Hospitals were busy; even meals were hurried for doctors, and Shao Yu had long since trained herself to eat fast.
She set down her chopsticks well before Song Yingqiu, picking up her phone to keep replying to online consultations, glancing at Song Yingqiu now and then, perfectly at ease.
Song Yingqiu ate at her leisure. She could tell Shao Yu’s mood was actually rather good right now.
With the matter resolved, the trending-topic fiasco had lost all its sting for the both of them, and Song Yingqiu felt much lighter.
After the meal, the two walked arm in arm to the elevators.
It was peak lunch hour; plenty of people were waiting after eating.
Song Yingqiu didn’t push to the front, standing at the back with Shao Yu, yet even so they drew plenty of stares.
Shao Yu noticed a girl fishing out a lip glaze to discreetly touch up her makeup.
Suddenly, a light bump landed on her shoulder.
Her attention snapped back to Song Yingqiu, who had bumped her shoulder with a grin, a question in her eyes.
Song Yingqiu’s lovely eyes rolled meaningfully, gesturing ahead with a look.
In front of them, a man and a woman were chatting idly.
“《No Regrets》 hasn’t left theaters yet, has it? I want to go see it.”
“It’s not that great. Chao Yushan’s face aside.”
“Chao Yushan? She’s not prettier than our boss. Forget the cinema then, I’ll head straight home after work.”
“You’re not going home to rewatch the annual gala footage, are you? I’m dying.”
“Can’t I? I’m going to watch it.”
They hadn’t the faintest idea their boss was right behind them.
The crowd at the elevator was wicked too. Not a single person warned them; they were all suppressing laughter.
Only when they sensed something wrong and turned around did they freeze.
“Boss! P-President Song…”
Song Yingqiu’s smile was gentle. She said nothing, only reminded them softly, “The elevator’s here.”
To be fair, in private Song Yingqiu was an easygoing boss who didn’t mind her employees joking at her expense.
Still, she never joked too much with them, keeping a proper distance and authority.
The elevator descended all the way down; by the time it reached the basement level, only the two of them remained inside.
Song Yingqiu: “You heard all that, didn’t you.”
Shao Yu paused to recall. “You mean, your employees calling you beautiful?”
Song Yingqiu shot her a reproachful look. “It’s about Chao Yushan.”
Shao Yu’s brow creased slightly. “Mm. I heard.”
Song Yingqiu had been watching her expression the whole time, and the moment those brows knitted together, she burst out laughing.
Now she was certain.
That day at the premiere… Shao Yu had done it on purpose.
Deliberately warm and friendly to Chao Yushan, winning her over in a few sentences until her heart wavered and she jumped ship on the spot.
Song Yingqiu had assumed Shao Yu was just a casual admirer of Chao Yushan and had even asked her about it afterward. But turning it over again later, it hadn’t quite added up.
Now it seemed Shao Yu felt nothing for Chao Yushan at all, which left only one possibility…
Shao Yu must have been jealous.
Honestly, at her age, still getting jealous over her “girlfriend.”
Even as she chided Shao Yu in her heart, an unstoppable smile she herself hadn’t noticed crept onto her face.
It wasn’t until the elevator doors opened and they stepped out that Shao Yu, seemingly at the end of her rope, stopped and asked, “What are you smiling at?”
Song Yingqiu touched her own face, letting out a soft “hm?” “I’m smiling?”
Shao Yu had meant to press further, but Song Yingqiu looked so adorably bewildered, so naturally guileless, that she forgot what she’d been about to say. All she could think was that Song Yingqiu was impossibly cute.
From the moment she’d said she only cared about her happiness, up to right now. All of it, adorable.
There hadn’t been any dessert at lunch, yet Shao Yu’s tongue was coated in sweetness.
Song Yingqiu said, “I’ll drive you back to the hospital. We’ve got time.”
Shao Yu hummed assent, following Song Yingqiu to find the car, her steps turning light despite herself.
Until someone darted out, blocking her path and Song Yingqiu’s.
Shao Yu recognized her at a glance. Xiao Fu.
She didn’t know why Xiao Fu was still around, but a moment later Shao Yu recalled the phone call, the one from when she’d first crossed paths with her.
Xiao Fu shot her a quick look, then turned to Song Yingqiu, the picture of pitiful grace. “Yingqiu, won’t you see me? I can explain.”
Shao Yu’s face stayed calm; only the light in her eyes dimmed, like a lamp being switched off.
Two seconds of silence, and then she looked at Song Yingqiu.
Song Yingqiu seemed not to have expected Xiao Fu to still be here. After a beat of surprise, she laughed softly, unhurried. “You’ve been waiting for me all this time?”
Xiao Fu nodded eagerly.
“I didn’t want something like this to come between y—”
“You’ve waited long enough. I’ll have Wu Rui take you back to the office.”
Song Yingqiu cut her off, gentle and merciless all at once. “Some things, once you choose to do them, come with consequences to bear. Isn’t that right?”
Xiao Fu was silent a long moment, then suddenly smiled bitterly.
“Am I really no different to you from all the other women.”
She looked at Shao Yu. “Just like her and me. Mess up once, and you get thrown away?”
Of course not.
Song Yingqiu wanted to retort at once. Maybe all the women in the world were much the same, but Shao Yu was, without question, the most special one.
But before she could speak, Shao Yu stepped aside.
Song Yingqiu: Hm?
Shao Yu stood well apart, her face utterly cool. “Don’t misunderstand. She and I are nothing like whatever you two have.”
Song Yingqiu: ?
Shao Yu was drawing a line between them?
“Wait…”
Xiao Fu said acidly, “Really? With a face like yours, she’d just let you go?”
Song Yingqiu, speechless, choked out, “Hold on, you too… I’m not that lecherous, am I?”
Shao Yu spared her not a single glance, merely nodding toward Xiao Fu. “As far as love goes, you and I have nothing whatsoever to do with each other.”
“What do you think Shao Yu meant by that?”
Song Yingqiu knocked the empty bottle flat, stood it up again, and toppled it again with one finger.
It wasn’t until Ning Wanmei reached out to rescue the bottle that Song Yingqiu flopped back onto the sofa, rubbing her temple, and shot the other woman a look, listing grievances against the absent Shao Yu:
“She was jealous over Chao Yushan just the other day. Then in front of Xiao Fu, she acts like she barely knows me? How can a woman flip that fast?”
Ning Wanmei, in Lingguan on business and dragged to a nightclub by her friend, stretched out in mimicry and delivered her considered verdict. “She’s disgusted by you.”
“……”
Song Yingqiu rolled her eyes. “My little sister wouldn’t be disgusted by me. And she’s been totally normal these past few days.”
Ning Wanmei: “So?”
Song Yingqiu: “I don’t know.”
Ning Wanmei smiled. “I wasn’t asking about her.”
Song Yingqiu: “Hm?”
Ning Wanmei: “I’m asking you. If you don’t think she’s disgusted by you, then what are you actually upset about?”
Song Yingqiu’s reach for the bottle froze, fingertips suspended in midair.
“I’m not upset…”
“Of course you’re not. You just had someone pick me up from the airport and drag me straight to a nightclub, so I could sit here and listen to you go on about your little sister for one hour and thirty-five minutes.”
“……”
Ning Wanmei’s phone lit up; she glanced at the screen, frowned, and pressed it dark, returning to her analysis on Song Yingqiu’s behalf.
“Or could it be that what actually bothers you is… why she stopped being jealous?”
Song Yingqiu nearly bit her tongue, refuting on reflex. “Why would I.”
Ning Wanmei nodded. “You’d better not.”
Song Yingqiu watched the dim blue spotlights drift across the glassware. “Why?”
“Need me to remind you? Since our teens, every time I asked what you and Shao Yu were to each other, you insisted: friends. I know how deep your feelings for her run. That you even depend on her.”
“At the end of the day, a little jealousy between close friends is normal. But she’s straight, and you’re not, and once certain lines blur…”
Ning Wanmei stopped there, and Song Yingqiu, belatedly remembering her situation, said at once, “All right, you don’t have to finish. I understand.”
Ning Wanmei smiled, then pivoted to gossip. “So. You’ve really fallen for her?”
Song Yingqiu smiled too, enunciating every word. “No.”
After dropping Ning Wanmei at her hotel, Song Yingqiu went home alone.
Just before her bedroom door, her eyes caught on Shao Yu’s, tightly shut.
Shao Yu had a surgery tonight. She wasn’t home.
Song Yingqiu breathed a sigh of relief for no reason she could name and turned toward her own room.
At bedtime, she closed her eyes, and what surfaced was Ning Wanmei’s sober, measured words.
And that last piece of gossip, and her own answer to it.
“So. You’ve really fallen for her?”
“No.”
Her denial had been nailed down word by word.
Yet Song Yingqiu couldn’t forget how, that day when Shao Yu had drawn that line between them, the loss had crashed over her heart like a surging tide, and even now its faint traces remained.
Not strong. But impossible to ignore.
