Chapter 61: Accompany Me for a Formality

"Huh? Right now?"

"It's so late—are you sure they'll still be open?"

Hearing Qin Yu say he was going to take Lin Xi to buy pea pudding, Cheng Si was dumbfounded and signaled Bai Xu to check the time.

Bai Xu replied, "It's almost midnight. They're already closed."

Cheng Si looked at Lin Xi, who had just woken up. "Why would you suddenly crave that in the middle of the night?"

At this hour, pea pudding wasn’t exactly hard to find; plenty of shops and street stalls would have it, and they could surely track down one still open. The problem was that Lin Xi was particular—she only liked the flagship store of that old, famous brand. Even the branches didn’t suit her taste.

None of them were fans of such delicacies and couldn’t tell any difference between the main store and the branches. To them, it was the same shop—how different could it be? But Lin Xi insisted that only the flagship made it well.

Though they didn’t understand, Cheng Si and Bai Xu were already on their feet.

Cheng Si pulled on his jacket and, phone in hand, asked Ruan Dong, "Isn’t that main store right near your place? Do you have their number? Try to get it."

She didn’t move, but Qin Yu reached out and took her hand, leading her outside.

—

As soon as they got in the car, the cool night air washed over her, and the storm in Lin Xi’s heart began to ebb, gradually calming.

She knew, just as she always had, that what she wanted wasn’t really the pea pudding.

She only wanted to be certain of something, to test their reactions, to fill the hollowed-out sense of security within herself.

She’d always thought she no longer needed those things.

But the emptiness and loss after waking from that dream, merging with her feelings after seeing her brother today, forced her to confront the truth.

Everyone is an independent being; in this world, no one is truly indispensable to another. No matter how close the bond, cracks can never be fully repaired.

So, she could stay apart from them for years and live just fine on her own.

But now, that potent sense of belonging, that flagrant, open favoritism, could not be ignored.

She realized that her sense of security still came from them.

It had never changed, all these years.

She always remembered what her brother once told her—when he was at the military academy and couldn’t leave often, he reminded her to go straight to Qin Yu and the others if she ever needed anything.

Back then, she was still in elementary school.

Her classmates envied her, saying she had so many older brothers, and a different one would pick her up from school every day. After spending so much time with them, her own brother would say she’d grown spoiled, a bad habit that was all their fault.

He wasn’t wrong.

She’d lived in the old compound since she was little, with her parents living elsewhere and only seeing them once or twice a week. So, the people who indulged her most were these young men.

Thinking back, even Qin Yu—who had the worst temper—never lost it with her back then.

"Maybe we should just forget it," she suggested, as Bai Xu drove and Cheng Si made calls.

Cheng Si didn’t hang up, but replied immediately, "Why would we forget it? Tonight, you’re getting your pea pudding."

"It’s too much trouble," she said with a laugh. "Tomorrow is fine, really. I didn’t mean it seriously."

"It’s not like you’re asking for the stars or the moon. What trouble?" Cheng Si drawled, as irreverent as ever. "It’s just a sweet—why wait until tomorrow?"

"Don’t talk about just pea pudding. If you ask for anything, we have to be worthy of you calling us brothers."

He glanced back meaningfully at Qin Yu. "Right, Third Brother?"

"If you really wanted the stars or the moon, you wouldn’t need us—Third Brother could probably arrange it all by himself. We’re only good for these trivial things."

"None of us can compare to Third Brother," he added.

At this, Bai Xu suddenly chuckled. Cheng Si knew what he meant, shot him a glare, and signaled him to be quiet.

Lin Xi glanced at Qin Yu, surprised to find him looking at her, too.

Their eyes met, but Lin Xi was the first to look away.

She said nothing more, just rolled the window down a notch and leaned against it, gazing at the dazzling lights along Chang’an Avenue.

When they arrived, Bai Xu and Cheng Si got out together.

"Third Brother, you and Xi Xi wait here. We’ll go pick it up," Cheng Si said, stopping Lin Xi from getting out.

The quiet around them felt unfamiliar, almost uncomfortable to Lin Xi.

She turned her head and found a topic. "Did you all visit my brother while I was away?"

She hadn’t expected to ask this, and Qin Yu’s expression went blank for a moment before he replied, "We did."

"All together?"

"Yes. Every year, on his birthday and during the New Year, we’d go without fail."

In recent years, the few times they’d gathered were to visit Lin Chen. Only then would they have any real conversation.

The focus was always on Lin Chen or Lin Xi—there was no escaping the siblings.

"My parents, too? You must have been very busy during New Year’s," Lin Xi said with a wry smile.

Her brother was supposed to be buried beside their parents, but in the end, her grandfather decided to keep him at the military cemetery, with his fellow soldiers.

So her parents’ resting place and her brother’s were on opposite sides of the city—across all of Beijing. During the holiday rush, traveling from one to the other could take up an entire day.

Thinking about how they made time every New Year’s to visit both her parents and her brother, Lin Xi felt a bittersweet ache.

"Not just them," Qin Yu said, as if truly recalling the past years. "During New Year’s, we also went to the neighboring city."

"…"

Oh, right.

Lin Xi remembered now—her maternal grandparents had mentioned Qin Yu also visited during the New Year.

"When did you usually go? On the first day?"

"I’d go over on the night of the first, and come back on the night of the second."

There was a tradition in the region: on the second day of the New Year, you were supposed to visit your maternal grandparents.

Qin Yu’s grandfather was Grandpa Bai, who lived in the same compound, just a two-minute walk away. There was no strict need to visit exactly on the second.

So, on the second day, Qin Yu would usually accompany Lin Xi’s grandparents in the neighboring city.

She couldn’t quite put her feelings into words and asked casually, "If you weren’t home on the first day, didn’t Grandpa Qin and Grandpa Bai get upset? Did you ever tell them you were going for me?"

"No, just got scolded a little," he replied carelessly.

Lin Xi muttered under her breath, "Why not just tell them? If you said it was for me, they wouldn’t have been angry."

If he’d explained, Grandpa Qin and Grandpa Bai would never have blamed him.

"Looks like I owe you a lot, Third Brother. I need to find a chance to thank you properly."

Putting everything else aside, she was truly grateful to Qin Yu for looking after her grandparents and brother—he was always so considerate.

"I’m going to London for work next month and might catch an auction. If there’s anything you like, let me know—I’ll bring it back for you."

"Don’t bother," Qin Yu said, drumming his fingers lightly on the armrest, his deep eyes fixed on her. "But next week, there’s a banquet I can’t get out of. Will you come with me, just to make an appearance?"

(End of chapter)