In the following days, Tang Yang left work promptly at 5:30 PM every day to visit the hospital, staying with him until 10 PM before returning home. Sometimes, Jiang’s mother would arrive after 10 PM. Before that, Tang Yang and Jiang Shiyan would lie together, engaging in intimate conversation.
On occasions when Jiang’s mother arrived early, Tang Yang would sit by the bedside, peeling apples while chatting with her. Whenever Tang Yang tried to feed Jiang Shiyan something, he would grab her hand in front of his mother and hold it still.
Jiang’s mother thought it was normal for friends to joke around like this. When Tang Yang and Jiang the Big Dog exchanged playful glances, her face would turn as red as if it were on fire.
Whatever Tang Yang said to Jiang Shiyan, he would look at her silently with eyes that seemed to call her “wife” in front of his mother, smiling.
Sometimes, when Tang Yang and Jiang’s mother sat on opposite sides of the bed, Jiang Shiyan would be even more daring. He would calmly discuss gossip about a certain TV show under Yihu’s production with them, while his hand, hidden at the side of the bed, held Tang Yang’s, squeezing, rubbing, and caressing it.
More often than not, he preferred to interlock their fingers, then slightly curl them, gently pinching her hand. Tang Yang’s hand was soft and fair, while Jiang Shiyan’s had a thin layer of calluses. As their skin touched, the warmth spread throughout their bodies.
To make matters worse, Jiang Shiyan would deliberately bring up topics like, “I feel a bit hot with the air conditioning on. Can we open the window for some fresh air?”
The late spring chill hadn’t passed yet, so how could it be hot?
Jiang’s mother grumbled inwardly but noticed Tang Yang’s flushed face and asked, “Are you hot too, dear? Shall we open the window?”
The window was right behind Tang Yang. But it would be strange if a certain someone let go of her hand.
Tang Yang found herself in an awkward and embarrassing situation, still having to explain, “No need. Maybe it’s because we just had dinner not long ago.” She then pretended to cough a couple of times, adding, “It’s easy to catch a cold in this weather.”
Jiang Shiyan’s lips twitched, trying to suppress a smile.
Tang Yang irritably scratched his palm. What are you laughing at? What’s so funny?
Jiang Shiyan let the little angry cat have her way, and as he did so, he suddenly enveloped her entire hand in his.
Jiang’s mother was unaware of their hand movements under the bed, while Tang Yang was both annoyed and embarrassed.
But she had brought this upon herself by insisting on “settling into a relationship pattern before telling family and friends.” Now, what could she do besides swallow her pride?
Jiang Shiyan, on the other hand, thoroughly enjoyed pretending to be just friends with Tang Yang. He teased her until she was flustered and ready to jump up and stomp on him, then when no one was looking, he would secretly comfort her.
How to describe this feeling?
It was secretive and… thrilling!
————
By Friday, colleagues had observed that Director Tang’s recent demeanor seemed to have a built-in beauty filter, and she smiled more often, with a small, charming dimple appearing on her left cheek.
During the lunch break, Lin Lang Fan was urged by coworkers to ask about her lipstick shade.
Lin Lang Fan reluctantly agreed, but upon entering Tang Yang’s office and closing the door, her first words were earth-shattering: “Are you two together now?”
Tang Yang nearly spat out her tea. She hurriedly put down her cup, coughing and wiping her mouth with a tissue. “When, when did I tell you?”
She hadn’t told anyone, after all.
This response was as good as a confirmation.
“Every strand of your hair is screaming ‘Look at Lin Lang Fan, that single dog,’ and you stutter when you’re nervous, repeating a word twice,” Lin Lang Fan presented her evidence. “When President Zhou was talking about the Yihu co-branded credit card case in the meeting earlier, you even managed to stutter while reading a prepared script, saying ‘Yi-Yi-Yihu…'”
Lin Lang Fan’s imitation was spot-on, causing Tang Yang to bend over as if looking for a hole to crawl into.
“Alright, alright, I’ll stop teasing you,” Lin Lang Fan glanced outside through the semi-transparent glass, then walked to Tang Yang’s office chair and nudged her arm. “Come on, tell me, what’s it like dating him?”
In Lin Lang Fan’s impression, Jiang Shiyan was the epitome of a domineering CEO – composed in his actions, aloof in his demeanor, a victor in the business world who walked with the aura of commanding thousands.
Tang Yang was similar – a mature female Ph.D., the youngest acting director, decisive and wise in her work, the very image of a strong leader.
Of course, Tang Yang could be a bit absent-minded during breaks, but such details were long buried in Lin Lang Fan’s mind full of novel-like scenarios.
“Marriage first, then love? Bed first, then love?” Lin Lang Fan asked, full of curiosity. “Are you both so rational that it’s just like being friends? You banter and laugh, and then when the time comes, President Jiang asks if he can hold your hand, you say yes, and you hold hands for ten minutes. Then after another set time, you ask if you can kiss, he says yes, and you kiss for half an hour.”
“Pfft, cough cough!” Tang Yang choked on air, her face turning bright red.
Seeing her reaction, Lin Lang Fan became even more convinced: “Then after another agreed-upon time, you go to the supermarket to buy special—”
“Get out, get out, I said get out!” The usually-composed Director Tang was so embarrassed that she physically started pushing Lin Lang Fan out.
Lin Lang Fan took this as confirmation and struggled against the doorknob: “We’re all adults, Director Tang, you—”
“If you keep gossiping at work, I’ll have you re-check all of last year’s files in the archives!”
Tang Yang playfully shoved Lin Lang Fan out the door, closed it, and then, with great poise, adjusted her collar.
Outside, colleagues swarmed around Lin Lang Fan: “Which brand and shade is it? Did you find out?”
Inside, Tang Yang sat in her office chair, spinning around. It was all Jiang Shiyan’s fault, though she wasn’t sure exactly what to blame him for, but blaming him felt right.
Tang Yang felt like she hadn’t talked to him in a while, but when she picked up her phone and opened WeChat, she saw their last chat was just ten minutes ago – he was going for a CT scan.
Ah…
She put her phone on the desk and rested her chin on it, her arms stretched out along the edge of the desk. Then she let out a sigh.
It was only 1:30 PM now, still four hours until 5:30 PM. How would she endure?
She had completely forgotten that she used to be an unrepentant workaholic.
Tang Yang knew he didn’t have his phone with him, but she couldn’t resist sending an emoji of a child spinning around saying “Give me a kiss.”
The child in the emoji spun and lunged towards the screen for a kiss, making Tang Yang feel elated.
Smiling, she made a plan to allow herself to think about him after completing each stage of work.
There were one or two slip-ups, but her efficiency was still much higher than before.
At 5 PM, Tang Yang finished reviewing other cases and handed them to Lin Lang Fan to take out. Then she opened the files for the Jiujiang special case and called the branch manager of Nanjin Street.
The Jiujiang Group had a massive and intricate structure. Since taking over the special case, Tang Yang has divided Jiujiang Group’s industries in A City by district and assigned them to various branches for covert on-site investigations, to be used as supplementary material for subsequent audits. After the recent fire incident, her relationship with Branch Manager Shen of Nanjin had grown closer, so naturally, she called him first to ensure any problems during the investigation could be addressed promptly.
The branch manager briefly reported on the progress, seemingly closing a door as he continued, “Director Tang, do you remember Chen Zhang Gang? The one we visited together last time when you came over.”
“Yes,” Tang Yang replied. She wasn’t in the habit of leaving things half-done. Regardless of whether Chen Zhang Gang’s insurance compensation contract could be used as collateral or whether he could get a loan, Tang Yang would follow up.
It’s just that Chen Qiang was still hospitalized, so she had temporarily set this matter aside.
“The Jiujiang Steel Plant I’m investigating this time is where Chen Zhang Gang used to work,” the branch manager said. “I visited some old workers, and they casually mentioned that about twenty years ago, Chen Zhang Gang was a senior technician and workshop director. He took on an apprentice who, after a few years under his guidance, became the deputy workshop director.”
“One year, on New Year’s Eve, they hadn’t started their holiday yet. Chen Zhang Gang still had lunch in the cafeteria, but his apprentice sneaked off to have a New Year’s Eve dinner with his girlfriend. The apprentice broke the rules and had a couple of drinks. When he came back to work in the afternoon, he made a fatal operational error – not fatal for the workshop, but for himself. Chen Zhang Gang reacted quickly to pull his apprentice away, but his arm got caught under the machine bed.”
The place where Chen Zhang Gang’s arm was amputated was wrapped in cloth, so Tang Yang hadn’t seen it.
Listening to the branch manager’s account, she began to guess what might have happened.
“Blood was all over the machine. Everyone rushed him to the hospital where he was saved but had to undergo amputation. When he returned to the steel plant to claim medical expenses,” the branch manager continued, sounding incredulous, “he found that in the two weeks he was gone, his apprentice had taken his position as workshop director. His medical expenses were covered, but he had to write a self-criticism in red ink and bear a lifelong disciplinary action for operational error.”
“He went to argue with the leadership, with his apprentice, but at the time of the accident, only he and the apprentice were in the workshop. There were no surveillance cameras then, and although the coworkers who took him to the hospital sympathized with him, they hadn’t witnessed the incident and couldn’t speak up.”
“One moment, the apprentice was on his knees telling Chen Zhang Gang that although he had a girlfriend and was about to get married, he had wronged his master and would immediately go to confess to the leaders and resign. Chen Zhang Gang comforted him and went home. The next moment, the apprentice went to the leaders, claiming that it was Chen Zhang Gang’s watch that had accidentally gotten caught in the machine. The watch was worth over a hundred yuan, and Chen Zhang Gang, unwilling to lose it, had risked reaching for it. The apprentice even took the leaders to see the watch still stuck in the machine where the accident occurred.”
Good deeds are punished, unable to defend oneself against false accusations.
Tang Yang felt as if a heavy stone had been placed in her heart, weighing her down.
“Chen Zhang Gang’s hand was amputated at the wrist. He had a prosthetic but discarded it when he resigned. Later, that apprentice climbed the ranks and now holds a high position of power in Jiujiang.” The branch manager added, remembering something, “Of course, without seeing Jiujiang’s internal records, these workers might just be spreading baseless rumors.”
He further added, “But I asked nearly ten old workers. They were from different departments, retired at different times, and hadn’t been in contact with Chen Zhang Gang since he left the factory.” If one person might lie, but ten people tell the same story…
Workers from the 1970s and 80s had iron rice bowls edged with gold.
If Chen Zhang Gang hadn’t saved his apprentice if that accident hadn’t happened…
But there are no ‘ifs’.
After the branch manager finished speaking, the phone fell into a brief silence.
After a while.
“I’m not a sentimental person. I’m close to retirement age and have always just gotten by, neither seeking progress nor regression. This is quite presumptuous of me, but I still want to say, if possible, when I submit Chen Zhang Gang’s case, Director Tang, could you perhaps,” the branch manager paused, “give it some special consideration.”
Tang Yang’s office phone automatically recorded calls.
Tang Yang held her breath for a moment, then exhaled.
She opened the revised regulations for Huishang A City’s spring credit review, moving the item “Special Collateral – Bills and Contracts with Clear Valuation or Pricing” that included Chen Zhang Gang’s insurance compensation contract up three lines in priority, and bolding her modification.
Tang Yang moved quickly, her words cold: “We should keep personal feelings out of work. If the conditions are met, I’ll naturally approve it. If not, I won’t. Branch Manager Shen, it’s good to put people first, but we must consider the bigger picture. Of course, I’m being presumptuous too.”
The branch manager belatedly realized Tang Yang was using a landline, breaking into a cold sweat and repeatedly agreeing.
After a few more words, Tang Yang hung up.
At 5:30 PM, when work ended, Tang Yang didn’t move.
Meanwhile, the branch manager, who usually took two weeks to submit files, spent half an hour submitting the detailed loan materials for Chen Zhang Gang that he had compiled over the past few days.
Tang Yang quickly wrote her opinion based on the regulations.
As she turned to the back to sign and stamp each page, her gaze fell on a place where “Chen Qiang” was written, and her expression gradually froze…
In the Huishang building, the lights went out one by one.
In the end, only Tang Yang remained.
When Tang Yang finished reviewing the materials and reached the parking garage, it was already past 7 PM.
It had been a long time since she had worked such late hours. She first went to the nearby Xinguang City to buy something, then drove to the hospital.
She didn’t go to see Jiang Shiyan but instead went to a room on the lower floor.
The door was ajar.
When Tang Yang pushed it open, Chen Qiang was sitting on the bed, facing the window.
The window was half open, and rain was falling on his face and body. He was whistling a melancholic tune in the light rain.
“Beyond the long pavilion, beside the ancient road, the green grass stretches to the horizon.”
“Can you play the harmonica?” Tang Yang entered, treading lightly.
Earlier, when she was taking care of Jiang Shiyan, she had encountered Chen Qiang and his father in the elevator, and Chen Zhang Gang had introduced her.
Chen Qiang stopped whistling but didn’t turn around.
Tang Yang put the things she brought on his bedside table, explaining, “It seems like people who can hum ‘Beyond the long pavilion, beside the ancient road’ can all play the harmonica.”
Chen Qiang thought this was fallacious reasoning, but thinking carefully, he could play, and so could the people he knew from the harmonica club.
Memories from my university days were too vague. He tugged at his lips, slowly turned around, and said to Tang Yang, “Sit.”
Tang Yang politely nodded.
After sitting down, she didn’t mention the loan or Chen Zhang Gang’s situation. Tang Yang dispassionately recited what she had seen in the office files earlier: “Chen Qiang, 25 years old, formerly attended Nanjin Middle School, won a bronze medal in the Pan-Asian Pacific Mathematics Competition in his senior year of high school, gaining admission to Jiaotong University’s Finance program. In his sophomore year, due to outstanding academic performance, he was promoted to the experimental class in Economics and Management. That same summer, he was expelled and sentenced to two years in prison for intentional assault. After release, he drove trucks at Nanjin Coal Factory,” Tang Yang said, “The person you beat was the then-director of Jiujiang Steel Plant, Wei Changchun.”
In the past, hearing these things would have devastated Chen Qiang.
Now, he just smiled: “What are you trying to express?”
Tang Yang crossed her legs, switching their position.
They were both intelligent people, so Tang Yang spoke directly: “You’ve self-taught multiple programming languages and have strong modeling skills. Investment banks rarely take interns below senior year, you were a sophomore, an exception.”
Investment banks have two main characteristics: working like a dog and staying ahead of the times.
Discovering trends before they become trends.
Tang Yang saw through issues clearly: “Expulsion means you’d have to start from scratch, retaking the college entrance exam to get a diploma that many people obtain by just coasting through four years. So after your release, you’ve been resisting your past and your major, preferring to drive trucks rather than picking up where you left off.”
“But your choice to drive trucks was also calculated,” Tang Yang said. “Coal factories have high profits, but night truck drivers often encounter robberies. Your release papers are a drawback elsewhere, but an advantage here.”
“It’s quite rude to casually comment on others’ choices,” Chen Qiang smiled.
“I’m stating objective facts,” Tang Yang remained calm. “Chen Qiang, you’ve already died once.”
Chen Qiang’s smile froze.
Tang Yang said, word by word: “Chen Qiang, the moment you jumped from the rooftop last week, you had already died once.”
This time, Chen Qiang didn’t speak.
Tang Yang gestured towards the bedside table with her eyes, her tone extremely mild: “I brought you a computer and an IOU. Take them if you want, owe if you want. If you refuse, you can call the cleaning lady later to throw the computer downstairs.”
Silence for one second, two seconds.
Chen Qiang sneered, “Playing the living bodhisattva?”
Tang Yang snorted, “Do I look like someone who does good deeds?”
Chen Qiang didn’t answer.
“Sharing economy, energy conservation, live streaming, there are many current trends that I know you don’t. What the future trends will be, you know and I don’t,” Tang Yang said. “I’m not a venture capitalist, I won’t give you money, nor will I provide you with resource channels. There’s a contract on the computer. Once you decide what to do, I require 30% of the original shares as compensation for lugging this dead-weight computer up to the third floor.”
Tang Yang’s words were quite clear, but Chen Qiang didn’t respond.
They fell into silence for the third time.
This time it lasted longer.
After a long while.
Chen Qiang glanced sideways at the computer. It was indeed heavy for her, but heavy enough to warrant 30% of the original shares.
“You studied accounting, right? Calculating so precisely,” Chen Qiang smiled.
“Sorry to disappoint, special admission to Economics and Management,” Tang Yang wasn’t young anymore, and since she had a boyfriend now, marriage and children were naturally under consideration. If Chen Qiang didn’t succeed, a computer wouldn’t be worth much, but if he did, those shares would be a growth fund for the children. She hadn’t thought of a name yet, maybe Jiang Xiao Bao?
The more Tang Yang thought about it, the more promising the future seemed. She joked in a light tone: “If you had gotten your diploma back then, you could probably call me senior.”
Chen Qiang chuckled, pushing up his glasses with his remaining hand, and said unhurriedly: “This afternoon I saw four groups of aunties bringing women in their early twenties, probably daughters or nieces, to your boyfriend’s room. The first group stayed for 20 minutes, the second for 35 minutes, the third for 10 minutes, and the fourth arrived 5 minutes before you came to see me. Their BMW is still parked downstairs. If you go up now, you’ll probably catch them.”
Tang Yang grabbed her bag and left immediately.
In the hospital room, Chen Qiang watched her running figure disappear. As an observer, he seemed to understand for the first time why some people could come out of a hail of bullets without flinching, iron-willed, yet when speaking of a first love they hadn’t seen in nearly a decade, they were full of tenderness.
Being loved by her must truly be wonderful.
Outside the room, Tang Yang hurriedly entered the elevator.
After she stood still, she realized: when had she told Chen Qiang she had a boyfriend? Why did Lin Lang Fan know, and Chen Qiang too? Had she written Jiang Shiyan’s name on her face?!
Wait, Tang Yang thought of something.
She glanced at her watch. Fifty minutes had passed since she arrived at the hospital…
Tang Yang stared at herself in the metal mirror, her lips slowly and forcefully curling into an arc.
What could take fifty minutes to discuss? And with young, dolled-up girls in their early twenties, fresh enough to squeeze water from?!
The more Tang Yang thought the more the unnamed fire in her heart blazed. Jiang Shiyan, you’re so great! Should I kiss you? Should I hug you? Should I lift you high?
I’ll give you… Tang Yang inwardly sneered, gritting her teeth as she exited the elevator… a lift… up… high!!