Little Moonlight
Translator: Shiny, Editor: Aru
Her skin was very white and delicate. Underneath the lights cast by the fluorescent light, it made people suddenly think of the terms ‘flesh of ice and bones of jade’(1) and ‘a breeze could break it’(2)……
Pampered and spoiled since childhood, it was no wonder that she had the bearing of the rich and noble.
Ruan Yue had a slight dust allergy. She’d always take a shower first thing after finishing up cram school in the evening. After her shower, she would sit on the sofa and apply the medicine. At first, he had assumed that she was applying lotion, so he hadn’t given it much thought. Later, he had felt that the scent did not smell quite right, and only then had he realized that she was applying medicine.
He was quite puzzled……
Why become a teacher if you were allergic to dust?
Later, she had said, “I really can’t change my job. It won’t help me support you.”
What was his reaction at the time?
“You? Forget about it…..”
And to this day, these four words were enough to make him feel uncomfortable.
Lu Chen withdrew his gaze.
Behind him, with a soft “whoosh” sound, Ding ChuChu jumped down from the stool. She lowered her gaze and saw that a thin layer of chalk dust had settled on the shoulder of his black shirt.
She hesitated for a long time before softly calling out, “Lu Chen.”
This sound attracted the attention of several boys.
Lu Chen was bathed in the sunlight, with his hands propping his body against the table. His line of sight fell on the girl’s crimson face, and he was not sure whether to laugh or not. “Huh?”
He had fierce and deep eyebrows, but his eyelashes were very long, thick and dense, casting a small shadow underneath his eyelids, a little unruly-
He was effortlessly sexy.
Ding ChuChu clenched the duster, and her voice was like the sound of a mosquito. “Sorry, I forgot to ask you to move. Your clothes…..”
She extended her slim finger and pointed at his shoulder.
Lu Chen lowered his head and looked down, but before he could say anything, Li Shiyu said in a dissatisfied manner, “Hey, class flower, my clothes are also full of chalk dust. Why didn’t you apologize to me, huh? What’s the idea? Do you treat different people in different ways?”
“Pfft-”
Hearing this, the boys burst into laughter.
Lu Chen was also amused by his teasing. He kicked him and said, “That’s enough! This drama is too much.”
Just as he said this, Ruan Yue came over.
Li Shiyu was unaware of this and meaningfully jostled him. “It’s not like I want to say anything about you Brother Chen, but it’s just obvious you’re defending someone. I: your brother, cannot bear to watch!”
As soon as this was said, there was another burst of laughter in the back row. Dong Guofeng, who was sitting by the platform and preparing for lessons, heard it and glared at them in warning.
Ding ChuChu’s face flushed red and she went over to wipe clean the other side of the blackboard.
Lu Chen softly brushed his fingertips against his forehead and glanced at Ruan Yue composedly.
The latter didn’t seem to have seen or heard anything and looked at Li Shiyu and said, “May I trouble you to move? I need to go.”
Li Shiyu spoke to Ding ChuChu wilfully, but when it came to her, he was very polite. He quickly pushed the table forward and smiled at her.
“Thank you.”
Ruan Yue passed by him.
She stood on the stool and was just about to do a rough sketch of the writing when she felt something suddenly brush against her leg.
For a moment, her train of thought was pulled back to the rental house in Yongning Lane. Some beautiful memories surged forth in her mind, and her hand holding onto the chalk paused in midair.
Lu Chen was her first boyfriend.
All of her first times were with him……
But she had never felt that his first time was with her.
Although she wasn’t as experienced as others, she vaguely felt that he was a veteran when it came to matters pertaining to love. He was merely in his twenties, and his ability to stir people up was quite seasoned.
She did think of breaking up with him when she was alone and clear-headed.
She knew that she did not love him.
But she kept compromising again and again……
She had been in a cold war with her mother and hated her father for a long time. She also had no special, close friends. The feeling of loneliness had already consumed her numerous times.
She was greedy for his broad, warm embrace and his passionate and unyielding kisses. When she was with him, she felt that she was still a person that was needed rather than a walking corpse from the inside to the outside……
He had numerous bad habits that she had become fed up with.
But she couldn’t bring herself to leave him.
It has passed, Ruan Yue.
It has passed.
You can start over now……
Without looking back, she faced the blackboard and wrote the first word on it.
But Lu Chen had noticed her momentary pause and rigidity.
Unexpectedly, she chose to be silent and ignore it.
He held a pen in one hand, and gently brushed it on the tabletop. In his chest, there was a somewhat inexplicable feeling, like a cat was scratching his heart.
A bit desolate……
He was no fool. How could he be unaware that Ruan Yue did not love him.
She had suffered and received grievance elsewhere , and chose him because of her excessive sorrow that day.
Two people living together for more than a year. He knew that she was at odds with her family and knew the address of her workplace, but he knew not much else about her.
Ruan Yue did not tell him, and he did not ask her.
Only on those dark nights, would he change his techniques, trying to please her.
He wanted her to remember him.
No matter when and where she left to, and regardless of whomever she was with, she could never forget that Lu Chen was her first man.
But in the end, this Ruan Yue was not his Ruan Yue…..
Lu Chen suddenly felt dull.
It was hard to even imagine, but he was here now. What was happening over there? Had Ruan Yue woken up? What could he do?
The bell signalling the end of class rang.
As soon as Dong Guofeng got off the platform, Li Shiyu heard Lu Chen’s desk being pushed with a screeching noise. He turned his head and saw that Lu Chen had already stood up and said, “Let’s go.”
“Ah? Where?”
“To Play all night.”
Li Shiyu: “………”
He knew that he was still his Brother Chen!
—–
Ruan Yue did not go back home for several days.
The school didn’t have evening study on Fridays. After the last class bell rang, Ruan Yue lowered her head to pack up her belongings and noticed a wechat message on her phone.
Her father had sent: “Came to pick you up from school. The car is in front of the tea shop outside of the school.”
“Ok.”
After replying to the message and packing her bag, she sat in her seat, lost in a trance.
When Ding ChuChu and her friends walked away from the platform, they caught sight of her sitting there. Just as she was about to say something, she was jostled aside by Sun Jing and they went directly to the corridor.
When she looked back, Sun Jing who was already discontented said, “What are you doing, ah? Still want to call her?”
“……It’s on the way.” Ding ChuChu smiled awkwardly.
Sun Jing was not in good humour and glanced at her. She dragged her towards herself and walked towards the stairs as she said, “I’ve never met such a good tempered person in such a hurry to bring misfortune upon themselves.”
“That’s right ChuChu, you really don’t have to be so nice to her!”
“She Doesn’t even appreciate your kindness……”
Several of her friends took turns saying such things and persuaded her as they walked out of the school gate.
There were several different roads, and after leaving the gate, they all parted ways.
Ding ChuChu carried her school bag and walked towards the bus stop, and inadvertently caught sight of a familiar black Maybach.
Uncle Ruan’s car?
She paused to look at the license plate, then quickly walked over to the car.
The chauffeur Zheng Yunkai had been paying attention to the rearview mirror and caught sight of her coming over. He promptly leaned his head and called out, “Chief Ruan.”
“She came out?”
Ruan Chengyi, who had been resting in the back seat opened his eyes and sat up straight to look outside. The car window slowly slid open and he caught sight of a little girl’s face.
He immediately smiled and said, “It’s ChuChu huh? Come inside. You’re just in time, I’ll take you home on the way.”
“It’s really you, Uncle Ruan……” Ding ChuChu said. She pulled open the front passenger side door and took a seat before fastening the seat belt and turning around to ask him, “Are you here to pick up Sister Ruan Yue?”
“Yes, there’s no work this afternoon.” The man replied and lowered his head to take a look at the steel watch on his wrist, then raised his face. His face was calm and did not reveal his mood, however, Zheng Yunkai felt that he had been waiting for a long time. He tentatively asked, “Should I give a call to the Young Miss?”
“No need, she must be held up. Wait for a while.”
“Okay.” Zheng Yunkai smiled.
In the passenger seat, Ding ChuChu sat with her schoolbag in her hands. When she heard this conversation, she said, “When I was coming out, I saw that she had packed her school bag. She should be coming out soon……”
“Wait a moment…. I need to take a call.”
As soon as he said this, the vehicle fell into silence.
A few seconds later, his mature, magnetic voice sounded in the back. “Reduce the price by five more points.”
Ding ChuChu didn’t understand anything about shopping malls. He was considered a successful entrepreneur in his hometown. He drove a good car and lived in a western style house, and had a chauffeur as well as a housekeeper. Furthermore, every year he returned to his hometown and donated money to help the less fortunate.
Listening to the phone call, she almost didn’t dare to breathe, afraid that she might disturb his conversation.
Ruan Yue’s figure appeared in the rearview mirror and she heard the driver’s side door open as Zheng Yunkai immediately got off.
He had followed Ruan Chengyi for several years and was diligent and used discretion. After getting off the car, he walked over quickly to Ruan Yue and raised his hand to take the school bag.
“No need. I’ll take it myself.”
Ruan Yue had hardly looked well upon her father’s people since her parents’ divorce. Even if she had come back in time, some of her emotions couldn’t disappear. Immediately after saying this, she headed straight for the front passenger seat.
She did not want to sit with Ruan Chengyi, but she did not expect that when she opened the door, there would already be someone else sitting inside.
At the same time, a man’s steady voice reached her ears. “Yue’er, sit in the back.”
Ruan Yue’s pet name was Little Moonlight.(3)
Ruan Chengyi had picked the name for her because she had been born at midnight, and was exceptionally fair.
She remembered that when she had been in kindergarten, he had often lifted her above his head and laughingly said, “Daddy’s Little Moonlight seems to be heavier again!”
Later, when she was in primary school, she had felt that the nickname was too childish so he wasn’t allowed to call her that anymore. He had coaxed her good naturedly, “Then I’ll call you Yue’er, alright? The Yue from moonlight”
After that, he had called her that way for many years.
Finally, when her parents divorced, he had wanted her to go with him, and still called her in the same way. She remembered that at that time, she had cried and screamed at him, “Don’t call me that again! I don’t have a dad like you!”
That sort of crumbling of the mind, it was painful no matter how many times she recalled it.
Ruan Yue closed the front passenger side door and raised her head, looking up at the grey-blue sky in the distance. Once her mood settled down a little, she opened the rear door and sat inside.
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- Flesh of ice and bones of jade: A beautiful woman; noble and unsullied; pure and uncorrupted.
- Blowing can break it: As if it would be broken if you blew on it. Used to describe skin which is very delicate. In this case, the skin is thin and tender, generally used to describe the skin of young girls.
- Ruan Yue’s name 阮玥 has a 月 character which by itself means moon, while 玥 means pearl used in sacrifice.
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