“Exactly. We will do our best to take care of him,” Auntie Lan answered.
With their promise, Huo Yunshen left relieved.
In the afternoon, Jing Xi stayed inside with the little prince and read stories for him.
Auntie Lan brought him two boxes of toys from the palace.
However, Little Grape wasn’t interested in any of them. He only wanted to listen to Auntie Xiaoxi’s stories.
“Your Highness, you’ve had a dozen stories so far! We should give Autie Xiaoxi a break,” Auntie Lan came and reminded him.
Little Grape then realized he’d already had quite a few stories, and Auntie Xiaoxi had been talking for a long while.
He was very reasonable and considerate. “Auntie Xiaoxi, let’s take a break and you should have some water.”
Jing Xi did feel thirsty by then. She put down the book and asked, “Would you like some water as well?”
“Sure.”
Jing Xi got him some water and had a glass for herself too.
After that, instead of continuing with the stories she tried asking, “Your Highness, would you like to take a nap?”
“No! I’m not sleepy at all!” Little Grape did not want to nap.
What if his Auntie Xiaoxi left while he was asleep?
He preferred to stay awake and constantly keep an eye on her.
Being rejected, Jing Xi thought for a second and asked instead, “In that case, would you like to do some drawing?”
That seemed to be fun. Little Grape nodded. “Sure. Let’s do drawing.”
“Ok. Wait for me. I’ll get the pens.”
Jing Xi brought some paper and pens. Then she sat by his side and watched Little Grape drawing.
Little Grape drew various shapes and lines on the paper. Jing Xi had no idea what he was drawing and wondered if that should be called impressionism.
No matter how confusing it seemed, Little Grape kept drawing carefully.
After a while, Jing Xi felt a bit sleepy. She bent over the bed and closed her eyes. Before long she actually fell asleep.
She was indeed exhausted. She got up very early in the morning and worked non-stop every day. There were times when she wished that she could stop and take a break. But whenever she thought about her family and child, she knew that she should never pause.
If she was not too tired she would have never fallen asleep during work.
“Auntie Xiaoxi, take a look…”
When Little Grape tried to show her the drawings, he found that she had already fallen asleep.
He hesitated but said nothing further. Instead, he raised his head and looked at Grandma Lan. “Grandma Lan, Auntie Xiaoxi is sleeping.”
“I see. Let’s keep quiet. She needs some rest.”
“OK.”
Little Grape stopped talking and continued drawing.
Jing Xi did fall asleep and even had a dream, where she was standing on top of a cliff and trapped by a blazing fire. To get out of the fire she had to jump off the cliff.
Then, she was woken up by the jump.
She woke up covered in cold sweat. By looking around she realized that she’d had the same nightmare of falling off a cliff again.
She wiped her lips and took two deep breath to barely calm herself down.
“I’m sorry, Your Highness. I fell asleep.”
Seeing that the little prince was still drawing and had finished quite a few, she figured that she must have slept for a while.
“Never mind, Auntie Xiaoxi!” Little Grape saw that she was awake and showed his drawings to her. “See, I’ve done a lot!”
“Let me see.”
Jing Xi looked through the drawings but only became confused. “Your Highness, what are these?”
…
