Chapter 41

At dawn, Jiang Lai came down with a high fever.

But because she was alone in the room, no one noticed.

It was only in the middle of the night that the woman, unable to rest easy no matter what, quietly went into her room. The moment she pushed the door open, she saw the girl curled up in the corner.

She walked over softly, picked up the blanket fallen on the floor, and the instant her fingertips touched the girl’s arm, she jerked her hand back.

It was burning hot.

"Alai?"

She called out softly, but the girl did not answer.

She reached out to feel Jiang Lai’s forehead; the heat there was alarming. Alarmed, she switched on the lamp by the bed.

The fever had left the girl dazed. Wet bangs clung to her face, soaked through with sweat.

"Alai, wake up."

She shook the girl’s arm, trying to rouse her.

Jiang Lai slowly opened her eyes in a daze. Her vision was blurred, and it felt as if something were blocking her throat; she couldn’t make out a single sound.

Seeing this, the woman hurried to get a thermometer. The cold glass had barely been placed under the girl’s arm when her body shuddered.

"Sorry, sorry."

She took the thermometer back out, warmed it in her palm until the tube no longer felt cold, then put it under the girl’s arm again.

The girl was still for only a few seconds before she started to fidget again. The woman pressed down on her arm and bent close to her ear, coaxing, "Be good; just for a moment. It’ll be over very soon."

The girl unconsciously nodded and stopped resisting.

While they waited for the thermometer, the woman brushed the damp hair from her face. The cool touch of her fingertips against the girl’s skin only made her heart ache more.

In the dim light, she saw the reading clearly.

39 degrees.

No wonder she was burning up all over. Stupid child; if she felt unwell, she should have called for help instead of just enduring it alone.

But concern outweighed reproach. She carefully tucked the blanket around her and was about to get up and leave when the girl caught hold of her sleeve.

She turned back and found Jiang Lai looking up at her with red-rimmed, watery eyes.

"What is it? Does something still hurt?"

She crouched down to ask, and Jiang Lai shook her head, but stubbornly refused to let go of her hand.

"Where are you going?"

Her voice was hoarse, as if it had been ground down.

"Alai, you’re sick. I’m going to drive you to the hospital now, okay?"

She explained patiently.

The girl stared at her without saying anything.

Looking at Jiang Lai’s cheeks slowly turning redder, Cheng Shuyang let out a helpless sigh. "Be good."

Jiang Lai hesitated for a long moment before slowly loosening her grip.

The woman stood on tiptoe to take the girl’s coat from the clothes rack and drape it over her shoulders, then carefully supported her as they went downstairs.

The girl’s body seemed even hotter than before, and her worry grew heavier by the moment.

After helping Jiang Lai into the back seat and fastening her seatbelt properly, the woman jogged back to the driver’s seat, and the two of them headed for the hospital.

————————————

The fog in her head seemed to clear a little.

When Jiang Lai opened her eyes again, what met her gaze was a white ceiling.

She froze, not quite able to gather her thoughts at once. Last night’s memories were like scraps of paper, crushed and then slowly pieced back together in her mind.

She was about to raise a hand to rub her temples when she found something heavy pressing down on it, making it impossible to lift.

She half sat up, only then realizing that the woman had somehow fallen asleep at the bedside. Loose strands of hair by her ear slipped down and brushed Jiang Lai’s palm, making it itch a little.

Jiang Lai instinctively held her breath. Even her heartbeat seemed to slow by half a beat, afraid that one careless move might wake the sleeping woman.

Her fingers were lightly held in the woman’s hand. She freed her other hand and gently swept the hair from her face.

It looked as though the woman had watched over her all night.

The rising sun filtered through the window and cast patches of light across the woman’s body, cloaking her in a faint halo.

Jiang Lai’s heart raced. She edged closer to her, until there was barely any distance left between them.

The woman’s brow was furrowed, dark shadows pooling beneath her eyes.

Jiang Lai slowly lifted her hand and held it suspended in the air for a long time before lightly pressing it between the woman’s brows, as if trying to smooth the crease away.

The woman murmured something. Jiang Lai snatched her hand back as if burned, breaking into a cold sweat. She hurriedly shut her eyes and pretended to be asleep, though the tips of her ears had turned an unusual red.

She waited for a while, but the woman didn’t seem to wake. Jiang Lai cracked her eyes open a sliver and saw that she was still sleeping soundly, and only then did she let out a breath.

Yet driven by curiosity, she still couldn’t help leaning closer, wanting to hear what the woman had said.

"Alai..."

Her eyes instantly reddened again. Tears fell before she could stop them, splashing onto the blanket. She bent down, and a soft kiss landed on the back of the woman’s hand, fleeting and without a trace of desire.

"Alai..."

The voice cut off abruptly.

Jiang Lai turned her head and found herself face to face with Xia Wanwan, who had just walked into the ward. The two of them stared at each other.

The atmosphere turned awkward in an instant, and Jiang Lai was so embarrassed she wanted nothing more than to find a crack in the floor and crawl into it.

"I’ll go out first. Or do you want to keep going?"

Xia Wanwan coughed twice and blinked.

Thinking of the fact that the woman was still asleep, Jiang Lai didn’t answer; she just shot Xia Wanwan a vicious glare.

"What are you doing? Sneaking a kiss on my mom and then glaring at me... mmph!"

Like a cat whose fur had been blown up, Jiang Lai sprinted over to cover her mouth and explained in a low voice, "It’s not what you think..."

"Forget it, let’s talk outside. We might wake Aunt Cheng like this; she probably didn’t get much rest last night."

Jiang Lai turned around and gently draped the blanket beside the bed back over the woman, then carefully tucked in the edge.

Xia Wanwan, watching her every movement so cautiously and tenderly, felt something stir inside her.

Her parents had divorced when she was young, and she had grown up with Cheng Shuyang. She knew better than anyone how hard life could be for a single mother.

Not to mention that back when Cheng Shuyang still hadn’t become famous across the country, she was just a bit player scrambling for small roles, yet she never let her down when it came to material comfort.

She had grown up living with the woman, which meant Cheng Shuyang had kept all her suitors firmly outside the door. There was only one person... and she could tell the woman treated that person differently.

When she was little, she didn’t understand. Only when she grew up did she realize that look in her mother’s eyes was called liking.

Later, that person disappeared without a trace, and she never again saw anyone else by her side.

That was why, when she found out Jiang Lai liked her mother, her first reaction was worry that Jiang Lai would get hurt. She knew her mother well; the woman had loved deeply before, and she would not easily love someone again.

But...

"What are you thinking about?"

Jiang Lai waved a hand in front of her face.

"Nothing, nothing."

Coming back to herself, she handed over the fruit basket she’d brought. "I bought this for you on the way; it’s for vitamin C."

"Thanks."

Jiang Lai set the basket on the empty table, then nudged her out of the ward. The two of them sat on the bench in the corridor and chatted.

"Why did you suddenly come to see me?"

"Because I was worried about you, obviously."

Xia Wanwan glanced at her. "Worried that someone might be scared to death, so I rushed over to watch the joke."

Jiang Lai gave a helpless laugh. "Aunt Cheng told you, didn’t she?"

"Who else? If my mom hadn’t found you, you might have fried your brain by now."

At that, the smile on Jiang Lai’s face stiffened, and her tone turned a little downcast. "I thought I could handle it..."

"What do you mean, ‘thought’? Jiang Lai, you’re a person, not a god."

Hearing the concern beneath the girl’s reproach, Jiang Lai couldn’t help but smile. "All right, I know I was wrong. I won’t do it again."

Xia Wanwan slapped her hand away and turned her face aside.

"There won’t be a next time..."

Jiang Lai coaxed her by scratching the girl’s palm.

"...If you do this again, I’ll never talk to you again."

As expected, mother and daughter really did share the same weakness.

"Got it."

The two of them chatted a little longer before Xia Wanwan finally asked cautiously, "Alai, do you... really like my mom?"

"I thought that was obvious."

"But you don’t know what she went through before you came along. She won’t fall in love easily again, so, Jiang Lai, stop liking my mom."

"I know."

"You know and you still want to keep banging your head against a wall?"

Xia Wanwan’s tone grew a little urgent. "You clearly have better options. Senior is so much better—pretty, kind, and a perfect match for you."

"...Wanwan, do you not want this?"

"I don’t want it?"

The girl punched her hard in the chest. "Jiang Lai, what do you take me for? If I didn’t want it, I wouldn’t have let my mom join this variety show."

Jiang Lai clutched her chest where she’d been hit, her face full of amusement. "I know; I was teasing you on purpose."

"...Jiang Lai, I just don’t want you to get hurt. That’s all."

Jiang Lai smiled and took her hand. "Wanwan, I chose this path myself. I can’t blame anyone else, and I won’t blame anyone."

"Don’t come crying to me later."

A rush of hurried footsteps sounded in the corridor.

The two of them looked up toward the noise and saw Lin Wanqiu and Qin Huaicheng coming toward them with gifts. The man was carrying a bouquet of flowers in his arms, his expression somewhat awkward.

"Jiang Lai, Director Zhang told me you came down with a fever last night, so I came to check on you."

After saying that, she looked at the girl’s face. "About what happened yesterday, I’m sorry, but I really didn’t do it on purpose."

As the saying went, when enemies met, their eyes flashed.

The moment Xia Wanwan heard that, her temper flared.

Rolling up her sleeves, she smiled without any warmth. "If an apology worked, why would we need the police? By Miss Lin’s logic, I could just beat you up first, then tell you I didn’t mean it and apologize. That would make it all right, wouldn’t it?"

"No, you misunderstood me."

"Misunderstood?"

The girl let out a scoff and, with startling speed, grabbed a fistful of Lin Wanqiu’s hair. "Let me tell you, Lin Wanqiu, Alai has a good temper, but I don’t. If you dare bully her again, I’ll beat you until you can’t find your teeth!"

"Huaicheng, save me!"

Red-eyed, Lin Wanqiu couldn’t break free.

By the time everyone reacted, they hurried forward to pull the two apart.

"All right, Wanwan, Wanqiu didn’t mean it."

"I haven’t even gotten to you yet!"

The girl instantly shifted targets. "Qin Huaicheng, are you even a man? And you come here now pretending to be sorry; who are you putting on a show for?"

"I..."

"What ‘I’? I was blind back then to ever entrust Alai to you!"

"Wanwan, enough."

Jiang Lai tried to pry the girl’s hand loose while persuading her at the same time.

The commotion in the corridor naturally woke the woman sleeping inside. The moment she pushed the door open, she saw an utterly dramatic scene.

Xia Wanwan still had both hands tangled in Lin Wanqiu’s hair, while Jiang Lai was behind her, desperately trying to pull her away. When they saw the woman come out, all of them froze.

The girl’s grip loosened slightly, and Lin Wanqiu seized the chance to shove her.

"Hey, you!"

Xia Wanwan made as if to lunge forward again, but the woman barked, "Wanwan, enough! Do you think this hasn’t been noisy enough already?"

"Mom!"

She stamped her foot, glaring at the two of them with resentment.

"You can go back. We appreciate the thought."

"...Then I’ll trouble Teacher Cheng to take care of her."

Qin Huaicheng quickly dragged Lin Wanqiu away from there.

"You two, come in with me."