In This Lifetime

17. Just a Friend

Mama slowly turned her head towards me with the end of the broom following her movements. "Chen Xiaofan, what does Lin mean by your boyfriend?" Mama urged.

I gulped. "Friend! He's just a friend that's a boy." I rushed out nervously. For now, it'll be best to just avoid any casualties. As Lianlian said, it's been a while since we've all been together. I shouldn't be the one to ruin the mood.

Mama lowered her broom, but from the skeptical look on her face, I knew she didn't entirely believe me.

"Lihua!" I yelled noticing Lihua open the door to see what the commotion was. I rushed out and pulled her arm towards my family.

"This is my new friend Jiang Lihua, Jiang Liwei is her cousin," I said gesturing towards the confused Liwei spread across our tile bathroom floor. "They wanted to make sure I got here safety so they came with me," I said hoping to push aside any suspicions my family might have.

I nudged Lihua's backside urging her to say something.

"Hi?" Lihua waved awkwardly, not sure what was going on.

Baba grunted realizing nothing was out of the ordinary and headed back to check on the food. Mama reluctantly followed him still turning back every once and a while.

Once the two of them were out of sight I let out a breath I'd been holding in. Next, I started attacking Lin.

I was pounding on his arm and chest, "Chen Chonglin, do you have a death wish! What's wrong with you?!" I screamed frustrated.

He simply laughed trying to avoid my attacks. I let out a frustrated groan when I quickly lost the energy to hit him any further.

This was all Lin's fault. Why did he have to butt in and say Liwei was my boyfriend?

Oh gosh, Liwei!

I quickly turned around to see Liwei still spread out on the bathroom floor. I rushed towards him.

"Liwei, are you okay?" I asked worriedly. I grabbed his face and twisted it around to see if there were any injuries. There was a small scratch on his left cheek. I quickly examined the rest of his body to see if he was hurt anywhere else.

He slightly hissed when I grabbed his wrist. His right wrist had a slight bruise forming.

I looked at his wrist again worried. Was it broken? Would he need a cast? How would he work with an injured wrist? Gosh, why did Mama have to be so aggressive and beat him with a broom?

Suddenly I felt a hand caressing my cheek. I followed the hand to meet Liwei's soft gaze.

"Stop making that face. I'm fine." He whispered lightly smiling.

I frowned at him before bending his wrist a bit. He hissed again in pain causing my frown to deepen, "liar." He gave me a pained smile trying to reassure me everything was okay but that only made me more upset.

"Why'd you go out of the room?" I asked.

"Bathroom." He said tiredly. He probably still hasn't had any proper food or rest all day. I helped him up so we could hurry and apply medicine on before dinner.

"Where do you think you're going?" Yang said blocking the door preventing us from leaving the bathroom.

"Yang, can we talk later?" I desperately asked.

"Explain. Now." He stubbornly said crossing his arms over his chest waiting for an answer while glaring back and forth between the two of us.

"Xiaofan and I-" Liwei slipped his hand into mine.