The Third Section Enters the Li Family

  Xuan Sheng walked up to Luo Er's side and said, "I'll send you home."

  The child raised his head, blinking with big eyes, and shed a few tears. Those uncontrollable tears: "You... send me... home? What for? Why? What's the reason?"

  "Anyway, we're both soaked now, and your feet are like that too, I'll send you back home!"

  After whispering a few words to Zhiquan, Chen Zhiquan first walked along the plank over the ditch and ran back, "Come on, I'll carry you!"

  "Are you behind me?"

  "Alright, come on..." Xuan Sheng half-knelt on the ground, "Hurry up..."

  A loud "slap" landed heavily on Xuan Sheng's face.

  "What's wrong with you? Do I have to get beaten up even if I carry you on my back? They say Xinjiang girls are hot-tempered, but not to the point of going crazy like you!" Xuan Sheng shouted with wide eyes.

  "If it weren't for you, I wouldn't have fallen into the water! If it weren't for you, I wouldn't have been rescued! If it weren't for you, how would my first kiss have disappeared? If it weren't for you, why would my back and body hurt so much? I don't even know who you are, nor do I know why I'm so unlucky when I meet you. Why does the good sunshine hide away when it sees you?" Luo'er seems to be out of control.

  Xuan Sheng looked at her tears and suddenly cooled down the hot blood in his brain. He wanted to help her wipe away her tears, but ultimately didn't lift his hand.

  He bent down and squatted on the ground, speaking in a soft and gentle voice, "Come on, I'll carry you on my back and send you home. Consider it an apology from me." After finishing his sentence, he couldn't help but feel a sudden darkness before his eyes. How could this be? How could he say those three words "I'm sorry"? Those three words, from childhood to adulthood, he had only said once in front of his mother's portrait, and never again to anyone else.

  At this time, Luo Er's mind seemed to flash with a ray of light, as if he had suddenly come to his senses. "I'll crush you, stinky rascal!" With a thud, he heavily fell onto Lu Xiang Sheng's back, watching him slowly and laboriously get up and walk forward. Suddenly, Luo Er felt that he was being a bit bad again!

  Like that, the two people didn't speak for a long time. Lu Xiangsheng continued to carry Li Luoye on his back as they walked forward. It wasn't until Luo'er buried her face in his back that she realized... the rain had already stopped!

  "Good grief, what was I just thinking?" Luo Er muttered to herself.

  "What did you say?" Xuan Sheng asked her.

  "I didn't say anything!"

  The sun is smiling again, as if it had just played a joke on them...

  "Hey, where's your home?" Xuan Sheng asked, looking at a pile of alleys in front of him.

  "Just go straight on this road and you'll be there soon."

  "Oh, is this it?" Lu Xiangsheng stared at a large blue wooden door and turned his neck to ask Li Lu'er.

  "Let me down."

  "What's wrong? Give me the key and I'll open it! Are you barefoot at home?"

  It wasn't until then that Luo'er suddenly remembered that his shoes were still hanging on the board.

  Xuan Sheng opened the door and entered the courtyard, gently putting Luo'er down. He let out a long sigh, his mouth curled up in a smile as he watched Luo'er change into slippers. Then he turned around and stood at the doorway.

  "Why don't you come in?" asked Lí Luòér.

  "Come in, come in quickly!" Xuan Sheng looked at Luo Er while glancing around the front and back doors. Perhaps afraid that Luo Er would close the door, he stepped inside with one foot.

  "What are you looking at? If you keep this up, I'm not afraid to shut the door and get rid of you!" La'er said with a smile.

  "Awesome! Awesome!" Xuan Sheng also chimed in with a smile, his eyes still fixed on the road ahead. "Hey, damn it, can't you hurry up? At this slow speed, we're doomed!"

  Lu Xuan Sheng then entered the large courtyard of Luo Er's house and said with a chuckle, "Hehe, I was just waiting for Chen Zhi Quan. His speed is truly slower than a woman with bound feet by three parts."

  "Haha... no way? How can you be so mean to your friend?"

  They were talking when Chen Zhiquan appeared.

  His appearance was a bit like that of a ghost entering the village. He first stretched half his head into the Li family's courtyard, and only when he confirmed that Lu Xiangsheng was also inside did he bring in his head along with his body.

  "Hey, aren't you a bit too slow? If I had to wait for you to buy me lunch, I'd have starved to death by now!" Xuan Sheng complained.

  "I guarantee that if I'm buying lunch, my speed is faster than light, otherwise the food will get cold and won't taste good, right? Monster?"

  "Depressed, how did you know I wanted to eat? I really regret bringing up the topic of food."

  The child lifted the door curtain of the hall and looked at them still poor, smiled and shook his head, "Hey, aren't you two coming in?"

  "Come in, come in."

  Xuan Sheng and Chen Zhi Quan entered the home of Luo Er one after another. Looking at the empty hall, Xuan Sheng couldn't help but exclaim in surprise, because he lived in Shanghai and had never seen such a poor and dilapidated home before, nor had he ever seen a home that still used a black-and-white TV, or a girl who would cry over a bag of laundry detergent...

  "Is it just you living at home?" Lu Xiangsheng asked, looking at a set of bowls and chopsticks on the table.

  "No, I still have my mom and little brother at home, haha, alone? Haven't thought about how to live if it's just one person?"

  "What about them?"

  "Our family condition is not very good, you've seen it, so my mom works in the city and can't come back at noon. My brother might not go to school anymore, so he went to his classmate's house to pick grapes early this morning." Luo Er said, her eyes involuntarily welling up with tears.

  As soon as he heard what Xiaoli said about the grapes, Chen Zhiquan immediately dropped a small bamboo basket he had just picked up from the window and stared at Xiaoli, asking, "Can you eat grapes with Xiaoli?"

  "Don't always eat! Is it okay?! How embarrassing!" Lu Xiangsheng's face was full of helplessness.

  The kid pouted, "Picking grapes is just cutting the grapes from the grapevine and putting them in a grape box, then others take them to sell, hehe ~ do you want to eat grapes?"

  "Yes, that thing is too expensive in Shanghai and doesn't even taste good. Your Xinjiang grapes must be organic, just thinking about it makes me drool."

  "Hehe, if you want to eat some, there are grapevines in the courtyard outside. You can pick and eat whichever bunch you like."

  "Really?" Zhi Quan leaned on the window and scanned the sky for half a day, "Haha ~ There are really grapes? I really went to eat them myself?"

  "Go ahead!" Luo Er looked at Zhi Quan's excited appearance and couldn't stop laughing, turning to ask Lu Xiang Sheng, "Has he really never seen a grapevine before?"

  "It's almost done, haha." Looking at Chen Zhiquan who was standing under the grape arbor eating with relish, Xuan Sheng seemed to have just remembered something, "Hey, Chen Zhiquan, where are the things I asked you to buy?"

  "Oh?" Zhi Quan glanced at Lu Xian Sheng, "Don't you have eyes yourself? Isn't it right under your feet?" He continued eating his grapes.

  Lu Xiansheng looked under the stool he was sitting on and pulled out a large plastic bag from behind the stool. He pushed it in front of Li Lu'er and said, "For you."

  The boy looked at the big pile of things with a bewildered expression, "What is this?"

  "Detergent." Xuan Sheng was a bit embarrassed to say it out loud, afraid that he might accidentally hurt this seemingly strong but actually fragile girl again.

  "Ah, are you guys sick or something? Why buy so much laundry detergent?" Luo Er looked at Lu Xiang Sheng with a puzzled expression, and poured the freshly brewed tea onto the table.

  Lu Xiansheng was confused by Lu Er's words, "Just now when I saw you on the water channel for washing powder... that tense look, Zhi Quan and I both felt uncomfortable, so we simply bought some, anyway this thing is not easy to expire, use it if you need it, don't be embarrassed."

  "Oh..." Luo Er looked at the detergent and then glanced at Lu Xiangsheng, secretly sneering in her heart, "Rich people are just rich people, they're generous with their spending, whatever they buy is always so extravagant, it's like they're two lunatics!"

  "Should I help you bandage your wound? It's too hot here and it might get inflamed. Girls shouldn't have scars, they're not pretty."

  Luo'er smiled and shook her head, suddenly discovering that this boy in front of her also had a similar gentle warmth to Shen Kai.

  Chen Zhiquan carefully ran in with several large bunches of grapes and said, "Hey, Lu Xiansheng, help me hold them down, can't you see they're about to fall?"

  Xuan Sheng took over the grapes and put them on the table, looking at Chen Zhiquan's greedy eyes, complaining helplessly, "I can't finish eating them myself, why take so many from others? What a waste you are!"

  "If I don't finish eating, can I just take it away?"

  Li Luoer and Xuan Sheng both smiled helplessly at his words.

  Luo'er took two towels from the towel rack and handed them to Xuan Sheng and Zhi Quan. "Wipe your bodies, you two are still wet."

  Xuan Sheng took over the towel and wrapped it around his head, fiddling with his hair, while Zhi Quan actually started wiping grapes...

  "You don't seem to have introduced yourself?" Zhi Quan said, looking at Luo Er who was cleaning the wound on her own foot.

  "Oh, haha, forgot. Sorry~ Then I'll go first, my name is Lí Luòér, Lí from dawn, Luò from fallen leaves, a high school student in Xīngyì Middle School, almost 17 years old. I also have a younger brother named Lí Chāo. Is that enough? What about you two?"

  Lu Xiansheng changed his usual cold attitude and took over the conversation, "My name is Lu Xiansheng, unemployed vagabond, already 18 years old, now preparing to take the entrance exam for Xingyi High School, also a senior. Hehe, maybe I'll be in the same class as you."

  "What? You want to test Xingyi? No way... Lu Xiansheng, this is not a joke..." Chen Zhiquan was extremely tense after hearing Xiansheng's words, his eyes seemed to be able to kill people with a single glance.

  Xuan Sheng looked at Chen Zhi Quan's eyes and became even more terrified, then only said one sentence, "Do I look like I'm joking?"

  Chen Zhiquan smiled wryly for a moment, "My relationship with Xuan Sheng is unbreakable, so... if he's going to audition for the performing arts school, I'll definitely go too! We're inseparable, fortunately this society is harmonious, otherwise people would think we're gay, but we're almost like that anyway. The two of us grew up together since childhood, and are actually cousins."