Chapter Ninety-Seven: A Hint of Sweetness in Happiness

Cheng Xiaoyu had not exerted himself this hard in a long time. It felt as though his lungs were on fire, every breath dry and scorching, as if it had passed through flames.

The game had now reached its fiercest moment. The score was 9 to 9, and possession was with Huang Liang. He Tao still shadowed Su Yuxi, sticking to her like a shadow.

Of the last three baskets, Wang Ou had made two, and Su Yuxi had made one with a shot from beyond the three-point line. Her score once again drew thunderous cheers from the stands.

She was adored not only by boys, but by many girls as well. Her beauty was one that conquered all without regard to gender. Especially when Su Yuxi rose for a jump shot, she seemed like a fairy gliding over rippling water. The ponytail that lifted and flew in the air, the breathtaking line of her body suspended in motion, all of it felt like the most exquisite rhythm in the world.

When we praise a woman’s beauty, we often say she is beautiful like a celestial maiden, yet no one really knows what a celestial maiden ought to look like.

But when everyone saw a girl like Su Yuxi, they could not help but think: so this was what a celestial maiden should look like.

This game had also begun to wear on Su Yuxi. It was her first time playing against boys, and the demand on her stamina was even greater. Fortunately, she exercised diligently every day, so she could still barely keep up. On the final play, she and Cheng Xiaoyu guarded the two sides of the key, while Wang Ou covered Du Hai in the middle.

Huang Liang leaned against Cheng Xiaoyu, driving his elbow into his chest as he reached out for the ball. He could not afford to lose. Three boys against two boys and a girl, and the other side even had a weakling like Cheng Xiaoyu, yet the game had become this difficult. Huang Liang had not expected that at all.

Du Hai knew Wang Ou’s jumping ability was formidable and did not dare take a jump shot. He also lacked confidence in a layup and did not want to shoulder the blame, so he passed the crucial ball to Huang Liang.

Huang Liang received it and seemed to turn for a shot, but Cheng Xiaoyu still had good positioning. Du Hai ran over, trying to set him a screen, and Huang Liang saw that Du Hai’s movement had drawn Cheng Xiaoyu’s attention. He feigned a pass, then quickly created space from Cheng Xiaoyu, turned, and released a fadeaway.

Cheng Xiaoyu reacted at once, but he had no strength left to jump high enough to reach the ball.

The instant Huang Liang released it, he thought the shot was good. But he failed to notice Wang Ou, who had followed Du Hai over, leaping high and pressing against Cheng Xiaoyu, trying to swat the ball away. She only brushed it, but that was enough to alter its trajectory.

Just as the ball was about to sail out of bounds, Su Yuxi shot out like a spirit fox. In one sideways leap she cleared the baseline, caught the ball in midair, and tipped it back to Cheng Xiaoyu before crashing to the floor.

Cheng Xiaoyu caught the ball and dribbled out of the key. Looking up and seeing that Su Yuxi was still seated on the floor and had not gotten up, he lost all interest in the game. He simply hurled the ball wildly toward the basket.

He did not even look to see whether it went in or not. Instead, he hurried over to Su Yuxi. She was sitting on the floor, breathing softly, massaging her right ankle. When she landed, her right foot touched down first, and she had accidentally twisted her ankle.

Seeing the crease in Su Yuxi’s brow and the cold sweat on her pale face, Cheng Xiaoyu’s heart ached unbearably. He crouched at once and, without the slightest hesitation, gently pressed the slightly swollen ankle. Su Yuxi hesitated, but did not stop him. In nearly seventeen years, aside from her father, this was the first time a boy had touched her body. Even in kindergarten, she had never held hands with another boy.

Cheng Xiaoyu did not know how innocent Su Yuxi truly was. When his fingers touched her skin and he felt her tremble, he assumed only that the pain must be severe.

He did not think any further. Shifting his position slightly, he slid one hand beneath her knees and wrapped the other around her back and waist. With a firm lift, he picked her up.

Su Yuxi had not yet reacted, much less refused, before Cheng Xiaoyu had already carried her in his arms. A flush rose at once in her pale face. Though he was her brother, this was still the first time she had ever been held so intimately by a man.

Cheng Xiaoyu did not care whether the shot had gone in. Carrying the exquisitely lovely Su Yuxi, he felt not the slightest trace of impure thought. Meanwhile, the students of Fudan Affiliated High School who had been watching the game saw this heart-stopping scene and felt as though they had been struck by lightning, their worlds collapsing around them.

For the first time, Su Yuxi felt a trace of embarrassment. She gently closed her eyes, her long lashes lowering over them. Sweat beaded on her face, making her already fair skin seem even more translucent, almost as though it might break at a touch.

Cheng Xiaoyu caught a faint, musky fragrance rising from Su Yuxi’s pores, subtle and intoxicatingly pleasant. He very much wanted to draw a deep breath of such sweetness from the air, but felt too shy to do so.

Su Yuxi in his arms was astonishingly light. Though she was five feet seven, she weighed barely a hundred pounds. Her frame was slender, yet her figure was just full enough in all the right places, unlike some girls who seemed made entirely of bone. Her body was the very image of flawlessness: narrow where it should be narrow, rounded where it should be rounded, full where it should be full.

What made all girls envious was her narrow waist, held with one hand, with not a trace of excess flesh, and even a faint, barely visible line of abdominal definition. To all men, it was nothing short of a fatal temptation.

Of course, at this moment, Cheng Xiaoyu only wanted to get Su Yuxi to the school clinic as quickly as possible, so her pain could be eased sooner.

When they came out of the gymnasium, Su Yuxi opened her eyes and said softly, "Brother, put me down."

Cheng Xiaoyu shook his head with a serious expression. "No. We’re almost at the clinic. The less you move, the better."

After a moment of silence, Su Yuxi asked, "Did we win?"

Cheng Xiaoyu smiled. "I don’t know. I just tossed the last ball up carelessly. I’m guessing we probably lost."

Held in Cheng Xiaoyu’s arms, Su Yuxi felt, for the first time, that having a brother could be such a sweet and cherished happiness. Especially this brother, who aside from liking to write flowery, empty poetry, seemed otherwise so perfectly in tune with her. This eased, to a great extent, the loneliness she had always felt, the loneliness she believed no one could ever understand.

Though she and Xu Qining were very close and shared a deep bond, being sisters and being confidantes were two different things. If not for the fact that they had known each other since childhood, she felt Xu Qining would never have been able to enter her world.

But Cheng Xiaoyu was different. The more she understood him, the more mysterious he seemed. Every time she thought she had reached his limits, he would effortlessly reveal another side of himself.

She had always believed she could see through anyone, yet she could never truly see through this brother of hers, while he, somehow, seemed able to see through her.

Su Yuxi herself did not know when exactly she had quietly lowered her guard and come to accept him as her brother. At first, when she had seen this homebound older brother, she had not felt he was really her brother at all; he had merely seemed like an irrelevant person who had suddenly appeared beside her. But now, she found herself grateful to this strange world for having given her such a miraculous gift.

Cheng Xiaoyu, of course, had no idea of the change in Su Yuxi’s heart, nor did he realize that he had finally won the seat of "brother." For him, the fact that Su Yuxi had helped him play in this game was already worth celebrating.

He carried Su Yuxi to the clinic and, under the school doctor’s instructions, laid her on the examination bed.

The school doctor was a plump woman in her thirties wearing black-rimmed glasses. With gloved hands, she pressed a few times on Su Yuxi’s swollen ankle and asked whether it hurt.

Su Yuxi shook her head. "It hurt a little at first. It’s much better now."

The doctor took out some medicated oil, applied it to Su Yuxi, and rubbed it in for a while. Then she told Su Yuxi to stand up and walk a few steps, and asked again, "Does it hurt? Can you walk?"

Su Yuxi nodded. "It still hurts a little when I walk."

The doctor told her to lie back down. "You’ve probably only suffered a mild ankle sprain. I’ll put ice on it for you. Take it easy these next few days and don’t exercise. If you can, go for some physical therapy. You should recover pretty quickly."

Su Yuxi nodded. Cheng Xiaoyu, a little worried, asked the school doctor, "Should we go to the hospital for an x-ray?"

With a blank expression, the school doctor said, "If you’re not reassured, then an x-ray would be fine."

Hearing that, Cheng Xiaoyu wanted to take Su Yuxi to the hospital, but Su Yuxi did not want to go and said it was not that serious.

The school doctor looked at Cheng Xiaoyu, then at Su Yuxi, curious about what kind of relationship these two had. Su Yuxi was too famous for her not to know who she was, while Cheng Xiaoyu was someone she was seeing for the first time. But gossip clearly did not suit the duties of a teacher, so she could only suppress the raging flames of curiosity in her heart and watch the two of them argue.

One insisted on going to the hospital; the other found it troublesome and refused.

The school doctor finally could not bear it anymore and said to Cheng Xiaoyu, "Student, this is only a very slight sprain. There’s no need for you to be this nervous, is there? Please trust my professional judgment."

Only then did Cheng Xiaoyu give in, his face reddening. There was still one class left, so he took leave and planned to send Su Yuxi home to rest. Seeing his grim, battle-ready expression, Su Yuxi could not help smiling.

She thought of how badly he had been beaten at the police station, and how a large patch of skin had been scraped from his wrist, yet he had acted as though nothing had happened. Meanwhile, she had only twisted her ankle slightly, and he was this worried. The thought moved her.

Cheng Xiaoyu carried Su Yuxi on his back to Fudan University, where he had parked his car. Su Yuxi could not help asking, "Brother, I used to treat you badly. What did you think?"

Cheng Xiaoyu clearly had not expected her to ask such a question. He paused for a moment, then smiled and said, "Even if you’re covered in defenses like a hedgehog, I’d still reach out and embrace you without fear. Don’t ask me why. I can feel it—the wind blowing from your side is warm."

Su Yuxi rested her head on Cheng Xiaoyu’s shoulder and said nothing.

The afternoon sun stretched their overlapping shadows long behind them. From the teaching buildings, the clear sound of reading still drifted through the air, and that boundless brightness seemed just like Su Yuxi’s mood.

After a while, Su Yuxi softly called out again in a lovely, lilting voice, "Brother!"

Cheng Xiaoyu smiled. "What is it?"

Su Yuxi gave him a sweet smile. "Nothing. I just never called you that before, so now I’ll make up for it by calling you a few more times."

Cheng Xiaoyu did not answer. He simply let the spring breeze lift his soul, as though it too had begun to drift.