Chapter 32: MAMA-32 Part 2

Her entire presence felt grand and fervent. Such words clearly had no persuasive power. Mi Shanxin tilted her head and let out a tiny puff of air.

Jian Wanji leaned in. “What are you ‘hmph’-ing about?”

“Nothing.”

“Speak your mind. Guessing clients’ thoughts at work is mentally taxing enough. I don’t want to guess yours.”

“I’m also your client.”

“That’s different. Between us, we can be considered…” Jian Wanji shielded Mi Shanxin the entire way, as if fearing the girl would wander out of her sight. But arriving at a less crowded floor, she released her, maintaining distance. “We’re mutual service parties.”

Mi Shanxin: “I don’t get it.”

She had overheard several of Jian Wanji’s phone calls, many sentences mixed with Chinese and English. Jian Wanji’s demeanor was also somewhat different.

Though still the same person, her laugh varied. During Mi Shanxin’s sleep aid time, she’d say there was an overseas call from an important client. When Mi Shanxin refused to let her leave, she’d continue her business while still attending to her.

Mi Shanxin would push her hand away, only for the woman to grip her hip bone, her neatly dressed upper body pressing down on Mi Shanxin.

There was nothing sensual about it—purely forceful restraint.

Adult women too, came in many varieties: the strength type, the slender type…

Jian Wanji wasn’t that fierce. She wasn’t the wheat-skinned, muscular sister with a gym bag slung over her shoulder Mi Shanxin saw on her commute, nor was she the constantly changing music instructor at the institution who never wore the same outfit twice.

When she divided her attention dealing with clients, perhaps she had to put on an act. But the version of her facing Mi Shanxin approached her truest self.

Blindfolding Mi Shanxin’s eyes—the smallest-size eye mask still nearly covered her nose when worn by her, leaving only the breathing holes.

In that final moment, Mi Shanxin’s last glance was of Jian Wanji, not wearing headphones, head tilted, her long pale neck and shoulder clamping the phone as she removed a finger cot.

Probably finding the index finger one too tight and difficult to remove, with someone still talking on the phone, Jian Wanji actually bit off that damp finger cot.

Mi Shanxin was monumentally shaken that night. In her dreams, she was still blindfolded. Jian Wanji, wearing a business suit, tied her to the back of a chair, forbidding her to close her legs.

The dream woman was very fond of the shallow indentations left under Mi Shanxin’s chest. It was the groove left by the underwire of ill-fitting bras, needing time to recover even after taking them off.

In reality, Jian Wanji had asked once how those marks happened, even reaching out to touch them, as if measuring something. The next day, new lingerie had arrived.

Mi Shanxin didn’t understand why underwear came as a set. She’d never worn matching sets before.

But if Jian Wanji sent them, she would wear them.

She also didn’t know if Jian Wanji wore matching sets too. This thought suddenly occurred to her now. She asked Jian Wanji, “The bra and underwear you’re wearing right now, are they a set?”

Jian Wanji was still pondering how to explain their mutual service relationship when this sudden question came. Her steps halted abruptly. “What?”

The girl stared at her with those eyes, innocence not even feigned. She was just like that.

A cool expression, round eyes, a chin shaped by thinness.

“You’re wearing…”

“Alright, stop, I get it.” Jian Wanji was more anxious than doing business. She was clearly fully convinced nothing existed between her and Mi Shanxin. Not now, and certainly not in the future.

An age gap this large couldn’t lead to good results.

Even without a large age gap, there usually weren’t good results anyway.

Jian Wanji’s hope for such feelings had hanged itself long ago, alongside the fluttering love letters of that year, along with Grandmother’s fury, thinking she had early crushes and was exhibiting homosexuality.

Her birth mother falling in love with a college classmate without Grandmother’s consent was a betrayal.

Marrying and having a daughter without consent was punishment.

Jian Wanji merely accepting a love letter turned her into an ingrate.

The girl stared at those heartfelt classmate details—it was just that a verbally rejected classmate had wished Jian Wanji would take a single look at her.

More than wanting to date, it seemed that being seen by the person she liked was already a complete victory.

But Wan Qingqing discovering the love letter became Jian Wanji’s total defeat. Starved for a weekend, she nearly fainted on the sports field during a Monday morning run.

She knew the feeling of gnawing hunger and living under someone else’s roof all too well. Even though Mi Shanxin and she were in an employment relationship, she wanted to do everything in her power to meet her needs, or demands.

This was a limited time. Being Mi Shanxin’s X tool didn’t hurt Jian Wanji in the slightest.

She could fully guarantee she didn’t have such feelings before and wouldn’t after.

It was just an intersection of worldly fates, like a leaf falling onto a pond’s surface. Mi Shanxin would sooner or later follow the water and drift away.

She wouldn’t be Mi Shanxin’s shore.

“I don’t wear them.” Jian Wanji answered. Mi Shanxin always posed questions in odd directions. Jian Wanji ruffled her bangs. “Satisfied with the answer you heard?”

“Satisfied. Can I ask more?”

“Ask, ask.”

“Then why do you send me sets?” People occasionally passed by, glancing at the woman leaning against the railing.

Jian Wanji’s jacket looked New Chinese style, the embroidered patterns on the back and cuffs like red clouds rolling over snow. Mi Shanxin’s black-and-blue color scheme was far less eye-catching than Jian Wanji’s.

Some people, even when silent, are like rolling thunder.

Mi Shanxin’s phone was vibrating again. She hadn’t noticed.

Jian Wanji also realized she asked questions one by one, as if she needed an answer before proceeding to the next.

A very procedural person; very old-fashioned, but not very obedient.

“No special meaning. This brand is really cute, I thought it suited you. You can’t buy them separately either.” The woman pointed to a brightly lit sign not far away. “If you don’t believe me, we can go look in the store. There’s one right here.”

Mi Shanxin made an “Oh” sound. “Then I’ll buy you a set too.”

Jian Wanji was amused to laughter by her. “Why? Only daughters can honor their mothers with gifts, right?”

She was even better at deploying this excuse. Mi Shanxin was stumped again, thought for a moment, and said, “But my mother asks me for money. On birthdays, I have to give my younger sister gifts.”

Her gaze at Jian Wanji was very earnest. “If I had a daughter, I’d want to give her the best.”

“But I’m not one.” Jian Wanji dragged her away. “Let’s go buy your phone.”

“How old are you? No dating and having babies in university, you’re still a child yourself.”

Mi Shanxin couldn’t break free, so she could only protest, “I’m an adult. Not a child anymore.”

Jian Wanji was utterly dismissive. “Then you can buy it for me after you graduate and start working.”

Mi Shanxin knew she never considered that they might be entangled until her graduation. Unwillingly, she said, “Don’t treat me like a child.”

Only children said that. Jian Wanji nodded, smiling broadly. “I’ll treat you as my mother, alright?”

Mi Shanxin was even angrier. “Is that how you speak to your mother?”

“I don’t know. I’m older than her now,” Jian Wanji shrugged. “Even if we met, she wouldn’t recognize me.”

No matter how unsatisfactory Mi Shanxin’s life was, her parents were still alive. She couldn’t completely comprehend this feeling of an empty, boundless world.

She had thought she and Jian Wanji overlapped at some stage, but had forgotten that even being alone had different shades.

The other’s nineteen extra years were more like a progress bar. Without disasters or accidents, Jian Wanji would also leave before her, perhaps meeting Wan Lingling in heaven or hell.

Mi Shanxin had affections for her mother, but not many. At least she’d never thought about her mother suddenly dying.

Just existing in mutual non-interference was fine too. This was the most stable approach Mi Shanxin could currently conceive.

But before Jian Wanji turned eight, she had been with Wan Lingling.

The diary in the cabinet of Wan Qingqing’s hospital room only covered Wan Lingling’s life before university. But the paper materials in Mi Shanxin’s hands contained the second half, organized by Jian Wanji.

Wan Lingling was gentle, kind, full of hope for the future, dying still holding the expectation that her mother would forgive her.

Her love was as she wished; at least it fulfilled the vow made during the wedding toast of following each other through life and death.

Seen now, those words were somewhat ominous, too overly romantic, viable only without children.

But if her husband had survived, maybe sincerity would have also drowned in life’s daily trivialities. Vows of eternal love would have turned to bubbles—also harming Jian Wanji.

Life was too dynamic, the future unpredictable. Playing Wan Lingling every day, Mi Shanxin realized at this moment that perhaps Jian Wanji didn’t just barely remember Wan Lingling as she verbally claimed.

She might remember very clearly. And precisely because she remembered so clearly, she was fixated.

Not only compiling her late mother’s brief life into a thick volume of data, but also painstakingly searching for actors resembling her mother.

Filial devotion was the surface meaning. What about the deeper layers?

Mi Shanxin stopped in place, pondering for a long time. Jian Wanji, having walked several steps ahead, turned back and saw the girl standing there, absorbed in thought. She retraced her steps. “Angry?”

“Fine. Wanting to buy me things doesn’t have to be rushed. Right now, you…”

Mi Shanxin suddenly hugged her. She clung tightly, as if rehearsing their farewell, embracing with deep reluctance, yearning to engrave it into memory.

“Wha—what’s wrong?” With people bustling around, such a sudden embrace inevitably drew glances. Jian Wanji gave two dry laughs, about to persuade her to let go, when Mi Shanxin already released her.

Maybe the fabric of Jian Wanji’s jacket was too coarse, but Mi Shanxin’s nose was rubbed red.

Wan Lingling’s lifetime was far too brief. The more she pondered it, the less Mi Shanxin wanted to waste time.

The girl rubbed her nose, suppressing the strange sourness in her heart. Looking up, she asked, “What if I’m impatient?”