillow.

Mo Xueyao glanced subconsciously at her chest, which had recently developed a little more, and couldn't help but roll her eyes. She squeezed Hua Yinyin inside and then wrapped herself in the outermost edge of the blanket.

Fortunately, the blankets were large enough, otherwise it's uncertain whether the three of them would have been properly covered.

Even late at night, the neighborhood isn't completely quiet.

Mo Xueyao probably had just slept for a few hours, so she wasn't sleepy enough. Although her eyes were closed, she couldn't fall asleep.

In a dark room, one's ears become extremely sensitive, enabling one to hear sounds from afar.

There was the sound of suitcase wheels dragging on the concrete, as if someone was about to head out in the middle of the night, perhaps to catch a cheap train.

I don't know if it came from downstairs or across the street, but I could barely hear the man's voice, only the woman's desperate shouts and screams.

After a long argument, a man finally roared, and the surroundings fell into a brief silence, followed by the sound of something falling to the ground.

"Ping ping pong pong..."

The noise at night made it even harder for Mo Xueyao to fall asleep.

The noise finally ended in the seemingly endless night, and Mo Xueyao could faintly hear the restless singing from the bar in the distance.

The dogs started barking at night, which caused several cats to meow as well.

Even in the dead of winter, cats were making sounds in the grass downstairs (Note ①), sounding like babies crying.

Hua Yinyin turned around and hugged Mo Xueyao tightly, but she had no one to hug and could only hug her own bedding.

The night never seemed to quiet down, but those sounds eventually faded away.

—Because she too had fallen asleep amidst the slight noise.

……

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Note ①: This quote is from Lu Xun's description of the mating between cats.