Xie Yan swallowed his annoyance and rolled the window down.
“What is it?”
Shen Ruoxi leaned in, pointed at the seat beside him. “The takeaway from earlier — give it to me.”
When they had left, he had out of habit picked up that paper bag of takeaway, and once in the car, he had set it casually on the seat beside him.
Xie Yan had thought she had turned back for him — but in fact she had turned back for the food.
He shoved the paper bag at her without any ceremony. “Food obsessed.”
Shen Ruoxi caught it quickly with both hands, and hearing him insult her, immediately arched her brows. “Have you ever gone hungry? Do you have any idea how precious food is? Do you know that this one bag of food could save a life?”
Xie Yan ignored her and rolled the window back up, then ordered in a low voice: “Drive.”
The car slid smoothly away. Shen Ruoxi raised a fist at the retreating vehicle. “Easy for the well-fed to forget the starving.”
Xie Yan couldn’t help glancing back and caught a glimpse of Shen Ruoxi jumping up and down in indignation. He couldn’t help the slight upward pull at the corner of his mouth, and under his breath he murmured: Who said I don’t know?
~
At night, Shun Cheng — Huarong Street — was a world that belonged to neon lights and vice.
Shen Ruoxi had barely appeared in the dressing room doorway when someone dressed as an attendant walked toward her, carrying a large bouquet of roses in his arms.
“Excuse me — are you Miss Shen?” the attendant asked.
Shen Ruoxi paused. “I am.”
“These are for you.” The attendant held the bouquet out.
“For me?” Shen Ruoxi didn’t take them right away. “Who sent them?”
“I’m only here to deliver the flowers.” The attendant extended them again.
Not wanting the poor fellow to stand there holding them indefinitely, Shen Ruoxi hurriedly took them.
When she walked into the dressing room carrying the flowers, a cluster of eyes immediately turned toward her.
“My goodness — are those roses?” someone exclaimed in astonishment.
At this time of year, it was impossible to grow roses in Shun Cheng. To have fresh roses, they had to be flown in from the far south, and the cost of a single air shipment was beyond anything ordinary people could imagine.
Though it was only one bouquet, at this moment it was worth as much as gold and jewels.
Shen Ruoxi set the bouquet aside and searched through it, but found no card or note of any kind.
“Latched onto a rich man so quickly?” someone said in a sour, pointed tone. “Sounds like last night’s service left the client very satisfied.”
“A cheap woman will always be a cheap woman. Put on airs as long as you like — it doesn’t change what you are at your core.”
“No matter how prim and proper she acts, she still ends up selling herself.”
Shen Ruoxi paid no attention to any of the jeering and cutting remarks. She picked up her makeup bag and began to apply her makeup.
“Would you all give it a rest.” Yun Jing had finally had enough. She stood up and said: “She received one bouquet of flowers — and you’ve already jumped to conclusions. Where does your mind go?”
“Oh, Yun Jing, what act are you putting on?” Several voices turned on her at once. “What’s she given you that you defend her at every turn?”
“Such energy to keep watch over someone else — better spent on yourselves. Two full years at this dance hall, and you still haven’t managed to attract a single decent client.”
“Who says she hasn’t? Remember that old man with the shoes on the wrong feet? He said she was his absolute favorite.”
“He was senile — he told the janitor he loved listening to her sing too.”
Just as they were all talking at full tilt, a dark object came flying through the air and hit one of the singing girls squarely in the face.
“Ah!” The girl let out a sharp yelp.
When everyone saw what had been thrown, they first went wide-eyed with shock, then broke into a chorus of outraged cries.
“How ungrateful can you be — throwing something that expensive?”
What lay scattered all over the floor were the roses from the bouquet. In everyone else’s eyes, it was as if gold had been flung to the ground.
Shen Ruoxi looked at them all with calm, steady eyes. “Does anyone here want to fight?”
“What?” The group looked at her in confusion.
Shen Ruoxi pushed back her chair and stood up. “I asked: does anyone want to fight? Mouthing off accomplishes nothing — better to use your hands.”
Faced with Shen Ruoxi’s eyes, which had taken on a somewhat fierce edge, several of them visibly shrank back.
Shen Ruoxi said with a cold laugh: “I, Shen Ruoxi, have crawled back from the gates of death more than once. Except for not having enough to eat, death holds no fear for me. I’m not good at fighting with words — if you have the nerve, come at me. All of you at once is fine too. At worst, we all go down together, and none of you will have any peace from me.”
These girls were used to bullying timid newcomers. Suddenly faced with someone this fierce, they immediately lost their nerve.
“Now, now, let’s all calm down — harmony brings good fortune.” Yun Jing, seeing the moment turn, stepped in at once to smooth things over. “We’re all in the same dance hall, earning a living side by side — no need to make it a fire-and-water situation. Look at these roses on the floor, what a shame. Ruoxi is being kind, sharing them with everyone. Come on, let’s all pick them up and put them in vases.”
Hearing this, the others each chose to take the exit Yun Jing had offered, and one by one they bent down to gather the roses.
“These roses really are beautiful — look, there’s even dew on them.”
“The half-open buds are the most gorgeous — leave them in water a couple of days and they’ll bloom fully.”
The singing girls’ attention quickly shifted entirely to the roses. After all, many of them had never seen real roses before. Even in summer, buying a single bouquet was beyond what they could afford.
Yun Jing gave Shen Ruoxi a quick wink. Shen Ruoxi smiled faintly and went back to doing her makeup.
That evening, as usual, Shen Ruoxi took the stage in place of both Chen Xiaoman and Meimei.
Red Gate Dance Hall had a custom: if a singing girl performed well, the guests would reward her with gold tokens, which they purchased from the servers. Each token cost one silver yuan — they weren’t solid gold, but they weren’t cheap either.
Guests gave these tokens to whichever girl they liked. The girls who received tokens could then exchange them for money.
At the end of each performance, a server would walk through the audience carrying a small box bearing the singer’s name, collecting tokens. Even at the low end, a box came back with at least three or four tokens.
The singing girls earned their daily keep from their performances, but the tokens were their primary source of income — the more tokens they received, the more money they made.
After Shen Ruoxi came offstage, Floor Manager Hu followed her cheerfully into the backstage area.
“Shen Ruoxi, you picked up quite a haul of tokens tonight — that little box is nearly full.” The mention of money made the manager’s eyes light up.
The singing girls she managed meant the manager got her share of their earnings too. No matter how much she despised Shen Ruoxi, she couldn’t afford to destroy her own golden goose.
Shen Ruoxi ignored the manager’s animated expression and asked in a flat voice: “When can these be exchanged for money? I need it now.”
“That… naturally has to wait until the monthly salary settlement at the end of the month.”
“That doesn’t sound right to me.” Shen Ruoxi looked at the manager, whose gaze immediately became evasive. “Someone told me the tokens collected each day can be exchanged once a week.”
The manager bristled at once. “What — you think I’d cheat you? Shen Ruoxi, just because you’ve filled in for Meimei for a few days, and some guest has sent you a few tokens, don’t go getting ideas above your station. Let me tell you — one performance of Meimei’s brings in twice the tokens you got tonight. You’re a brand-new face who’s barely stepped out of the gatehouse. Just who do you think you are?”
“She’s not ‘who she thinks she is,'” a calm, composed voice cut in. “She is a rare gem.”