TIL - 34

There were also many people outside: teams of various actors, cheering fans, and a portion of unofficial media not among the invited, just waiting to capture content for articles.

Chen Cheng had someone send Han Bailu away, and then he himself walked out of the Digital Base leading a young, beautiful woman. This was truly huge news.

For a moment, the Golden Rooster Award for Best Actress didn’t seem as appealing.

The distance from the multi-functional awards hall exit to the parking lot was quite far. The entire path was filled with people—waiting, chatting, sparsely occupying the sidewalk.

The purposes of the Chuan Valley Film Festival awards ceremony and the promotion of tourism and cultural exchange between China and foreign countries proceeded hand in hand. Therefore, in the past few days, the inside and outside of the venue were crowded and chaotic, exceptionally lively.

Tang Junen had been trying to prevent it, but he couldn’t make them ignore the sight of Chen Cheng walking out with Wen Huo. Chen Cheng was simply too conspicuous.

Wen Huo’s gaze was dull. She followed Chen Cheng, tracing his steps, oblivious to the surprised and theatrical expressions around her. Once a person succumbed to negative emotions, no amount of external stimulation could elicit a reaction.

Chen Cheng’s hand was cold, and he gripped her very tightly; he was hurting her. When was he ever gentle? He was never truly gentle.

In the past, Chen Cheng had never lost his temper with her because he didn’t need to. A single glance or gesture from him could clearly convey his dissatisfaction, and even unintelligent people would rein themselves in due to his aura and pressure.

Lately, Chen Cheng had been somewhat unpredictable compared to the past; he was no longer as calm and composed as Wen Huo remembered him to be.

Or perhaps, he had always been this way, merely adept at concealing and disguising it.

On an autumn evening, the sky was somewhat murky. Clusters of mosquitoes gathered under the streetlights, as if it were early summer, and a sense of restless heat, like a dense fog, filled the entire twilight.

It took about ten minutes to walk to the car. During these ten minutes, the rhythm of the awards ceremony was disrupted. Media outlets rushed out, one after another, wanting to get the last bite of the crab, to dominate the headlines before other reports came out.

In almost no time, news of ‘Chen Cheng abandoning his original wife, openly leaving with a beautiful woman’ was pushed to the top trending searches by various media outlets.

Once in the car, Wen Huo was like a lifeless body.

Chen Cheng, seemingly calm, fastened her seatbelt.

He rarely drove himself, as his resting time was scarce, so he usually used car rides for resting his eyes.

The car drove for over an hour, along the Daguang Expressway, Jingcheng Expressway, and onto the East Fifth Ring Road. During this hour, neither of them spoke a word. Even the starlit ceiling, which could raise body temperature, couldn’t alleviate the low pressure filling the car cabin.

Upon arriving home, Chen Cheng got out of the car and opened the door for Wen Huo.

Wen Huo got out of the car.

Chen Cheng walked towards the elevator.

Wen Huo didn’t move.

Chen Cheng felt she hadn’t followed him, so he stopped, turned, and looked at her.

A distance of seven or eight meters separated them. Just standing face to face, the story seemed to begin under the pen of an invisible chronicler.

Wen Huo looked down, seeing how perfectly and beautifully drawn the parking lines in the wealthy district were. She slowly raised her head, looking at Chen Cheng’s face—a face she had touched and kissed, yet belonged to someone else—and called him, “Teacher Chen.”

Chen Cheng looked at her.

Wen Huo said faintly, “Can it just be like this? Between us.”

Her voice at first sounded normal, but perhaps due to their unstable emotions, Chen Cheng detected a despair different from her usual self. Even she, who had deceived him from beginning to end, could feel despair.

He said nothing, walked over, picked her up, and headed towards the elevator. Since he had brought her back, he wasn’t going to just “leave it at that” with her.

Wen Huo closed her eyes.

________________________________________

The moment Qiu Mingyun saw the trending topic, she overturned a large bowl of braised chicken rice onto the table. So, Wen Huo’s self-negation stemmed from Chen Cheng bringing Han Bailu to the film festival.

It turned out that the one who left a hickey on Wen Huo’s neck was Chen Cheng.

________________________________________

Jin Ge was discussing a new documentary project, hoping to capture the scenery of the great Northwest in her work. While her collaborating friend was in the restroom, she checked the time on her phone and saw the breaking news notification.

Chen Cheng and a young woman with a heroic yet pure demeanor were holding hands, passing through a crowd of onlookers.

She suddenly lost her grip on the phone, her nail scraping against the phone case, emitting a sharp, piercing sound.

She had never seen Chen Cheng proactively hold a girl’s hand, but he was married. For a moment, she didn’t know whether to be happy or sad.

________________________________________

Cheng Cuo read the news with pursed lips, then looked at his apologetic student with a look of disappointment.

The student was very sorry: “Teacher, I don’t know what got into me, how I revealed the patient’s condition... But I really didn’t mean to, Teacher, please believe me...”

Cheng Cuo believed him, but that had nothing to do with him expelling him.

A psychologist, whose weakness was deduced and attacked by an outsider, ultimately being successfully exploited—he was truly unfit for this profession. Keeping him on would be irresponsible to the patients.

Now that Chen Cheng knew Wen Huo was using him as a sleeping aid, with his double standard of only being able to scheme against others and not tolerate being schemed against, he didn’t know what kind of predicament Wen Huo would face.

He felt a slight concern for her.

Amidst his worry, there was also a hint of surprise that Chen Cheng would be so muddle-headed, so brazenly publicizing Wen Huo, knowing it wouldn’t benefit him.

________________________________________

Su He glanced at the news and then turned it off. Just then, Ruan Lihong returned and saw him lying naked on the bed, looking somewhat displeased. “I’ve told you many times, don’t be naked when you’re here.”

Su He pulled the towel blanket over himself. “Oh, I forgot.”

Ruan Lihong took off her high heels and earrings. “Did you look for a job today?”

Su He stood up, wrapped in the towel blanket, walked behind Ruan Lihong, put his arms around her, and rested his chin on her shoulder. “Didn’t you say you’d support me?”

“Does me supporting you conflict with you realizing your value?” Ruan Lihong removed her lipstick.

Su He squeezed her chin while she was halfway through, turned her neck, kissed her, their lips and tongues entwined for a while, then said, “I’m your boyfriend, not your son.”

Ruan Lihong corrected him, “You’re just my fuck buddy, not my boyfriend.”

Su He didn’t care. He even told her, “Did you see the news? Your precious daughter was exposed as a mistress.”

Ruan Lihong had seen it. What did it matter?

The intimate detail of Wen Huo’s insomnia, Su He knowing about it was certainly not a coincidence; her biological mother, the forty-something woman holding him, Ruan Lihong, had told him.

He still remembered Ruan Lihong’s purpose in bringing him to China: she wanted to cure Wen Huo.

Ruan Lihong used to be somewhat superstitious because her mother was superstitious. Her mother said she couldn’t sleep for nights because of “little ghosts,” saying the little ghosts told her this illness was hereditary, and she believed it. Because she had a demand and was superstitious, she was easily misled and fell into the Falun Gong cult.

After accidentally dropping her son, she woke up and received proper mental guidance. In that era, there was no concept of psychotherapy. She was confined to a mental hospital and underwent a long period of torment. It was only after she was on the verge of madness that she realized her problem was superstition.

She didn’t have a mental illness; she had just been indoctrinated with too many mystical things and was too easily deceived.

Being confined to a mental hospital and subjected to various coercive methods wasn’t entirely bad. She became a materialist from then on.

After being discharged, she divorced Wen Xinyuan. At that time, she made Wen Xinyuan choose between their son and daughter. Wen Xinyuan chose their son, so she took their daughter abroad. Aside from her past superstition and being brainwashed into going astray, Ruan Lihong was actually a very responsible mother.

During her years in Canada, she always took good care of Wen Huo. Later, she fell in love with a Pakistani man who came to Canada and planned to marry. Wen Huo then returned to China, went to university, pursued postgraduate studies, and conducted her academic research.

Wen Huo’s insomnia started when she returned to China; she mentioned it during a phone call with Ruan Lihong. Upon hearing that she had reached the point of seeing a doctor, Ruan Lihong was very worried and wanted to break up with the Pakistani man, but he wouldn’t allow it. He said he would jump off a building if Ruan Lihong broke up with him.

Ruan Lihong had almost caused her son’s death by dropping him, so she had a physical fear of words like “jumping off a building.” So, she was held back and endured him for over a year.

The year she moved to Canada, she rented a house from Su He’s family. Seeing each other constantly, they became familiar with the family.

Su He had a twin brother, but they looked like children from two different families, with no resemblance whatsoever. Later, it was discovered that they didn’t share the same father; Su He’s mother had intercourse with another man shortly after having sex with his father, resulting in two children from different fertilized eggs, meaning dizygotic, di-spermic twins.

Su He’s father was very accepting, mainly because the family was well-off. In terms of raising children, raising one or two made no difference. Furthermore, he was a habitual cheater but never considered divorce, so he could naturally tolerate his wife’s infidelity.

So their family was quite harmonious; both were scoundrels, both were tolerant. When love transformed into kinship, and they could no longer leave each other despite not being in love, there were fewer calculations. What difference did a cuckold or a red hat make?

The two children were not exploited by their parents. Their upbringing was relatively smooth, and their relationship was good.

After Wen Huo came to Canada, she always played with the two brothers. They were a few years older than Wen Huo and always treated her like a younger sister. Later, Wen Huo returned to China, and Ruan Lihong and Su He, on a rainy day, fueled by alcohol, had an intimate encounter.

The Pakistani man jumped off a building after finding out. He was a wealthy businessman dealing in cashmere products and dabbled in gemstones. After his death, all his money went to Ruan Lihong. He was overly rigid and obsessive. He deeply loved Ruan Lihong and was profoundly attracted to the ferocity of this Eastern woman, loving her to the point of being unable to extricate himself, thus unable to tolerate her betrayal. In the end, among many choices, he chose the most puzzling death.

Ruan Lihong, however, could understand. She had fallen for him partly because of his obsession, his temperament of either loving or dying.

This was also why she got involved with Su He.

Su He was also a patient with paranoid personality disorder. Later, in her interactions with Su He, she learned that he and his brother had always known they weren’t full brothers and never condoned their parents’ harmonious facade in love.

Therefore, they prioritized love, pursuing a love that was almost madly sought after, one that couldn’t be found elsewhere on earth or in heaven.

Later, the couple discovered this fact, and their feigned harmony finally ended in ruin. When a person’s long-held beliefs collapse, physical ailments often follow.

The couple successively fell ill, their conditions worsening. Though not fatal, it was too disruptive to their lives. Their once prosperous life, lacking proper management, gradually declined, becoming financially strained, eventually reaching the point where Ruan Lihong had to provide assistance.

Su He thus became Ruan Lihong’s “toy boy.”

Not long after, Ruan Lihong missed her daughter and longed for her son, so she returned to China with Su He. After returning, she didn’t show herself or tell Wen Huo. She planned to use Su He to find out about Wen Huo’s recent situation.

Perhaps her daughter had grown up, or perhaps she was naturally a person who disliked communicating, but Ruan Lihong found that Wen Huo hardly ever confided in her. Although she could feel her daughter’s love for her as a mother, she just couldn’t get into her heart.

So, she sent out Su He.

Ruan Lihong was the kind of person who ignored cries for help at her doorstep but would give everything for her family—not kind, and without morals.

The deceased Pakistani man and the living Su He were nothing compared to her two children. She wasn’t a person who prioritized love; love was merely a seasoning in her life, not an item on the main course menu.

She thought that the biggest mistake she had made in her life was being superstitious, almost costing her son his life.

What a terrible woman. The poor Pakistani man, the poor Su He, were no different from toys in her eyes.

In fact, the world is full of such women.

Ruan Lihong bore no legal responsibility for the Pakistani man’s death, which did not align with societal morals. However, there were very few instances where societal morals influenced legal judgments, allowing immoral people like Ruan Lihong to act without restraint.

Su He actually knew better than anyone that his need for Ruan Lihong was greater than her need for him. He also knew that she would eventually turn to another man’s embrace, but this still didn’t stop him from being infatuated with her and being used by her.

A woman from a Beijing compound in her forties, who had traveled extensively, practiced Falun Gong, and been institutionalized in a psychiatric hospital. Divorced, moved abroad, traversed between slums and affluent areas, lingered in war zones and in front of government buildings. Loving wildly, hating fiercely... She had rich experiences that could fill a book, a devilish figure, and the face of a thirty-year-old. Of course, he would be hopelessly in love.

Whether a man likes a twenty-year-old, a forty-year-old, or a sixty-year-old, it has nothing to do with age. It has to do with whether the person he loves makes him feel an urgent, crazy need, like he’s on drugs.