Chapter 163: If I Were a Cockroach, Would You Still Love Me?
Peiya let out a small huff. “Just one day. Don’t think too much.”
“I’m not overthinking. The one overthinking is you,” Elise said.
She looked at Peiya and noticed that her ears were already completely red. She was clearly at her limit. Just a little push, and she would melt like she did last night.
Right now, she was just holding on.
“I’m not! Hurry up, you… you lie down.”
Peiya nervously pushed Elise down. She remembered this was called a lap pillow, but since she had never done this for someone else before, she looked very clumsy, awkwardly adjusting her clothes.
Her heart was beating fast. Luckily, Elise cooperated and lay down with her head on Peiya’s lap, feeling a strange restless warmth.
“Mm, it’s quite soft.”
“Don’t comment on it!”
Peiya took a deep breath. She could feel Elise’s hair brushing under her skirt, smooth like wet jade. It made her nervous, but after a few deep breaths, she managed to calm down.
The real problem was Elise, she clearly had no intention of lying still.
“If you like me, would you say you love me?” Elise asked.
“No. Don’t dream about it,” Peiya said, biting her lip. “I just thought you worked hard all week, so I wanted to reward you a little. How did that turn into something so weird?”
For some reason, she felt Elise was doing this on purpose. And there was someone else here too. Although Yuni in the front hadn’t turned around, Peiya knew she could hear everything.
“I didn’t twist anything. You said it yourself. If I’m going to enjoy it, I’ll enjoy the full experience.”
Elise pinched lightly at Peiya’s stockings, watching the small reactions in her body with satisfaction.
Wow… she’s not even pretending anymore?
“By the way, now that we’re going back, should we tell the others?” Peiya asked while tying a ribbon at the end of Elise’s hair. The fine golden strands slipped through her fingers, and it actually made her feel a bit happier.
“Tell them what? Are you in such a hurry to show off?” Elise replied.
“Of course not. I just think it’s less awkward to say it first than to let them figure it out.”
“So you admit our relationship?”
“No. Aren’t we still just friends?”
“Female friends are still friends, right?” Elise smiled, a bit amused. She felt like Peiya might want to keep things going like this for a long time.
But maybe that was just Peiya’s personality.
Elise shifted closer, resting her face against Peiya’s stomach. It was warm and comfortable.
Seriously… even when given the chance, she doesn’t know how to use it.
“What are you doing?”
“What, can’t I?”
……………………
Since coming back home this time, Elise had been saying more and more bold things. Now that they both understood each other’s feelings, she spoke much more freely, almost as if Yuni wasn’t even there.
Yuni felt like crying.
She appreciated that the two young ladies didn’t treat her as an outsider… though honestly, they didn’t really treat her as a person either.
The carriage moved steadily along, gently rocking. Before long, Peiya fell asleep again. Elise got up, placed a piece of clothing over her shoulders, and then spoke to Yuni in front:
“You didn’t hear anything just now, right?”
Yuni suddenly felt her heart jump to her throat. She had grown up with the young lady and had always been her companion. Surely the young lady wouldn’t get rid of her now that she was no longer useful… right?
But hearing the tone of Elise’s voice, Yuni couldn’t help but feel nervous. She even wished that when she woke up, all of this would turn out to be just a dream.
However, when she opened her eyes, she realized everything was real. This was not a dream at all.
“Young Miss, I don’t know anything,” Yuni said quickly.
“It’s fine. I know you heard everything. When we get back, tell the other maids too. From now on, she is also the lady of the house. Whatever treatment I get, she should get the same.”
“Understood.”
The maids nodded quickly like pecking chickens. When had they ever dared to neglect Miss Peiya? They were more afraid of living too long than offending her.
In fact, they had already been serving Peiya with the same standards as the young lady. So when they were questioned, they could only complain helplessly.
Luckily, Elise didn’t keep pressing the matter. It wasn’t until they got off the carriage that she gently tapped Peiya awake.
“Wake up, we’re home.”
“We’re home?”
Peiya didn’t even know when she had fallen asleep. She fixed her clothes and got off the carriage. As she stepped back into the familiar streets, her feelings were completely different from before.
She felt like she had changed, from an innocent girl into… something else.
Before, she really didn’t understand anything. But Elise had been teaching her all kinds of strange things, even showing her directly. It felt like Columbus discovering a new continent.
These kinds of “knowledge” were strange… but she still wanted to look again.
“Where did you even learn all this weird stuff? It feels like you’ve changed,” Peiya said.
“Didn’t you give it to me? I found a book by the bed.”
“What? Show me.”
Peiya looked confused. When had she ever given Elise a book? Even she didn’t know.
When Elise took out the book from her bag, Peiya was shocked. The cover looked very old and classic, like some secret martial arts manual hidden at the bottom of a bookshelf by older generations.
Just looking at the cover, Peiya could almost imagine Elizabeth smiling knowingly behind it.
It felt like someone’s plan had succeeded.
There’s a traitor among us!
“That definitely wasn’t from me. If I had that book with me, do you think I would have been so awkward last night? Someone clearly set me up.”
Elise thought about it and felt that might actually be true. After all, her mother did seem like the kind of person who would do something like that.
“Then forget it. Let’s just destroy the book. Keeping it is useless, and you don’t even like it.”
“Well… we don’t have to destroy it. I think we can study it… in a critical way.” Peiya nodded seriously. “Knowledge has no borders. We must respect the value of knowledge.”
Elise’s eyelids twitched. She thought, If you want it, just say it.
Why make it sound so formal?
“Alright, alright, ‘critical study,’ I get it. Just don’t let me catch you making strange noises in your room next time.”
“Stop slandering me. I’m a sigma woman. Woman, you don’t attract me at all.”
Peiya put on a very serious face, as if she really meant it.
“Oh really? Then help me remember, who was the one begging yesterday, and then clinging to me when I wanted to sleep? Not going to answer?”
“……”
Talking is fine, but bringing up the past like that is too much.
“Hmph, that was the old me. Now I’ve closed off my heart.”
Peiya put the book away. As she stepped back into this familiar home, she immediately felt something was different. It seemed like the place had been redecorated.
After going inside, she realized it really had changed a lot. Elise had moved the lawn and planted a row of flowers.
She quickly walked over to the Xiangfran flowers she got from the old lady last time. Between their small handprints, she saw a tiny sprout breaking through the soil.
The sprout was very small, but it was reaching toward the sunlight, trying hard to grow.