Chapter 10

Jiang Siwei’s intentions were obvious. Even Jian Rongrong, who was usually slow to react to emotional issues, realized something was wrong after seeing the post in his circle of friends.

She knew Jiang Siwei too well to ask him anything, so she called Lou Jia directly: “Excuse me, can I post on Zhihu now?”

“What?” Lou Jia was confused by her question, and sent a few photos that she had just fixed to He Miao, and then clicked on the next one.

Jiang Siwei’s face appeared on the screen without warning.

It was a close-up that she had taken of Jiang Siwei alone on the mountain that day.

She didn’t notice what Jian Rongrong said for a while.

“Are you listening to me or not?“ Jian Rongrong was impatient to eat the melon but got no response, and she was getting irritable.

”Yes, yes, yes.“ Lou Jia clicked on the mouse and kept enlarging the local area. There was almost nothing to fix. ‘The signal here is not very good. What did you just say?’

”…” Jian Rongrong sighed and gave up asking around the corner. She asked directly, ”What’s the situation with Jiang Siwei?”

Luo Jia paused for a moment with the mouse: “Huh?”

“I think I’m not wrong about his circle of friends,” asked Jian Rongrong. “What’s the situation with you? It’s only been a few days, and you’re already going after someone.”

Luo Jia smiled: “What do you mean I’m going after someone? I really haven’t gone after anyone this time.”

“Huh?” Jian Rongrong was a little surprised, but soon felt justified. “No wonder he only acts like a human being in front of you.”

“…“

”So are you two in a relationship or in love?“

”Neither.” Lou Jia thought for a moment and then gave her a warning shot. ‘Not yet.’

Jian Rongrong snorted twice and couldn’t help but be nosy: ”Jiang Siwei has such a personality that even Auntie Jiang can’t stand it sometimes. What do you see in him?”

Lou Jia looked at the screen and looked at Jiang Siwei’s dark eyebrows and eyes, half-jokingly saying, “The face.”

Jian Rongrong shouted, “I didn’t know you were such a shallow person!”

“Now you know.” Suddenly there was a loud noise outside the office, and Lou Jia got up with her phone and walked to the window.

It was Jiang Siwei outside.

He was standing by the pool with a dozen children, chattering and making a lot of noise.

Jian Rongrong also heard it. “What’s going on?”

“Nothing, the teacher is teaching the students.” Lou Jia and Jian Rongrong didn’t chat much. As soon as they hung up, the bell rang for the end of class.

She looked out and saw more people gathered around the pool, all of them younger students.

Lou Jia was a little curious, so she closed her computer and walked out. The students saw her and shouted, “Hello, Miss Lou,” but they still surrounded Jiang Siwei.

She approached and asked, “What are you doing?”

Jiang Siwei was holding an old piece of soft plastic pipe in his hand, looking mysterious. “I’m going to do a magic trick for them.”

After saying that, he dragged the pipe to the side of the flowerbed and said, “Teacher Lou, could you please turn on the water?”

Lou Jia responded by turning on the faucet.

The water flowed quickly down the pipe, but when it reached the spout, Jiang Siwei squeezed it tightly. He raised his hand and the pipe sprayed a large mist of water in midair.

Between the light and the water mist, a rainbow appeared.

“Wow!”

Rainbows are not common in the mountains, and most of the children had never seen a rainbow before, so they were all very impressed.

“It really is a rainbow!”

“There are so many colors in a rainbow! Mr. Jiang is amazing!”…

As a teacher, Jiang Siwei was very pleased with the praise. After the students had dispersed, he put away the hose and walked over to Lou Jia with a smug look on his face, looking for praise.

Lou Jia couldn’t let him be so smug, so he said, “You’re wasting water. Be careful, Principal Luo will find you in trouble.”

“I’m not wasting water,” said Jiang Siwei, pointing at the flowerbed. “I’m watering it.”

The school is small, so there are no flowers in the flowerbeds. They are all vegetables and fruits, which are not only beautiful when they bloom, but also edible.

Lou Jia was amused by his serious look, and imitated the children’s applause, saying, “Wow, Mr. Jiang is really amazing!”

Jiang Siwei realized that Lou Jia was joking, and his eyes blinked, and his ears turned red. He picked up the hose without saying a word: “You…”

“Huh?” Lou Jia raised her eyebrows and looked at him.

“Is the rainbow beautiful?” He didn’t know what to say, so he could only awkwardly change the subject.

“It’s beautiful,” Lou Jia said. “Teacher Jiang is really great.”

Jiang Siwei’s ears turned redder, his eyes wandered, and he wanted to run with the hose, but he didn’t want to.

Fortunately, the bell rang in time, and Lou Jia had two more classes to attend. He didn’t want to “bully” him anymore, so he smiled and said, “I’m going to class first. If you have time, give your sister a call.”

“What’s wrong with her?” Jiang Siwei asked.

“Your circle of friends…” Lou Jia said, “she’s quite curious.”

“Oh,” Jiang Siwei said, “let her continue to be curious.”

“…” Lou Jia smiled and didn’t bother to deal with the grievances between the brother and sister. He waved and went to class.

She didn’t know how Jiang Siwei communicated with Jian Rongrong, but after class, Lou Jia saw several new WeChat messages from her on her phone.

She wasn’t curious or nosy anymore, and instead began to earnestly persuade Lou Jia not to be so narrow-minded as to fall in love with Jiang Siwei.

Now it was Lou Jia’s turn to be curious.

She took her phone and found Jiang Siwei, and asked him in a roundabout way what he had said to Jian Rongrong.

“Nothing,” Jiang Siwei said. “I just asked about her relationship status.”

“And then?“

”I also told her not to worry too much about my relationship status.”

Lau Ka realized that she even suspected that the main reason why Jiang Siwei had not contacted them for so many years was still in Jian Rongrong.

After all, she had never seen such a pair of siblings who were so at each other’s throats.

Jiang Siwei also knew Jian Rongrong well: ‘What did she tell you?’

Lau Ka naturally wouldn’t add fuel to the fire: ”She didn’t say much, just a few words about you.”

“Didn’t she tell you not to consider my words?“ Jiang Siwei thought this was not very much like Jane’s style.

”No, do you want her to say it?“

Jiang Siwei shook his head and suddenly looked at Lou Jia: ‘Does she say it or not, does it affect your decision?’

”What do you think?” Lou Jia looked at him without flinching, and even added a little more smile in his eyes.

Jiang Siwei was not her match after all, and his ears were a little red. He looked at her and then looked away, and after a long time, he said in a low voice, “I don’t think so.”

“Then there is no,” said Lou Jia.

“Then you-” Jiang Siwei asked tentatively, “how long do you have to think about it?”

Lou Jia looked at him and smiled, “Aren’t you still here?”

“…”

Goddamn it.

Jiang Siwei suddenly regretted what he had said before. When he thought about leaving, he should have done it in one step, not waiting a day.

But he had said it himself, and it was too late to regret it. He could only grit his teeth and let Lou Jia think it over slowly.

Fortunately, time always moves forward, and the life of teaching in the village gradually got on track.

It seemed like he had just arrived, but he didn’t want to have already entered the countdown to leaving.

In the more than a month he had been here, Jiang Siwei had already perfectly integrated into local life. Not only could he speak the local dialect, he had also secretly learned some local folk songs and dances.

Of course, they didn’t learn all this for nothing.

The seventh day of the seventh lunar month is a traditional festival in Wutong Village. The whole village is bustling from morning to night on this day, burning incense to pray for blessings, singing and dancing, and eating a continuous banquet.

It was the first time that Lou Jia and the others had participated in such a gathering. Surrounded by the enthusiasm of the villagers, they ate from morning to night, and by the end they wanted to go next door and induce vomiting.

“I really can’t eat anymore,” He Miao waved his hand, “I’m going to take a break.”

Lou Jia followed suit and put down his chopsticks, “I’m going to take a break too.”

The table they were at was full of teachers who had come to teach, and there weren’t many of them in the first place. The villagers were afraid that they wouldn’t have enough to eat, so they kept feeding them.

When Ying Xi came to see them, there were still a few dishes on the table that hadn’t been touched.

She saw this as normal and said with a smile, “It’s fine. The banquet doesn’t end until the table is cleared. If you get hungry, come back and eat. Just tell them to reheat it.”

“That’s good,” Fang Jin said. “We really can’t eat anymore.”

“Drink some tea to help you digest.“ Ying Xi put the teapot on the table and asked, ‘Why is there one less person?’

”Siwei went to Xiao Dong’s house to change clothes,“ Fang Jin added.

”What happened?“ Ying Xi looked at Lou Jia.

”He accidentally spilled it on his shoulder when serving the food,” Lou Jia said.

Ying Xi exclaimed, ”Did it burn him?”

“It’s fine, it’s a cold dish.” Lou Jia smiled.

While they were laughing, Liu Xiaodong rushed over, ‘Sister Yingxi, something happened to Teacher Jiang!’

His words were so scary that Lou Jia’s head buzzed and she immediately stood up, ‘What happened to him?’

The others at the table also stood up, and Yingxi grabbed Liu Xiaodong and asked what had happened.

Liu Xiaodong hurriedly said, ”He was saving someone and got a little injured in his arm.”

The incident was not complicated. A child in the village was climbing a tree to get a bird’s nest, but he lost his footing and fell. Jiang Siwei and Liu Xiaodong happened to be passing by.

“It was also a bit of bad luck. There was a pit under the tree, and he didn’t stand up straight when he caught the child. The child wasn’t light, and his arm was probably crushed.” Liu Xiaodong sighed, “Uncle Luo has already taken someone to the village clinic, and asked me to come and tell you.”

The few of them had no appetite for food or drink, and hurriedly ran to the clinic. When they arrived, Jiang Siwei had just come out with his arm hanging.

Lou Jia looked at the small scratches on his face and frowned, asking, “How is it?”

“Dislocation, not a big deal. The doctor has already put it back in place for me,” Jiang Siwei said with a smile. “I just can’t move it around for a while.”

“Fortunately, nothing serious happened, otherwise I really don’t know how to explain it to Teacher Lou.” Principal Lu sighed, ‘I don’t know if there is any feng shui problem with this position, Teacher Zheng injured his leg, and you came to replace him and injured your arm.’

After saying that, he decided to go to the temple to burn incense again.

Ying Xi also said, ”Why don’t we go back first, the bonfire party is about to start.”

This is the last activity on the 7th of July.

At 5 p.m., a bonfire will be lit in the square in the center of the village. Men, women, and children will gather around the bonfire to sing and dance. There will also be passionate young men singing folk songs and inviting their beloved girls to dance with them, creating a new legend.

“Yes, yes,” He Miao saw that the atmosphere was not good at the moment, and followed suit to smooth things over, “Hurry up and go, or you’ll miss a good spot if you’re late.”

As they walked out of the clinic, they could already see the smoke from the bonfire in the distance, and the cheerful singing echoed in the mountains.

Jiang Siwei and Lou Jia walked side by side at the end. He looked at Lou Jia from time to time, and she always frowned as if she was displeased. He whispered, “I’m really fine. If you don’t believe me, I’ll show you a dance.”

He was about to start dancing.

“Okay, okay, don’t do that anymore.“ Lou Jia stopped him, a little speechless and a little amused. ‘I didn’t say I didn’t believe you, I just…’

She pursed her lips, a little speechless for a moment, angry that he didn’t know how to protect himself, and also distressed that he had allowed himself to be hurt: ‘You really are…’

”What?“

”Stupid,” Lou Jia said.

Jiang Siwei laughed lightly: ”I am indeed quite stupid. I haven’t been able to learn to dance well with Brother Xiaodong these few days.”

“You’re learning to dance with him?“ Lou Jia was a little surprised. No wonder he’s always seen him with Liu Xiaodong these days. ‘You’re not always interested in singing and dancing, so why did you suddenly decide to learn this?’

”It was Sister Xiaoxi who told me that if a boy invites his favorite girl to dance this dance on the seventh day of the seventh month, they will receive the blessing of the Seven Star Goddess.”

Lou Jia froze for a moment, turned her head to look at him. The boy stood in the twilight, his dark eyes staring at her.

Her heart skipped a beat, as if she were both looking forward to and nervous about it.

“Lou Jia,” Jiang Siwei kept looking at her, “will you dance with me?”