Chapter 45

“You…” Lu Zhi leaned in slightly, her eyes staring directly into Rong Yin’s bright, dark pupils. The corner of her lips curled into a smile. “Are you sure you want me to be your personal assistant?”

Rong Yin shrank back, her neck recoiling under Lu Zhi’s sudden forward movement. She blinked, her long lashes fluttering uncertainly, her voice even stuttering: “C-can I?”

“I’m… I’m just suggesting it. I feel like the assistants I’ve seen before haven’t worked out, and it looks like I won’t find one anytime soon. If you’re willing, you could stay at my place first. My house is big, I can’t use all the space myself anyway.” After speaking, Rong Yin looked down at the surface of the water in the glass cup. “And you run around all day, then live in this place at night, so… I just feel pretty bad about it…”

With that, Rong Yin lifted the cup and sipped the plain water in small mouthfuls, not looking up.

Lu Zhi couldn’t help but laugh. Her gaze fell on Rong Yin’s nose, which seemed even more delicate and fine when she lowered her head. Occasionally, her nose would reflexively wrinkle the tip slightly when it touched the rim of the cup.

“Don’t you mind having someone stay at your place anymore?” Lu Zhi asked with playful interest.

Rong Yin let out a small sigh, raising her eyes to look at Lu Zhi resentfully: “It’s no use if I mind. Someone’s going to have to be there at home watching me anyway, so it might as well be you personally.”

Lu Zhi nodded, straightening her body again. Looking at Rong Yin, she thought for two seconds, then suddenly nodded. “Then I’ll move to your place tomorrow.”

Rong Yin looked up.

“The script read-through is at 3 PM tomorrow, so we’ll move in the morning.” Lu Zhi tilted her head slightly, her brows and eyes holding a smile as she looked at Rong Yin.

“From now on, I’ll be relying on Boss Rong Yin to support me.”

She said this softly and slowly, her voice carrying an affectionate teasing.

Rong Yin looked at her. Only after a long while did she smile, her eyelashes curving, and say: “Okay!”

Lu Zhi didn’t have many things of her own. Not long after arriving here, she had already sorted through all of Chen Qihua’s belongings. Those books, gifts, ornaments, souvenirs—she had packed them all away in boxes, preserved intact.

Perhaps Lu Zhi would never use these things in her lifetime, but they were the last traces a young girl left in this world. She was willing to cherish them.

Rong Yin was clearly somewhat excited too. Just past nine in the morning, she already called asking where Lu Zhi was. But as soon as she hung up, she felt she was being really strange.

But regardless, Lu Zhi moved in smoothly.

Rong Yin’s villa had two and a half floors. The first floor was mainly the reception area, the second floor had the rooms, and the third was a small attic with an attached large flat rooftop terrace.

Rong Yin was picky and didn’t let Lu Zhi stay in the guest room where previous assistants had lived. She chose a bedroom with a very large floor-to-ceiling window.

After tidying up, the two went downstairs back to the living room.

“Now then, half your identity is my personal assistant, so I’m your boss. At home, you have to listen to me.” Rong Yin sat cross-legged on the sofa, lifting her little chin to look at Lu Zhi, declaring her sovereignty in a very serious manner.

Lu Zhi had just found her phone among the clutter on the table. Upon hearing this, she didn’t unlock it, setting it aside first instead. She looked over at Rong Yin: “So, what are Boss’s orders right now?”

Rong Yin hummed in a drawn-out tone. Catching sight of the fruit platter on the table out of the corner of her eye, she grinned, showing a few small teeth, looking like a little fox. “First, peel an orange for me.”

“Very well.” Lu Zhi was exceptionally accommodating. Reaching out to pick up an orange, she began peeling it while asking, “Shall I feed you, too?”

Rong Yin licked her lips and opened her mouth: “Ah.”

Lu Zhi broke off a segment and placed it inside. She watched as Rong Yin’s rosy lips closed, her pink little tongue curling it in, eating it.

“Unqualified. You have to remove all that white stuff,” Rong Yin chewed with her small mouth, finding time to criticize her work.

Lu Zhi didn’t get upset. She meticulously picked off every white stringy bit from the orange, feeding her segment by segment.

“Satisfied now?” Lu Zhi stuffed the last piece of orange into Rong Yin’s mouth.

Rong Yin put on an expression of magnanimously granting you face, saying, “It’s passable.”

“Oh,” Lu Zhi nodded, but then extended her slender index finger right in front of her, saying, “But even if it’s passable, you shouldn’t have bitten my finger, right?”

She said it very seriously, looking like she was about to pick a fight. Rong Yin nearly choked on the pulp. Coughing once, she hurriedly explained, “I… I didn’t do it on purpose! My tooth just accidentally touched it, I didn’t bite…”

“Then I forgive you.” Lu Zhi said very good-naturedly. Then, using the fingertip of that very index finger—the one her tooth had “accidentally” touched—she very naturally wiped a little orange juice droplet from Rong Yin’s lip, her smiling eyes fixed on hers all the while.

It wasn’t until Lu Zhi turned away that Rong Yin realized she might have forgotten to breathe just then.

“How’s the script reading coming along?” Lu Zhi sat back down on the opposite sofa, picking up the booklet from the coffee table. “During the read-through this afternoon, you can communicate your opinions directly to the screenwriter or director. All the main creators will be there anyway.”

Rong Yin hadn’t expected Lu Zhi to switch into work mode so quickly. Pressing her lips together, she first grabbed a throw pillow to hold, pursed her lips again, then spoke: “It’s… it’s okay, I guess…”

Lu Zhi made an “hmm” sound. “I looked it over yesterday. The script writes Tang Mi and Lu Shuang’s first meeting in a bar, with her drunk. I feel like that doesn’t quite fit Tang Mi’s airhead persona. Plus, we’ll need to find a way for this show to air on satellite TV later, so we might have to discuss this part with the screenwriter.”

“I think so too. And it’s an ‘accidentally spilling drink on the male lead, then kindly offering to pay his tab’ scenario. Ugh, eight out of ten overbearing CEOs get drinks or coffee spilled on them. So cliché,” Rong Yin quickly shifted her attention back to work as well, tossing that slight ripple of awkwardness to the back of her mind, complaining disdainfully.

Lu Zhi smiled and used a red pen to mark the booklet.

The two briefly discussed the plot. At noon, the housekeeper came to cook lunch, incidentally celebrating Lu Zhi’s housewarming, so the meal was exceptionally lavish.

Rong Yin ate very happily. After the meal, she circled around the living room cradling her little belly to digest, muttering all the while, “I bet I’ll turn into a huge fatty pretty soon.”

Lu Zhi was checking messages in the work group on her phone. Hearing this, she casually asked, “Did you weigh yourself this morning?”

“I did,” Rong Yin sighed, pinching her non-existent belly fat, saying resentfully, “I actually hit 93 jin!”

Lu Zhi heard this and made an “oh” sound, saying nonchalantly, “Then there’s still room to grow.”

“It can still go up? But I’m a female celebrity!” Now that Lu Zhi was spoiling her like this, Rong Yin actually felt worried herself. “My weight’s never exceeded 87 jin before. Every time it hit 87, Zhuang Jie would start only giving me water, or at most some protein powder mixed in.”

Lu Zhi put down her phone, turned to look at Rong Yin, and said, “Don’t be afraid. From now on, we’re taking the strength route.”

Rong Yin pressed her lips together, couldn’t hold back her laughter after a moment, but still quietly retorted, “But a strong actress can’t be a huge fatty either.”

“Relax, you’re still a long way from being a huge fatty,” Lu Zhi had always understood girls’ anxiety about their figures, especially for someone like Rong Yin who had been strictly ordered to control her weight before. So she patiently comforted her: “You were way too thin before. You felt all bony to the touch. It was just your youth keeping the flesh on your face; otherwise, you definitely wouldn’t have looked good.”

“Really?” Rong Yin felt her own wrist uncertainly.

Lu Zhi hummed in affirmation, raising her hand to look at her wristwatch, simultaneously changing the subject. “We leave at two, so we still have an hour. Why don’t you go take a nap first? I’ll wake you when it’s time.”

Maybe it was better she didn’t mention it, because as soon as she did, Rong Yin wanted to yawn. Rong Yin nodded, heading upstairs. As she walked, she couldn’t stop muttering under her breath, “Eat a full meal and then want to sleep. Ah, I’m hopeless…”

The afternoon was the script read-through, held in a hotel meeting room booked by the producer. The seven or eight main actors, the directing team, the production team, screenwriters, and executive producers were all present. No open flames were allowed indoors for smoking, so everyone had an e-cigarette in hand.

To be serious about it, in all her years acting, this was only the second official script read-through Rong Yin had attended. The first was for that satellite TV historical fantasy drama she did when she was nineteen. Back then, her future seemed even brighter than it did now. But because she offended a fairly famous director at a dinner banquet, she was knocked right back down to being a web drama actor.

Although several of the web dramas she took on in recent years were huge hits, she was also pinned to the pillar of shame, labeled low-tier by netizens.

Because Lu Zhi had brought a sponsor on board, the producer had been persuaded by her to aim this drama towards satellite TV broadcast as much as possible. So he was putting in twelve times the effort compared to before.

The suggestion about the male and female leads’ first meeting scene was indeed accepted by the screenwriter. The young-looking young woman came up with a plot twist in five minutes, saying to change it so that the female lead happens upon the male lead’s grandmother falling down. While others are afraid to help, she does, and enthusiastically takes her to the hospital. Consequently, she naturally gets to know the male lead. Afterwards, because of this incident, she also passes the interview and enters the company, exceptionally making her the male lead’s secretary.

It neatly sets up the grandmother’s later matchmaking efforts. It also ties into current social issues and aligns with the values of truth, goodness, and beauty.

With this change, Rong Yin’s side naturally had no objections.

The actor playing the male lead, Lu Shuang, was Yang Yuanfan, the entertainment industry’s famously typecast “overbearing CEO specialist.” He was a rich second-generation himself. He debuted at twenty, basically playing himself—an overbearing CEO. He’d played it for ten years; the overbearing CEO image was deeply ingrained, his overbearing CEO acting skills reaching perfection.

Yang Yuanfan’s attitude towards the script changes was indifferent. Lu Zhi could see that this person perhaps didn’t really like acting that much, but simply enjoyed the feeling of being treated like a star surrounded by admirers, and was almost addicted to the overbearing CEO halo.

Filming for “Honey and Arsenic” was scheduled to start on August 29th and run until December, right up to the Spring Festival period. Lu Zhi didn’t arrange any other work for Rong Yin, planning just to let her walk some red carpets, take some classes, focusing on letting her rest, recuperate, and shed all her bad habits.

Modern dramas weren’t as complicated as period dramas, but all the basic procedures were still there. On the morning of the opening ceremony, the location was already packed and blocked solid by major media, fans, and crew members.

All the main creators burned incense, bowed to the Buddha, and handed out red envelopes. Then came media interviews, group interviews, individual interviews. When it was finally over, the crowd outside was even denser. The cars could barely get out.

The car had already sped fifty meters away, but Rong Yin was still leaning out the window, shouting back and forth with that group of girls: “I love you all too!!!”

This provoked the fans to chase after the car like zombies from behind.

Lu Zhi pulled her back in from the car window, warning her: “Behave.”

Rong Yin giggled: “It’s just that I haven’t seen them in so long. Before, Zhuang Jie was always organizing fan visits to the set, airport pickups, meet-and-greets every few days. It got super annoying. Now…”

She fiddled with her fingers, saying, “I actually haven’t seen my fans in almost two months! It feels so novel!”