Chapter 109: Chapter 109: Exchanging Surprises

’Crap,’ Xue Rui thought. ’This is bad.’

He’d been in such a hurry to leave that he’d brought it out with him.

As he walked out of the recording studio, Xue Rui didn’t hide the hair tie. He just gave Gu Muxue a calm smile, as if nothing was wrong.

He didn’t know if Gu Muxue had noticed it yet, and hiding it now would only make him look guilty.

"Come on, I’ll take you out to eat," Xue Rui said, tugging on the sleeve of Gu Muxue’s dress.

Gu Muxue just said, "Oh," her tone clearly unhappy as her eyes remained fixed on the black hair tie on Xue Rui’s wrist.

She desperately wanted to ask Xue Rui whose hair tie it was.

’But what right do I have to ask?’

’As his girlfriend?’

’But she’d never agreed to be with Xue Rui...’

’More importantly, Xue Rui hadn’t confessed his feelings to her even once in the last month.’

’She couldn’t say yes now even if she wanted to.’

She decided to wait for Xue Rui to explain it himself.

As the two of them walked out, a driver got out of an Audi parked at the entrance and opened the rear door.

Xue Rui found the man somewhat familiar. It turned out he was Gu Muxue’s personal driver.

"Thanks." He didn’t stand on ceremony and got right in.

Gu Muxue hesitated awkwardly. Then, to the surprise of both Xue Rui and the driver, she walked around to the front passenger seat.

Xue Rui understood then. It was definitely because of the hair tie.

’But rushing to explain now would just make me look guilty.’

"Let’s go to that hot pot place on Jiefang Road," Xue Rui suggested.

"Oh," Gu Muxue replied coldly.

Xue Rui just smiled and said nothing.

’Is Gu Muxue jealous? Is she waiting for me to explain?’

They drove in silence until the car came to a smooth stop.

Xue Rui nodded to himself. Not only was the car high-end, but the Gu Family’s driver was also a true fucking professional. You could barely feel the car starting or stopping.

It was a world of difference from the car he’d taken that morning.

"Sir, would you like to join us for a bite?" Xue Rui asked.

"No, no, I’m fine." The driver waved his hand and was about to get out to open the door for Gu Muxue.

’What a little princess,’ Xue Rui thought. ’Is she too lazy to even open her own door?’

He motioned for the driver to stay put and walked around to the passenger side.

Xue Rui opened Gu Muxue’s door, shielding the top of her head with his hand. "Time to get out, little princess."

The corner of Gu Muxue’s mouth twitched, but she quickly pressed her lips together again.

Xue Rui was all smiles. ’This girl is so easy to please,’ he thought. ’Is she already smiling again?’

Like a eunuch serving his master, Xue Rui held out his hand, gesturing for Gu Muxue to place hers on top.

However, Gu Muxue just pouted and slapped his hand away.

This was the first time Xue Rui had eaten out with Gu Muxue.

They often ate together in the cafeteria, though. He wasn’t sure if their tastes had always been similar, or if they’d just grown alike after eating together for so long.

They both loved spicy food.

So, Xue Rui had chosen a Chongqing hot pot restaurant.

The restaurant was decorated with all sorts of chili peppers. Although autumn had already begun, the air conditioning inside was still turned way down.

This made sense, since spicy food always made people hot and sweaty, and there were always customers asking to make it colder.

No one came to a place like this if they couldn’t handle spice; the decor alone would have scared them off.

"What kind of soup base would you two like?"

"Let’s go with mild," Xue Rui suggested.

Gu Muxue nodded. She had never been to this restaurant before, so she’d just go with Xue Rui’s choice.

Xue Rui smiled and handed the menu, which had many items checked off, back to the waitress.

’If this were in the past, he definitely would have ordered the extra spicy without hesitation.’

’But spicy on the way in and spicy on the way out was never a good thing.’

’A moment of bliss for the mouth, but a funeral for your stomach.’

Soon, the soup base and the other dishes arrived.

All the while, Gu Muxue’s eyes kept darting to Xue Rui’s wrist, her hint anything but subtle.

Her beautiful, almond-shaped eyes twinkled, as if they were trying to speak.

Xue Rui could read them clearly: ’Hurry up and explain!’

The more she acted like this, the less hurried Xue Rui felt.

’It was just a hair tie. Finding a suitable excuse to brush it off wouldn’t be hard.’

’The important thing was how to make Gu Muxue forget about it completely.’

Suddenly, Xue Rui’s phone rang.

But the instant it rang, Xue Rui hit the mute button.

"Muxue, you start eating. I’m going to the restroom."

Xue Rui clutched his stomach and hurried toward the back of the restaurant.

Gu Muxue’s chopsticks froze mid-air. ’Xue Rui hadn’t eaten a thing, and now he suddenly had a stomachache and needed the restroom?’

’Her hearing was sharp; she’d heard Xue Rui’s phone ring a moment ago.’

’Going to the restroom at this exact moment?’

’She recalled how secretive Xue Rui had been on the phone in the car, saying something about "contacting by text." Who had he been talking to?’

’The questions piling up in her mind made her chest feel tight, and the pent-up feeling was unbearable.’

Gu Muxue decided that when Xue Rui came back from the restroom, she would ask him directly, whether he explained himself or not.

Xue Rui went to the back of the restaurant and asked a waitress, "Where’s your back door?"

"The back door?" The waitress was busy clearing a table and casually pointed toward a corridor at the back.

"Do me a favor and take good care of the girl at table three. Don’t let her leave."

Xue Rui slipped the waitress a fifty-yuan bill and whispered, "For your trouble."

The waitress’s face lit up with a pleasant surprise. "Mission accepted!"

Xue Rui sighed as he walked out of the restaurant. ’The pocket money his grandmother had just given him was almost all gone in a single day.’

’Hmm... I’ll have to make sure Gu Muxue pays the bill later.’

While on the road, Xue Rui remembered that Gu Muxue’s birthday was tomorrow.

’Since they were already out together today, he might as well celebrate it with her now and use the opportunity to gloss over the whole hair tie issue.’

He had contacted a bakery while on the way and placed a rush order for a cake.

The call just now had been from the bakery. He was going to pick it up now.

Gu Muxue sat blankly in front of the hot pot. Her family didn’t eat spicy food, so she had actually been very happy when Xue Rui brought her to a Chongqing hot pot restaurant.

But... Xue Rui had run off.

She looked at her watch. Twenty minutes had passed, and Xue Rui still hadn’t returned.

"Hello, would you like more soup base?"

Having been tipped by Xue Rui, the waitress was being especially attentive to Gu Muxue.

Gu Muxue was about to say yes, intending to wait for Xue Rui to come back so they could continue eating.

But then her phone buzzed with a text from Xue Rui: *Sorry Muxue, I left the gas on at home. I had to go.*

"No more... thank you." Gu Muxue couldn’t hold it in any longer as tears streamed from the corners of her eyes.

’She had waited for so long, only for Xue Rui to run off with such a flimsy excuse.’

"Maybe... some other girl is more important than me," Gu Muxue began to sob.

’Connecting all of Xue Rui’s strange behavior today, she concluded that another girl must have called him just now, and that’s why he abandoned her and left.’

The waitress could see that the boy who had tipped her and this beautiful girl were a couple.

She wanted to explain to Gu Muxue that it wasn’t what she thought, but out of the corner of her eye, she saw the boy returning through the back door, carrying a cake and a little brown teddy bear.

Xue Rui winked at the waitress, signaling her to keep quiet. 𝓯𝙧𝙚𝒆𝙬𝙚𝒃𝙣𝙤𝒗𝓮𝓵.𝙘𝙤𝙢

Xue Rui brought the teddy bear close to Gu Muxue and said in a deep, muffled voice:

"Why is the little princess crying? Which bastard made you angry?"

Gu Muxue stiffened. She slowly turned her head and saw Xue Rui peeking out from behind the teddy bear.

"You bastard!"

Gu Muxue’s eyes were filled with tears, her voice trembling.

However, Xue Rui then produced a cake with his other hand. "Muxue, happy birthday."

Gu Muxue’s heart was being pulled in every direction. One moment, it was an icy mountain; the next, a sea of fire.

Now she was both angry and happy.

Gradually, the feeling of being touched won out.

Xue Rui put down the things in his hands and walked behind Gu Muxue.

He gathered her hair from the sides of her face and gently tied it back with the hair tie from his wrist.

"I asked you out for hot pot today, and I was afraid your hair would stick to your face from the heat, so I brought a hair tie," Xue Rui explained softly.

"Mmm," Gu Muxue murmured, her breathing gradually steadying.

Looking at the teddy bear beside her and the cake on the table, she started connecting the dots.

’The phone call from earlier was most likely from the bakery. All of Xue Rui’s strange behavior today had actually been for her sake.’

"But my birthday is tomorrow," Gu Muxue said, wiping her tears.

As he fixed her hair from behind, Xue Rui said lightly, "Of course I know that. But doesn’t school start tomorrow? I wanted us to celebrate it early, just the two of us."

The waitress glanced over, full of envy. ’This boy is so thoughtful,’ she thought.

She was so touched that she went to the kitchen and called out, "A customer is celebrating a birthday! Make a bowl of longevity noodles."

A smile slowly spread across Gu Muxue’s lips. She tilted her head back, resting it against Xue Rui.

At the same time, she took a card from her purse and secretly slipped it into Xue Rui’s pants pocket.

Xue Rui didn’t notice what she’d done; he only knew that Gu Muxue was very happy right now.

’If they weren’t in a public place, Gu Muxue would probably throw her arms around him and give him a kiss.’

’Women are creatures of emotion. Emotion trumps everything.’

’It’s like knowing that buying a new handbag means going hungry next month, but emotion still triumphs over reason. The joy of that unboxing moment is more important than anything else.’

’They only care about how they feel in the present moment. It doesn’t matter if the world comes crashing down the next; that’s a problem for later.’

’So, no matter what he had done before, as long as he could stir Gu Muxue’s emotions at the last moment, everything would be fine.’

’So much for the hair tie incident,’ Xue Rui muttered to himself.

’Besides, all black hair ties look the same. Even if Gu Muxue wore it every day, Lin Ruoxi would never recognize it.’

’And even if she did, it wouldn’t matter. That girl, Lin Ruoxi, was too easy to handle. To be precise, she didn’t need handling at all.’

’As long as Xue Rui offered an explanation, Lin Ruoxi would believe him unconditionally, even if it didn’t make sense.’

A smile played at the corners of Gu Muxue’s eyes. She knew Xue Rui was developing a mobile game and had recently seen him with a notebook, constantly doing calculations.

She knew Xue Rui was short on money.

Her main reason for meeting him today was to give him a bank card, but since he had surprised her, she wanted to give him a surprise in return.

So, she had slipped the bank card containing her saved-up New Year’s money into his pocket, planning to tell him about it after he got home.

Gu Muxue was overjoyed, her small hands fiddling with the fabric of her dress.

"Hm?"

She suddenly felt something tangled around her fingers.

Looking down, she saw a few long, black strands of hair.

’Where did this hair come from? Did it come from Xue Rui’s pocket just now?’

’Why would a girl’s hair be in Xue Rui’s pocket?’

"What’s wrong?" Xue Rui asked curiously.

"Nothing," Gu Muxue said, shaking her head. She felt she was overthinking things.

’There were so many women in Xue Rui’s family; it probably just got on his clothes by accident.’

’She felt she shouldn’t doubt Xue Rui. He had planned a surprise for her today, and yet she had been the one to get angry and cry.’

Gu Muxue casually wrapped the hair in a tissue. After looking around and not finding a trash can, she simply stuffed it into her purse.

"Thank you," Gu Muxue said, giving Xue Rui a sweet smile.