After Yan Xinyi finished she looked directly at Long Huizhong, an old man who liked to sit next to her father.
"Old Mr Long, the money you have embezzled in this company is more than the line of ancestors in your lineage, don't you feel ashamed of yourself? your work is to broaden your body following the slogan from an ugly duckling to a beautiful big contented swan, right?" She questioned him.
"Yan Xinyi, didn't your father teach you, you should not talk to elders that way. It is disrespectful." He tried to defend himself with a statement that Yan Xinyi found being very useless.
"Old Mr Long. If I ever need a brain transplant, I'd choose yours because I'd want a brain that had never been used." She flunged back at him.
The old man hang his head down in shame, he had been humiliated by a young lady who was not even comparable to his youngest son who was turning twenty eight years old that year, he had already been called grandfather already.
"Madam Liu." Yan Xinyi greeted her smiling, the old lady smiled amiably exposing her eggshell white teeth back at Yan Xinyi to express her gratitude.
"You know I heard that there is a discount in the beauty shop downtown for old ladies, why don't you try it since you have already tried the previous one that was in Beijing?" Yan Xinyi asked, then suddenly the smile on Liu Yuming's face slowly disappeared.
"Your work is to beautify yourself like a young woman, it's like a grandmother in rapunzel's face, how has your marketing strategies helped us, nothing? Just sprinkling diesel into a burning fire?"
"Mr Hong, how old do you think my father is?"
"Twice as old as you." He replied boisterously but he knew deep down that she would humiliate him.
The afternoon sun cast long shadows on the ground. The slanting rays of the almost setting sun gave a warm orange tinge to the sky.
Down in the boisterous city hubbubs of people were hear, they were now rushing to pick up their kids from the kindergarten.
"Mr Hong, my father is as old as I am."
"How is it possible?"
"He became father only after I was born. I hope you understand what I am saying."
"No."
"Then, does an old man require to play billboards just to please young teenage girls into marrying his son?"
"No. I should embrace my old age and remain at home and so work diligently."
"Right, you should also stop embezzling funds to give your son for dating young teenage girls."
The sky was ablaze with the fire of the setting sun.
As the meeting ended, each and every branch manager had representative had already been scolded as if they were young children and reprimanded that if they did not make a fifty percent profit to cover up the twenty percent loss, they would lose their jobs immediately.
The afternoon sun bathed the buildings in its warm light. Tiny specks of dust seemed to dance in the shaft of afternoon sunlight that slanted through the window.
Xing Yinuo was watching all this from her office, she was standing next to the windows, leaning on the concrete wall. Everything that was going around in the town just beloe her was clearly visible and explainable. From her vantage position she was able to see a young girl hopping down as her mother walked behind her.
A black audi RSQ8 whistled down the almost empty road. It was stressful inside the car. Yan Xinyi was speaking to Xing Yinuo over the phone. Her driver was concentrated on driving the car but he could also clearly hear whatever she said.
"Where do we meet this weekend?" Xing Yinuo asked.
"I'll be busy maybe next weekend," she answered.
Yan Xinyi hanged up and put the phone down, she turned on the music and told the driver accelerated the speed. She needed to arrive home early because she needed extra rest, her head was aching and she was extremely tired from hearing stupid excuses from the managers at work.
The night sky was aglow with bright city lights. The pale crescent moon shone like a silvery claw in the night sky. There was also a blanket of stars that stretched to infinity.