Chapter 11: Chapter11

After Lu Xingxue left, Jiang Ci returned to the piano room to continue working. Not long after, Xiao Chen came into the room: "Director Jiang, I will pack the coffee cup."
Jiang Ci: "Thank you."
Xiao Chen took the paper cup, but didn't leave. He hesitated and said: "...Director Jiang, someone brought us afternoon tea just now."
Jiang Ci looked at her, Xiao Chen scratched his neck and said, "I just saw you downstairs at the window... No, Director Jiang, don't get me wrong, I didn't mean to peek."
"Yeah." Jiang Ci motioned her to continue.
Xiao Chen's expression is not natural: "I saw you eating cakes together, she also used your lipstick... Everyone has been circulating recently that you are married and your relationship is so close, so is she yours... ...?"
Since Xiao Chen took the initiative to ask, Jiang Ci didn't have to lie to deny it, and nodded and admitted: "She is my wife."
"!" The guess was confirmed personally, and Xiao Chen's voice instantly rose up: "I knew it! I knew it was like this! Hmph, the Director You, spread rumors everywhere, and you must be because your lover can't handle you. I have been hiding it from everyone, either old, ugly, or poor!"
Jiang Ci: "..."
"Director Jiang, it turns out that your wife is so beautiful! The temperament is amazing, she is super gentle when she laughs! My heart beats faster when I look at the window from a distance! She is so familiar, is she a star? That's why you have to keep it secret?... Ahem, Director You is really too much! The words are so bad that everyone is talking about you behind your back!"
Xiao Chen still muttered bad things about You Lu, Jiang Ci said helplessly: "Go and do things, otherwise it won't be done today."
"Oh oh!" Xiao Chen nodded as if smashing garlic, before running out, added the last sentence: "Director Jiang, you and your wife really match well!"
Jiang Ci: "..."
Good match?
The piano room returned to quiet, Jiang Ci sat in front of the piano, raised his hand to try a tone, and paused.
She fumbled out the lipstick from her pocket.
The scene of Lu Xingxue putting on lipstick was only a moment when it happened. Looking back at this time, it seemed like a slow motion movie, replaying frame by frame in Jiang Ci's mind.
The arc of her eyeliner, her undulating breath, her slightly opened lips, her delicate and flawless skin that can be broken by a bomb in the sun...
Remember every detail so clearly.
It was obviously not the first day I met Lu Xingxue, but I suddenly discovered that this person not only has a good voice, but also seems to have grown in his own aesthetic point.
Jiang Ci put away her lipstick and went to Xiao Chen's piano room to find her.
Xiao Chen was staring at the screen of the phone, pressing his finger on it quickly, Jiang Ci knocked on her door a few times: "We will have dinner together after today?"
Xiao Chen: "Wow!!!"
After the work was completed, Xiao Chen proposed to eat barbecue. Another assistant named Li raised his hands in agreement, and Jiang Ci went to the barbecue restaurant with them.
Fat and thin pork belly creaked in the roasting pan, the barbecue shop was noisy, Xiao Chen talked about a lot of gossip in the company, Xiao Li and her laughed and tears came out, but Jiang Ci appeared absent-minded.
The mobile phone placed on the table suddenly buzzed and vibrated, and Jiang Ci subconsciously sat upright.
Xiao Chen: "Director Jiang, is your wife looking for you?"
Jiang Ci's eyes flashed, and he looked down.
"Is it, isn't it?" Across the table, Xiao Chen had already glanced eagerly at the phone screen.
Jiang Ci picked up the phone, got up and left the seat: "My mother."
After the phone was connected, Jiang Lin said, "Aci, your Aunt Ning and I are visiting the mall right now, so come on."
Jiang Ci said inexplicably: "Now? I haven't yet—"
She didn't finish a word, and the person on the other end of the phone was changed to Ning Shuyue: "Aci, it's me. I'm shopping with your mother. I haven't seen you for a long time. Have you finished your work now? Come and chat with Auntie, okay?"
Jiang Ci: "..."
Jiang Lin really understood her and knew she would find a reason to refuse, so she directly asked Aunt Ning to speak.
After eating, Jiang Ci touched up her makeup in the mirror. She stopped when she opened the lipstick cap and rotated the paste to apply to her lips.
Her lips are clearly printed in the small makeup mirror. The mirror surface moved, Jiang Ci looked into his eyes.
...What is there to hesitate? Does Huo Zhenzhen often use her new lipstick to test colors? She never minded.
Convincing himself in this way, Jiang Ci took a paper towel and gently wiped it on the top of the lipstick and the part that touched Lu Xingxue's lips.
After that, she went back to the barbecue restaurant to settle the bill, explained a few words to Xiao Chen and the others, and left first.
She is not far from that shopping mall, and the subway is only five or six stops past. Jiang Lin and Ning Shuyue were shopping for baby products. As soon as Jiang Ci appeared, Jiang Lin pulled her into the rows of shelves.
"Where are you from?" Jiang Lin sniffed and said disgustedly: "A strange smell?"
Jiang Ci does smell from the barbecue restaurant, but it is not an exaggeration. Jiang Lin loves to tell her, Jiang Ci let her go.
Standing in front of the shelf, Jiang Lin picked up a pair of small socks: "Look, how delicate the baby's things are."
"And this little hat. Oh, it's so soft. You have to buy this, Aci, pick it quickly. Which color is good?"
Jiang Ci asked her: "Who do you want to buy?"
Jiang Lin slapped her arm: "Who else can you buy it for? Are you pregnant? Or Lu Xingxue?"
If you don’t understand Jiang Lin’s intentions, Jiang Ci has been her daughter for 25 years.
Simply pretending that he couldn't understand Jiang Lin's overtones, Jiang Ci pointed to the pink top embroidered with cartoon carrots: "Wen Nian might like this one."
"Pink?" Jiang Lin shook her head.
Ning Shuyue chose a few baby onesies and was approaching them, Jiang Lin raised her voice: "The one who was born in Nian Nian must be a male treasure, we have to pick blue."
Jiang Ci: "..."
Ning Shuyue listened and smiled: "I don't know yet, let Nian Nian check it. She always says busy. Aci, have you seen Nian Nian recently?"
Jiang Ci: "I saw it during the Mid-Autumn Festival."
Ning Shuyue said, "Is she thin? You also persuade her-I change my way to study the dishes every day, I think she can eat a few more bites, but she is good, and she often forgets to eat meals when she works."
Jiang Lin slapped her tongue: "This can't work, no matter how important work is, it can't be compared with her body!"
She took Ning Shuyue's hand and lowered her voice: "As long as the child falls on the ground, Lin's, Wen's, what she deserves, can he still run away on her own?"
Ning Shuyue shook her head: "Hey, Nian Nianming is not good, so she throws it in my stomach. If she is Mrs. Wen's child..."
Jiang Lin frowned and said in disapproval: "Stop! You are filial, if you let her know that you say something like this, if you don't know how to be sad, don't say it!"
Ning Shuyue: "I'll just talk in front of you."
While they were chatting, they chose a few sets of baby’s bedding. For the time being, they couldn’t think of what else to prepare. Jiang Ci asked the cabinet sister to wrap everything up and was about to settle the bill. Ning Shuyue stopped her: "We The one who came out to chat with you was not the one who made you pay."
Jiang Lin pulled Ning Shuyue aside: "Okay, why do you have so many opinions?"
Ning Shuyue: "I bought too much..."
Jiang Lin: "Listen, I'm angry if you do this again!"
Ning Shuyue gave in after a few words: "That's OK, Aji, let Niannian thank you when you turn around."
Jiang Ci didn't answer, Jiang Lin said, "Why do you want to thank you? You like to see things blindly."
Carrying big bags and small bags, Jiang Lin was going to the bathroom, Jiang Ci and Ning Shuyue sat in the lounge chairs and waited for her. Ning Shuyue looked at the baby supplies she had just bought, and sighed: "I buy things bit by bit, and then I gradually gain a sense of reality. The little girl I hold in my palm has grown up and is about to be a mother. I want to be a grandmother too."
Jiang Ci didn't know what to say. She hopes Wennian is happy, even if this happiness is not given by herself. But what Wen Nian met was not a good match. Jiang Ci couldn't say those blessings.
"Aci, your mother said that she would be a grandmother who wants to be a child. She said it several times but she couldn’t laugh at me. It’s not easy for her to be a grandmother—Aci, you talk to Aunt Ning, what are you going to prepare? Time to have a baby?"
Jiang Ci: "..."
She knew it was so.
Jiang Lin circuitously hinted that Aunt Ning played a straight ball, and she deserved to be a sister who had known each other for 20 years.
Jiang Ci: "We will not consider this matter for the time being."
Ning Shuyue raised her eyebrows: "Why? Lu Xingxue is 29 this year? She has a single seedling in the Lu family. Elder Lu is getting older and not in good health, so why don't you rush her?"
The reminder is better, Jiang Ci remembers Lu Xingxue mentioned it once. But they are contract marriages, this kind of thing is not in the scope of discussion at all.
... and Lu Xingxue had a baby, Jiang Ci stopped this association, prevarication: "We are too busy now, not suitable for having children, wait a few years."
Wen Nian was busy all day while pregnant. Ning Shuyue knew the hardship, and her tone couldn't help but soften a little: "That's true, you're still young..."
Jiang Ci drove Jiang Lin's car and sent her and Ning Shuyue back one by one. After Ning Shuyue got out of the car, Jiang Lin turned over her phone and transferred a sum of money to Jiang Ci: "I will pay for the clothes."
Jiang Ci didn't plan to accept it: "No need."
Jiang Lin said disapprovingly: "How much money can you make? I told you to stop doing it a long time ago. I told your dad to find you a position in the company."
As she said, she sat forward: "Even if you don't think about yourself, you have to help your brother plan, right? That's your brother! I think your dad has been very concerned about the newly hired manager from the company recently. Please also go home for dinner, young talent, wealthy family, or single! I wondered if he was looking for Tong Zhenni. — Think about it, he and Tong Zhenni are going to become, what will your brother do? You My younger brother is only eight years old this year. When he waits for more than ten or twenty years to fight, the day lily will be cold!"
Jiang Lin became more excited as she spoke, but Jiang Ci remained indifferent: "Mom, I worry so much, it's easy to get old."
Jiang Lin suddenly became angry: "Then you don't make me worry less? If you don't make progress in your career, you can't worry about marriage!"
Jiang Ci sighed.
She got used to it more often, and she said calmly: "Mom, all your ideas and proposals, I didn't fail to consider them seriously. But I like my current job very much, and Lu Xingxue and I are also very satisfied. The current state of life, I hope you can understand me."
Jiang Lin hummed, and the mother and daughter did not communicate anymore for the rest of the time.
At No. 3 Songling Road, Jiang Ci parked the car in the parking space and returned the key to Jiang Lin to leave. Jiang Lin pulled a face and chased off the car: "Your father is at home, why don't you go in and say hello to him?"
Jiang Ci: "Next time."
Jiang Lin's face became more stinky, and she said fiercely: "You are waiting here!"
She stepped on high heels and disappeared before Jiang Ci's eyes. After ten minutes, I came back with a bunch of bandaged roses: "Take it back. I just cut it from the garden this afternoon."
Knowing that Jiang Lin was angry, Jiang Ci reached out and took the bouquet into his arms without wanting to upset her.