Can't Possibly Fall for My Wife Again After Rebirth, Right? - Chapter 71

When they arrived at school the next day, He Qiao saw that Fu Qiao had brought her a small cake.

It was a cupcake, about the size of a palm, topped with a small flower piped in red frosting. It looked a bit low-quality, but He Qiao didn’t mind at all. As long as it was a gift from Fu Qiao, she loved it.

“Thank you.” He Qiao accepted the cupcake and placed it carefully on her desk before pulling two sets of exam papers from her backpack, handing one to Fu Qiao.

“Are these the practice problems your parents got?” Fu Qiao clutched the paper, her eyes lighting up.

She skimmed through every question on the exam and realized the person who designed it was truly skilled. None of the problems were easy to solve, and the coverage of knowledge points was comprehensive—perfect for seniors like them.

He Qiao looked at Fu Qiao, her lips curling into a gentle smile. “I’m glad you like them. Shall we do these during the noon break today?”

“Sure!” Fu Qiao tucked the exercises away and said to He Qiao, “A cupcake isn’t much. Let me treat you to a good lunch today. We can’t leave campus, though, so you can pick whatever you want at the cafeteria.”

He Qiao’s eyes crinkled with a smile, and she nodded in agreement.

During the noon break, the two sat in their seats and began working on the exercises. Although they weren’t separated, they both consciously refrained from flipping through books or looking at the other’s paper. Fu Qiao, in particular, was handling these types of questions for the first time and looked intensely serious as she worked.

He Qiao, however, was acting very unusually today. Although she was also working on the problems, she kept wanting to tilt her head to sneak a look at Fu Qiao.

It wasn’t that she was looking at Fu Qiao’s answers, but rather at the girl herself. Fu Qiao’s eyelashes were so long, and her skin was smooth and fair—it almost seemed to glow. Her bangs were a bit longer than when they first met, but she looked… very beautiful.

He Qiao was startled by her own internal thoughts. She had never felt that anyone in her life was particularly “good-looking” before, but today, she genuinely felt from the bottom of her heart that Fu Qiao was stunning.

Beautiful enough to make her heart race; beautiful enough to make her nervous. She had never been this tense before; even looking at Fu Qiao for a few extra seconds made her breath hitch.

He Qiao quickly turned back to her own exam paper, her thick glasses concealing her expression. But she knew—she was no longer acting like herself…

Fu Qiao finished the paper before class started, only to find that He Qiao, for some unknown reason, hadn’t even finished the first page. This was completely unlike her usual study speed. Since He Qiao was the one who provided the exercises, Fu Qiao figured she would wait for her to finish so they could check the answers together.

He Qiao was quite frustrated with herself. She didn’t eat much at dinner and went straight back to continue the problems. During evening self-study, they finally began checking against the reference answers. They found that neither had made many mistakes; Fu Qiao had missed a few more than He Qiao, specifically the last two large questions. He Qiao got one right, but Fu Qiao didn’t get either of them.

Those questions accounted for a lot of points. Fu Qiao turned serious immediately, organizing her error log on the spot and spending the entire evening wrestling with those two problems.

When school let out, Fu Qiao was slightly delayed before leaving the classroom with He Qiao.

“Those questions today were way too difficult,” Fu Qiao told He Qiao with a headache. “If you hadn’t spent so long explaining it to me, I still wouldn’t have wrapped my head around it.”

He Qiao smiled. “It’s actually not that hard. You probably just haven’t taken similar courses. Don’t you go to a training center on weekends? Did the teachers there never show you this method?”

Fu Qiao couldn’t exactly say that her training center wasn’t the kind the other girl thought it was. She could only bite the bullet, shake her head, and say, “No.”

“Then your training center is no good; you should switch to a better one,” He Qiao said as they walked. “Why don’t you come to ours? It’s a bit expensive, but the teachers are great. If you listen to them, your grades will definitely improve further.”

“Um… we’ll see. My training center is also quite expensive.”

“Then you definitely need to switch. If it’s that expensive and they aren’t teaching you well, it’s a pure waste of money.”

Fu Qiao gave a dry laugh. When they reached the school gate, she spotted a familiar figure and froze.

He Qiao noticed her pause and asked, “What is it?”

“Why is she here?” Fu Qiao’s eyes widened slightly. “Something must have happened!”

With that, Fu Qiao ran over quickly. He Qiao followed her gaze and saw Xu Yingran standing at the gate.

The temperature had dropped today. Xu Yingran was wearing a dark down jacket over her blue-and-white school uniform, standing there with her backpack. He Qiao watched as Fu Qiao ran up to her, said something, and even proactively reached out to touch the other girl’s face.

[You could tell?]

[I do like her, but we aren’t dating.]

[Since you can tell I like Fu Qiao, surely you can also see that she’s been rejecting me, right?]

[We’ve been childhood friends for so many years. If she liked me, she would have been with me long ago. They say constant dripping wears away the stone, but I’ve only just started. I feel like I need to keep working hard.]

He Qiao suddenly recalled their conversation on the bus. Back then, Xu Yingran had admitted very naturally that the person she liked was Fu Qiao and that she was pursuing her—that they were childhood friends who had known each other since they were small.

Originally, He Qiao thought it was just Xu Yingran one-sidedly pestering her and that Fu Qiao had no interest at all. But looking at the two of them now, she realized she was wrong. Very wrong.

If Fu Qiao really had no feelings for Xu Yingran, why would she tolerate the other girl coming to find her time and time again? How could she show such a concerned expression, or even take the initiative to hold Xu Yingran’s hand?

He Qiao stood where she was, feeling her heart begin to flutter in a chaotic mess.

“Why did you run over here so late at night?” Fu Qiao held Xu Yingran’s ice-cold hand, frowning as she felt her equally cold cheek. She said angrily, “Did you skip evening self-study to come here? How long have you been waiting? Why didn’t you find somewhere warmer to stay?”

Xu Yingran lowered her head and said, “I was afraid you wouldn’t see me when you came out, and I didn’t want to disturb you.”

Fu Qiao frowned. She admitted to herself that her heart ached for her. Feeling how cold Xu Yingran’s hands were, she rubbed them for a long time before saying softly, “Let’s go to the convenience store next door. I’ll buy you something hot to eat so you don’t freeze.”

Holding Xu Yingran’s hand, Fu Qiao remembered she still had a desk-mate. She looked back to see He Qiao walking up slowly and said, “Sorry, Qiaoqiao, I can’t walk with you to the bus stop today. You head home first; I have something to talk to Xu Yingran about.”

He Qiao opened her mouth, wanting to say she could join them, but seeing the way Xu Yingran looked at her, she swallowed her words. She said softly, “Okay. I’ll head home then.”

“Mm.” Fu Qiao nodded to He Qiao and then pulled Xu Yingran into the convenience store.

The Oden was already sold out, so Fu Qiao bought a bowl of instant noodles and asked the clerk to help prepare it. She then sat Xu Yingran down with the steaming noodles and said, “Eat some. Look at you, your face is purple from the cold.”

“It really is freezing today.” Xu Yingran blew on the noodles, took a bite, and said, “It feels like it might snow in the next couple of days.”

“It’s December already; it’s about time for snow.”

“Yeah.”

Watching Xu Yingran eat half the noodles, Fu Qiao finally asked, “So what is it? Did something happen for you to come to school to find me so suddenly?”

Xu Yingran shook her head. “Jin didn’t come to school today.”

Yao Jin hadn’t returned after leaving yesterday afternoon. Xu Yingran had sent her messages, but there was no reply, and there had been no news all day today. Xu Yingran was worried.

In truth, she wasn’t sure what she was specifically worried about. She was starting to wonder if she had made a mistake by helping Xie Qing tell Yao Jin about her mother’s illness.

In her previous life, although she and Yao Jin were classmates, they weren’t nearly as close as they were now—at most, they were just acquaintances. She had never attended Yao Jin’s 18th birthday party, didn’t know the relationship between Yao Jin and her mother was that bad, and certainly didn’t know her mother was ill. These were things the 28-year-old Xu Yingran had never known.

So, once she told Yao Jin about the illness, she began to panic. Every decision she made now might cause catastrophic changes in the future. Just like when she thought about finding a “curvy beauty” to date, it resulted in Fu Qiao moving houses and transferring schools, making it so they had to cross half the city just to see each other. Now that she had made a decision she never made in her past life, what would be waiting for her?

Xu Yingran was afraid. She didn’t know if she had done the right thing, so after thinking about it all day, she decided to find Fu Qiao and hear her opinion. Of course, she couldn’t be too explicit, so she asked Fu Qiao cryptically if her decision was correct.

Fu Qiao listened and thought seriously for a moment. “Even if you hadn’t told Jin, someone else would have, right? That assistant by her mother’s side would eventually find a way to contact Uncle Yao and tell him everything.”

Xu Yingran thought about it and agreed that Xie Qing probably would have done exactly that.

“As for whether Uncle Yao would tell Jin, we don’t know. But I think Uncle Yao is such a good person; he wouldn’t let Jin’s mother stay in the hospital alone awaiting surgery.”

If Xu Yingran hadn’t helped Xie Qing, Xie Qing would have found a way to reach Yao Heng. Yao Jin might have stayed in the dark, perhaps never knowing for ten years that her mother had brushed with death, but Yao Heng would likely have known—after all, they were still legally husband and wife.

“So don’t overthink it,” Fu Qiao held Xu Yingran’s hand, smiling softly. “This is the first time I’ve seen you look so lost. If I didn’t know better, I’d think the person you liked was Jin.”

Upon hearing that, alarm bells rang in Xu Yingran’s head. She practically jumped out of her chair in a fright, hurriedly explaining to Fu Qiao, “My concern for Jin is just as a friend! You’re the only one I truly love!”

Perhaps because Xu Yingran’s voice was too loud, the convenience store clerk instinctively looked their way.

Fu Qiao was startled by her words and then flushed a deep red. She hurriedly pulled her back down and said, “Wh-wh-why are you being so loud! Sit down, sit down!”

Xu Yingran sat back down, saying to Fu Qiao with a pouting, aggrieved look, “My heart only has room for you. Fu Qiao, you have to believe me.”

Fu Qiao, blushing and embarrassed, replied, “I get it. Just… stop saying that all the time.”

Always saying it out loud—doesn’t she know how to be shy?