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The Blossom Guardian · Page 1 of 3
Once the two girls had finished eating, they went upstairs. It was already very late by then, around eleven o'clock, and both of them had school the next day, so at this hour they ought to have been turning in early.
Wei Zhao rose to his feet and came over to the dining table, a faint and rather handsome curve sliding across the corner of his mouth. He had not heard what Gu Mengyao and Shen Yushu had said to each other earlier, but everything that had happened after Shen Yushu called him over to eat and then sat back down at the table — that Wei Zhao had seen perfectly clearly.
The two girls had kept their voices very low, but it never once occurred to them that Wei Zhao could read lips, and so every word Gu Mengyao spoke had been taken in by him without a single one missing.
So the young lady was one of those girls with a sharp tongue and a soft heart. Wei Zhao smiled faintly and set about clearing away the two girls' leftovers — though leftovers they hardly were. Neither girl had much of an appetite, and no matter how hungry they got, they could never finish four large boxes of food. The braised chicken pieces had only been picked at a few times; plainly they had held back for fear of putting on weight.
In truth, to be allowed to eat what Gu Mengyao and Shen Yushu left behind was, in the eyes of many boys at No. 1 High School, nothing short of tremendous good fortune. Take Zhong Yongliang, for instance: he could eat it every single day and never grow tired of it.
Wei Zhao was genuinely starving. After sweeping every dish on the table clean the way a gale scatters the clouds, he let out a satisfied belch.
Footsteps sounded behind him. Wei Zhao did not turn around; from the sound alone he could tell that the one coming was Shen Yushu. The two girls' footsteps differed slightly, and he could still tell them apart with perfect accuracy.
"Whoa there, Arrow Brand, are you a pig? That's some appetite." It was indeed Shen Yushu. She was a little thirsty and had come down to fetch a bottle of something to drink upstairs, only to be greeted by a table of utterly empty food boxes — which gave her quite a fright.
"Heh." Wei Zhao smiled. "Not bad, I suppose. Though the two of you are wasteful enough, leaving this much behind every day."
"Well, now you're here, aren't you?" Shen Yushu said airily. Plainly, raised in a household like this, they could hardly be expected to know the feeling behind the old line: every grain upon the plate is bought with bitter toil.
Wei Zhao said nothing more. He understood well enough the gulf that circumstance had opened between them, and so there was no use in speaking of such things; Shen Yushu and Gu Mengyao would never understand.
"Oh, that's right, Arrow Brand, let me tell you a little secret." Shen Yushu took a bottle of black tea from the cooler, then addressed Wei Zhao with a most conspiratorial air.
"What secret?" Wei Zhao blinked, looking at Shen Yushu in some bewilderment.
"Sister Yao-yao said she never said she didn't like you. Next time you can eat together with us." Shen Yushu said this in a low voice.
"Is that so. I see." Wei Zhao nodded. "Thank you. But next time I'll still wait until the two of you have finished before I eat."
"Why?" Shen Yushu looked rather puzzled.
"Afraid I'd eat it all and leave the two of you short." Wei Zhao smiled and gestured at the empty boxes on the table.
"Ha!" Shen Yushu burst out laughing. "I'm going up. You get some rest early too." And with that she made a little gesture of farewell and went scampering up the stairs.
Wei Zhao watched Shen Yushu's figure disappear into the stairwell and shook his head. This girl gave him a feeling he could not quite see through: she looked sweet and adorable, but in truth she was very shrewd.