Chapter 2

After dinner, I took him to the bathroom. When I followed him inside, he clutched his pants and flushed bright red.

He stammered for ages without managing a complete sentence.

Realizing he was embarrassed, I shook my head helplessly. “I’m not going to watch you bathe. Look, this is body wash, this is shampoo, and here’s the toothpaste. Can you wash by yourself?”

He nodded at once. “I can! I always bathe by myself at home.”

I stroked his head and praised him. “What a good boy.”

Once outside the bathroom, I took out my phone and opened a chat I had not touched in years.

Xiangxiang is with me.

The other person replied almost immediately.

I know. He told me on his smartwatch.

The indifferent tone made my hands shake with anger.

But I had no standing to reproach him.

When are you coming to pick Xiangxiang up?

I have meetings and no time lately. Let him stay with you for a couple of days.

I gritted my teeth and drew a deep breath.

So this was how little his child mattered to him.

I had just finished typing an accusation when the bathroom door opened.

Holding his dirty clothes, Xiangxiang came scampering toward me.

“Mommy, I’m all clean and nice-smelling now.”

I deleted the message in the input box and put my phone away.

Then I took a hair dryer and dried his hair.

The little boy in the mirror narrowed his eyes with a soft smile. Perched on a stool, he swung his legs in obvious enjoyment.

I smiled and ruffled his hair.

When his hair was dry, I tucked him into bed and gave him a kiss. “All right, time to sleep. I’m going to wash up.”

The blanket covered most of his face, leaving only a pair of bright, watery eyes. He nodded.

When I came back, the little figure on the bed was hugging the quilt and rolling around in delight.

The moment he saw me, he lay down properly again and patted the spot beside him.

Understanding, I climbed into bed and gathered him into my arms.

His small body was soft against me. Somehow, that tiny weight filled me with an immense sense of contentment and happiness.

I tucked the blanket around us and gently patted Xiangxiang’s back.

As I kept patting him, the little boy in my arms quietly began wiping away tears.

His tiny hand clutched my pajamas as though he feared I would vanish the next second.

Sleep comes quickly to children. After crying in my arms, he soon drifted off.

But I could not sleep at all that night.

My thoughts wandered back many years.

When I met He Jinnan, I was a junior at film school.

I ran myself ragged chasing even the smallest parts and showed up at every kind of drinking party.

My agent at the time pointed out a shortcut.

He said the head of the company had taken a fancy to me and could make me a star. He asked whether I was willing.

There was no such thing as a free lunch. Everyone knew what it would cost.

But I was young then, proud to my very bones. Of course I refused.

So the company quietly blacklisted me. They would not cast me in their own productions, and while I remained under contract, I could not act in anyone else’s.

The penalty for breaking my contract was five million yuan. Given my family’s circumstances, we could have sold everything we owned and still not paid it.

They cut off every escape route. If I refused, all I could do was wait out the contract. In their eyes, my youth was worth nothing.

Then I met He Jinnan.

At the time, I was in a restroom vomiting up alcohol, wretched and humiliated.

He handed me a tissue and said, “If you can’t hold on any longer, come to me. I can give you everything you want.”

I still refused. He merely smiled and placed a business card in my palm.

“Come find me when you’ve thought it through. At least I’m younger than those men, and I’m not bad-looking. It wouldn’t be a bad bargain for you.”

Things changed when my father injured his leg in a car accident and had to have it amputated. The pillar of our family had fallen.

I broke down sobbing in a hospital stairwell.

That was when I met He Jinnan again.

He quietly lit a cigarette beside me.

“Wen Ni, that pride of yours isn’t worth much.”

He was right. My pride was not worth much.

In the end, I became He Jinnan’s kept woman.

He paid the penalty for breaking my contract, placed me with an entertainment company owned by a friend, and found me one of the industry’s best agents.

From then on, I was a sparrow transformed into a phoenix.

The offers never stopped. I wore one haute couture gown after another and took roles in films by famous directors whenever I wished.

In those years, Wen Ni was dazzlingly successful.

When our passion was at its height, I once asked He Jinnan why he had chosen me.

He grinned with careless abandon and answered without shame, “Lust at first sight.”

“I’ve always been domineering. When I want something, I have to have it.”

The reason was that simple. He wanted me, so he had to have me.

I also knew perfectly well that He Jinnan, born into a courtyard mansion in Beijing, and I would never belong to the same world.

We each took what we needed, and neither of us was right or wrong. So I used his influence and clawed my way upward with everything I had.

When love clouded my eyes, I even imagined that one day I might earn the right to stand beside him.

Everything changed the day I learned I was pregnant.

Overjoyed, I told He Jinnan the news.

His brows drew into a tight frown.

He said, “Wen Ni, I can’t give you a legitimate place by my side.”

“If you want the baby, have it. I’ll take responsibility for the child. If you don’t, you can terminate the pregnancy.”

With those words, I felt as though I had been plunged into an icy abyss.

I did consider ending the pregnancy. But blood ties are strange, and I could not bear to do it.

After I gave birth, Madam He came to see me.

She told me plainly that there would never be a place for me in He Jinnan’s future.

The wisest choice was to quit while I was ahead.

She sent my father to the best rehabilitation center overseas and gave me a blank check.

She also secured me the leading role in a film by a renowned director in Beijing’s elite circle.

A man like that would not grant He Jinnan a favor, but he would grant one to the matriarch of the He family.

It was a circle I could never have forced my way into, no matter how hard I tried.

Rather than gamble on a future that did not exist, the success laid before me was painfully hard to refuse.

But I did not agree. The final blow to what I had thought was my salvation came when He Jinnan became engaged.

He had never hidden it from me. I asked him, “What am I supposed to do after that?”

He thought all night and gave me no answer.

But his silence was answer enough.

I might love money, but even I had a line I would not cross: I refused to become the other woman once he married.

So I ended things with him. I took everything Madam He offered and severed every tie between He Jinnan and me.

At the time, He Jinnan demanded, “I can give you what you want too.”

“Why do this?”

I smiled at him and said, “You can’t give me what I want.”

He lowered his head in silence.