Chapter 6: Being "exposed" 2
I got up early on Sunday and planned to cook some porridge for Xiao Nuo. Just as I was busy in the kitchen, there was a hurried knock on the door.
"Who is it?" I asked loudly. When I got closer to the peephole, I saw four or five men in orange uniforms standing outside the door. The words "Perfect Home Decoration Company" were printed on the uniforms... Strange, why would the decorators come to my house?
"Excuse me, are you Miss Yuan Wan?" asked the man standing in the front with skin as dark as charcoal.
"Yes, I am Yuan Wan, and you are..."
Although I had doubts in my mind, I still opened the door a crack and looked at them. They were smiling at me one by one. Each of them was holding a tape measure, a blueprint or something in their hands. They didn't look like bad people.
"Oh, the water pipe downstairs burst. We were asked by our neighbors to come and take a look at the structure of your house," the leading black uncle explained patiently.
"Ah?" I was stunned and let them in.
The dark-skinned uncle stretched his neck to look inside the house, pointed at my room, and asked, "Is this your room? The water pipe downstairs is right below your room."
I nodded dumbly, and he yelled, "Brothers, go!"
A few uncles received the order and broke into my small room. They immediately took out their cameras and started taking pictures of every corner, even under my bed.
"Hey, you guys..." I hurriedly followed.
These people are really weird!
"withdraw!"
Just when I was puzzled, the black uncle shouted again, and the uncles who were taking pictures quickly left my house.
"Sorry to bother you." said the dark-skinned uncle, and ran away.
The house suddenly became empty, leaving me confused. I looked around anxiously and found that nothing was missing from the house. It was really puzzling...
I rubbed my dizzy head and went back to the kitchen to continue working hard.
The next day was Monday. After three days of snowing, the sky finally cleared up. The long-lost sunshine sprinkled on the white snow, making everything bright.
I walked to a nearby breakfast shop and found Zeng Chen already standing in line, but he had his back to me.
"Good morning." I walked up to him and poked his arm. He turned around, his face mostly covered by a blue mask. "Huh? Do you have a cold?"
"It's because of you that I got it." Zeng Chen looked helpless. He lowered his head and coughed a few times.
"I...I don't have that." I felt a little guilty.
Could it be that he was infected by me? After all, he was so close to me a few days ago, and stayed with me for such a long time to take my temperature. When I thought of the intimate scene of our foreheads touching, my heartbeat immediately accelerated.
I glanced at him worriedly and saw his red eyes and bloodshot eyeballs. It seemed that he had a bad cold.
"I'm just kidding. It has nothing to do with you." Zeng Chen seemed to see through my thoughts and asked with his head down, "What do you want to eat? Two-color toast and taro milk?"
“You guessed it right!”
I gave him a thumbs up. I don't know when we have such a tacit understanding. Zeng Chen glanced at me, as if he didn't want to pay attention to me, but there was a smile in his eyes.
After buying breakfast, he and I walked to school together. On the way, I saw classmates playing snowballs, and I suddenly got excited. I grabbed the snow on the ground, rolled it into a small ball, and threw it at his back provocatively. The snowball broke on his schoolbag and fell off.
He stopped, turned around and looked at me with disdain: "Childish."
Then Zeng Chen turned around and continued walking forward. It seemed that he didn't like playing snowball fights.
Oh, how boring.
I followed him dejectedly, but I didn't expect that when I got next to him, he suddenly came behind me and covered my neck with his cold hands.
"Ahhh! Help!" I was so cold that I jumped up and down. I finally pried his hands apart. "You are the childish one!"
When I wanted to fight back, he had already run ahead. Seeing that I couldn't catch up with him for the time being, he even turned around to make fun of me.
"My legs are too short to reach it." After saying that, Zeng Chen hooked down the mask with his index finger and made a big face at me.
"Childish!" I yelled at him angrily and threw a snowball at him. "Look at my ranged attack!"
He and I laughed and played along the way as if no one was around, enjoying the gentle winter sunshine. Looking at his eyes curved in a rare smile, my mood was as good as the weather today.
Before we knew it, we were almost at the school gate, but when the classmates passing by saw me, they turned around and pointed at me.
Strange, did I not wash my face clean and there is toothpaste residue in the corners of my mouth?
"Isn't she Yuan Wan? How dare she show up in school?"
“You are so shameless.”
"Relying on his good looks, he first snatched Lin Tong away, and now he's pestering Zeng Chen. Don't be too greedy."
…
The girls standing only two or three meters away from me on my left side underestimated the volume of their voices , and their conversation reached my ears.
However, I didn’t seem to understand what they were saying. I have always kept a low profile in school and it seems that I haven’t done anything to offend anyone.
"Let's go, ignore those people." Zeng Chen's face also darkened. He pulled my sleeve and urged me to speed up.
I continued walking depressed, but when I reached the campus path, I was stunned when I saw the densely packed posters on the bulletin board.
Why are my pictures on all the posters? And...what are those eye-catching titles?
There was a poster among them, and the picture attached was a photo of me rolling my eyes, which was secretly taken at some unknown time. The words "I am just magical and soft" were pasted on the photo, making me into an emoticon package.
Countless ugly photos of me were lined up along the campus road, and hot slogans such as “No need to guess anymore! Magical Ruanruan is in Qingda” and “Yuan Wan from the Art Department is Magical Ruanruan” could be seen everywhere.
"What's going on?" Zeng Chen looked around blankly.
"I don't know either." I shook my head blankly, frightened by the situation. I felt like my brain was a mess and I couldn't figure it out.
Suddenly, colorful balloons appeared from nowhere and rushed to the center of the school road. Then they exploded one after another in the crowd, and the large number of leaflets hidden in the balloons scattered all over the ground.
I lowered my head and saw the shocking red words on the flyer:
"The popular anchor of Qingning TV faked the live broadcast and deceived the ignorant netizens" "Magic Soft Played with the netizens to reproduce the 'honey trap'" "Yuan Wan under the mask, today is the day of suffering"...
More and more people gathered around me, looking at me as if I were a monkey in a zoo. They took out their phones and took a lot of photos of me. The flash brought me back to my senses.
“Stop filming!” I raised my hands to cover my face and yelled in disgust.
Zeng Chen took out a new mask from his backpack and helped me put it on.
"Let's go." He took my hand and led me away through the crowd of onlookers.
