Chapter 4

Chapter 4

When I went to the hospital to have my dressing changed, my agent was outside, frowning as she spoke on the phone.

One look at her, and I understood.

Another audition had fallen through.

I walked out with my medication just as my agent hung up and came toward me.

All these years, no matter what I tried to do, something always got in my way. She was the only one who had never given up on me.

She always said I was the most fearless actress she had ever met, and that she believed my luck would turn someday.

But this time, her face held a despair I had never seen before.

She asked me, “Have you ever offended Ye Shi’er?”

Several trending topics were plastered with my name.

Entertainment accounts had broken the news that Ye Shi’er had been splashed with sulfuric acid on set, and that a certain washed-up actress, after failing to get a role, had incited her fans to take deliberate revenge.

Her fans swarmed my comment section, hurling abuse nonstop and threatening to get me blacklisted.

There were rational passersby who tried to stay neutral, but they were quickly drowned out by the dirt dug up by paid trolls.

They combed through my entire past. In just a few short hours, I had gone from a washed-up actress to a disgraced celebrity nailed to the wall.

“How could I possibly do something like that just because of one role?” I said, unable to believe it. “That’s a crime. Do I have a death wish?”

“They haven’t named you outright, but every detail points straight at you. Suing over this kind of smear campaign takes too much time and energy,” my agent said. “Right now, the fastest solution is for you to go to Ye Shi’er and beg her to help prove your innocence.”

Would she help me?

I blankly tightened my grip on my medical records.

“But everyone knows the Ye Family is behind her,” my agent sighed. “She’s the person Ye Qingshi values most. After something like this, even if she’s willing to help you, Ye Qingshi might not let you off.”

Ye Shi’er and I were in the same hospital. The only difference was that she was staying in the VIP ward on the top floor.

Ye Qingshi had always given her only the best.

When I arrived at the door to her room, it was pulled open from the inside.

A handsome male doctor came out while straightening his clothes.

His expression was a little flustered as his gaze swept past me.

On the rumpled hospital bed, Ye Shi’er’s cheeks were faintly flushed.

Seeing my own face in person for the first time felt complicated.

Especially when that face clearly saw me, and the contempt and smugness in the corners of its eyes could not be hidden.

“Long time no see, Ye Shi’er,” she said in a languid, dismissive tone. “Oh, wait. I should call you Jiang Cun now.”

“You know me?”

She smiled, winding a lock of hair around her fingertip. “Your body is pretty durable.”

I tightened my grip around the fruit basket my agent had told me to bring.

“What, are you not resigned to it?” She took in every inch of my expression. “You know better than anyone what my existence represents, don’t you? The winner takes all. If you have to hate someone, shouldn’t you hate yourself for being useless?”

She looked perfectly fine. In fact, she seemed to be in rather good spirits.

There was only a tiny bandage stuck to the back of her hand.

“He cares too much about me,” Ye Shi’er said, noticing my gaze. “I told him I was fine, that it was just a little scratch, but he insisted I stay in the hospital for observation. He was terrified something might happen to me.”

“You saw him today, didn’t you?” Wearing my face, she gave me a bright smile. “My brother.”

I pressed my lips together, and that only encouraged her further.

“You can’t even stand hearing me call him brother?”

She said, “Then if you knew that sometimes I even call him husband, wouldn’t you be furious enough to die?”

“Why are you saying all this to me?” I asked calmly.

“Oh my, did I hit a nerve?” she sneered. “Since you already know you’re bound to lose, why go to such lengths to get close to him? Do you really enjoy stealing other people’s things that much?”

Footsteps sounded outside the door.

“You really want a touching reunion with your brother, don’t you?” she said, looking as if victory was already hers. “I’ll give you the chance. Go on, say it. Say everything in front of him and see which one of us he believes.”

The moment she finished speaking, the door was pulled open.

Ye Qingshi stood there, tall and lean, dressed in a plain black suit, a thermos container in his right hand.

Our eyes met, and his gaze darkened.

Then he turned to the assistant beside him with no expression at all and asked, “Why are you letting just anyone in?”

With one effortless sentence, he rendered this wager between her and me completely meaningless.

I had always been the loser.

Ye Shi’er curved her lips and called out sweetly, “Brother.”

He walked over and opened the thermos.

“Drink the porridge.”

His tone held a gentleness he had never once shown me.

Ye Shi’er took the spoon and began eating at an unhurried pace. As she drank, she said, “The egg-drop porridge Brother makes is the best.”

Egg-drop porridge?

My heart jolted, and I looked at Ye Qingshi.

My original body was allergic to eggs. I couldn’t touch even a bit of them.

But Ye Qingshi loved eating them, so they were often cooked at home.

When I was little, in order not to be disliked by my adoptive parents, and because I was afraid of being called a picky eater, I always pretended I liked them and forced myself to swallow them down.

Until my entire body broke out in a rash and Ye Qingshi discovered it.

He asked me, “Why didn’t you say anything?”

I refused to tell him the reason.

With a cold face, he scolded me, saying that if I didn’t explain myself clearly, he would hate me.

I was so frightened my face turned red from holding it in, but in the end I couldn’t stop my tears. “Brother, don’t send me away.”

“Why would I send you away?”

“Because I’m different from you,” I sobbed. “I can’t eat eggs.”

Having been displaced since I was young, I understood one thing all too well: being hated and being abandoned only required the simplest of reasons.

It could be because I was a picky eater. It could be because I slept in. It could even be because, in some fleeting moment, I laughed too happily, and fate would strike me over the head for it.

Back then, after Ye Qingshi heard me out, he froze, then unconsciously pulled me into his arms.

That was the first time he ever hugged me.

After that, eggs were never cooked in the house again.

But now, he lifted Ye Shi’er’s hair aside to keep it from falling into the porridge. Looking at her with an almost-smile, he said softly, “You like it? I’ll make it for you again tomorrow.”

Ye Shi’er ate a few bites, then slowly wiped her mouth and looked up at me.

“Brother, this is Jiang Cun. You know her, right?”

Ye Qingshi glanced at me coldly.

He did not answer.

“What happened today had nothing to do with me,” I explained. “I never incited any fans to throw sulfuric acid.”

His brows drew together slightly. “Miss Jiang, if you’re here to apologize, then please leave.”

Miss Jiang.

To him, I was now nothing more than a stranger.

“Brother, don’t be so fierce.”

Ye Shi’er’s voice softened as she tugged at the corner of his clothes. “It really was a misunderstanding. Jiang Cun didn’t do it.”

He looked away and patted Ye Shi’er on the head.

“Brother, Jiang Cun said she’s very envious that I have such a wonderful brother. She wants one too.”

With a coquettish expression, Ye Shi’er hooked her arm around his, looked at me provocatively, and said, “Brother, why don’t you treat her as your little sister too?”

His hand paused on top of her head.

Then he said, “I only have one little sister.”