促銷資訊載入中...
He Said Brown Sugar Milk Tea Was Brotherhood; I Believed Five Years
NovelShort
已完結
The night Xavier threw a birthday party for me, he invited his female buddy, Frances Summers. The private room was loud with celebration. Until I pushed the door open. What I saw was a room full of st...
章節（4）
第1章
The night Xavier Harding threw me a birthday party, he invited his "just a buddy," Frances Summers.
The private room was loud, too loud.
Then I pushed the door open.
What I saw was a room full of strangers, his friends and hers.
The cake already cut open, hacked down to a shape you couldn't name.
The two stools pushed right up against each other, his and hers.
"Why are you so late? You made everyone wait on you."
No welcome for me, no explanation, just his cold face and the reprimand behind it.
"Come on, Lauren Rockwell didn't mean it. Sit next to me. I'm worried if Xavier drinks too much later, you won't know how to take care of him."
Xavier saw nothing wrong with any of it. He reached over, picked up the milk tea in front of Frances, and took a sip like it was his.
"Still brown sugar."
Frances's mouth curved into a smile.
"Right? None of these people get us. No taste at all. Brown sugar milk tea is the best there is."
I took out my phone and canceled the plane ticket for three days from now, the one Xavier was supposed to take to my parents' house.
If you love her milk tea that much, then fine. You're hers now.
1
"Huh, after all these years you two are still this cozy. Even your taste in drinks matches."
Their friends started ribbing them, one after another.
Frances's cheeks flushed pink.
As if she were the little girlfriend being teased in front of everyone.
"Oh, stop it, you guys, little Lauren's still right here."
"Lauren, don't read too much into it. We've all been like this for years, we're used to it."
Frances laid her hand on my arm.
I pulled my arm free and gave a cold "Mm."
Frances looked a little awkward, her brows knitting, her voice edging into hurt.
"See? Now I've made little Lauren misunderstand. Look how unhappy she is."
The whole room went quiet for a few seconds. Then Xavier spoke.
"What's with the face at Frances? You show up late, you make everyone wait, and then you act like this. Where are your manners?"
I didn't answer.
He hadn't looked.
Hadn't looked at my messages.
I'd texted him early that it was pouring and I was stuck in traffic.
He hadn't cared about the rain soaking my hem, and he hadn't cared about my messages.
"Okay, okay, Xavier, Lauren's still a little girl, she's not like me. I'm around you every day, I've practically turned into one of the guys."
Frances stepping in to smooth it over made my stomach turn.
"Come on, everyone, let's play a game."
Frances suggested it with a forced little smile, as if, after suffering some enormous wrong, she was still the one covering for me.
"Such a pain."
Xavier's words were short, but I knew exactly who he meant.
Everyone in the room wore the same look, half contempt, half enjoying the show.
As if to say that this was all the standing I had in Xavier's heart.
Frances chose truth or dare.
The first spin of the bottle in her hand landed on herself.
She chose truth.
"What's the raciest gift you've ever given?"
Frances looked at Xavier, blushing.
"Does giving Xavier underwear count?"
Gasps went up around the room.
"What's the big deal? There's nothing about each other Xavier and I haven't seen. It's just a pair of underwear. Right, Xavier?"
And with that Frances threw an arm around Xavier's shoulders.
Xavier only laughed and bumped his fist against hers.
I clenched a fistful of my skirt. In that moment, I was the outsider.
Second round, the bottle turned to me.
"Lauren, you picked truth last time, so this round you have to pick dare. I'll go easy on you, just do a plank."
I could hear the mockery in it. It was Frances all over.
I froze for a while, resisting it.
Little by little, when they saw I still hadn't moved, the room started to sour.
"Lauren, what are you killing the mood for now? It's just a plank, you can't even do that? Besides, you're pretty flat as a board yourself."
Xavier's words hit right where it hurt. He knew exactly what that surgery had done to me, the shame it left behind.
"That flat, huh, Xavier? Her figure's even worse than you made it sound."
Laughter went around the room.
"Oh, I'm sorry, little Lauren, I wasn't thinking. It's my fault. Never mind, never mind, let's stop playing, don't be upset."
I opened my mouth, and before I could get a word out.
Xavier suddenly stood up.
第2章
"This is boring. I'm done. Let's all head back to my place."
Not once did Xavier look my way.
Everyone else looked at me like I was the clown of the night.
"Lauren, everyone came out tonight to celebrate your birthday, so cleaning up and settling the bill are on you. I'll take everyone home first. Once you've handled it, grab a cab and come back."
As he spoke, Xavier smoothly took the coat and phone Frances handed him.
"Thanks for the trouble, Lauren. We'll be waiting for you at home."
The smugness at the corner of Frances's mouth made it sound like the place was hers.
Then again, over all these years, Frances had crashed at our home more times than I could count, eaten the breakfasts he made, slept under his blankets, worn his slippers.
She'd never needed my permission for any of it.
The others drifted out one by one, until it was just me, staring at the wreckage across the table.
The Happy Birthday on the wall looked so glaring now.
I still remembered my first birthday with him, the night Xavier confessed to me.
He'd secretly rounded up my two or three closest friends to celebrate, and he'd said that every birthday from then on, he'd be there.
He'd changed too much.
Five years ago, when I caught a cold, he'd thrown on a thin jacket in the dead of winter and spent his last hundred dollars on a cab across half the city just to bring me medicine.
When I had the mastectomy for breast cancer, he'd dug up story after story of women who'd been through it to comfort me, and he'd told me he'd love me no matter what.
In the middle of building his startup, pulling all-nighter after all-nighter, he'd carve out a sliver of his rest to make me breakfast, boil water for my footbath, dry my hair...
It hurt me to watch how much he gave, so I quietly reached out to my parents for the funding that got his startup off the ground.
But all of it came to an abrupt end when Frances came back from two years of studying abroad, and our life stopped being just the two of us.
I knew that even during those two years when it was only him and me, the two of them had still texted every single day.
Back then he told me it was purely a friendship, and he hoped I'd understand. So I did. I let it go.
By the third year, he was late for everything, addicted to it, always with a thousand reasons.
Like the heavy rain, so he had to drive Frances home.
Like Frances moving apartments, so he had to go help.
Like Frances getting laid off, so he had to go drink with her.
He always said she was a good buddy, that loyalty meant standing by her. But that loyalty he kept talking about was never once spent on me.
By the time I got back, two hours had passed. Everyone else was gone. Only Frances was still there.
She was still in Xavier's shirt and slippers.
"Why so slow? You did that on purpose, didn't you."
I didn't have much feeling left in me. I just hung my rain-soaked coat over the back of a chair.
"It was raining."
Frances stood up.
"I'll head out for tonight, then. Xavier, go make it up to Lauren."
Xavier's brow creased slightly.
"It's so late, it isn't safe for you to go home alone. Let me drive you."
Frances waved him off, playing at breezy and carefree.
"Drive me where? I'm not that delicate. I'm keeping the clothes, by the way."
As Frances passed me on her way out, the smugness at her mouth was impossible to hide.
The moment the room went quiet again, Xavier let out a long breath.
"Lauren, can you stop getting jealous over nothing? I don't want to say anything harsh to you, but the scene you made tonight puts me in a real bind. Do you know how embarrassing that is?"
Xavier rubbed the space between his brows, looking exhausted.
"Fine."
I won't get jealous over nothing anymore. I'd done it for almost five years. I was tired.
I quietly cleaned up and washed, then lay down in bed without a word.
I don't know how long it was before Xavier lay down behind me and wrapped an arm around my waist.
"All right, stop sulking. Don't you have that photo shoot tomorrow? Be good, tomorrow we'll..."
Before he could finish, a message alert cut him off.
第3章
When he saw the message light up his phone, he pulled his arm back from around me and sat up.
I didn't have to guess.
It was Frances.
"Glad you got home safe. Get some rest early. You caught a bit of rain today too, so take your medicine. Don't act like one of the boys and forget to look after yourself."
The voice message ended, and the room fell back into a dead silence.
He remembered to tell Frances to take her medicine. He couldn't remember that I, the one right beside him, had been caught in the same rain.
I didn't say anything, and somehow that unsettled Xavier.
"It's Frances. You know how it is—she lives alone, and I worry about her. She doesn't take care of herself."
I didn't react much.
"Mm."
Xavier ruffled my hair, taking it as proof that I just cared about him too much.
Early the next morning, Xavier packed the breakfast he'd made into a bag and hurried out the door.
An hour later, he came back with Frances.
"We're going to do a photo shoot, so I brought Frances along. She studied fashion design abroad. Maybe she can help you pick out something to wear."
Frances was still holding the leftover breakfast he'd made, the part he hadn't finished.
"Perfect timing, there's still some breakfast left. You eat it. She's got a big appetite, not like you—a little bit fills you up."
As he said it, Xavier tossed me the half sandwich left in Frances's hand.
I didn't eat it.
That afternoon, Xavier rolled down the car window and spoke to me where I stood at the curb.
"Frances gets carsick, so you sit in the back for now."
I said nothing. I wasn't upset.
I opened the back door and got in.
He'd probably forgotten. On our first trip together, I'd gotten so carsick I could barely stand it, and he'd run around for twenty minutes just to find me motion-sickness pills.
When the car speakers came on, Frances teased him easily.
"Oh, still using my playlist? All these years and you never get tired of it."
The corner of Xavier's mouth curved up.
"Habit."
By the time we reached the studio it was already afternoon. He bought three cups of brown sugar milk tea from next door.
When he held one out to me, I didn't take it.
"I'm allergic to brown sugar."
Only then did it dawn on Xavier.
"Sorry, Lauren, I forgot. Let me go buy you another one."
I shook my head.
"It's fine. I don't feel like it."
I wouldn't feel like it again, either.
Xavier frowned, as if I were the one being difficult.
He opened his mouth and didn't say anything.
When it came time to choose outfits, Xavier was on the other side while Frances followed me into the women's fitting area.
"I really can't tell if you're playing dumb or if you're actually dumb."
Frances's words were scornful, with a sneer under them.
"What are you trying to say."
I stopped walking and turned to look at her.
"You don't get it? Lauren, you don't actually think he's going to meet your parents in a few days because he wants to marry you, do you? You're just something he plays with to pass the time after I left."
I let the corner of my mouth lift and laughed lightly.
"Is that so? More than ten years, and you never even got to be something he plays with?"
My words turned Frances's face dark in an instant.
Frances grabbed a dress and pulled me out of the clothing section.
"Lauren, this one really is the best. It'll look amazing on you."
I was about to refuse when Xavier came over from behind.
"Listen to Frances. She's got a better eye than you."
But it wasn't until I'd changed into it that I understood.
The dress bared my scars plainly, and the curve where one cup sat empty—everything about it pointed straight at what I'd lost.
It looked absurd. Laughable.
When I stepped out of the fitting room, Frances let out a small snort of laughter, then quickly arranged her face into an apologetic look.
Seeing my cold expression, Xavier finally couldn't hold it in.
"Enough, drop the attitude. That's just your figure, it's not the dress's fault. Hurry up and shoot, before it gets crowded in here."
During the shoot, several of the shots caught that empty cup and the trace of my scars.
Xavier grew more and more impatient.
Then he said something that stirred the calm I'd held onto for so long.
第4章
"Enough. You just want the photos, right? Let Frances shoot in your place, and we'll edit them to look like you afterward. I'm busy."
Something in my chest twisted, and I couldn't say why.
I'd booked this shoot half a year in advance. Xavier knew how much I'd been looking forward to it.
I said nothing for a long moment.
"What's with the sour face? If your figure were even worth looking at, we wouldn't have to trouble Frances."
Frances slid her arm through Xavier's, feigning reluctance.
"Let it go. A girl like Lauren must have been dying to do a shoot like this. It was thoughtless of me. Don't be angry with her."
Xavier looked at me, brows drawn tight.
"Learn something from Frances. Don't be so precious."
Only then did I finally speak.
"Fine. The photos are yours."
And so am I—no more.
The next second, the ringtone of a video call sounded from Xavier's phone.
It was his mother.
"Xavier, your father says you've got a girlfriend now. Who is she?"
Xavier glanced at me, then instantly turned the camera toward Frances.
"So it's Frances. Here I was, worried. Day after tomorrow I'll come see you two."
The three of them chatted like one warm family.
And I, standing behind the phone screen, was a clown doing a one-person act.
I quietly changed out of the clothes and left the photo studio.
Xavier didn't so much as notice.
Back home, I packed a few things. For all these years, I'd told my parents again and again that he was responsible, that he had promise.
But in his eyes, I was someone who couldn't be shown to his parents.
Xavier came back at dusk.
He saw my packed luggage and simply took it as what we'd need for the trip to my parents' place the day after tomorrow.
"Lauren, are you upset?"
I zipped the suitcase shut and shook my head.
"Come on, you know how things stand for me right now. My parents are very traditional. They need time to adjust. When the chance comes, I'll tell them."
There it was again. When the chance comes.
Just to let his parents know I existed—in five years, I'd heard that line no fewer than ten times.
And yet Frances could be shown to his parents so easily.
"Be good. Day after tomorrow, go to the airport and wait for me first. Once I've handled things on my mom's end, I'll come find you at the airport, and we'll fly home together."
I stood and studied the man in front of me one last time.
When exactly had he changed—or had he always been like this.
Xavier saw me looking at him and thought I still cared too much, and pulled me into his arms.
Early on the third day, Xavier left to bring Frances to meet his mother.
And I dragged my suitcase out of the home where three people had lived for five years, the home I'd swallowed everything to keep.
As I walked into the airport, a new post appeared on Frances's feed.
"Mom Harding's cooking. The dishes he picked out for me."
I deleted her from my contacts and walked through security.
By the time Xavier reached the airport, he was already an hour past the time we'd agreed on.
The explanation he sent me was:
"Frances lives kind of far. I came over as soon as I dropped her off."
He circled the airport for a long while and never saw me, never got a word from me.
Worried he'd miss the flight, he headed to board—only to be stopped at the gate.
"Mr. Harding, according to our records, your ticket was canceled three days ago."
Xavier was about to message me to ask why when a red exclamation mark popped up on his screen.