Oneshot Part 1

Hi guys, thanks for reading my translation. I decided to translate this short one as part of Foxaholic’s Summer Raffle event (bonus points for projects with foxes as MCs!) I personally find this story really cute and bittersweet, but as for the romance

Spoiler

MC & ML don’t have a romance line

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This translation has not been edited or proofread, so if anyone wants to help out, please DM me on Discord (Superbulat✨#9662)~~~

There’s a certain charm to the author’s writing in this oneshot. I hope I don’t butcher it T.T

Anyways, happy reading!

“Xiao Chun- ah , your cousin wants to go to town today. She asks if you want to go with her?” Grandma shouted at the door.

Chunjun turned over, grabbed her phone from beside the pillow, and looked at the time. It was only a little over seven in the morning. Do the people in the countryside not sleep in? Grandma had gotten up at five in the morning, and Second Cousin Sister had come to their house on a Vespa at six. She had heard these sounds clearly, and she knew that Cousin Sister and Grandma had waited for more than an hour before they had woken her up. It was as though they thought that waking up at seven was already considered late.

Grandma’s house was on the outskirts of the village, a two-story self-built house. Chunjun’s room was on the second floor. She looked out the window. The morning fog was about to dissipate, and there were blue-grey distant mountains among the layers of green.

Chunjun had just finished her college entrance examinations this year, and after filling out her college application, her mother had sent her back hometown. She originally had her vacation all planned: traveling to Hainan with her besties, attending a class reunion, joining a group trip with the graduating class… She would be missing out on a lot.

And among all these activities, what Chunjun minded the most was the sentence her deskmate had said when he learned that she was going back to her hometown, “Actually, there is something… um, it’s fine, I’ll tell you about it when you come back.” Chunjun was wondering, what did he want to say?

They had gone to school to fill in their college applications together that day. She and her deskmate had applied for different majors in the same college. After filling out the form, they were ready to go home. When her deskmate was talking to her, he was facing her with one hand resting on her desk and the other on the back of her chair, almost encircling her. What was she doing back then? She shrank in the tiny space surrounded by his arms, her heart fluttering like a cicada wing, as she pretended to pack her school bag with her head down.

*

Her grandfather had passed away a year ago. At that time, she was preparing for the college entrance examinations, so only her father had accompanied her mother back hometown for a week, and she was told to stay at home. Her grandma was currently living alone on the outskirts of the village. Before sending her here, her mother had repeatedly urged her, “Take the opportunity to spend more time with Grandma during this holiday. Besides that, your Big Cousin Sister’s child, Fulin, is in the second grade of elementary school this year. Fulin is a very naughty boy, so Chunjun, make sure to get him to complete his summer homework. Your Second Cousin Sister is going to have a wedding soon. Chunjun, remember to help out with the chores…”

Her mother was very busy with work and barely had time to go back to her hometown. But she was always talking about family, hometown, and her roots. While her mother was talking, Chunjun was thinking about how the electric fan in the classroom blew on her deskmate’s back when he talked to her. His school uniform puffed up, the upright and thin figure of the young man appeared, and the wind sent the scent of the softener to her.

Chunjun had arrived in the village the evening before yesterday. She had taken the high-speed train from X City for nearly six hours to a prefecture-level city, and then got off and took the bus. After sitting on the bus for two hours, her uncle-in-law had picked her up, and he had driven his small car for forty minutes around the mountains before they reached her grandma’s house on the outskirts of the village.

After a long journey, she was dead tired. Yesterday, she had almost fallen asleep in bed all day, and hadn’t gotten up until evening. After waking up, she had seen two WeChat messages from her deskmate. One had been sent in the morning: ‘What did you have for breakfast?’ And one at noon: ‘What did you eat for lunch?’

She and her grandmother had a simple dinner in the small courtyard. During the meal, her deskmate had sent a message: ‘Whatcha eating for dinner?’ Chunjun took a picture of Grandma’s stir fried garlic stems with Chinese sausage 1 and sent it over. The signal in the mountains was not good, and it had taken more than ten minutes for her picture to be sent. When it was finally posted, and after a long time, he replied: ‘Thank God. You ignored me for the whole day. I thought that something had happened to you.’

Before Chunjun could reply, she received a blurry photo from her deskmate with the caption: ‘I’m on the way to my granny’s house. Here’s a pic of a puppy by the roadside.’

When her mother was driving her to the train station in X City, they had a fight. Chunjun had asked if she could shorten the trip to her hometown, but her mother had said that she had to stay there for at least a month as her relatives missed her very much.

Chunjun retorted, “Then why aren’t you going back with me?”

Her mom said, “I have work to do. I can’t leave.”

“I also have something to do,” Chunjun replied. It was always like this. Her mother almost never went back hometown, but she had always asked Chunjun to go back.

She cried when she boarded the high-speed train. She felt that one month was far too long. She wanted to stay in the big city, to attend her class reunion, to go on her graduation trip, and to know exactly what her deskmate was going to tell her. She couldn’t wait for a moment longer.

When she reached her grandma’s house the evening before yesterday, only one light was on in the living room. The TV was showing the story about a person getting rich from raising pigs, and her grandma was waiting for her. Grandma had cooked a bowl of glutinous rice balls in brown sugar syrup 2 for her. Chunjun took a bite, and tears fell. The night in the countryside was quiet, and Grandma treated her very well, but she still missed the moon in the big city. When Grandma saw her crying, she stroked her hair and said, “Poor baby.”

Did Grandma know what she was upset about? She only cried because the rice balls burned her mouth, not because she wanted to go back to X City.

*

Footnotes

(Pic source https://home.meishichina.com/recipe-51900.html )

(Pic source https://www.xiachufang.com/recipe/100427794/ )