Chapter 28 Waiting Alone 獨自等待(1/2)

Author: Qi Zi

Translated by: lovexsweet

Translator’s Note: There were a couple of sentences in this chapter that I found to be pretty hard to translate, so I might go back and revise with a better phrase eventually, but it shouldn’t impede understanding even if you notice that it’s a little weird in English. Sometimes I still keep slightly “off” phrases in dialogue to better match the Chinese, even though it doesn’t exactly flow like a native English speaker would speak – I think it’s fine for readers to remember that at the end of the day, it’s a translation and some things don’t cross over perfectly.

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Chapter teaser: He has been beside her all this time, so close, as if she could see him any time she turned to look back…was this love?

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At 11 o’clock, Du punctually called Jiang Jun and chatted with her as usual about nonsense.

“Why do I feel like after you got promoted, you actually are more idle now?” Jiang Jun was a little curious. “Is MH closing? Give me some insider information, okay?”

“Don’t worry, when the time comes I’ll definitely notify you in advance.”

“Don’t, just lay me off directly, then give me ten years of compensation, and it’ll be all good.”

On the other end of the phone, Du laughed. “Little money grubber, you’re at home all day and you don’t even go out to buy things, so what do you need so much money for?”

“Do you think it only counts as spending money when you go shopping with your little lovers? I keep it at home and use it as firewood, that’s what’s really awesome. What’s so remarkable about spending extravagantly*? This is way more impressive.” [T/N* An idiom that means throwing away money recklessly, literally ‘betting a thousand gold pieces on one throw of the dice’]

“How would I dare to have that many lovers? Just one already takes half of my life.”

“Oh, I forgot, you’re also a poor man, you’re already missing half of your net worth! Yikes, you’re more generous than me.”

“Actually, I think it would be really worth it.” Du laughed again. “In the future, if I marry a woman who can make a lot of money, wouldn’t it all come back to me then?

“If someone can earn money themselves, why would they marry you?”

“You… Am I really that bad? Other than money, I have nothing else to offer?”

Jiang Jun put her feet up on the desk. “Du, how long has it been since you’ve been to the theater? How long has it been since you’ve had a good life?”

After a long time, Du finally said, “I also really want to stop and take a break, and I’ve tried it before, but it felt terrible. You already know that I’m a solitary person*. If I have to go to the theater by myself, I’d rather not go at all. [T/N* Someone who is cut off from others; can also indirectly refer to an unmarried person]

Jiang Jun sighed and didn’t know what to say for a while.

“Hey, since you’re saying all that, then you should be responsible for helping me relax a bit.”

“Huh?”

“What? I know that you have a boyfriend right now, but are you sure that you want to put sex before friendship*?” Half serious and half joking, Du threatened, “Would you believe it or not if I just showed up at your doorstep?” [T/N *paying more attention to a lover than your friends]

“You……” Jiang Jun didn’t know what to say for a while.

“Don’t ask me how I know. Even though you didn’t put on a Band-Aid*, you changed to a turtleneck shirt.” [T/N* “ok貼” must be a HK or mainland Chinese term]

“Sorry.”

“Don’t say sorry, I said before that I won’t force you to accept me. I like you, I appreciate you, but you don’t consider me to be a suitable partner, so you didn’t choose me, and it’s your right not to choose me. I only hope that you can be fair and that you won’t deny even my status as a friend.

Jiang Jun sighed softly. “Okay, okay, I won’t reject you as a friend. At MH you are my boss, but in private I’ve always treated you as a brother, okay? But this weekend I already have a date with my family to go to the mountains for a retreat. We’ll meet up next week then, I guarantee you’ll be satisfied.”

“That’s more like it. I’ve helped you do so much work, after all,” Du said cheerfully. “By the way, that guy Jay keeps asking for your contact information, but I didn’t give it to him.”

“Don’t give it to him, I don’t want to get involved with him.”

“You can’t just keep doing this, you still have to think of a way to stop him. You have to buy me a drink, this confidentiality fee is very expensive.”

“Okay, as long as you don’t let him bother me, I’ll do whatever you say.”

“It’s a deal?”

“Yes.”

“Okay, bye!”

Jiang Jun hung up the phone and looked at the time, it had been half an hour. This man was really…

In the evening, she estimated the time when Yuan Shuai would get home, then started washing the vegetables and wrapping the dumplings. When Yuan Shuai came out of the shower, the hot dumplings had just been delivered to the table. Yuan Shuai sat at the dinner table looking at the plump white dumplings and sighed. “If my grandmother and my mother knew about this, they would feel relieved. Their daughter-in-law might be a little rough around the edges, but her hand craftsmanship is very good, as if she’s taken a training class before.”

Jiang Jun gave him a blank stare and threw a piece of Chinese broccoli into his bowl. “Idiot, who needs to learn this? This is hereditary, I’m naturally talented!”

“Don’t show off so shamelessly, have you even counted it before? Because of your natural talent, how many times did I get enteritis? How many times did I have to go to the emergency room because of food poisoning?”

“Shut up, don’t speak while you’re eating.” Jiang Jun stepped on his foot and put all the dumplings on his plate. “Once you’re finished, go wash the dishes.”

After the meal, Jiang Jun accompanied Yuan Shuai to wash the dishes, and hesitantly said to him, “I talked to Du for a while today.”

“Yeah.”

“He’s coming over next week, I’m going to take him out to have some fun.”

Yuan Shuai made a sound from his nose and continued to work.

“I’m going to apply for a transfer to Beijing.”

“That’s good, don’t be like the Cowherd and Weaver Girl, you really don’t worry about me.” Yuan Shuai washed the plate in his hand and held it in front of Jiang Jun. “Don’t move! Look into the demon mirror and see your true form, you little white-eyed wolf!” [T/N* A Chinese folk tale about forbidden romance, where the cowherd and the weaver girl are banished to opposite sides of the heavenly river, and only get to meet once a year.]

Jiang Jun used the plate to fix her hair. “You aren’t angry, are you?”

Yuan Shuai exaggeratedly gave a long sigh. “With your stubborn temperament, do I dare to be?”

Jiang Jun grinned and held him. “Let’s go, the two of us can walk around and drink a little wine to make it more fun.”

“So nice.” Yuan Shuai looked at her suspiciously and used both hands to hold her face, squishing it into a ball, “You’re being particularly attentive for no reason, did you do something bad?”

“If you don’t want to go then forget it.” Jiang Jun struggled to escape. “I still have to beg you?”

“You’re no fun, go change your clothes then.”

Neither of them really liked to stroll around the streets, so at the last minute they decided to go watch a movie, but the movie they wanted to watch wasn’t playing at that time, so they had to wait. There was only a low budget domestic film called “Waiting Alone” that was playing just then. When they bought tickets, the distributor gave a free gift, a candy ring. Yuan Shuai carefully held the ring and beckoned to Jiang Jun. Jiang Jun pursed her lips and, acting especially aloof, extended her left hand and waved it in front of him. Yuan Shuai put the ring on her ring finger and scrutinized it left and right. The ring was a little too big, but it didn’t matter, it was still better than nothing.

The two of them were like little kids who hadn’t grown up, holding hands together and swinging their arms, singing songs and happily going to buy popcorn.

The movie was a very old-fashioned romance, which told the story of loving and being loved. From the dream lover to the childhood sweetheart next door, from waiting to being waited for, the game of love was surprisingly real.

“If I were a girl, I would have fallen in love with me long ago!” The hero in the movie swallowed the candy ring bitterly after his courtship was rejected. The audience roared with laughter and Yuan Shuai laughed too, laughed in desolation. He rubbed the ring on Jiang Jun’s finger. That’s how he had waited all the time too, waited for her to grow up, and waited for her to come to his side. Maybe he had done a lot of wrong things, but if he had to do it all again, he would still do it all. He loves her, and one of these days, she will open up to him and will loudly tell herself that she loves him.

Jiang Jun thought of Yin Zhe, of her self-righteous love, and those irretrievable moments. She had thought she would bear the hatred for a lifetime, and feel the pain and hurt for a lifetime. Yet when they met again, she had become calm and indifferent, as if it had all been a story that had happened to someone else.

She also thought of Du. They were both of the selfish type. They both wished for someone to be besides them, someone who would understand them, who they could mutually trust, and who would accompany them in their times of need, even if it was just a phone call. She understood that this was not love, and yet it really wasn’t pure friendship either; it was closer to a kind of entrustment.

Jiang Jun leaned her head on Yuan Shuai’s shoulder. He has been beside her all this time, so close, as if she could see him any time she turned to look back. Was this love? She couldn’t tell, and she didn’t want to be able to tell, she held onto Yuan Shuai’s hand and just wanted to hold it like this, wanted to keep holding it.

Yuan Shuai glanced at Jiang Jun from the corner of his eye. She was sitting next to him, wearing the sugar ring he had given to her, smiling heartlessly. He couldn’t help but pinch her face and she bared her teeth and waved her fists at him. Yuan Shuai smiled at last, secretly, smugly, and happily.

At the end of the film were some captions: Dedicated to the one who got away.

They clasped their ten fingers together tightly and smiled at each other. You are here, so how can I get away?

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Yuan Shuai knew that Jiang Jun was bored at home, so he often dragged her out to socialize.

The gathering of the so-called elites in the financial world is nothing more than a group of dry old men picking up beautiful women in the name of social entertainment. Jiang Jun was heartily sick of this atmosphere of mad bees and butterflies. Who knew where this bunch of young girls had come from, many of them starlets wearing heavy makeup and gaudy dresses, sweetly snuggling in the embrace of other people’s husbands—how disgusting.

Jiang Jun looked around in boredom. Colorful bright lights blazed all over. There were huge ice basins everywhere, with centerpieces of test tubes filled with colorful alcohol, fairy wands sparking with fireworks, and white mist rising from the decorations. She sipped the Ceylon black tea in front of her, endured a yawn and propped up her chin as she watched Yuan Shuai chatting with a group of his colleagues in the industry, radiant with delight.

“Jiang Jun, why aren’t you drinking?” Ren Jun shook the test took in his hand, the liquid a pure blue that rippled strangely under the light.

Jiang Jun smiled and pointed to her stomach. “Please spare me, my stomach has been upset these past few days.”

Ren Jun was the vice president of a bank in the mainland and was a classmate of Yuan Shuai’s in their MBA program. He had always had a good relationship with Yuan Shuai, and he was also one of the few people who knew her real identity. He leaned closer, pointing at the person who had been stuck to Yuan Shuai’s side, Liu Dan, and said with a smirk, “Jealous, hm?”

“How so? It’s good if other people are fighting for him, otherwise it means there’s something wrong with my taste,” Jiang Jun said nonchalantly. “Anyway you’re the one who came to pick up girls behind your wife’s back.”

Ren Jun smiled and said, “These days it’s the girls who are trying to pick us up, okay?” He paused for a moment and leaned in very secretively, “Are you and Yuan Shuai okay?”

“You’re nuts!”

“Don’t keep pretending, just from the looks between the two of you, little flames are crackling.”

Jiang Jun burst out laughing.

“Just look how beautiful you guys are together. To be honest, it’s been so many years for you guys, it’s about time you had some results. My son’s already in kindergarten.”

“And yet you still come out.” Jiang Jun gave him a look.

Ren Jun tilted his head up to drink down the strong alcohol, and said especially bitterly, “It’s not as if you don’t know that for people with family backgrounds like ours, just how many options for marriage can we really have? Even putting aside whether it’s an appropriate match with regard to each family’s social status, you also have to unite the clans, and when it comes to feelings, it’s all bullshit. Jiang Jun, as your older brother, let me tell you something from the bottom of my heart. I’m truly envious of Yuan Shuai. How come I don’t have someone to be my childhood sweetheart? You said that we were both in the same courtyard when we were kids, so why didn’t we know each other?”

Jiang Jun patted him on the shoulder. “Come on, brother, even if we knew each other, back then you would definitely have called me a snotty little girl, and you’d be the little master who wouldn’t have played with me even under threat of death.”

“Hah, that’s true. Maybe Yuan Shuai was a bright boy, so he saw the situation clearly even at such a young age, and knew that you have start already with the baby, while the rest of us were still stupid—it looks like Liu Dan probably drank too much.” He suddenly stopped and stood up.

Jiang Jun turned to see Liu Dan in the middle of pulling Yuan Shuai down to say something. She also stood up and subconsciously rolled up her sleeves.

“Don’t mind it, don’t even bother moving. That girl is crazy to get involved with, it’s not worth it. I’ll go bring Yuan Shuai over,” Ren Jun said soothingly.

Jiang Jun returned to her seat and stared at Yuan Shuai. His face was becoming darker and darker and he kept looking at himself. Jiang Jun made a gesture at him like she was shooting a gun and then suavely blew a breath at her fingers.

Ren Juan and a few other people were next to them to help smooth things over, but Liu Dan seemingly had fixed on Yuan Shuai, clinging onto him and refusing to let go, her ample breasts almost spilling out of her little dress and pressed up against his body. They were least a C cup. Jiang Jun looked down at her own chest, her anger rising, this was bullying people, wasn’t it!

She strode up to the two of them, Ren Jun nervously supporting her arm and trying to pull her away. Jiang Jun broke away from him and said, neither urgently nor slowly, “Buddy, your wife just called me and asked what time you’re going to be returning, is your cell phone out of battery?”

“Oh, uh, maybe.” Yuan Shuai said, going along with it, a smile in his eyes.

Liu Dan jumped up as if she had been electrocuted. “You… What nonsense are you saying? He’s not even married, so where is this wife from?”

“How is he not married? Ren Jun and I have both seen her before.” Jiang Jun looked toward Ren Jun. “Right?”

“Yes, I was just chatting with her.” Ren Jun discreetly stood by Jiang Jun.

Liu Dan looked at Jiang Jun suspiciously. “What’s your relationship with him? How are you involved in this?”

“I’m a good friend of his wife.”

Yuan Shuai nodded very seriously. “Yes, they’re such good friends it’s like they’re the same person.”

“Then why didn’t you bring your wife?” Liu Dan asked doubtfully.

Ren Jun, his expression twisted, said, “His wife is so elegant, she doesn’t like to mess around here.”

Liu Dan let go and leaned awkwardly against the chair, mumbling, “Is she pretty?”

“Very pretty, she’s a beauty,” Jiang Jun glared at Ren Jun who was gasping with laughter.

Ren Jun beat on Yuan Shuai’s chest with a deadpan expression. “As beautiful as a fairy, how did a fellow like you get such a bargain?”

Yuan Shuai grinned and put his arm around his neck. “Buddy, in your next life, remember that you have to start early.”

Jiang Jun believed in Yuan Shuai’s feelings and loyalty to her and she didn’t care about the flies and mosquitoes around Yuan Shuai, but some other people did. Within a few days, she received a call from her mother, who asked about Yuan Shuai and Liu Dan. Jiang Jun abandoned the shopping cart and walked aside, saying, “I know about this, he told me everything. It’s okay, I’ve seen that woman.”

Yuan Shuai leaned over, hugging her waist, and got close to the microphone.

“Mom, don’t worry, even if she’s as beautiful as a flower, if the cow manure isn’t happy, it doesn’t matter anyway.” Jiang Jun pushed him away, pinching him on his waist while she was at it, and walked to the side to continue persuading the old lady to relax.

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T/N: That was a really long chapter… hope you guys enjoyed it! Thank you for all your comments and encouragement, it really helps to know there are readers!