Chapter 37

Wen Fu wasn't great at putting things into words. A short story took him forever to tell. After each part, he'd stop and lower his head, quietly trying to figure out how to phrase the next bit. Sometimes it took him a few halting tries just to get one thing across.

Fei Bolin listened in silence. He didn't know how long he'd been listening. The wind outside the window died down, and Wen Fu's memories came to an end too.

He waited for Wen Fu to finish, stumbling through it all, then lifted a hand and touched the Buddha Talisman resting in Wen Fu's palms. Their fingertips brushed by accident. Fei Bolin's hand was warm. Wen Fu's fingertips were cool.

Fei Bolin didn't pull his hand away. He just rubbed the nick on the Buddha Talisman with his fingertip and smiled. 'Actually, when she came back that year, she did mention you to me.'

Wen Fu suddenly looked up and stared hard at him.

Fei Bolin said, 'She said when he went to Yunnan Province, she found a kid in the river. Looked really little, maybe four or five. No idea how he'd fallen in, and his parents weren't looking after him either.'

That was Lin Yuanyi's exact wording.

But that was as far as Lin Yuanyi ever went when it came to Wen Fu.

Wen Fu blinked and listened with total focus. 'And then?'

'And then...' Fei Bolin's fingers paused. 'She also said... that kid couldn't talk. No matter what she asked, he wouldn't answer. If she hadn't been worried his parents would be anxious, she would've brought him home and made him my little brother.'

Lin Yuanyi had never said that.

Wen Fu propped himself up on an elbow and edged closer to Fei Bolin, so close he was almost right under his eyes. Those black-gem eyes locked on him. 'Really?'

'Really.' Fei Bolin patted his hair, not changing expression. 'You should've been my little brother a long time ago.'

Wen Fu's eyes flickered, then his lashes lowered and he fell quiet.

'But it's not too late now.' Fei Bolin pressed him back onto the pillow and tucked the blanket tight around him. 'Either way, you found me in the end. Right?'

Wen Fu looked at him and gave a tiny nod. It wasn't clear whether he was agreeing or meant something else. 'Mm.'

While Fei Bolin was tucking in the blanket, the pendant at his neck kept swinging in front of Wen Fu's eyes.

It swayed left and right. Finally the blanket was tucked in, and just as Fei Bolin was about to lie back down, Wen Fu reached out and grabbed the Buddha Talisman.

When the cat made a move, it always caught people off guard.

Fei Bolin lowered his head. 'I just got you tucked in, and you're reaching out again for what?'

Wen Fu held the Buddha Talisman tight and touched the image on it. His voice was low. 'Has it been protecting you?'

Fei Bolin froze for a second.

Thinking back on all the rough years he'd been through, he'd still made it to the other side. Whether that was because of the Buddha Talisman or something else, he ought to be grateful.

Sure, people beat fate and all that, and the person he should really thank was someone else. Better to thank Aunt Wu downstairs, or his mother for holding on to the end, than any god. But what was the harm in humoring a kid?

Fei Bolin had just been about to answer 'yeah' when he saw Wen Fu shake his head.

'No.' Wen Fu stared at the pendant and murmured to himself, 'It was protecting me.'

Wen Fu looked deep in thought, completely absorbed in the Buddha Talisman. Very softly, he said, 'It protected me so I could find you.'

It just took a little longer for him to find Fei Bolin. He walked that road for ten years.

Fei Bolin took his hand and put it back under the blanket. Then he noticed Wen Fu's lips, a little chapped and cracked, and realized Rongzhou had fully entered winter tonight.

Maybe I should buy him a lip balm, he thought.

'And it was protecting me too,' Fei Bolin said to Wen Fu. 'Go to sleep.'

Wen Fu fell asleep.

Fei Bolin closed his eyes. He was just drifting off when, out of nowhere, a voice popped into his head.

—'Fei Bolin gege.'

'!!!'

Fei Bolin whipped his head around toward Wen Fu on the pillow beside him.

But the other boy was sleeping soundly.

He let out a breath, settled himself, and closed his eyes again, planning to sleep.

...Two hours later, Fei Bolin slowly opened his eyes.

A sigh came out in the dark.

'...Why's it gotta sound like that when he says it.'

So damn annoying.

Fei Bolin went through another week of School with faint dark circles under his eyes.

In the second week after the sports meet ended, Xie Yining gave Wen Fu 1,200 yuan in prize money for winning two events.

Wen Fu hadn't known there'd be prize money ahead of time. When Xie Yining called him out to the balcony to get it, he was still dazed enough to ask what it was.

Xie Yining smiled and explained, 'Blue ones, fifty. Red ones, a hundred. Anything else you don't get?'

Wen Fu said nothing.

'Alright, alright.' Xie Yining stopped teasing him. 'It's the sports meet prize money. Didn't you break a School record? The School gave you an extra two hundred.'

'Oh,' said Wen Fu.

He tucked the money away and was about to head back to the classroom when Xie Yining called after him again. 'Hey, Do-Re-Mi!'

Wen Fu turned around. 'You calling me?'

'Yep.'

Xie Yining pulled the top-end new phone model from the year before out of her School Uniform. 'What's your Q/Q number? I'll add you and pull you into the class group.'

Wen Fu entered his Q/Q number. Xie Yining took the phone, looked at it, and immediately made a scornful face. 'Your nickname is just Wen Fu?'

Wen Fu nodded.

'That's so dead boring.' Xie Yining added him while openly judging him. 'Just like you.'

Wen Fu stood there without saying anything.

'Done.' Xie Yining sneakily glanced into the classroom, made sure Gu Mingchun wasn't there, then hurriedly opened Weibo to keep reading the fanfic smut she'd failed to finish during the day. At the same time, she waved Wen Fu off. 'Go on, go on. Remember to accept my friend request.'

Wen Fu glanced at her screen, left the balcony, and went back to the classroom.

That night, while he was minding the shop at Lin's Convenience Store, Wen Fu felt the wad of bills in his pocket and called to the person taking inventory behind the shelves, 'Fei Bolin gege.'

'!'

Fei Bolin jolted again.

That was the second time Wen Fu had called him that. No matter how many times he heard it, his scalp still tingled.

He had to find a time to get Wen Fu to change how he addressed him.

Fei Bolin poked his head out from behind the shelves and asked Wen Fu first, 'What is it?'

Wen Fu said, 'You done yet?'

Fei Bolin's gaze moved back to the shelves. 'Almost.'

After finishing the inventory, he went back behind the register and asked while opening his schoolbag, 'You need something?'

Wen Fu said, 'I have something for you.'

Fei Bolin's hand paused inside the bag. 'I've got something for you too.'

Wen Fu's ears seemed to perk up. He leaned toward Fei Bolin, obviously curious. 'What?'

There was a hint of a smile in Fei Bolin's eyes. 'What's yours first?'

Wen Fu sat back down and dug into his pocket. He pulled out a pile of bills he'd clutched into a crumpled greasy mess and dumped them on the register in a chaotic heap.

Fei Bolin took one look and got it. 'Your sports meet prize money?'

Wen Fu nodded and pushed the money toward him. 'For you.'

Right now he had food, a place to live, and clothes to wear. There was nowhere he needed to spend money, so naturally he figured if he had money, it should go to Fei Bolin.

Fei Bolin sighed softly, put down his bag, and straightened the bills one by one. Then he told him, 'Don't keep grabbing money like this. Stack it flat by size and put it in your bag. If you carry it around all messy, your hands end up smelling like cash too.'

As he said that, he handed Wen Fu a pack of wet wipes. 'Wipe your hands clean.'

Wen Fu sniffed his palm. It really did smell like money.

He tore open the wipe and rubbed his hands down carelessly, then hurried to ask what Fei Bolin was giving him.

Fei Bolin saw he was about to toss it after two random swipes and immediately said, 'Do it properly.'

'Oh.'

Wen Fu lowered his head and carefully wiped his hands clean again.

When he finished and looked up, he saw Fei Bolin standing a Pikachu lip balm on the table in front of him.

Wen Fu looked left, then right. 'Candy?'

Fei Bolin said, '...It's lip balm.'

Ever since Fei Bolin had a sudden impulse a few days ago and fed Wen Fu a few Fujiya milk candies, this guy seemed to have discovered a whole new world. At this point he liked them even more than milk.

Every day, when Fei Bolin asked what he wanted for breakfast, Wen Fu's first question was always, 'Can I have candy?'

At first Fei Bolin indulged him. On the first day, he let Wen Fu eat more than ten in one go. Then Wen Fu secretly hid some when Fei Bolin wasn't looking and chewed on them so loudly during Chinese class that the teacher made him stand for two whole periods.

His grade in that subject was bad to begin with. Now the Chinese teacher disliked him even more.

After that, Fei Bolin stopped giving Wen Fu candy every day. He only got it once a week, and he had to eat it at home, under Fei Bolin's nose, and finish it there.

Studying the little Pikachu cap, Wen Fu muttered under his breath, '...Lip balm?'

Fei Bolin had him take it. 'Pull the cap off, twist it up, put it on your lips, then twist it back down. When your lips feel dry, do that. Got it?'

Wen Fu pressed his lips together. This morning when he'd been brushing his teeth, a crack had split open in the middle of his lip. Every time he licked it, it bled. He hadn't understood why before. So that was it—too dry.

He took the lip balm and sniffed it first, then opened the cap and sniffed it again. A light sweet orange scent drifted out. Only then did Wen Fu briskly do what Fei Bolin said, opening his mouth and coating his lips in a circle. It really did feel a lot better.

Watching from the side, Fei Bolin didn't know whether to laugh or cry. 'You don't have to open your mouth that wide.'

Wen Fu wasn't used to how this thing worked. When he first put it on, he opened his lips wide enough to fit an egg between them, like he was scared the lip balm meant for the lower lip might accidentally touch the upper one.

Fei Bolin reminded him once and didn't say more. With Wen Fu's personality, he'd have to repeat it a few more times before it stuck anyway.

Once he saw Wen Fu cap it and start lowering his head to turn the Pikachu over and over in his hands, Fei Bolin tapped his fingertip on the table. 'Also...'

The second he spoke, Wen Fu looked up at him, full attention on his face, waiting for what came next.

Fei Bolin chose his words for a moment. 'From now on... you don't need to call me gege.'

Judging by Wen Fu's reaction, he clearly didn't get it.

Fei Bolin explained, 'Just call me Bo-ge.'

This time Wen Fu seemed to receive a new instruction. After running it through his head, he output, 'Bo-ge?'

That sounded way better.

Fei Bolin pressed his lips together in a smile. 'Xiao Fu.'

Hearing that way of calling him, Wen Fu tilted his head. It seemed new and interesting to him. 'Bo-ge?'

Fei Bolin said, 'Xiao Fu.'

'Bo-ge?'

'Xiao Fu.'

It was like Wen Fu had decided 'Bo-ge' was some kind of special button. If he said 'Bo-ge' once, he'd get one 'Xiao Fu' back.

His interest shifted from the Pikachu cap on the lip balm to this almost immediately.

'Bo-ge?'

'Xiao Fu.'

'Bo-ge?'

'Xiao Fu.'

'Bo-ge?'

'Do your homework.'

Fei Bolin turned around and cut him off without mercy.

Wen Fu said, '...Oh.'

There was morning self-study first thing the next day.

Fei Bolin happened to take a few hard problems he'd put off from the night before to the office to ask about. Xie Yining, who sat to Wen Fu's front left, aimlessly worked on practice questions for a while, then decided to take her workbook to the office too—mostly because she wanted to wander out and get a breath of air so she wouldn't doze off.

She had just stood up and was about to ask her deskmate to let her out when she happened to glance at Wen Fu and suddenly jumped. 'What are you doing?'

Wen Fu had his mouth open and had just snapped the Pikachu cap back on. The second he finished applying the lip balm, he shut his mouth at once, put his blank expression back on, and answered in that dull voice of his, quick and neat: 'Putting on lip balm.'

'I know you're putting on lip balm.' Xie Yining looked baffled. 'Why were you opening your mouth that wide? Your tonsils dry too?'

At that, Wen Fu touched his throat and looked thoughtful.

Xie Yining clicked her tongue and shook her head, stepped out of her seat, then suddenly doubled back and asked him in a low voice, 'Did you start talking kind of late when you were a kid?'

Wen Fu: ?

Before he had time to react, Xie Yining had already walked out.

Wen Fu watched her back, still trying to figure out what she'd meant just now.

Xie Yining glanced sideways and saw Wen Fu staring after her in a daze. She turned away and muttered to herself in her head:

Do-Re-Mi acts weird as hell all day long.