Chapter 4 The Ugly Duckling Turns Into a Swan_7

Li Li buried her head in the blanket and silently wept. She thought if her life ended at that moment, then this pretty boy named Pei Shangxuan would be the only warmth in her life.

Years later on her birthday, Li Li received luscious roses, precious gifts, and chocolate mousse cakes, but what she couldn't forget was the water chestnut cake she had at The Bund when she was fourteen. She couldn't recall the taste of the cake, but she never forgot the incredibly happy feeling she had at the time.

Accompanying a client from her company, she perused the night view of The Bund—Oriental Pearl and Jinmao Tower, as iconic buildings of Shanghai, adorned the Huangpu River, shining brightly. She mentioned with a smile about a year when a boy celebrated her birthday in front of the flood prevention wall.

"I think the cake was more delicious than anything else."

"You must love him very much," the golden-haired beauty from Germany said with a gentle smile, her tone full of certainty.

She paused, reminiscing about the warmth she had felt from him on her fourteenth birthday, and responded, "Yeah."

It was the first time Pei Shangxuan celebrated a girl's birthday, and the girl was Li Li. He often joked that he had given his "first time" to her, and Li Li had to be responsible for him.

She brushed it off with a laugh. Over the next fifteen years, Pei Shangxuan celebrated the birthdays of several girls, having long forgotten the first time he shivered in the biting wind offering his blessings.

He said, "Li Li, I want you to be happy for life, to be a brave girl," the last sentence borrowed from Little Tiger Team's lyrics. He imperiously didn't use the word "hope," but instead commanded it.

Li Li told herself to be a brave girl, but only as an adult did she realize—a woman of strength and courage does not inspire love and pity from a man. Pei Shangxuan misled her with a sentence; at twenty-nine, he didn't remember the girl of fourteen he once despised, who screamed at the sight of cockroaches and was all tears. What he really relished was the feeling of holding a soft, gentle, and sweet girl in his arms.

He slowly grew up, losing the fa?ade of boyhood. Her infatuation began on her fourteenth birthday and waited fifteen years in the hope that he would turn back to pick up the long trail of unrequited love scattered along the way.

Once the scabs had formed where Li Li's face was scratched, she finally met her future stepfather, Liu Zhixian, and his son—two years her senior, Liu Qianren.

Liu Qianren was a good-looking boy with a touch of effeminacy, tall and lean. Standing in front of Li Li, he made her feel utterly insignificant.

As they stood face to face and exchanged greetings, Li Li stole glances at him, marveling at how the heavens could be so biased—it was such a waste for a boy to be this handsome!

Liu Zhixian, a teacher, was a gentle and refined man whose smile gave people a mysterious sense of comfort. Aside from a little uncle, it was Li Li's first time interacting with an adult male, and his generous elder disposition unwittingly melted away her resistance. She even secretly thought that, from any angle, Li Meiqing did not deserve this dashing man.

Liu Qianren in his first year of high school was the complete opposite of his father—his gaze seemed dark and brooding, his attitude proud and recalcitrant. The entire evening, the words he uttered didn't add up to more than five sentences. At the dinner table, with Li Li sitting opposite Liu Qianren, she felt occasional chills creeping up from her feet, winding around her body like a snake.

Pei Shangxuan had taken her to the market to watch snake-handling, which she had thought would be as entertaining as watching monkey fights, so she had followed enthusiastically. What she saw, however, was the slick snakes crawling over people's bodies, coiling around their necks.

Li Li immediately vomited, and while Pei Shangxuan wiped her mouth with a handkerchief, he mockingly teased her for being faint-hearted.

Liu Qianren gave one the feeling of being a snake with its fangs bared, never knowing when it might spring up to bite you. She felt somewhat uneasy, avoiding making eye contact with him as much as possible and kept her head down, eating her food voraciously.

The boy's sinister gaze rested on the top of her head, and the muscles at the corner of his mouth twitched, his expression strange.

At the moment of parting, Liu Qianren stopped in front of Li Li; he lowered his head and said, "In the future, I'll get along with you well—sister." The parents on both sides were very pleased with his friendly demeanor, but only Li Li saw the malicious smile that filled his face.

She was stunned and had no response. On the way home, Li Meiqing scolded her for her lack of manners. After all, she should have said something in reply to Liu Qianren. Li Li listened in silence with her head down, his smile replaying in her mind like a slow-motion scene—she was afraid of this young man and wanted no further entanglements with him, but with Li Meiqing and Liu Zhixian getting married, her opposition would be futile.

The next day on her way to school, Pei Shangxuan was waiting for her at the entrance of the alleyway and asked her if Li Meiqing's fiancé was easy to get along with. Li Li suddenly felt at ease, as her entangling nightmares seemed far removed from her life. No matter what bad things happened, at least Pei Shangxuan cared about her.

"Uncle Liu seems like a very amiable person." Her right hand was in Pei Shangxuan's coat pocket, his warm hand tightly holding hers—round and plump Li Li looked healthy but actually had poor circulation, with hands that would turn icy in the winter. Pei Shangxuan had discovered this by chance and volunteered to be a human furnace to keep her warm.

Pei Shangxuan's face showed relief, and the knot in his brow finally unwound. Li Li swallowed her real opinion of Liu Qianren and easily laughed it off.

"You really care about me, don't you?" she asked, looking up at him playfully with a proud expression.

Pei Shangxuan turned to face her, raising his right hand to rumple Li Li's hair, "Silly girl, we're good friends. If I don't look after you, who will?"

The young man had inadvertently spoken the truth. Li Li seemed to get along with everyone in the class, but she hardly had any friends in the true sense of the word. It wasn't until much later that Pei Shangxuan realized Li Li was actually a conflicted person, craving genuine affection yet instinctively resisting trust due to a deep-seated insecurity. But in their youth, he just thought she was picky, even choosing her friends with great selectivity—unlike him, who generously considered everyone a brother, as long as there was a connection, they could be friends.

She criticized him for having too many friends, and he indignantly accused her of being arrogant, with neither able to persuade the other.

Year after year, as the autumn winds began, Li Li got to know Pei Shangxuan's new friends—at his birthday parties each year, there would always be new faces, both male and female. She teased him for his wide range of acquaintances, but after the long wash of time, few relationships remained.

Pei Shangxuan was about to retort, but he was taken aback to realize—over all these years, only Li Li had always been by his side.

As 1990 gave way to 1991, on December 31st after school, Pei Shangxuan tugged at Li Li's long ponytail and beamed as he wished her a happy new year, hoping she would transform from an ugly duckling into a swan next year.

Li Li, irritated, clenched her fists and chased after Pei Shangxuan, who laughed heartily as he ran away quickly. His height had shot up significantly over the past six months, giving him the advantage of being tall and leggy. Li Li chased him for quite a while, but the distance between them did not shrink; it only grew.

"Pei Shangxuan, I hate you the most!" Li Li stopped, out of breath, and yelled at his retreating figure. Pei Shangxuan seemed to turn his head, but the nearsighted Li Li, without her glasses, could not see his reaction clearly. She turned around and walked towards her own home.

(End of chapter)

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