[Volume I: Seeking Cotton] - Dedication

Waiting for you in the flowering season of Kapok in Allure,

When the flowers fall, it will be the king again.

……

November 2010.

The first snow of the year is the first snow of the year as the north wind tightens overnight, and the first snow falls quietly when people sleep in the middle of the night.

When Jiang Xiaomian woke up, he got out of bed in heavy pajamas, smoothed the slightly messy hair, opened all the half-hidden curtains, and sighed at the window, and the world outside the window immediately became blurred.

"It turns out that the snow can come so quietly..."

For this first snow, Jiang Xiaomian has been looking forward to it for a long time.

Although she had grown to the age of sixteen, it was the first time in her life that she had seen snow with her own eyes. If she hadn't come to this far north, maybe she wouldn't have had a chance to see snow.

"Twenty-nine days... Thirty days, plus today...", the family came to Beijing for exactly a whole month.

She listened attentively, and there was no movement or human speech beside her, as quiet as time stood still, but she was left alone, only hearing her own thoughts.

Needless to say, his younger brother Koizumi, who usually knocks on the door to make trouble, stopped today, and even his mother, who makes breakfast for the whole family early on weekdays, is lazy once today.

This weather is really a common problem of lying in bed.

When Jiang Xiaomian was still a little sleepy and wanted to go back to sleep, he habitually looked at the clock on the table, it was almost eight o'clock.

But today is the weekend, and she can stay in bed a little, anyway, she never sleeps on weekdays, once in a while.

When Jiang Xiaomian was about to burrow back into the warm and residual quilt, his head suddenly jumped up: "Weekend!"

She instantly lost her sleepiness and got up to wash up.

The rapid movement woke up the mother in the next room.

Bai Shengxue walked out of the door and saw her daughter changing her shoes and going out, not knowing where she was carrying something.

"Xiaomian, it's a cold morning, where are you going?"

Jiang Xiaomian changed his shoes and said, "Mom, I'm going to the same school..."

Bai Shengxue responded after hearing this, and after seeing her daughter go out, she muttered: "This kid, just moved here a few days ago, and the relationship between classmates is good..."

Thinking about it, there was a mother's smile on her face, and I was a little happy about it.

At that time, Jiang Xiaomian's primary school homeroom teacher talked to Bai Shengxue, and they suspected that Jiang Xiaomian had a tendency to depression, and gradually distanced himself from his classmates at school, acted withdrawn, and did not like words.

Regarding the words of the head teacher, Bai Shengxue was clear and uncomfortable.

What is clear is that the daughter is not the kind of depression in medicine at all; What is uncomfortable is the root cause of Xiaomian's loneliness, and it is also the past that Bai Shengxue can't look back on.

This is about Jiang Xiaomian when she was seven years old, she witnessed the bloody scene of her father and uncle falling from a high place. All this slowly cleared up the memories with entering the Xian family.

Jiang Xiaomian carried a bag of cotton clothes, got on the bus, and after a few stops, entered the university and came to the door of Xian Xinchen's dormitory.

The last time I saw Xian Xinchen walking in a hurry, Jiang Xiaomian was afraid that he would freeze.

Ben has not been in Beijing for a long time, so this is the first time Jiang Xiaomian has come to the university to find Xian Xinchen.

She dialed the number, perhaps his phone was silent, and there was no response after dialing. Jiang Xiaomian had no choice but to wait downstairs in the dormitory, and the lonely figure was in the snow, looking weak and weak.

"Brother, I've brought you clothes."

In the middle of the night, Jiang Xiaomian called, and a tall, flat-headed, handsome-looking young man walked towards her.

This is Xian Xinchen.

Xian Xinchen looked at Jiang Xiaomian in front of her, she was dressed a little thinly, a white sweater with a red skirt on the lower body, a red scarf tied with twist flowers, and a youth ponytail. The breath that came out of the words turned into cold air in the air, and in such a freezing and cold weather, no matter how much she dressed, it could only make her figure look more delicate.

"Hey, Xiaomian, why are you here?" Xian Xinchen was surprised.

Jiang Xiaomian smiled slightly and brushed the emanation that was blown away by the cold wind, in her heart, she was very reluctant to call the person in front of her "brother".

"It's snowing, my mom asked me to bring you some cotton clothes." Jiang Xiaomian's little lying eyes were in a trance, and he clumsily stuffed his clothes into Xian Xinchen's hand.

Xian Xinchen saw her liar, and only smiled for a while, and then said, "Thank you Aunt Bai for me!" ”

The two didn't talk much, and a few daily male classmates walked around, and they saw a pair of beautiful people standing there, but they didn't know that this was a good brother and sister.

One of them put his shoulder on his shoulder and joked to Xian Xinchen: "My sister-in-law is sending carbon in the snow, and the courtesy is light and affectionate!" Hey, handsome guy Xian, can you give me other peach blossoms without hesitation? ”

"Sister-in-law?" Who are you talking about? Jiang Xiaomian's pair of watery eyes blinked, like a grape elf soaked in water.

She likes to hear this kind of joke the most, and Xian Xinchen pretends to be a couple in other people's jokes, even if it never comes true.

In Beijing's universities, excellent female students are like flowers in a flower garden, even if they are uneven, they have their own beauty.

Jiang Xiaomian is as humble as mud and grass, and she sends clothes in the snow, and she still carries the name of "sister".

Xian Xinchen didn't have any abnormal expression for the banter of his classmates on the side, and naturally turned his head and smiled back and said, "You are wrong, she is my sister Xiaomian!" ”

They looked at Jiang Xiaomian, and Jiang Xiaomian had to nod.

Another voice asked, "Xian Xiaomian?" ...”

"No, my surname is Xian, my name is Jiang Xiaomian!"

There was a sound outside the words, Xian Xinchen staggered the topic and told her: "Xiaomian, it's getting colder, you have to take care of yourself."

"Okay."

Jiang Xiaomian said and left.

Xian Xinchen looked at the direction she was leaving, knowing her thoughts, but what could he express.

Everyone was stunned, stunned, and stood for a while before scattering.

Jiang Xiaomian is the daughter brought by Xian Xinchen's stepmother Bai Shengxue when she remarried, and thus became Xian Xinchen's nominal sister.

Why does Xian Xinchen have a stepmother?

This has to mention her own mother, Xian Xinchen's real mother is a woman who loves money like her life.

Father Xian Xiuyuan, mother He Liu, son Xian Xinchen, a family of three.

It is said that they will fly separately when disaster comes, which is not wrong at all.

A few years ago, the Xian family was not richer than it is now, in the year when Xian Xiuyuan's business was facing bankruptcy, the house leak happened to rain overnight, and he was forced to sign a divorce agreement, and Xian Xinchen's mother abandoned her son and flew away.

Because no woman who wants to remarry into a wealthy family will take her ex-husband's son with her.

The year his mother left, Xian Xinchen was nine years old; And when Bai Shengxue married Xian Xiuyuan, Xian Xinchen was sixteen years old. At that time, Xian Xinchen was almost sensible.

No one will feel affinity for the word stepmother, but disgusted by it. Even if this is not the case, there are few exceptions, and this exception was encountered by Xian Xinchen.

Bai Shengxue is different, she is an elder who makes Xian Xinchen respect. It's been almost seven years, and she has accompanied her father all the way to the hardships of entrepreneurship. Especially in the first year they met, Bai Shengxue had to spend a difficult time with his father. When the economy is tight, he eats cold rice and pickles, sleeps on the construction site when he is conscientious, and accompanies his father to make a comeback of Shengxing Real Estate.

One lost his father and the other lost his mother, bringing the two families together.

When all the situation improved, Bai Shengxue became pregnant.

Even if Bai Shengxue is reborn, she is not an advanced maternal age, and she has added a younger brother to Xian Xinchen. But Bai Shengxue, who is healthy and has no serious illness, left some postpartum diseases for this child.

The new life just greeted the situation when everything was improving, Xian Xiuyuan named this little son Xian Xinquan. Now a family of five is living happily, which is probably the happiest appearance of a reconstituted family.

This year, because Xian Xiuyuan's branch in Beijing was about to expand, they moved from the south to the north to live temporarily.

However, for Xian Xinchen, Beijing is also half of his hometown, and the prosperous Beijing is one of the three caves where Xian Xiuyuan started his business. His father tossed and turned for his career, Xian Xinchen's studies were fixed in Beijing, and he would only follow his father during the winter and summer vacations.

Jiang Xiaomian stepped on snowshoes and stepped on the snow, walking in the snow for the first time, but she didn't have the heart to feel these atmospheres.

The words of some of Fang Cai's classmates were still recalled in his mind, which hooked Jiang Xiaomian's heart.

Even if they didn't enter the Xian family, Jiang Xiaomian and Xian Xinchen had known each other for a long time.

At that time, Jiang Xiaomian's father, Jiang Yihua, was still alive and made a living as a porter at the construction site.

During the summer vacation, Jiang Xiaomian delivered food to his father, because the weather was too hot, Jiang Xiaomian didn't expect that the meal left for his father overnight had become rancid. I didn't want my father to go hungry, so she just sat on the construction site and sobbed quietly, not knowing what to do.

It was Xian Xinchen who found Jiang Xiaomian in the corner with a cry when he passed by, and after learning the reason, he brought her lunch box back and replaced it with a new meal.

The sentence "My name is Xian Xinchen", to Jiang Xiaomian's ears, the person who spoke was the star shining in her eyes.

Later, Jiang Xiaomian never met the little Xinchen who ran towards her with a lunch box.

And on the construction site, there was no longer the scene of Jiang Xiaomian taking a boxed lunch to deliver food to his father.

Because on that day, Jiang Xiaomian was carrying the empty lunch box that his father had eaten and was about to go home, and as soon as he stepped on the high building stairs, he witnessed the tragic incident of his father and uncle falling from the building.

Intertwining the fate of that day is simply a blessing and a curse, the important person in Jiang Xiaomian's life just met one, but left another.

"Brother Xinchen"

Jiang Xiaomian called Xian Xinchen like this at the beginning.

It wasn't until she met again a few years later that she didn't want to be her brother for life.

Because the three words "Jiang Xiaomian" were actually printed on the Xian family's household registration book.

The stubbornness in Jiang Xiaomian's mind drove her, how she didn't want to admit this relationship. Later, she learned that this relationship was called pseudo-consanguinity.

If you pretend to marry blood relatives, you can't escape the controversy.

What's worse is that the premise of marriage must first be dissolved from the fictional relationship.

Jiang Xiaomian knew that it was impossible to lift. Because it is impossible for Uncle Xian and his mother to break the mirror, and no one wants this.

The north wind was howling, and Jiang Xiaomian saw a few more snowflakes falling, and she accelerated the pace of her return journey.

Bai Shengxue heard the sound of someone entering the door, and when she looked back, it was her daughter.

"Xiaomian, you're coming back so soon?"

Jiang Xiaomian answered, his younger brother was learning to hold a spoon and drink porridge, and saw him throw away the small spoon, bury his immature face in the bowl and suck, let the preserved eggs get a mouthful, as if the cold was swallowed and melted in the warm porridge.

"Come and drink porridge, it's delicious!" Bai Shengxue urged her.

"Mom, where's Uncle Xian?" Jiang Xiaomian glanced at it.

Bai Shengxue said: "Where else can I go, the company, it has become his life!" ”

Jiang Xiaomian looked at the landline and asked, "Mom, have you received a call looking for me?"

Bai Shengxue put the pot on the table, and said while taking off her apron: "I haven't received it, I'll ask your Uncle Xian later."

"Oh." Jiang Xiaomian pulled down his face and only cared about drinking porridge.

"What's the matter, just came here, young friend, whose call are you waiting for?"

Jiang Xiaomian stirred the porridge in the bowl, blew away the heat, and slowly replied: "It's nothing, some books may have been left on the plane or in the taxi last month." ”

"It turned out that there was a book, it doesn't matter, it's okay to find it, if you can't find it, you can wait for it to have it again, I thought it was something."

Jiang Xiaomian listened to her mother's words, nodded, and returned to the room after drinking the porridge.

She didn't listen to her mother's words, and what she lost was not a book, but Jiang Xiaomian's cherished sketchbook.

She flipped through the books in vain, and the album was really not in the stack, wondering where it had gone.

It's been a month, and I can't wait for a reply from the lost and found, and I can't find it.

Jiang Xiaomian loves painting, and is still only a freshman in high school, when he was a child, Jiang's family was poor and had no professional training, so he had to go to the gallery to refer to other people's works.

It is said that diligence can make up for clumsiness, and I have to say that in terms of painting, Jiang Xiaomian has some geniuses.

She has put her sketchbook on the ground, and these are all works from elementary school, junior high school to the present, and they have never been missing. The picture book I am looking for now is the first one that has been lost.

Jiang Xiaomian didn't dare to tell anyone what was drawn in the lost picture book, and only those who turned through the picture book knew.

is a picture book about Xian Xinchen, from the first glance, Jiang Xiaomian painted a full book of his joys and sorrows.

Now, I don't know where the book is lying. Maybe many people will think that it doesn't matter if you lose your sketchbook, you can redraw it.

But given the shell of the book itself, it is more important than the painting inside. Regarding the origin of the painting book, Jiang Xiaomian can no longer have a second book.

She flipped through another picture book on the table, and every page of the painting was made of kapok in colored pencils. This is a picture book that belongs only to kapok.

Jiang Xiaomian loves kapok very much, but her mother said that the weather in the north is not like her hometown Changnan City, and the climate here is not conducive to growing kapok.

Don't think that only people are not adapted, and so are plants.

When he was still in Changnan last month, Jiang Xiaomian went through the school transfer procedures, accompanied by Xian Xinchen. He also helped carry a box of books, and the two of them passed by the tallest kapok tree in the school.

How Jiang Xiaomian longed to be able to walk under the kapok tree with Xian Xinchen. But that time, it was not the kapok season, and there were only a few autumn yellow scattered kapok leaves on the tree, which looked indifferent and cold in Xiao Tianyue.

"Sister......

Jiang Xiaomian saw Xiaoquan coming over, and she was busy packing up the sketchbook that had just been put on the ground.

Xiaoquan pushed through the door, and Xiaojiaoya came to Jiang Xiaomian's side in cute thick cotton shoes.

Seeing the big red flowers on the painting page, Koizumi, who had just learned to pronounce them, pointed unfluently and said, "Flowers... Flowey"

Jiang Xiaomian saw his younger brother pointing to Kapok and asked, put down the picture book in his hand, hugged Xiaoquan and sat on his lap to teach him: "This red flower is called Kapok, it grows on a tall tree, like a hero." As he spoke, he turned the page to a red kapok tree.

Koizumi clapped his hands and cheered, and another thicker picture book next to him attracted Koizumi's attention.

I took it and opened it, skimmed the first two pages, and turned the back to look at it with my little hand.

"Big brother!"

On the first two pages, the reason why Koizumi was not interested in calling was because he did not know Jiang Yihua on the painting. And the portrait on the back he can recognize, obviously depicting Xian Xinchen.

Jiang Xiaomian followed Xiaoquan's call, he opened a family picture book, Jiang Xiaomian drew every member of the family in this book.

Children are born with a nature to beat around, and they always like to turn to another one without reading it, even if they can't understand it.

Jiang Xiaomian looked at his father in the first page of the painting, and gradually closed the painting book.

Snow was falling outside the window again, and my mother had said they wouldn't stay here long.