Chapter 56

Allen looked at the guy in front of him and his expression changed minutely. “Yi, he’s your boyfriend?”

Su Yi picked the paper up and forcefully stayed calm when wiping at the corner of her mouth. “Yes.”

Allen’s expression turned uglier.

Wu Xue hurriedly got up and said, “Allen, see, it’s bleeding from the corner of your mouth. Let’s go, I’ll go buy you a band-aid when coming in just now I saw a pharmacy nearby.”

Wu Xue tugged the guy away. Allen was quite bulky, if he didn’t intend to leave himself, he wouldn’t have been so easily led away by Wu Xue.

Su Yi shifted to the side, making a seat for him. “Why are you here?”

Chu Ying said lightly, “It was on the way. Did I interrupt your work?”

“No.” Su Yi explained. “I’d originally planned to come here with Wu Xue, but Allen said he wanted to chat about work so he came along.”

“Mmhm, do you have any brands you like?”

This question was so sudden Su Yi took a long while to react. “What’s it?”

Chu Ying said, “Change, don’t continue with this.”

“All right.” Su Yi agreed without a second thought. Holding Chu Ying’s hands, she played with it. “But I don’t have any other brands I like in particular. After I dissolve the contract with them, others would probably come find me, you don’t have to worry. Have you eaten?”

“No.”

Su Yi was about to call the waiter over when Chu Ying got up and said, “Let’s go home.”

She asked, “You haven’t eaten yet, have you?”

“Let’s eat at home,” Chu Ying said, “I want to eat the noodles you make.”

When the two got in the car, Su Yi looked sideways at the guy, still feeling like something was off. From their meeting up until now, there weren’t that many emotions on Chu Ying’s face. Just like when they first met.

Their driver today was a different one, not the one who spoke with a stutter. This driver looked a little aged. Since Su Yi got on board, he was seated sideways looking at them with a smile.

After the two were seated, he then slowly greeted. “Miss Su.”

Su Yi smiled and said politely, “Hello. Have you eaten dinner yet?”

“I’ll go back and eat soon. Miss Su really is very pretty.” The driver stopped looking at her, flooring the accelerator and saying joyously, “No wonder the young master is willing to wait so long in the car park.”

Chu Ying cut him off with a frown. “Yang-bo.”

[*’bo’ is a way of referring to an uncle, similar to ‘shu’, but implying someone older – as in this case.]

“Ay, Young Master, where are we going?”

“Yang-bo.” Su Yi addressed him like Chu Ying did. “Please bring us to the supermarket, thanks.”

Yang-bo smiled and said, “Good, good, I’ll bring you to a bigger one.”n/ô/vel/b//in dot c//om

“Okay.” Su Yi answered, her hands tightening around the guy’s.

After getting off the car Su Yi waved at Yang Bohui through the window. “Go back and eat first, we’ll take a car later.”

After the car drove off, Su Yi grabbed Chu Ying’s hand. “Let’s go.”

“Why are we at the supermarket?”

“To buy ingredients.” Su Yi said, “I promised to make you a Manchu Han Imperial Feast, have you forgotten?”

The supermarket was really huge, and there were plenty of ingredients in the fresh section.

“What do you want to eat, fish, beef, pork?” Su Yi held Chu Ying’s hand, squatting down and looking at the fish in the tank. “These fish are really fat, let’s eat fish, I can make sweet and sour fish.”

Chu Ying looked at the little head beside him, his eyes filled with gentleness. “All right.”

The woman’s figure was tall, and although she had covered herself up tightly, she still attracted a lot of attention. On top of that, there’s a handsome guy that looked at least one metre and ninety centimetres with her – really, wherever they went they were the centre of attention.

Not long after, the cart in front of them was full. After picking the ingredients, when passing by the fruits section Su Yi stopped and said, “Let’s get some fruits, there’s none at home.”

Chu Ying tipped his head. “All right.”

Su Yi picked up a watermelon and patted it a few times.

“This is good.” She put the watermelon in the cart.

A girl approached them from the side. “Are you Su Yi?”

Su Yi tugged on her mask and didn’t reply directly. “Hello.”

Although the girl had greeted her, her gaze kept wandering over to Chu Ying. “That, can you take a photo with me?”

“I’m sorry.” Su Yi declined politely. “It’s personal time, it’s not too convenient.”

The girl didn’t want to give up. “It’ll be quick.”

Su Yi shook her head once more. Perhaps the girl felt that she was being shamed – her expression wasn’t too nice.

This little interruption was over in a moment. Meal-break was over and there weren’t that many people in the mart. The two left very soon after paying for their items.

After taking a taxi back, Su Yi closed the door, took the bag from Chu Ying and entered the kitchen.

Chu Ying followed her closely, automatically washing the vegetables.

Su Yi descaled the fish naturally, abruptly saying, “Today… you came to pick me up from work?”

Chu Ying didn’t stop. “Yeah.”

Su Yi was silent for a moment. “Why didn’t you call me?”

Or perhaps it might be better to ask, why not call her when he reached the parking lot?

“I was afraid of interrupting your work.” Chu Ying put the clean vegetables aside. “Anything else you need me to do?”

“— Yes.”

“What is it?”

Su Yi put on the apron – she was still clutching a fish in one hand – and tilted her head, saying, “Kiss me once.”

The guy didn’t dally about it. Leaning down, he dropped a kiss as light as a dragonfly touching the water.

Su Yi spent more than half an hour in the kitchen and finally produced an entire table’s worth of dishes.

Chu Ying didn’t eat very daintily. Her bowls weren’t too big; with two mouthfuls the guy could finish half a bowl of rice. It didn’t take long before everything was polished.

Su Yi had a dishwasher, they didn’t need to do the dishes. So, after showering, the two got onto bed together.

The guy held her when they slept, as usual, his hands very respectfully placed on her waist, not wandering about. Su Yi’s back was to him. Her back, pressed against his chest, was really warm.

Not too long later, Chu Ying got up again.

Su Yi heard him retrieve something from his pocket and head straight to the balcony, even closing the door lightly after he was outside.

She got off the bed softly, tip-toeing over.

Under the moonlight, the guy stood by the railings, a cigarette in his hand.

Su Yi had never seen him smoke before. His actions were skilled and practised, so it’s easy to see that he used to smoke a lot. Beside his hand was an ashtray, one Su Yi had prepared for Wu Xue. His hand shifted to above the ashtray and he tapped the cigarette lightly with his second finger. Plenty of ashes scattered and dropped due to his action.

She pushed the door open and went outside.

The guy heard the sound and turned his head, raising a brow and asking, “Why are you awake?”

Su Yi was only wearing an oversized shirt, one that Chu Ying had left earlier. It was only able to cover the important parts, exposing the pair of long legs nakedly beneath it.

He continued. “Go in, it’s cold outside.”

Su Yi didn’t listen to him, walking over and opening her arms, embracing him tightly.

After a moment, Chu Ying looked down, extinguished the cigarette and tossed it into the ashtray. He ruffled her hair, the other hand on her neck as if trying to block the wind for her.

She buried herself against his chest, asking in a muffled tone, “What’s it, really?”

There was a silence for a long while. Then she heard the guy ask.

“Are you afraid of me?”

Su Yi paused, then asked, “What for?”

Chu Ying said, “— I hit someone.”

Being in the army for so many years, he’d long since trained himself to be very restrained. In the past there were a few times when he’d gone on search and rescue missions and, on the occasions where they missed someone out and the family members who’d lost control of their emotions and came at him with their fists, he could stand straight and still manage to bow to them. There were also criminals that tried to use money and women to bribe him, and he could catch them without blinking.

But in front of this woman, his restraint had vanished. When he saw her get onto the foreigner’s car at the parking lot, he was already faintly feeling anxious. At the restaurant, he sat at the table next to theirs. That foreigner began trying to court Su Yi. His words were filled with insinuations and he kept showing off.

When he heard the other say something as strongly suggestive as “You can decide after trying out” that string named ‘calm’ in his heart, broke.

“I’m not scared.”

The person in his embrace said without thinking, her tone certain.

Chu Ying tilted forward a little, his hands stilling too.

The woman’s voice was soft and thin. “You’re the gentlest (an exaggeration on purpose) person in my eyes.”

Chu Ying tightened his embrace. His voice was really low, with an indescribable emotion.

“Su Yi, like me.”

Su Yi was caught off guard. “What?”

“Like me,” he said, “you won’t be disappointed.”

“…”

Su Yi put her hands on his chest and struggled to look up. “Did you make a mistake somewhere?”

Chu Ying didn’t say anything.

Su Yi continued. “If I don’t like you, why would I chase you?”

“— because I saved you.”

The wind was really strong.

Su Yi frowned and, curving her eyes, asked, “What?”

The person didn’t seem to want to repeat what he had said, but it was fine, she had heard it clearly. The guy’s strange behaviour recently had successfully connected with this sentence to make sense.

When learning about that happening at Ding town, Chu Ying didn’t appear to look happy at all, and he had taken her away hurriedly. Now that she thought about it, was it that…

“At that family farm, when you hurried to leave, it wasn’t because of Zhou Ming was it?” She said, “Did you think that I got together with you only because you saved me, you thought I was repaying a debt?”

Chu Ying didn’t say anything as if he had agreed to it.

Su Yi wasn’t sure whether to laugh or to cry. She let go of the guy and reached up, putting her arms around his neck instead.

“I did fall in love during that mudslide.”

Chu Ying’s eyes darkened.

“You were like a bolt of lightning, bringing with you the thunder.” She exaggerated, revealing her white teeth. “Boom and you lit up my world. Handsome and manly, I was completely taken with you. All the way I kept asking for your name, but you refused to tell me. After being saved, I once went to the army to look for you but I didn’t find you. I didn’t know that after so many years I would meet you again.”

“It’s just nice that this time, I’m not that little girl lying in the corner waiting for you to rescue me. I have my own career, and I’ve become a lot prettier.” Her eyes curved very prettily. “I have finally grown up into someone that could match you.”

Chu Ying’s eyes brightened at her soft, gentle tone. It felt like an earthquake had hit his heart; just when he was about to say something the person in his arms stood on tiptoes and, with a tightening of her arms, reached and pecked him on the lips.

The woman dragged her words out, saying it syllable by syllable, “So, my love for you isn’t built on gratitude. In fact, you only saved me coincidentally. Even without that incident at Ding Town, as long as I’m alive, as long as I meet you, then I’m fated to fall in love with you at first sight.”