Xi Yuan froze as he looked at the small box in the girl"s hand, and then back at the girl. The man noticed the girl"s nonchalant expression and let out a sigh, "There isn"t a ring inside it, right?""Sorry. I was confused about your size.", the girl smiled helplessly, "I just found it in Little Alix toys earlier, so I picked it up.
"I just wanted to see your reaction to the "Will you marry me?" question."
"You are hopeless, you know?", the man flicked the girl"s forehead, eliciting a grunt from her, "Of course I will marry you. And we will decide the size and style of the rings together later. Okay? Always dramatic!"
He then pulled the girl into his embrace, inhaling her unique scent, "But don"t rush into it. We have time. I promise you. You will have the grandest wedding ever. A wedding that one can only dream of."
"No.", Rong Xinghe shook her head, pulling away from the man, "We don"t."
"What do you mean?", Xi Yuan frowned.
"We don"t have time.", the girl said, her tone soft, "I used to think the same when I realized that I had fallen for you. I wanted to confess to you, the way I thought you deserved. Royal. Magnificient. In the end, I couldn"t. You were attacked before that, and then, for four months, I regretted my choices.
"Ever since then, I decided to live in the present. No big future plans. The present, Yuan.
"We shouldn"t be even discussing a wedding when everything around us is so torn apart. Rong Yufan is on a killing spree. He is somehow connected to the Bleeding Avenues. My parents are dead.
"But then again, when is my life not crazy? It"s always messed up. I can"t stop living because of that. I have to move on. And I have to fight. For the people I love. For you. No matter how much it hurts me. So I don"t care if I asked my boyfriend to marry me on the same day my psychotic ex-brother pulled off of one of his murderous tricks. I had to know your answer today, so I did.
"But the moment you decided to stand by my side, you walked right into a battlefield. This is my life, Yuan. Death. a.s.sa.s.sinations. Wars. You are in love with a soldier. Always remember that. So don"t you ever dare to a.s.sume that "we have time". That"s the only thing I might never be able to promise you. Okay?"
"Understood.", the man nodded, "But don"t you want a grand wedding? Every woman I have ever met wanted that. Diamonds. Jewelry. Crazy Bachelorette Parties. Destination Weddings. All those things.
"In fact, Ying keeps telling me about her "dream wedding list" every second day. So I thought... you might want that too."
"Xi Yuan.", Rong Xinghe laughed, "Everything in my life is so extravagant. My enemies are terrorists, for G.o.d"s sake! The Six most influential men across the globe are my brothers. My ex-brother is a dangerous hypnotist. My blood family wants to kill me. I don"t need a wedding to establish how important I am to the world. Unlike those high-cla.s.s socialite girls, my ident.i.ty has already been implanted into the minds of every single citizen of Country X. Trust me. A grand wedding would be nothing but a drop of water into the ocean."
"A very fine point.", Xi Yuan agreed, suppressing his chuckle, "So what kind of wedding do you want?"
"I don"t want grand, Mr. Xi. I want meaningful.", the girl answered honestly, "Now since you are equally into this, I will be needing your approval too."
"You already have it. Just tell me your plans, Xinghe.", Xi Yuan held onto the girl"s hands, intrigued.
"Well. I am not sure if you will consent this.", Rong Xinghe smiled, nervous, "But instead of all those Millionaires and Billionaires that the Xi family would probably want to invite, I was thinking of letting in the kids from Youth Team NGO.
"I know that some of them are physically disabled, and some are suffering through psychological disorders. G.o.d, some of them won"t be able to even look at me in the wedding gown. But they will be able to hear our vows, right?
"Society never accepted kids like them, Yuan. In this compet.i.tion of showcasing one"s strength, these kids were always left out. Left alone. They never witnessed the holy ceremony of matrimonial, or get togethers. But in the end, they are still humans, aren"t they? Living, breathing, struggling humans.
"Yuan, their blessings will count. Their hearts are pure. More than any of those so-called well-wishers. I want those kids and our families to be there when I walk down that aisle. And at the end of it, I want to see you, Mr. Yuan. My future husband. That"s the perfect wedding for me."
Xi Yuan looked at the girl as if she was some sort of magic. As if she was the best thing that ever happened to him.
She stood out. Her thoughts. Her heart. Her intentions. Her love. Everything about her simply stood out. And this was the woman he had fallen for.
For her, the Youth Team was never a mere social service. It was a house she made home. And those kids meant a lot to her. After all, they were a lot like her. Motherless. Fatherless.
To those children, Rong Xinghe was their sister. Their only family. Despite the fact that they never shared the bond of blood. Just like how the Six tigers were a family to her. Or maybe, they were all related. Not by blood, but by love.
This was the beauty of the Superfamily. They weren"t just a group of successive individuals. They were a thought process. A chain that could be formed by anyone. It wasn"t fictional. It was a reality. A possibility, that everyone was too self-centered to accept, under the excuse of practicality. Rong Xinghe wanted to put down the veil between those beliefs. She wanted to show to the world that, despite being the Business King and the Military Chief of Country X, Xinguan preferred humanity over all those materialistic temptations.
"What are you thinking?", the girl clicked her fingers, pulling the man back to reality.
"Nothing.", the man said, placing a soft kiss against the knuckles of both her hands " I would love those little guests at our wedding, Bub."
"Thank you! Thank you so much.", Rong Xinghe"s eyes sparked up, "But what about your business a.s.sociates then?"
"I guess they will have to make peace with the wedding reception.", the man shrugged, "We can organize a high-cla.s.s reception, right?
"And as far as weddings are concerned, I have two other brothers. A sister, too. Xi Fang is already in a relations.h.i.+p with Jiang Yue. Eventually, the guy will want to get married.
"When that time comes, he can have grand. We will have meaningful. We will have the pure blessings of the angels you brought up, the plants you nurtured."