You’re Beautiful When You Smile

Lu Sicheng coughed and sniffled as he spoke…...Tong Yao sat down on the edge of his bed to order take out on her phone. Lu Sicheng didn’t lie back down either, but leaned against the head of the bed and watched Tong Yao work on her phone over her shoulder. She kept clicking on her phone screen but didn’t really order anything. Finally, he had to ask: “What’s wrong?”

“All of these porridge places don’t sell plain porridge. The only one that has it doesn’t have good reviews.” Tong Yao put down her cell phone: “Never mind, I’ll cook porridge myself. I don’t really like the porridge from the stores anyway, who knows what they put in there.”

Lu Sicheng replied with another “oh.”

Tong Yao got up and rubbed her stomach. She picked up the blanket to pull over Lu Sicheng’s shoulders: “You sleep for a while, I’ll call you when it’s done.”

She bent down, her face covered by shadow, and her short hair with a faint scent of shampoo brushed over Lu Sicheng’s nose tip. She seemed to notice and raised her hand to pull her hair behind her ears-- --

Half of her pale face was exposed under the dim light of the room. Her eyes were cast down, the eyelashes projected a small area of shadows under her eyes, and the contour of the side of her face was quite soft.

Lu Sicheng didn’t say anything, but his dark brown pupils turned even darker-- --He kept his silence as Tong Yao straightened herself after tucking him in under the blanket. Tong Yao turned to walk out of the room with the cup and medicine.

She stood at the doorway to get her slippers on while balancing the cup and medicine in her hands.

After putting on the slippers, she childishly stamped her feet a few times, then walked out of the room to go downstairs. Soon, the footsteps disappeared at the other end of the hallway.

……

Tong Yao went downstairs, put down the cup and medicine, and prepared to cook porridge. She bent over to get enough rice for two and when she stood up, she felt sore on her back and waist. She almost forgot about this other symptom she usually would suffer in addition to the stomach cramps.

Now she felt like she had been punched by someone and her health bar was almost empty!

“It hurts, hurts, hurts……”

Tong Yao used one hand to hold on to the counter and the other hand to cover her stomach. She bent over to calm the surging pain while mumbling all the curses she could think of. She tried to remember whether the medicine box had any pain killers and started to miss her bed…....

She saw through the corner of her eyes the inner pot of the rice cooker which was sitting on the floor. She stopped groaning and remembered that there was a sick person upstairs. She murmured: “There’s only the weak and the sick left in the base.” She released the hand which was rubbing her stomach to pick up the inner pot-- --

Not just Lu Sicheng, but she was also very hungry. They had been busy the whole morning and hadn’t even had lunch yet.

She set the pot with the rice in the sink. As she was about to turn on the faucet, she heard footsteps behind her. She turned to check and saw the man who was supposed to be lying in bed was walking over-- --

He was still wearing the team uniform, but had a jacket draped over his shoulders. He was walking slowly down the stairs.

“What’s going on? Did you forget something? Or do you want to drink some water? You can send me a WeChat message and I can bring it over to you……”

Lu Sicheng came to the kitchen and, under the gaze of a babbling Tong Yao, reached over Tong Yao’s shoulder to turn on the faucet of the sink.

Tong Yao: “?”

Lu Sicheng: “Step aside.”

Tong Yao: “? ? ?”

Tong Yao subconsciously moved away and watched the man take her position, who began to wash the rice. He proficiently swished the rice, poured out the water and repeated the process two more times. Then he poured in enough water to cook the porridge. He put the inner pot into the rice cooker, put the lid on, and turned it on-- --

The whole process was smoothly conducted.

Tong Yao could only watch with question marks plastered over her face.

“When Godzilla invades the earth, a woman shouldn’t touch cold water.” After he was done with the rice cooker, he took a look at her and coughed a couple of times, then used his hoarse voice to say: “Call me when it’s done. I’m going up now.”

After he spoke, he raised his big hand to pat Tong Yao’s head who was standing dumbfounded next to the counter. He turned around, walked by her without looking at her again, and went upstairs.