Hello, Mr Li: The Christmas Trip

The discomfort Joreen felt made her wake up from her sleep. "Ah! this is so annoying." She said sleepily and touched the side of her neck. "I think I hurt my neck." She yawned and finally sat up before she slowly opened her eyes.

She had dozed off not quite long after they boarded the plane because she wasn't in the mood to talk to anyone and at the same time, bored out of her mind. Since the previous evening, she had been pissed and even till now, she still was.

The seat here was a lot better than the one in the economy class. While flying down to the other country with her manager and assistant, they had taken the economy class. She wanted to know how it felt to travel with that class for a change, but sleeping well had been impossible for her. She was the type who slept in one edge of the bed and woke up on the other side of the bed and with a scattered bed. She liked to sleep comfortable and roll from one side to the other but was limited by this seat. But she stubbornly refused to use a bed. She had promised herself not to sleep off and just get angry all day until Li Hoy asked asked her what was wrong with her. Unfortunately, she dozed off.

She noticed a blanket was covering her body and looked at it in confusion. The blanket doesn't look familiar. Who covered her with it?

Joreen turned to look behind her and there he was. He sat there cross-legged, looking like nothing in the world concerned him. He was going through a magazine and beside him was a bottle and glass of wine.

She frowned deeply before standing up. After carefully folding the blanket, she left it on the cushion and began to walk towards him.

If the mountain will not come to Muhammad then Muhammad will go to the mountain.

She walked really slowly and waited for him to raise his head to look at her. But he didn't.

After walking past him, she stopped to look at his back, 'Maybe he didn't see me?' She thought to herself and turned to walk past him again. She stopped and turned to spare him another glance when he still didn't acknowledge her presence.

She passed again.

Thankfully, they were only four people in this area and the other two was a middle aged man and a teenage girl she believed was his daughter. The girl wore an earphone and was busy with her phone while the man was going through a document. So they both didn't pay her any attention as she moved back and forth.

After walking past him for the third time and he still didn't give her any attention, she plomped down on the seat in front of him and turned to look at him while keeping her hands on the headrest of the seat.

"What are you doing?" She asked in a tone which made it obvious that she was mad at him.

"Reading." He answered without lifting his head.

"That's not what I'm asking. Why aren't you talking to me? Can't you... see I'm not in a good mood? Shouldn't you ask me what is wrong or something?" She whined.

"You didn't want to talk to me earlier." He reminded her with the same casual tone that made her almost snatch the magazine from his hand so he would focus on her.

She didn't say another word to him when they met this morning after a 'good morning' and it hadn't been in her usual cheerful manner. After her conversation with him the previous night, which had left her displeased, she had gotten into a fight with one of the actresses, or rather, bullied an actress. It made her feel terrible because it seemed like she was using the influence she had to bully people. She never wanted to be that kind of person. She was also mad because those had been the same people who had asked her to go out with them. Why couldn't they just like her? What did she do so wrong? Everything made her really angry and sad at the same time so she wanted some time to herself and didn't speak to even Li Hoy.

"You should at least be worried and know the reason why I was so quiet. Am I usually this quiet?" She asked, her round eyes looking at him eagerly.

He finally looked at her. His dark eyes bore deeply into hers.

She understood the look he was giving her right now. He usually looked at her this way whenever she badgered him with questions and he knew he had to answer unless he didn't want her to let him be.

"I even walked past here a few times but you snubbed me!" She complained.

"The methods you used when you were a kid can no longer work on me, Luo Joreen."

"So now you finally see me as an adult?"

"Do not put words into my mouth." He said calmly before dropping the magazine to give her his full attention.

"Heard you got into a fight." It wasn't a question and she knew it. It also wasn't surprising that he knew about it. He always knew about everything.

"I was the only one who hit her. As usual, everyone is badmouthing me." She sighed sadly.

"I guess you are a bit relieved you aren't returning with them then?"

"I would have loved it had Xiao Fei been here though. Too bad she had to leave with the rest."

He didn't say another word. He continued to look at her and relaxed casually on his seat.

"But… aren't you going to scold me for hitting her?" She asked. It felt weird that he wasn't already reminding her about how the things she did in public could ruin her career.

His lips curved upwards. He had expected that question. He looked away from her to sip from his glass of wine. "Get a good sleep. We'll land in three hours."

"You really aren't going to scold me?" She asked, a bit surprised.

"You hit two people last night. You sure are having fun lately. I probably should get you a punching bag as your Christmas present this year." He replied sarcastically.

"Humph! As if he has a better temper" She muttered under her breath but loud enough for him to hear before refilling his almost empty wineglass.

"What are you doing?" He asked, his curious eyes watching her as she lifted the glass.

Once she moved it towards her lips, he snatched the glass from her. "No drinking, Luo Joreen."

"WHY!?" Her voice was so loud that the man in the front seat turned to look at her.

"Sorry" Joreen apologized meekly before turning to look at Li Hoy.

"Sometimes you see me as an adult and other times I'm not?"

He sighed wearily. How long was he going to keep explaining to her that the entire family put her under his care? He also didn't like monitoring her life like this and stopping her from doing what she wanted to do. But as her guardian, he had to do this until a few weeks time when she was finally going to turn 18.

"You really are impatient. Just a few weeks more." He dropped the wineglass back on the fancy tray.

"Does it matter? I already feel like I'm 18. Days are only numbers. Nothing is going to change about me between now and when I finally turn 18!"

"It's a civil crime for underage, drinking I mean. And you are a public figure. They won't treat it as lightly as they would treat that of other normal citizens. And not only that, the citizens and netizens are going to drag the entire family and especially me into this."

She narrowed her eyes to look at him, when he picked his magazine and began to flip through it,

"Immediately I turn 18, I will go to clubs, get a boyfriend and drink alcohol!" She said resolutely before returning to her seat, looking even worse than she was before.

When she turned to look at him one last time, she was a bit startled to find him staring directly at her.