Wrong? Then Kiss Me

The day Bai Mo returned from B City, A City saw its first autumn rain.

Dead leaves were scattered across the ground, and the rain soaked through them, turning them into fertilizer for the soil.

Xi Zhen sat in her office waiting for him. Fine, dense rain streaked past the floor-to-ceiling windows, and the whole city was shrouded in a gray veil of mist.

Bai Mo stepped out of the nanny van looking thinner than before, his eye sockets sunken, a worn look on his face. Even so, he seemed to be in decent spirits.

“Sis,” he called out. It had been a long time since he’d seen Xi Zhen, and his voice was almost painfully nostalgic.

Xi Zhen looked at him. She didn’t ask why he’d lost weight, and she didn’t ask whether he’d been sleeping well lately. She only said, “How is your mother?”

“She’s already been discharged. The paperwork was finished yesterday. The doctor said she’s recovering well, so she just needs to go home and rest.” Bai Mo brushed the raindrops from his clothes, his tone hesitant. “It’s just that she doesn’t really want to talk to me.”

Xi Zhen didn’t speak after hearing that. She waited quietly for him to go on.

Bai Mo lowered his head and stared at the water he’d just flicked onto the floor. “She knows about me and Zheng Yuyu. Everything. I told her. The day after you left, I told her. I didn’t hide a single thing from start to finish.” His voice grew softer and softer. “After she heard it, she didn’t say anything for a long time. Then she just said, ‘You can go out first.’ So I went out and stood in the hallway all night.”

“Sis, Mom isn’t angry. She’s sad.” Bai Mo’s voice turned a little hoarse. “She asked me, ‘Why didn’t you tell me earlier?’ I said I was afraid you wouldn’t be able to accept it. She said, ‘If you don’t tell me, how am I supposed to accept it?’” He looked up, his eyes red. “Sis, I want to let her meet Zheng Yuyu. Not now, but after she’s a little better. I want her to know Zheng Yuyu is really a good person, that he treats me very well. But she won’t answer my calls anymore. After she was discharged, I called her and she didn’t pick up. I sent messages and she didn’t reply. She answers Aunt Zhang’s calls, she answers Grandma Liu’s calls, but she just won’t answer mine.”

Looking at him like this, Xi Zhen suddenly remembered that many years ago, she had stood in front of Xi Shulan in exactly the same way, crying and saying that it was all her own fault and had nothing to do with anyone else.

What had Xi Shulan said then? Xi Zhen was already a little dazed now; she couldn’t tell whether time had deliberately blurred that memory, or whether memory itself had chosen to erase it.

“Sis, can you help me talk to her?” Bai Mo’s voice was pleading. “She listens to you. She’s always listened to you.”

Xi Zhen didn’t answer. She took out her phone, found the familiar number, and dialed.

Beep—beep—beep—beep—beep. One ring, two rings, three rings, four rings, five rings. No one answered.

She held out the ended call screen to Bai Mo and said calmly, “She’s not picking up.”

Tears spilled from Bai Mo’s eyes. He wiped them away once, then again, but the more he wiped, the more they came; no matter what he did, he couldn’t stop them. “Sis, does she not want me anymore?”

Seeing him like this, Xi Zhen reached out and brushed aside the damp lock of hair stuck to Bai Mo’s forehead by the rain. “No,” Xi Zhen heard herself say. “She just needs time.”

“Mo Mo, your mother... she’s had a very hard life. I really want to persuade you not to keep seeing Zheng Yuyu, but I also know you won’t listen, so don’t push her too hard.” Xi Zhen withdrew her hand. “Go back first and get some proper rest. I’ll think of a way with your mother.”

“Sis...”

“Go back.” Xi Zhen patted his shoulder. “Don’t think too much.”

Bai Mo nodded and turned to leave the office. After a few steps, he stopped and looked back. Xi Zhen was still standing where she’d been, watching him. He opened his mouth as if he wanted to say something, but in the end he only said, “Sis... you should take care of yourself too.”

After seeing Bai Mo off, Xi Zhen’s phone rang. It wasn’t a call; it was a message from Li Xingqing.

Li Xingqing: [What are you doing?]

Xi Zhen looked at the message and didn’t reply right away. She slowly sat back down, picked up her phone again, and had just typed two characters when the office landline rang.

“What is it?” Xi Zhen set her phone aside for the moment and didn’t answer Li Xingqing’s message.

“Zhen-jie...” Lin Runan’s voice came through the landline, a little tight, not as bright and crisp as usual. “Qingshi Culture called and said they want to transfer me over to follow a new project.”

“Qingshi Culture?” Xi Zhen repeated, sounding a little off. She knew that was Li Xingqing’s subsidiary. Although Li Xingqing now ran an entire behemoth, Qingshi Culture was the company that worked most closely with Xi Zhen.

And a while ago, in order to deal with Zhou Ping’s matter, she had even placed several projects there for Li Xingqing to keep an eye on. But moving someone like this—Li Xingqing hadn’t mentioned it to her at all.

“Mm. Their HR called this morning and said someone above had specifically named me to follow a project, and they also said they hoped I’d go over as soon as possible to hand things off...” Lin Runan paused. “Zhen-jie, did I do something wrong? You... can you not want me anymore?”

“No.” Xi Zhen’s tone was calm. “Don’t worry yet. I’ll ask about it.”

After hanging up, she glanced at her phone screen. Li Xingqing’s message was still lying there quietly, with not the slightest sign of anything suspicious.

But at this time, why was Lin Runan being transferred?

On purpose? But why? Li Xingqing couldn’t possibly have suddenly decided on a whim to take her assistant away today.

Or was it unintentional? But Xi Zhen truly couldn’t figure it out. If it was unintentional, why had it to fall on her?

Her thoughts turned over and over in her mind. In the end, Xi Zhen dialed the number.

It was answered after one ring.

“Jiejie?” Li Xingqing’s voice carried a trace of surprise, as if she hadn’t expected Xi Zhen to call directly.

But to her surprise, Xi Zhen opened with Lin Runan’s matter. “Did you arrange Lin Runan’s transfer?”

There was a moment of silence on the other end; then Li Xingqing’s voice turned instantly cold. “Jiejie called me just for her?”

Xi Zhen hadn’t expected Li Xingqing to react like this. In that instant, she also understood clearly that Li Xingqing couldn’t possibly know nothing.

“Li Xingqing, I’m asking you...”

“She came to you?” Li Xingqing cut her off, her tone even colder. “What did she say? That I insisted on transferring her away? That she doesn’t want to go? Or that... she can’t bear to leave you?”

Hearing her grow more and more outrageous, Xi Zhen tightened her grip on the phone. But the irritation stirred up by Xi Shulan and Bai Mo could no longer be held back; she snapped, “Li Xingqing, can you speak properly?”

“Which word of mine wasn’t proper?” Li Xingqing’s voice suddenly sharpened. “If she doesn’t want to go, then she doesn’t have to. If she can’t bear to leave you, then let her stay. Anyway, jiejie has plenty of ways to protect her. Anyway, everything I do is wrong, and everything has ulterior motives.”

The fragile decorum they’d maintained was completely torn apart. The emotions Li Xingqing had kept buried for five years came rushing out; it turned out that the seemingly peaceful years before had only been a mirror flower, a moon in water.

Li Xingqing had always felt she wasn’t that important in Xi Zhen’s heart; she couldn’t compare to Xi Shulan, couldn’t compare to Bai Mo, and now even a tiny assistant like Lin Runan seemed to outrank her. She couldn’t accept that, so she would instinctively feel jealous, would instinctively use every possible means, all just to prove her importance in Xi Zhen’s heart.

“Li Xingqing.” Xi Zhen’s voice came out squeezed from her chest. “Say that again.”

There was no sound on the other end. Li Xingqing seemed to have suddenly come back to herself and realized what she’d said; yet she didn’t take it back, and stubbornly refused to apologize.

The air remained deadlocked for a while—so long that Xi Zhen thought the other side must have already hung up. Only then did she hear Li Xingqing’s voice again.

“I said,” Li Xingqing began, “everything I do is wrong, and even caring about you comes with ulterior motives.”

“You said I’m younger than you and have more choices, that I should let you go... but have you ever thought that the so-called right choices in your eyes might mean nothing to me?” Li Xingqing’s voice tightened with emotion. “Just because I’m better than others, because I seem to have more choices than others, does that mean everything I do in your eyes is wrong?”

“Me keeping an eye on Song Xunqing for you is meddling; me wanting to protect you is wishful thinking; even me saving you probably looks like I staged the whole thing myself in your eyes, doesn’t it?”

“Xi Zhen, that isn’t fair to me.”

“...” Xi Zhen fell silent all at once, unable to say another word.

But Li Xingqing kept going. “Xi Zhen, jiejie, you always say you’re good to me... but you’re good to everyone.”

“You’re good to family, good to friends, even good to a colleague. Your kindness feels wholesale, something anyone can come take a share of from you. But...”

“But my kindness is custom-made, only for you; if you don’t want it, it expires.”

Xi Zhen listened wordlessly to her long confession and suddenly understood Li Xingqing’s real weak point: she hadn’t given her enough security, which was why the other woman kept overthinking everything.

It was because she hadn’t dared to say she loved her outright that Li Xingqing had become so insecure and anxious.

All along, the one in the wrong had been Xi Zhen. She had never given Li Xingqing a chance to speak before arbitrarily deciding everything for her.

In their relationship, Xi Zhen always held the power to call a halt. So Li Xingqing would feel uneasy, would use every possible means to clear away all the obstacles in her way.

“Li Xingqing.” Xi Zhen finally spoke. “Listen to me.”

“Have you ever thought that I might not be as good as you imagine?”

“......” Li Xingqing wanted to argue, but Xi Zhen didn’t give her the chance.

“Xi Shulan is my aunt, Bai Mo is my younger brother, Lin Runan is my assistant. I know where they stand in my heart. But you...” Xi Zhen’s voice shook slightly. “Where you stand, I don’t know. And I don’t dare to think about it.”

“So the two of us...”

“Don’t say it, jiejie.” Li Xingqing seemed to realize what Xi Zhen was about to say and immediately cut her off. “I was wrong. I won’t say it again. If you’re angry because of Lin Runan, I’ll have An Ning transfer her back right away; we... can just pretend nothing happened, okay?”