Chapter 1

Chapter 1

This year for Spring Festival, I went back to my parents’ hometown with them to spend New Year’s at my grandparents’ place.

For New Year’s Eve dinner, all the relatives and family friends showed up.

The moment I arrived, they crowded around me and started asking questions.

According to my dad, he worked as a security guard at a company in Beijing, while my mom worked as a cleaner at another company.

So in their discussion, my future kept swinging back and forth between following my dad into security and following my mom into cleaning.

They really cared about me.

My third aunt asked, “I heard you went to Peking University?”

I said, “What Peking University? A university in Beijing! Wudaokou Vocational and Technical College.”

My eldest aunt asked, “You’ve been graduated for two years now, right? How’s work? Seeing anyone?”

I said, “Where would I find a job? These days, college students graduate straight into unemployment!”

“And how would I dare date anyone? With what I’ve got going on, who would I be worthy of?”

“I’m planning to wait until I’m almost thirty, then find a divorced man with a car, a house, and a kid.”

My older cousin said, “Oh my! How can you have thoughts like that at your age? Being a stepmother isn’t easy!”

“How about I ask your cousin-in-law to keep an eye out for someone for you?”

I said, “I’m not in a rush right now. Back when I was in school, I spent a little too freely and still owe over a hundred thousand in credit cards and online loans.”

“I should pay that off first, shouldn’t I? I heard my cousin-in-law is in management at a big company. Why doesn’t he lend me some money to tide me over?”

My words successfully put an end to the relatives’ interrogation.

My grandparents even gave my dad a scolding, demanding to know how he had raised his child and how he could let me get involved with credit cards and online loans.

They told him to hurry up and find a way to solve it for me, or my whole life would be ruined.

My dad was so angry he glared at me, lowered his voice, and pinched my arm.

“I told you to hide our wealth. I didn’t tell you to talk nonsense!”

“You can’t even handle this one little thing. Believe it or not, when we get back, I’ll transfer you to toilet-cleaning duty.”

I had started interning at his company in my freshman year of college, learning from the ground up. After graduating, I took a formal position and climbed step by step. Last month, I was appointed general manager of our company.

After all these years, even if I hadn’t made great achievements for his company, I’d at least put in hard work, hadn’t I?

I even held ten percent of the shares! And he wanted to transfer his own daughter to clean toilets?

I couldn’t help crying. Tears fell in fat drops.

“Dad! I won’t be a cleaner! I don’t want to end up like Mom.”

My mom, who normally never so much as dipped her fingers in dishwater, froze when she heard that.

It took her a good while to react. Then she wailed and hugged me, wiping at her tears.

“My daughter, this is just our fate!”

“Who told your dad and me to be so useless…”

With the atmosphere already at this point, my dad had to add a few lines no matter what.

He turned to my grandparents and said, “Dad, Mom, the child was ignorant and got herself into trouble. Her mother and I were too ashamed to say anything.”

“We won’t be coming back for New Year’s for the next few years. Don’t worry. Xiufen and I will work hard to earn money and try to pay this debt off within three years.”

“The people of our Shen Family stand tall and upright. We don’t do things like owing money and refusing to pay it back!”

My dad really could act. If the Oscars didn’t give him a little golden statue, that was because the committee had no eye for talent.

With just a few sentences, he stirred my grandparents’ blood.

My eldest uncle, second uncle, third aunt, and fourth aunt all came over to comfort him.

The looks they gave me were full of reproach.

“This child. How can she be so thoughtless?”

Faced with the verbal condemnation of my elders and relatives, I was “too ashamed to show my face.”

I got up, wiped at my tears, and ran out crying, my cotton slippers slapping pia-pia against the ground.

Before I left, I’d hidden several boxes of snap-its in my pockets, planning to find somewhere empty and play with them by myself.

I didn’t expect to run so fast that I crashed straight into someone.

My forehead knocked into his nose, and he immediately let out a muffled groan.

I jumped in fright and leaned backward, about to fall, but that person endured the pain and reached out to steady me.

Under the streetlight, our eyes met, and we both found each other extremely familiar.

We blurted out at the same time.

“President Gu?”

“President Shen?”

Realizing what the other had just said, we both panicked, looked around in every direction, clapped our hands over each other’s mouths, and hid behind a tree.