Chapter 5
“Um..."
Tang Yiling had braced herself against the back of the sofa and was still inching away. “W-wait, let’s talk first.”
Li Lan didn’t move.
When her hair brushed Tang Yiling’s cheek, Tang Yiling felt her breath catch for a beat.
Then Li Lan straightened.
She took the document from behind her back and handed it to Tang Yiling. “You can read it slowly.”
Tang Yiling pinched the paper in her hand.
Her ears were probably so red they could drip blood.
Li Lan poured two glasses of water and came back.
She sat on the nearby sofa, opened her laptop, and kept working.
It was an agreement.
It concerned the matter Tang Yiling and Li Lan had discussed yesterday.
Li Lan was willing to pay her a certain amount for her work.
Tang Yiling would not only be Li Lan’s work assistant, she would also be responsible for grocery shopping and cooking at home.
Flipping farther down, she saw page after page of highlighted clauses.
Every Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, Tang Yiling had to stay over here.
Li Lan had the right to require Tang Yiling to do anything except anything illegal.
From Monday to Thursday, aside from class time, Tang Yiling had to go to Li Lan’s company to work.
In addition, if Li Lan needed to find her for something, she had to be available at any time.
There were plenty of other minute details, which Tang Yiling skimmed over quickly.
After reading the whole thing, she summed it up in three words: “kept woman.”
Li Lan was making her into her kept woman.
The white moonlight heroine from a novel was inviting a cannon-fodder supporting character to be her kept woman!
Was this even right?
Could it possibly be right?
Tang Yiling pressed her lips together.
She quickly flipped back and forth, looking for the part she cared about most: how much money did this pay?!
Li Lan looked up and immediately guessed what she wanted.
“If you have any thoughts, we can discuss them.”
Tang Yiling gave it another careful look.
She cautiously made an outrageous opening bid. “Ten thousand?”
Li Lan had just raised her cup; she nearly took a sip before setting it down again.
Her gaze landed on Tang Yiling’s face.
Ah, so that was a no.
Tang Yiling tried again. “Six thousand?”
After all, if she was going to be a kept woman, and one who belonged to the heroine at that, asking too little would make it seem like she was looking down on Li Lan, right?
Li Lan still didn’t speak.
Her gaze drifted away from Tang Yiling and toward the door.
That was still a rejection.
Very understandingly, Tang Yiling took another step back. “Then how much do you think?”
“Salary, six thousand.”
Li Lan picked up her cup again. “Living expenses separate.”
Six thousand.
Wasn’t that just a regular employee salary?
Though for a student, that amount was enough to live on.
But for the work she had to do, wasn’t it a little too low?
Li Lan didn’t say anything.
She seemed to be giving Tang Yiling plenty of time to think.
If there were any other way, Tang Yiling wouldn’t have come begging to Li Lan in the first place.
She drew in a breath and forced a smile. “How about eight thousand, sister?”
Li Lan curved her lips.
Just as Tang Yiling thought she had agreed, Li Lan reached out and made a “please” gesture toward the doorway.
“Fine, fine!”
“I agree!”
Tang Yiling said irritably twice in a row and picked up the pen, flipping to the last page.
She felt that Li Lan, just like the boss at her previous company, was a damn capitalist.
There wasn’t even a copy for each side, and Li Lan wasn’t in any hurry to sign.
The agreement turned into an unfair contract binding only Tang Yiling.
Before opening her laptop again, Li Lan did something on her phone.
A message notification popped up soon after, and Tang Yiling saw that she had transferred 4,000 yuan to her.
“What’s this for?”
“Living expenses.” Li Lan stressed it specially. “Yours and mine.”
The smile Tang Yiling had just begun to raise vanished at once.
If that wasn’t enough, would she have to make up the difference herself?
“I don’t have anything else here. Do as you please.”
After saying that, Li Lan returned to work mode.
It was obvious she really was busy.
Tang Yiling sat awkwardly on the sofa for a while, then asked her a little sheepishly, “Um, how do I get back to the school?”
Li Lan looked up.
Her expression was complicated as she carefully traced Tang Yiling’s features again.
“This is the residential area by the school’s back gate.”
“Once you go downstairs, you’re at the school.”
Tang Yiling tried to stay calm and gave a quiet “oh,” then got up to leave.
She had only been here a few days; not knowing was perfectly normal. But she definitely wouldn’t dare say that directly to Li Lan.
“Wait.”
Li Lan stood up, took a keychain with a little rabbit charm down from the shoe cabinet by the door, added a new key to it, and handed it to Tang Yiling.
“Don’t lose it.” Li Lan paused. “If anything comes up, you can call me.”
Tang Yiling nodded and carefully put the key away.
She went downstairs, opened the navigation app, and found her way back to the dorm.
The dorm was very quiet.
Everyone should have been taking a nap.
Tang Yiling wasn’t sleepy. She sat at her desk, fiddling with the keychain Li Lan had given her.
And thinking about life.
Given the current situation, she felt like she could take on some part-time work.
Once she had some savings, she wouldn’t have to be constrained by anyone.
Just as she was thinking, her phone suddenly rang.
She startled and hurriedly hit hang up, afraid of waking her roommates.
Not long after, a text from He Wenwei came in: “Mianmian, when are you free? Come back home for a bit.”
“The school is full of people and eyes everywhere; we can’t keep coming over all the time.”
Tang Yiling was just about to reply when the curtain on the window-side bunk suddenly opened.
A girl in a white nightdress climbed down from above. Seeing someone below, she froze slightly.
Tang Yiling recognized this girl.
On the day she’d been locked in the storage room, this girl had appeared at the doorway together with Tang GeYun.
Could this be Chang Yuruo?
The other female lead in this novel?
Chang Yuruo gave Tang Yiling a friendly smile.
She pointed toward the upper bunk. “An Qi and I were watching a movie. We had our headphones on, so we didn’t know you were back.”
Tang Yiling nodded.
She lowered her voice. “My phone rang just now. I thought I was disturbing you.”
“No, not at all.”
Chang Yuruo smiled again and went to the desk opposite hers; it looked like that was her spot.
A short-haired girl poked her head out from where Chang Yuruo had just climbed down.
She first glanced at Tang Yiling, then called to Chang Yuruo, “Come on up already; it’s not over yet.”
“Not now. Let’s watch it tonight.”
Chang Yuruo sat down at the desk. “We have class in a bit.”
An Qi lowered her eyes, looking a little disappointed.
Then she shrank back into the bed. “Alright, then.”
The dorm became quiet again.
Tang Yiling checked the class schedule and looked for the specialized books she needed to bring for the afternoon.
About ten minutes later, Chang Yuruo stood up.
She walked over to Tang Yiling and called softly, “Yiling.”
Tang Yiling looked up. “Mm?”
Chang Yuruo wasn’t wearing makeup. Her face was pale and clear, her eyes naturally curved with a gentle, innocent smile.
These two female leads really were completely different.
Compared with Li Lan’s aloofness, Chang Yuruo was simply too approachable; it made people want to get close to her.
Chang Yuruo bent slightly and asked in a low voice, “Um, have you run into some trouble?”
Tang Yiling told the truth. “I was kicked out by my family.”
If she was going to cling to a thigh, of course she couldn’t cling to just one.
She lowered her eyes, looking fragile and heartbroken. “Maybe no one loves me? It’s fine, I can manage on my own.”
Sure enough, a little pity and concern entered Chang Yuruo’s eyes.
“If you need a part-time job, I might be able to help you look.”
Tang Yiling remembered that in the book, Chang Yuruo’s family background wasn’t very good.
She’d grown up relying on her grandmother, and she’d come here from a small place.
“I found a weekend part-time job,” Tang Yiling said after a pause. “It’s, um, a tutoring job.”
A little touched by Chang Yuruo’s kindness, she reached out and held her hand. “I’ll check it out myself first. If I need help later, I’ll ask you.”
Chang Yuruo gave a soft “mm.”
“It’s okay,” she said gently. “We’re roommates; we should look out for each other.”
Class time was almost here, and An Qi and Qian Xueqing both climbed down.
Tang Yiling and Chang Yuruo smiled at each other, then packed their things separately.
They had full classes in the afternoon.
The four of them went out together and also sat together in class.
An Qi had brought some snacks; during the break, she took them out and shared them with everyone.
When she handed some to Tang Yiling, she hesitated a little, but still placed them on her desk.
An Qi seemed cheerful and straightforward.
Tang Yiling guessed she probably didn’t like the original her very much.
But that was fine; she was taking the place of the original character now.
She was confident that before long, she could become good friends with everyone.
After class, the four of them were still together.
They went to the cafeteria for dinner, then walked back together.
Tang Yiling carefully put away the card she had topped up with money, and her heart felt much steadier.
Although the salary hadn’t met her expectations, at least she no longer had to worry about food and clothing.
Chang Yuruo and An Qi were holding hands and walking in front.
Tang Yiling and Qian Xueqing were a little behind them.
Looking at the two people in front, she couldn’t help asking, “Xueqing, have they always been this close?”
This afternoon, Tang Yiling had deeply understood Qian Xueqing’s feelings about not wanting to go watch the sunrise with Chang Yuruo and An Qi.
Because those two were like they had some kind of barrier around them; anyone standing next to them looked like a light bulb.
Take dinner just now, for example: An Qi said the beef in her tray was delicious.
Then she picked up a piece and naturally fed it to Chang Yuruo.
That scene had left Tang Yiling a little stunned.
If she didn’t know Chang Yuruo was the female lead, she would have suspected the two of them had some special relationship.
“Actually, no. They used to be even closer.”
Qian Xueqing shook her head. “This semester, Arou seems to like someone, so the two of them aren’t as close as they were before.”
“Someone she likes?”
Tang Yiling’s radar perked up. “Gu Feng?”
Qian Xueqing nodded.
She lightly bumped Tang Yiling. “I didn’t expect you to be so interested in gossip.”
Tang Yiling gave two awkward laughs.
Was that interest? That was a matter of life and death; it was making her so mad she could die.
After coming to this world for a few days, this was the most relaxed evening Tang Yiling had had.
An Qi and Chang Yuruo climbed onto the same bunk again to watch the movie they hadn’t finished at noon.
Qian Xueqing opened her computer and played a farming game.
Tang Yiling sat at her desk and spread out her textbooks.
They were studying liberal arts; if she worked a little harder, she should still be able to keep up with the lessons.
Feeling a little more at ease, she borrowed toiletries from Qian Xueqing and went to the bathroom to shower.
Unexpectedly, not long after she went in, someone knocked on the bathroom door.
Qian Xueqing stood outside. “Yiling, your phone’s been ringing for a while. Do you want to take it?”
Tang Yiling rinsed the foam off her hands and called through the door, “Xueqing, could you please bring it in for me?”
Qian Xueqing agreed and turned to get the phone.
When she knocked again, her voice had gone quieter, and she sounded a little awkward, stumbling over the words: “Y-yiling, here you go.”
Tang Yiling thanked her and cracked the bathroom door open a sliver.
The moment she saw the screen, she understood why Qian Xueqing had been like that.
Her phone was still vibrating and ringing nonstop.
The display showed the contact name she’d saved for Li Lan.
“Sugar Mommy.”