Ye Zhou thought vegetable juice was the most anti-human thing in the world, but he didn’t expect Boss Jiang to always bring him new surprises.
If vegetable juice was simply unpleasant to drink, then the taste of Chinese medicine, especially decocted Chinese medicine, was astonishingly lethal.
When Ye Zhou held the bowl, he was already thinking that he might have misunderstood Boss Jiang.
Someone as refined and pure as Boss Jiang, desires and passions? They don’t exist.
He must have misjudged at the hospital. How could Boss Jiang possibly have lust for him? Ridiculous! There was only pure father-son affection between them. How could he want to sleep with his financial sponsor?!
Inwardly scolding himself, how could he have such thoughts? Too dirty, too shameful, too perverted!
Ye Zhou wanted to struggle a bit more, but before he could speak, he met Boss Jiang’s seemingly smiling yet not smiling eyes. After being together for so long, how could he not know this was non-negotiable.
He decisively shut his mouth, tested the temperature to make sure it was acceptable, then lifted the bowl and drank it all down in one breath, holding his breath.
Although he was mentally prepared, when the strong bitter taste spread in his mouth, Ye Zhou still grimaced in bitterness, even feeling a bit nauseous.
But before he could bend over, a hand stuffed something into Ye Zhou’s mouth first.
Ye Zhou instinctively wanted to spit it out but soon felt the sweet and sour taste quickly suppressing the bitterness. He bit down and realized it was a preserved plum.
“Jiang-ge, when did you buy preserved plums?” He remembered they didn’t have such snacks at home.
Jiang Tingyuan patted his head. “When I was getting the medicine.”
Ye Zhou was choked up for a moment. He glanced at the clock on the wall and lightly coughed. “Um, Jiang-ge, I have an appointment with Screenwriter Song today to revise the script. It’s about time for me to go.”
Jiang Tingyuan saw that he wanted to escape but didn’t stop him, only saying, “Have the driver take you.”
“Oh, thank you, Jiang-ge!” Ye Zhou beamed.
When Ye Zhou arrived near Song Qifan’s home, he was fifteen minutes early. He wandered between the maze-like old residential buildings for a while but couldn’t find the building Song Qifan had described.
Helplessly, he could only call him. Soon, he saw Song Qifan’s figure approaching quickly from afar to where he was standing.
Perhaps because he had run too hurriedly, Song Qifan didn’t even have time to speak before he was gasping for breath, his fair face flushed from the intense exercise.
“I’m so sorry, I should have come down to get you.” Song Qifan was full of regret and apprehension, repeatedly apologizing to Ye Zhou.
Ye Zhou shook his head. “It’s fine, I just have a poor sense of direction.”
Song Qifan smiled shyly and led Ye Zhou through the buildings. After walking for about ten minutes, they stopped in front of a residential building.
He looked rather awkward and said to Ye Zhou, “The environment here isn’t great. Why don’t you wait downstairs for me, and we’ll go to a cafe instead to talk?”
How could Ye Zhou not understand his meaning? He immediately smiled. “Senior, you’re too polite. I’ve lived in much worse places before, it’s fine.”
What he said was not nonsense. During the first two years after Ye Zhou started working in his past life, he was very poor. After leaving the school dormitory to save money, he lived in a basement for quite a long time.
It was the kind of small studio room without even a window, less than 10 square meters in total, dirty and messy, damp and cold, where it was difficult to dry clothes.
Even moving into an old residential building like this was after Ye Zhou had worked for a while, so for him, there really wasn’t anything unacceptable about Song Qifan’s place.
Hearing him say this, the tension in Song Qifan’s nerves finally relaxed a little. He led Ye Zhou up to the fourth floor.
The old residential building had a layout of three units per floor. Song Qifan rented the middle one. As he used his key to open the door, footsteps could be heard coming down the stairs above, someone carrying a bag of trash down.
Ye Zhou looked up at the sound and was instantly stunned when he saw the person’s face.
Song Qifan had opened the door halfway when he also heard the sound behind him. He turned his head, saw the person, and immediately smiled, greeting them, “Xiao Xiao, you’re up early today?”
The person’s eyes were half-closed, still showing obvious traces of sleepiness. The pajamas were wrinkled, the hair a bit messy, looking as if they had just woken up not long ago.
Hearing Song Qifan’s voice, the person only lifted their eyelids slightly and responded, “Morning, Song-ge. I have some things to do today…”
The words stopped mid-sentence when they saw Ye Zhou standing next to Song Qifan.
Silence. A long silence, as if the air around them had solidified.
Song Qifan keenly sensed something was wrong. Just as he was about to say something to ease the atmosphere and introduce them, Qi Xiao had already quickly left.
When passing by Ye Zhou, whether accidentally or deliberately, there was a heavy bump into him.
Ye Zhou clutched his stomach where he had been hit, not feeling well at all. He felt like the Chinese medicine he had finally managed to drink down this morning was about to be vomited out.
Song Qifan immediately went to support him, his voice full of panic, “Director Ye, are you alright?”
Ye Zhou waved his hand and stood still for a moment before finally suppressing the nausea. He said to Song Qifan, “Let’s go inside to talk.”
Ignoring the little interlude when they entered, the two had a very pleasant conversation that morning.
Having been a scriptwriter for others for many years, Song Qifan was no newcomer. He was extremely clear on things like modifying scripts, the effects the director needed, what kinds of plot designs would look good when filmed, how to set up suspense and create climaxes, refine characters, etc.
Ye Zhou didn’t need to spend much effort communicating at all. Every time he had just finished explaining his thoughts, Song Qifan could quickly catch on to his train of thought. Sometimes the effects he wrote were even far better than Ye Zhou had anticipated.
“That’s good enough. Tweak the last part, and we can use it. We can make further adjustments during official filming.”
Ye Zhou spoke while drinking some water from the cup on the table. He simply tidied his things, preparing to leave.
Song Qifan nodded, putting away the notebook covered in dense annotations. His expression toward Ye Zhou seemed hesitant like he wanted to say something but didn’t dare to.
Seeing Song Qifan’s uneasy manner, Ye Zhou thought he had more thoughts about the script and asked, “Senior Song, do you have any other ideas?”
Song Qifan was startled at his words, knowing Ye Zhou had misunderstood his meaning. He hurriedly waved his hands. “No, it’s not about the script.”
This left Ye Zhou even more confused. He pondered for a moment before asking again, “Um…then is it about casting? The roles aren’t fixed yet. If you have suitable candidates, you can recommend them to me.”
“No, I trust your judgement, you can decide on your own.” Song Qifan’s face reddened from the misunderstanding as he shook his head explaining.
He hesitated for a moment before saying, “Director Ye, the one who bumped into you this morning is also from our school. His name is Qi Xiao. He’s usually very nice. He’s just probably under a lot of pressure recently and not mentally focused, so he accidentally bumped into you. I apologize on his behalf.”
If Song Qifan hadn’t brought it up, Ye Zhou might not have thought of that sleepy-looking young man from this morning. His face gradually overlapped completely with the arrogant-looking young man from the auction house bathroom long ago.
That was none other than the original’s ex-boyfriend, who was only briefly mentioned once or twice in the book, not even deserving of a name.
Yes, throughout the entire novel, this person was only referred to as the original’s ex-boyfriend. His name was never revealed even until the end.
It was probably because the original’s purpose was to advance the plot. Most of the memories were related to the plot, while irrelevant memories seemed to be intentionally downplayed, to the extent that even the original’s memories rarely contained the ex-boyfriend’s existence.
If not for Song Qifan’s mention just now, Ye Zhou might still not know what that man’s name was until now.
Ye Zhou collected his thoughts and smiled at Song Qifan. “It’s a small matter, I didn’t take it to heart.”
Seeing that he truly did not look angry, Song Qifan felt half his worries disappear. His expression also relaxed a lot.
“Xiao Xiao is also a very talented scriptwriter. He…” Here, his voice paused slightly. He organized his words before continuing, “He’s actually had it quite hard.”
When Song Qifan said this, he was actually very apprehensive, afraid that Ye Zhou wouldn’t like to hear such things and thus displease Director Ye.
But he still said it. Song Qifan and Qi Xiao graduated from the same school but got to know each other off campus.
When Song Qifan met Qi Xiao, he had just gotten a work stolen by someone else. The other party was a well-known screenwriter. Song Qifan had a soft personality and little connections. Not only did the other take his work, but they had only paid a third of the agreed remuneration before firing him.
The days after being fired were the darkest in Song Qifan’s life. He had to go out looking for a new job during the day and force himself to write scripts at night after getting home.
When it rains, it pours. That screenwriter was still not satisfied and used his connections to spread the word. Despite Song Qifan’s best efforts to find work and his great talent, no one dared to hire him.
When he was about to be unable to even pay rent due to lack of income, a friend of his pulled him into a group, the so-called ghostwriters group, using helping others write scripts and selling his work’s authorship for nothing to earn a meager income.
The bottom rung of any profession was the hardest to endure. Not only did he have to face other people’s criticism of his work, he had to modify it over and over according to others’ ideas until it reached a satisfactory level before the other party would pay.
The money earned this way was painfully difficult. Not only difficult but also agonizingly painful for Song Qifan was writing scripts catering to the client’s requirements day after day. Like machine parts churned out by a factory.
He could clearly feel his inspiration gradually disappearing.
Just when he couldn’t take it anymore and wanted to give up, he met Qi Xiao. They had only chatted more due to being alumni and added each other at first. Later, they grew closer and closer.
The more Song Qifan understood about Qi Xiao, the more he felt inferior.
Although Qi Xiao seemed cold and unapproachable on the surface, he actually had a very good personality. After getting to know each other, Qi Xiao helped Song Qifan a lot, both work-wise and emotionally.
Even directly submitting scripts to directors was done under Qi Xiao’s constant encouragement before Song Qifan finally worked up the courage to do it.
Song Qifan was timid, with few connections. The only person he could try to establish relations with was Director Ye. If possible, he truly wanted to recommend Qi Xiao to Ye Zhou.
If Qi Xiao could gain Director Ye’s favor and have a chance to collaborate in the future, his days would definitely improve by a lot.
I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did. Please consider supporting the author directly.
You can also follow me on Ko-fi to get the latest updates on my translation progress and new projects. I appreciate your love and feedback.
