Flirting Under Favor (GL) - Chapter 19

In the waiting room, Mu Fan sat blankly on a chair, not fully recovered from Wang Lin’s kiss. The skin that Wang Lin had kissed still felt fiercely hot.

She sat up straight, biting her lip, her expression serious. She couldn’t help but recall every moment with Wang Lin—remembering her various emotions and expressions: lively, cute, sly. She also remembered the softness of her body in her arms at night, her smooth breathing.

She shook her head vigorously, but the images became clearer and wouldn’t leave. She felt that she was really about to fall for her, and she panicked.

God, am I actually going to fall for a straight girl?

The announcement for boarding calmed her down. She pulled her suitcase and unconsciously quickened her pace, as if trying to escape this place, to escape Wang Lin, as quickly as possible.

She thought that if she left for a month, perhaps all feelings would cool down, both hers for Wang Lin and Wang Lin’s for her. But at this moment, she suddenly realized that she was fundamentally unable to refuse Wang Lin, unable to refuse any of her requests, and she couldn’t help but want to be good to her, to indulge and spoil her.

Sitting on the train, the scenery outside the window quickly rushed by. Her body was moving away at a high speed, but her heart didn’t seem to be. It was still tied to and thinking of that person. She closed her eyes, feeling irritable.

/

Good news lifts the spirits. Wang Lin drove back to her accommodation, walked into the bedroom, spun around happily, and collapsed onto the bed. Thinking of Mu Fan’s blank and flustered expression after being kissed by her, she found it utterly adorable, almost as if she had been teased.

She kicked off her slippers, hugged the quilt, and rolled around on the bed, her excitement refusing to subside for a long time.

She picked up her phone and messaged Mu Fan: “Where are you now?”

Soon, Mu Fan sent her location.

She followed up: “Message me when you arrive~”

On the train, Mu Fan looked at the flirtatious little tilde, and it was as if Wang Lin’s playful, cute appearance was right in front of her.

“Okay~” she replied, deliberately adding a little tilde at the end.

Wang Lin naturally burst into laughter when she saw it. She knew Mu Fan was busy with work and assumed that, given Mu Fan’s nature, she was probably reading various documents, so she didn’t bother her further.

She got out of bed, put on her slippers, and went to her art studio. As a painting major, Wang Lin hadn’t seriously picked up a brush these past few days, being preoccupied with Mu Fan. Now that she was in a happy mood and had nothing else to do, Wang Lin decided to seriously paint a portrait—another one of Mu Fan.

Why another? In fact, during the winter vacation, Wang Lin had already painted a cartoon-style portrait of Mu Fan from memory: a scene of her walking away in a hurry after knocking Wang Lin down. With snowflakes swirling and her long hair flowing, Wang Lin had romanticized the scene, resulting in a piece with considerable artistic conception, with which she was quite satisfied.

This time, she planned to paint a realistic portrait of Mu Fan. The subject was still a back view: Mu Fan walking toward a crowd, pulling her suitcase. Beyond that, she also wanted to paint Mu Fan right after being kissed, her cooking, her reading, her thinking… many different moments. Wang Lin smiled, thinking of painting a thick stack of Mu Fans, in all sorts of poses. She loved every single one of them.

Painting was very time-consuming. It was almost six o’clock in the evening when the housekeeper came to call her for dinner. Only then did she put down her brush. On the white paper on the easel, the subject of her painting was already taking initial shape. She checked her phone. Mu Fan had messaged her twenty-something minutes ago, saying she had arrived in K City. Wang Lin replied: “I was doing homework earlier, just saw this. Have you eaten? I’m about to eat.”

Mu Fan sent back a picture. The main subject was a dining table with delicate dishes, suggesting she was at a restaurant. Wang Lin was sharp-eyed and saw a hand at the top of the picture, the furthest point from the camera.

“Someone is with you?” she asked.

Mu Fan replied: “A colleague.”

She asked again: “Male or female?”

“Female.”

“Is she pretty?” she continued to ask.

“Why are you asking that? She’s quite pretty.”

“Is she prettier than me?”

Mu Fan was helpless. Wang Lin seemed to especially love comparisons. In the game, she had already compared who was sweeter—her or the candied hawthorn—and who was cuter—her or the pets.

Truly a child. Mu Fan unconsciously smiled and replied: “You’re prettier.” Since it was the truth, she satisfied her little vanity.

The colleague across from her saw her smiling happily and asked, “Chatting with your boyfriend? You look so happy.”

“No,” Mu Fan waved her hand repeatedly. “Not a boyfriend, it’s a junior.”

/

After dinner, Mu Fan returned to her hotel room and received a message from Wang Lin. She sent a screenshot from the game, followed by a text message: “I’m playing by myself.” It was unclear if she was pouting or asserting her independence.

Mu Fan replied: “Don’t stay up too late and neglect your studies.”

“Okay~”

So they each went about their own business. At eleven o’clock, Wang Lin lay down in bed, sent Mu Fan a goodnight message, and after receiving a similar reply from Mu Fan, she grabbed her teddy bear, closed her eyes, imagined it was Mu Fan, and slept soundly.

/

On Monday morning, when Wang Lin woke up, the poor teddy bear had somehow fallen to the floor. Wang Lin rubbed her eyes, pawed at the empty space with her hand, then let it drop weakly onto the pillow.

She was alone in bed. Realizing this, Wang Lin felt an emptiness in her heart. The first morning Mu Fan is gone, and I miss her.

She sat up, tousled her messy hair, grabbed her phone, and checked for messages from Mu Fan. The message interface was completely clean. She sent a “Good morning,” then went to the home screen, entered her contacts, found Mu Fan’s number, and dialed.

After the “Du-du-du” sound rang for a while, the call connected.

“Hello.” It was the familiar, pleasant voice. “Why are you calling me so early?”

Wang Lin held the phone, sounding a little unhappy: “Can’t I?”

On the other side, the hotel room table was covered with a pile of documents that Mu Fan was organizing.

“Of course you can. Have you eaten breakfast yet?”

“Not yet, I will in a moment. How about you?”

“I’ve eaten.”

“Then what are you doing now?”

“Organizing documents for a meeting preparation.”

Sensing that Mu Fan was busy, Wang Lin didn’t want to disturb her and softly said, “Oh, then you get back to work. I’m hanging up.”

“Wang Lin.” Mu Fan stopped her. “Is something the matter?”

“Nothing.” Wang Lin stammered, her voice gradually softening. “I just miss you.”

Mu Fan on the other end was silent for a few seconds, then asked flatly: “Why do you miss me?”

Wang Lin didn’t know how to answer. She could only say, “I just miss you! Alright, I’m hanging up now, you get busy.” She hung up the phone after speaking.

Mu Fan slowly put down her phone, her face unreadable, and continued her work. She had asked that deliberately.

Who asks someone, ‘Why do you miss me?’ when they say they miss you? Wang Lin angrily tossed her phone aside. After dressing, washing up, and eating, she went downstairs, drove to school.

Because of the morning’s call with Mu Fan, her mood was low all day. When she returned to her accommodation in the evening, Mu Fan hadn’t contacted her, and she resisted the urge to contact Mu Fan. She went into the game alone, played listlessly to pass the time, and fell asleep as soon as she went to bed.

The first day Mu Fan is gone, and I’m unhappy.

/

The next day, Mu Fan still didn’t contact her, and there was no message all day. She kept checking her phone during class and was even called out by the teacher. In a huff, she still didn’t contact Mu Fan. By evening, she lay dispiritedly in bed with her phone. QQ reminded her that she hadn’t exchanged messages with Mu Fan today, and their ‘spark’ was about to disappear. She wavered, typed “Hello” into the input box, then deleted it. Typed “What are you doing?”, deleted it. Typed “Are you asleep?”, “Is work going well?”… In the end, she deleted everything.

She stared at the time on her phone until after midnight. Her eyes were stinging. She turned off her phone, wrapped herself in the quilt. After staying up so late, she should have been very sleepy and fallen asleep quickly. However, tonight, despite her usually regular sleep schedule, she suffered from insomnia.

Maybe she’s just too busy, but she quickly dismissed that. No matter how busy, she shouldn’t have failed to send a single message.

Her thoughts were chaotic, and she started overthinking:

Maybe I was just imagining things, unrequited love.

It’s normal for feelings to be unequal. Maybe Mu Fan’s feelings for me aren’t the same as mine for her.

We’re not a romantic couple; why do we need to contact each other every day?

A truly good relationship doesn’t need daily contact; it’s light as water.

What is Mu Fan doing while I can’t sleep here? Maybe she’s sleeping peacefully.

This isn’t fair.

Why?

…

The more she thought, the more distressed she felt, concluding that she liked Mu Fan so much, but Mu Fan might not necessarily like her back. Tears fell uncontrollably, quickly wetting a corner of her pillow. But…

But the night before last, Mu Fan said she liked me.

Was she lying to me?

She remembered every moment with Mu Fan, remembering Mu Fan’s actions, words, expressions, her indulgence and spoiling, the gentle treatment that made her increasingly reckless. She tried to console herself again: Mu Fan does like me.

Suddenly, she remembered something Yu Sheng had said to Mu Fan on their first meeting at the hot pot restaurant: You’re still the same, still like taking care of people.

Like someone jolted awake from an illusion, she realized the crux of what she found difficult to accept.

Mu Fan was just used to being kind to people. If it were someone else, she would treat them the same way she treated her. So, what did everything Mu Fan did mean? It turned out to be just very cheap, mass-produced… and she, foolishly, had taken it seriously.

She felt utterly wronged, more wronged than she had ever felt in her life. She cried all night, filling the trash can with tissues, and finally drifted off to sleep unconsciously when she was exhausted from crying.

At 2 a.m. in K City, Mu Fan was rapidly typing on her keyboard in front of her computer. She paused, picked up the coffee beside her and took a sip. Her fair, slender fingers rubbed her temples and eyes, then she grabbed the phone next to the mouse, lit up the screen, and unlocked it.

The screen after unlocking showed her chat interface with Wang Lin. From yesterday until now, Wang Lin hadn’t contacted her. The ‘spark’ was gone.

Disappointed, yet relieved.

It’s good that it’s ending calmly this way.

Wang Lin was a clingy, dependent person. She wasn’t clingy to her specifically, or dependent on her specifically. Without her, Wang Lin would find someone else to rely on. She would find a suitable, gentle, caring, safe, and reliable boyfriend from a similar background. And she, Mu Fan, had merely played the role of a gentle older sister in Wang Lin’s life for a period of time.

She put down her phone and continued typing on the keyboard.