I ignored Kefei's obstruction and returned to the box. Chu Kehuan's face reappeared in front of me. Like everyone else in the box, he was surprised by my sudden departure, but he still maintained his demeanor and smile.
"Hello, I'm Zhou Weiwei. We met at the Business Management Student Union, right?" I deliberately mentioned this not to build relationships, but because I met Chu Kehuan's girlfriend Gao Ziyuan in this club.
This set of keywords is just to release a message to Chu Kehuan: I know you have a girlfriend, don't make trouble behind her back.
For a second, a hint of surprise flashed in Chu Kehuan's eyes. He stared at me, and I wondered if he was planning to kill me and silence me, or maybe how to bribe me? But soon, Chu Kehuan returned to his original calm.
"Then we should have a lot of mutual friends? Would you like to add each other on Facebook?"
Nausea. I save face for you in front of people, but you shamelessly want to be friends with me?
Taking into account that there are many outsiders present, I can only suppress my displeasure and smile lightly. "No need to add me, I have heard a lot about you. is it really necessary?"
"So you know each other? That's even better. You can just sit and chat together! I was afraid that you would be embarrassed!" 2891 man seized the opportunity and directly pressed me on the should and put me and Chu Kehuan together.
From his eagerness, I felt how much he wanted to sit next to Kefei, and even wanted to bring her out for the second time. But Kefei's face is not good. After all, my uncontrollable variable has completely ruined her plan tonight, but I don't regret my decision. By my standard, I don't like Chu Kehuan who clearly has a girlfriend. The slutty man who also came to this kind of occasion to find a partner is absolutely gross!
"Chu Kehuan, you just got off work and haven't eaten, right? Do you want to order something to eat first, or maybe drink some tequila? The special tonight is amazing!" Kefei was trying to turn the tide.
"I won't drink tonight, I have to drive home later." Chu Kehuan looked at me with a confident face and said something that almost made my jaw drop. "I remember, I saw you on my girlfriend's Facebook."
Girlfriend? Girlfriend? Girlfriend?! No matter how I tried to distinguish syllables, what my brain told me was these two words, "girl friend". Chu Kehuan didn't intend to hide the fact that he had a girlfriend, and so blatantly admitted that he was looking for passion outside?
I looked at Kefei in surprise, but Kefei threw me an "I told you so" look. I looked at the other people in the box again, and a cold wave suddenly hit my whole body. How many people were there with the same stable relationship status as Chu Kehuan?
"Kehuan is really handsome! If you tell me directly that he will die, my sister can still take care of it." The 2891 man was the first to praise and applaud when Chu Kehuan confessed so frankly.
"I'm here to expand my network." Chu Kehuan took it with a smile.
"What, you are already in 2882, what kind of contacts do you want to expand? Your company has enough money to sponsor the NBA. Last time, the end of the year your pockets were full. This is a good place to stay until retirement!" 2891 man joked with Chu Kehuan.
"I still want them! There are fights in the company every day, and I always need some spiritual sustenance after I get off work."
"If connecting with your old classmate and giving a little face to the girl you are with is just like expanding your network, then I won't have a brother to drink with me in the future!"
If it were an ordinary man, 80% would only try his best to hide his motives for riding a donkey and looking for a horse. However, Chu Kehuan was not in a hurry to clear himself but directly shifted the focus from love to brotherhood, as if he was not interested in the women present at all, and exposed me in a big way.
"But today, I should also sacrifice my time to accompany these gentlemen. However, I have the impression that you also have a very stable boyfriend. You are in 2317, yes?" As soon as these words came out, the 2891 man and the others present were shocked.
"...But didn't you say that you just broke up?"
"Are you single now?"
"Don't ask, it's scary."
The men and women who were present had a lot of discussion, and every word made me shiver.
"I shouldn't have said anything wrong, right?" Chu Kehuan judged the situation very keenly. His hateful smile was nothing more than wanting to clear all his sins and shift the focus to me. Before long, everyone present will leave the matter of his death to the sky.
"Yeah, I had to pretend I was single earlier, but thank you for admitting that you will die, letting me know that I didn't deceive other people's feelings! Hahaha." Not to be outdone, I tried my best to keep the smile on my face, but presumably, I must look uglier than when crying right now.
I thought I was the embodiment of justice, but I was slapped in the face with a smile on the spot.
"Oh, I knew that both of you would die, so today's game would be boring!" One 2451 woman couldn't help complaining.
"It doesn't matter. I'm about to leave anyway, you guys keep talking! Goodbye!"
After saying this, I was too lazy to maintain a smile. I picked up my purse and rushed out without looking back.
I was running on the street, and there were people coming and going, and when they saw my embarrassment, they seemed to be smirking. If I chose to open one eye and close the other just now, the scene wouldn't have been so stiff, and Kefei would have been able to... hunt well. I should have walked back to the box and apologized to Kefei, but now I'm so panicked, frightened, and tired that I just want to go home.
I steadied my breath, raised my head, and was about to walk to the MRT station, but I heard a male voice behind me. "Are you going to go back and go shopping? Don't you want to buy a gift to make amends to your boyfriend?" I looked back and saw that it was Chu Kehuan.
"You...?"
"You left halfway through, I have to come out and collect money for your drinks!" He laughed.
I took a deep breath and patiently prepared to pay. "How much in total?"
"134.5m." He said an incredible number.
"Huh?!" I didn't understand.
"It's the closing price of your stock today." He looked at me with a smile. "You only sell your liver for the company and don't care about the stock price? It's tragic that the company's allotment for employees has turned into a pile of waste paper after retirement."
Are all stock brokers like this? Tricking people with numbers?
"I don't want to owe you. How much is it?"
I opened my wallet and wanted to throw away a five thousand yen bill, only to find that I only had a thousand yen bill on me. It was embarrassing enough.
"Leave it for tomorrow and talk to your colleague!"
He pressed the back of my hand to prevent me from taking out the money. I felt the warmth from his palm, and Chu Kehuan looked at me from a very close distance, his face only inches away now.
"Seriously. I just said in public that you have a boyfriend, did it ruin your situation? You couldn't find a 'friend'?"
"I don't need 'friends'!"
I withdrew my hand as if I had been burned, put away my wallet, and finally couldn't suppress my anger. I replied, "Please, if it wasn't for Kefei I wouldn't have come at all. I love my man. My good 'friend' relationship, I love it very much! It's totally different from a man like you who has been with your girlfriend for ten years and still rides a donkey everywhere to find a horse!"
"It's not very kind of you to say that," he said softly, the simple language suffocating me. "Tonight, the two of us are standing on the same benchmark, carrying our own other halves behind our backs. Pretending to be single, coming out to meet new people, what is the difference between us?"
I was startled. Looking at myself reflected the store window beside us, with heavy smoky makeup, my breasts were practically about to emerge from the loosened neckline. If you want to talk about riding a donkey to find a horse, I'm a real criminal. I don't even dare to report to Haoyi about tonight's 'friendship' dinner. What qualifications do I have to wash Chu Kehuan's face in public?
In an understatement, he told everyone that I had a boyfriend and let me jump into the Yellow River to wash it off just fine.
"You have learned the theory of risk, and you should always know that there is always risk in investing. The only way to avoid risks is to not put all your eggs in the same basket. The investment target that can ensure a steady profit without loss is never a single project. It's a combination of allocations. This is true of investment transactions, and it should be true of love."
"Dealing is your job, love attitude is a personal choice. Don't forget, this society is monogamous. Your investment theory doesn't apply at all." I tried to answer him calmly.
"It's like this for me. I feel unsatisfied in my relationship. No matter how much I stop losses, I will lose. I always have to profit from other targets. This is the principle of personal survival."
Staring at me as if I was also one of his 'targets'.
"The unhappiness between you and Ziyuan should be resolved through communication. If it really can't be resolved, you should end the relationship instead of seeking comfort outside her back."
"End?" He sneered and continued to apply his investment theories. "Even if I want to 'exit', I will choose a 'stop loss' with the lowest loss. In the stock market, the losses are all procedures. There are fees to pay. In a love relationship, it's a split and split, and every time it's a pain in the ass."
"Say whatever you want to say, I don't want to hear it. Goodbye!"
I turned to leave, but Chu Kehuan grabbed my hand, preventing me from escaping. Ah, I said 'goodbye' right away, as if there would be a next time.
"What are you doing? It's just a slip of the tongue..." I wanted to withdraw my hand, but found that his grip was terribly strong. "Let go of me!"
"I'm just worried about you." Chu Kehuan took two more steps toward me and stretched his hand out toward my chest. I reflexively wanted to avoid him, but found that Chu Kehuan was buttoning my shirt up for me.
"You look good in this way." He looked at me with regret, his gaze burning through me. "But no one will protect you when you go home, so remember to put on your clothes properly."
Is it because he is too close to me? My body feels slack. Or is it because his voice is too soft? Or did his carefulness shake me? I am already confused. I actually began to think that everything he was saying made sense, and I didn't resist him making such an intimate gesture toward me...
"I-I'm leaving." I tried to stay awake and turned away, pulling a safe distance away from him to catch my breath. Am I dizzy? Then I remembered that I didn't drink at all tonight.
"Goodbye." Chu Kehuan spoke behind me as a turned to leave. I didn't answer because I didn't want to see him again.
***
The so-called escape is probably the reason I entered the MRT station all the way without looking back. I know that Chu Kehuan was long gone, but I just didn't dare to look back. It wasn't until I got into the MRT carriage that I finally breathed a sign of relief.
It's 10:30 in the evening, and this time is just the beginning of the nightlife in Taipei City. There are many busty girls with heavy makeup ready to run around. All of them have tighter and more attractive skin than me. If there is really a strange uncle or wolf of mass transit, it's not my turn to be the victim at all. Looking at these youthful bodies, I figured out one thing: Chu Kehuan buttoned up my shirt just now just to get close to me.
As soon as I realized this, the anger in my chest rekindled! At this moment, I just want to jump in front of Chu Kehuan to ask the teacher to admit his guilt, but I don't have his contact information at all! In anger, I swiped my phone to Facebook and found the girlfriend of Chu Kehuan, Gao Ziyuan, who was in my friend list but had no contact added.
At first I was just a little curious, what was his girlfriend doing while Chu Kehuan was looking for excitement outside? Are you faithfully waiting for your boyfriend at home? Pretending to be busy and forgetting about your boyfriend? Or can't get in touch with your boyfriend, and are anxiously posting some unhappy emotional phrases on the internet? But I don't get an answer. Gao Ziyuan's last update was two weeks ago, and it was just a check-in update for a friend's dinner.
It is precisely because Gao Ziyuan is not the kind of person who will post everything online that I have not known her at all these past few years. I patiently looked back for a few months, and found that although Chu Kehuan and Gao Ziyuan have been in a stable relationship, they are not one of those sticky couples who come in and go out everywhere together. At several friend gatherings attended by Gao Ziyuan, there was almost no trace of Chu Kehuan attending.
It appears that either their private lives are too independent, or they have been separated for a long time. Is this why Chu Kehuan began to participate in the gathering?
This is the most intuitive inference, but I am not satisfied with this conclusion. A relationship that lasted for 10 years must not be as simple as two people falling in love with each other behind it.
A strong desire to snoop was born like this. I was like a thief who managed to break through the layers of levels and finally slipped into the mansion compound, greedily digging and digging into other people's homes, and had to turn over the entire Baoshan. I feel crazy in general. Every little discovery makes my heart beat faster in excitement.
Finally, my eyes stayed on a photo of Chu Kehuan and Gao Ziyuan. The photo was taken a year ago, but this is the most recent group photo I could find. I zoomed in on the photo and carefully examined the moment when Chu Kehuan and Gao Ziyuan took a photo together.
Rather than trying to 'see', I wanted to 'find out' the clues about their emotional change. I know it's weird to do this, but I'm just curious, how many secrets can there be in a seemingly beautiful photo? Are their smiles reluctant? Is there an infidelity floating in their eyes? They may have sublimated from love to family, but what will they turn into? Does the so-called 'love' still exist?
While I was thinking about these things, Haoyi's call jumped out of the screen, making my heart skip a beat.
"Hello?" I picked up the phone hurriedly. "Haoyi?"
"Are you still outside?" Haoyi's voice was not sullen, but sounded a little confused.
"Well, didn't I tell you before I got off work? Kefei asked me for dinner after we got off work, and we just finished."
For tonight's dinner, what I said to Haoyi was to 'dine with my colleagues'. It's not that I want to hide it, just to reduce to possibility of being misunderstood.
Long-running water is the way Haoyi and I maintain our relationship. We are both tired from work. We usually only choose one night to get along, have a meal, watch a movie, and then go spend the night together. On other days, we go home after we get off work, drop messages and chat with each other, and call each other to say goodnight before going to bed.
Haoyi doesn't usually contact me urgently, but it was abnormal to call so early today, which made me feel guilty and worried. Did she shrewd Haoyi see through my cover-up?
"I've been home for a while, and I just saw a few houses on the internet. Would you like to accompany me to visit some this weekend? See you see the URL I sent you?"
Buying a house in the urban area is not a matter than can be settled in a day or two, and I was too crazy digging into the privacy of Chu Kehuan and Gao Ziyuan just now that I didn't pay attention to the messages he sent and didn't see it.
"I can accompany you to look during the weekend! But it's not very convenient to see it on my phone. Should I wait until I get home and look on my PC?"
"Do you need me to pick you up?"
"No need! I'm almost home, I'll talk to you later."
I hung up the call, and the screen on my phone returned to the photo of Gao Ziyuan and Chu Kehuan. Thanks to Haoyi's call, I calmed down a lot, and I could finally look away from this couple who I was not curious about at all. Whether their relationship is good or bad is their business. Chu Kehuan just buttoned my shirt for me.
When Haoyi and I go further hand in hand and look back on the past few years, this trivial matter is not even an episode, because tomorrow when the sun rises, I will forget it.
I must forget it.
I cleared out the photo of the two of them and took a deep breath, only to find a message lying quietly in my inbox:
"It wasn't easy to find your Facebook. Let me know when you get home."
Why am I so unsurprised, the sender is Chu Kehuan?!
I endured the blue veins that were about to burst and swiped my finger on the phone to delete this message.
Everything that has happened today, I will throw it all into the dark corners of this city night!