My Clingy Fiancée Is Forcing Me to Marry Her Again - Chapter 31.2

Knowing her cousin was down, Li Fangge was very restrained, but the thought of Guan Xiaoyu’s return made her unable to suppress the joy in her heart. This joy easily surpassed the satisfying happiness she used to feel after writing a good song.

This made her seem like the opposite of Bai Shao: one like a blossoming spring tree, the other like a wilting flower.

Even with a wig and exaggerated makeup, Li Fangge’s tall figure stood out, making them the natural focus wherever they went.

“Who?” Bai Shao looked over suddenly.

Li Fangge felt her cousin was asking knowingly, or perhaps she didn’t want to hear any news about Guan Xiaoyan right now. So she avoided her cousin’s still-sorrowful gaze. “Guan Xiaoyu and Guan Xiaorong.”

“I’m telling you, are you serious?”

“I’ve been bored lately, and I don’t have money to go out and play, so—I suddenly felt like having a relationship.”

Although not entirely true, saying it out loud gave Li Fangge a flighty, happy feeling that she was about to fall in love.

From her perspective, treating Guan Xiaoyu like that fortune-teller fan in Hong Kong who impulsively ran up to her and naturally called her ‘Sister Li’ was permissible; the two could fully integrate.

She had intermittently thought about her over the past six months, and then, in another timeline, she reappeared as her fiancée.

She went from shock and confusion to fear and unease, then from fear and unease to a strange anticipation, and from strange anticipation to—a slight fantasy that, besides surviving, she might be able to have a romance with the delicate flower.

Li Fangge now realized how easy it was for a person in a low moment to be swayed by someone who was deeply in love with them. Moreover, Guan Xiaoyu was so playful, lovely, passionate, warm, and deeply devoted.

Several times she genuinely wanted to ask Guan Xiaoyu if she was also a transmigrator, but she ultimately held back. If she were, she wouldn’t be so wholeheartedly devoted and untesting towards her; if she wasn’t, Li Fangge didn’t know how to explain any of this.

Guan Xiaoyu wasn’t the only person who looked exactly the same as someone from her last world, which allowed her to somewhat rationalize things—

“No money! You don’t have money, yet you bought a dress worth over thirty thousand? I didn’t even know you were interested in dresses?”

“It’s been raining continuously lately; it’s depressing. I wanted a change of mood.” Li Fangge offered another excuse.

Although none of them were very convincing, she didn’t mind.

“That’s true, it’s hard to feel motivated looking at the gloomy sky.”

“Sis, does the heartache never lessen, no matter how many times you break up?”

“I thought this breakup would bring liberation. Now I realize that whether she and I are together or apart, it’s this painful. Meeting Guan Xiaoyan was really the worst luck.”

“You mean—”

Li Fangge lowered the fashion bag in her hand. “You mean, she’s the only one for you?”

She didn’t really understand the emotion of deep devotion. For the past decade or more, she had been focused entirely on her career. Besides, her fans wouldn’t want to see her dating, especially not women, so she had always neglected her own feelings—but in Guan Xiaoyu and her cousin, she saw the magic of love. There really are people in this world who can make you utterly captivated.

In the midst of Guan Xiaoyu’s devotion and Bai Shao’s relationship, were they truly gaining more happiness?

From an outsider’s perspective, Li Fangge felt that the pain in their emotional lives clearly far outweighed the happiness.

They weren’t unaware, yet they knew but still couldn’t stop, or rather, weren’t willing to stop—

Is it possible that as long as there is even a small, insignificant amount of joy in the loving, people can lose themselves and sink into it, like moths to a flame?!

“I don’t know. I don’t know what’s wrong with me. Maybe I’m crazy.”

“Sis, why don’t you go relax in the South after the weather clears up?”

“Will you come with me?”

“Wouldn’t you get tired of seeing me every day?”

“Right. You have a romance to pursue. Go be busy. You’ve started wearing dresses, so it looks like you’re really falling for her.”

Li Fangge couldn’t explain to her that she had always liked dresses.

The rain kept falling. They waited in the boutique for a long time, but the rain didn’t lighten up.

Bai Shao sighed softly. She seemed to be trying her best to restrain herself, but unhappiness still poured out. “Heguo, did you know? Ten years. Guan Xiaoyan and I have never once gone shopping together so freely, or casually watched a movie. Before, I kept fooling myself, thinking that one day we could walk the streets openly, in the crowd, in the night breeze, like any ordinary couple—free and easy, doing whatever we wanted.”

“Now I understand. From beginning to end, all of that was just my naive fantasy, my naive wishful thinking—”

Li Fangge felt a pang in her heart.

Looking at her listless cousin, she felt a sense of empathy.

Weren’t Guan Xiaoyu and her facing the same future?

Her motive for approaching her now wasn’t entirely pure. Although they had the official, undeniable CP status, the will of the original novel was there, and the dangerous character Zheng Lier had arrived as scheduled.

If they took one wrong step, Guan Xiaoyu and she might be utterly doomed.

“Sis, you’re not naive—”

Li Fangge paused, looking at her cousin’s vacant eyes. “You simply can’t help but like her.”

She had held back this sentence for a long time. Bai Shao also knew about her feelings for Guan Xiaoyan, but the difference between saying it and not saying it was in understanding and not understanding.

Before, Bai Shao said she wouldn’t understand her heartache over the breakup. In fact, she just didn’t want to point it out.

Just like when she asked her cousin, “What’s so great about me? That Guan Xiaoyu likes me so much,” Bai Shao replied, “I can’t think of any reason other than love.”

The reasons why people are distressed because of another person are not complicated. They revolve around love and hate, dislike and apology, being together or not being able to…

The distress of not getting what you want, or the dissatisfaction or boredom once you get it.

Pointing all this out, it felt so powerless and tragic—

“So what? Anyway, continuing won’t lead to a result.”

“Sis, does a relationship have to have a result? Isn’t it enough to be happy when you’re together?”

Li Fangge knew she was being overly simplistic. Whether in emotion or material things, the greed to get more of what one likes is the most common darkness in human nature. Everyone has some degree of insatiable desire and simply cannot stop. Especially in their twenties, an age dedicated to active exploration and wanting to try everything, nearly everyone only wants more.

“Are you saying you don’t care if you and Guan Xiaoyu will have a result?”

“…I haven’t thought that far ahead.” Li Fangge felt uneasy.

More than whether she and Guan Xiaoyu would have a result, she needed to worry about how long she could live in this world.

She was trying to date her primarily for survival.

Although, although she couldn’t deny being attracted by the delicate flower’s loveliness, confidence, persistence, and passion, she couldn’t prioritize her emotions like they did.

“Really?”

The rain was heavy outside. They talked softly.

The shop assistant came over to pour them herbal tea and invited them to sit and rest.

Li Fangge thanked her. She placed the paper bag on the black leather sofa and sat down first.

Bai Shao followed suit, slumping powerless onto the wooden table, staring blankly at the tabletop. “I really don’t know what’s wrong with me.”

“Sis, you said you were tired.”

“Yeah, a love that doesn’t get the nourishment and blessing of sunlight is even more exhausting.”

“You talk as if you did something wrong to someone else.”

“Not wrong to someone else, I just did wrong to myself.”

Bai Shao’s voice was muffled as she spoke lying on the table. She looked so wronged.

“Sis, is self-pity really good?”

“Heguo, I hope you and Guan Xiaoyu can achieve what Guan Xiaoyan and I couldn’t.”

“What?”

“What I just said: walk the streets holding hands openly, in the crowd, in the night breeze, like any ordinary couple; shop freely together, casually go to the movies, share a bucket of popcorn, secretly feed each other a kernel now and then, drink cheap soda with one straw—when you’re unhappy, when words clash, have a big fight. If you can’t win the argument, cup her face and kiss her hard. If that still doesn’t work, kiss her twice, until you can make up, without caring about the stares of passersby…”

“Sis, did you drink before leaving the house?”

“Screw you, I won’t be that stupid now. Getting drunk is too uncomfortable.”

“I think you two can do it. Try a little harder.”

“The scariest thing about love is trying hard. Heguo, this is a bloody lesson; you absolutely must not repeat my mistakes.”

“Really?”

“Yes, you must let things take their natural course.”

“I don’t agree with you. Some obstacles require two people to face together. Difficulties never disappear automatically. If you avoid them, even if your hearts are aligned, your story will be swallowed up by difficulties much more easily. But if you confront the challenges, they might become a whetstone. You’ll become sharper as a result, and then dissolve the difficulties, making the impossible possible—”

“Where did you get that inspirational speech?” Bai Shao smiled bitterly, a little bit of life returning to her face.

“From Guan Xiaoyu, I guess. She has a unique infectious quality that lets people see, hope?”

“Is that so?”

Li Fangge didn’t confirm or deny.

She picked up the teacup and took a sip of the fragrant herbal tea.

It contained orange blossom, and the familiar scent instantly reminded her of Guan Xiaoyu…

Li Fangge, under the shade of the camphor tree, raised her wrist to check the time. Guan Xiaoyu should be arriving soon.

She hadn’t quite understood before why Guan Xiaoyu said she didn’t dislike waiting, especially waiting for her.

Now Li Fangge understood. Waiting for the person you like brings a pleasant feeling that something good is about to happen, and a joy similar to a wish being fulfilled. It contains excitement, impulse, nervousness, tension, and expectations, and a stream of beautiful fantasies that can’t be stopped.

In the time spent waiting for the person you like to arrive, your heart will bloom into a spring, capable of growing a garden, with thousands of butterflies fluttering their soft wings everywhere, and a warm spring breeze rushing to greet you…

And all of this is nothing compared to the moment when the other person’s smiling face appears in your mind.

You are intimately familiar with her expressions and voice. There is a person in this world who, even if they do nothing, just thinking of them will bring you enough happiness. As long as you stand somewhere waiting for her to rush toward you, it seems like you can have an extraordinarily grand and brilliant future…

Li Fangge was now also a little impatient to see Guan Xiaoyu.

Impatiently, she wanted to hear her loudly and passionately call out to her, “Sister Li!”

Li Fangge found Guan Xiaoyu calling her “Sister Li” to be so beautiful and uplifting.

In the past, many, many people liked her, more than she could count, but no one had ever called out to her with such warmth and fullness, rushing towards her without hesitation, like Guan Xiaoyu.