Chapter 18 Two Hearts One warm, regularly beating heart. ...
"I want you to kiss me instead."
Because she was sitting on Liang Minghe's lap, their heights were reversed, and Zhou Jinqin was now looking down at him.
She looked down at the man standing very close to her. His eyelashes were long, but not particularly perky. The thick, black lashes stretched straight out, with the tips drooping slightly due to gravity, leaving a fine shadow on his eyelids, like a vibrant morning forest, adding a touch of hazy intoxication to his peach blossom eyes.
Lost in those watery eyes, Zhou Jinqin felt as if she were being led by the nose, and inexplicably agreed to his request. She asked in a hoarse voice, "Kiss...where?"
His eyes turned into crescent moons, and Liang Minghe chuckled softly, his voice clear and bright like a fleeting breeze, elusive yet always lingering in one's ear.
Liang Ming looked up at her, the pink blush around her eyes making them resemble peach blossoms. He raised his voice slightly and asked instead of answering, "Where do you like?"
Zhou Jinqin remained stunned for a long time before finally pulling away from those alluring eyes. But now, there were even more obvious traps and problems, and she wasn't about to fall for them!
Zhou Jinqin blushed, half shy and half angry, and said, "Close your eyes."
Liang Minghe smiled and obediently did as he was told.
Zhou Jinqin carefully examined the man's delicate and clean face, determined her destination, held her breath, and then slowly approached, quickly placing a kiss on the man's right eye.
After it was over, she hurriedly tried to leave, but the hand around her waist suddenly tightened and pulled her back.
The two moved even closer together. To maintain her balance, Zhou Jinqin had to put her hands on Liang Minghe's shoulders to support her upper body, making it look as if she had wrapped her arms around his neck. The posture was quite intimate.
Zhou Jinqin asked, embarrassed and annoyed, "What are you doing?"
Liang Minghe didn't say anything, but opened his right eye, tilted his head, and smiled at her.
He reached out and took one of her hands, guided her index finger to touch her lips, and then touched his own still-closed left eye, which had not yet been favored. Everything was understood without words.
Zhou Jinqin argued with him for a while about things like "equal distribution of benefits" and "treating everyone equally," but finally blinked and gave in.
She calmed herself down for a long time, but her body temperature did not drop at all, and her breathing became more and more disordered. It was clear that this delay was not a solution, so Zhou Jinqin simply took a deep breath and kissed the other person's still closed eye.
Her stay this time was still short, but perhaps because she was under actual supervision, that short second felt especially long.
She could even clearly feel the slight trembling of her lower eyelids and the gentle fluttering of her long eyelashes, which tickled her lips.
Liang Minghe suddenly chuckled, his voice so pleasant it seemed to be seductive, and Zhou Jinqin was instantly captivated.
She didn't dare look into those swirling, captivating eyes again. Her head drooped, and her hands, which had slipped from her shoulders, pressed against the man's chest as she tried to escape.
Fortunately, Liang Minghe had no intention of teasing her anymore and quickly let go this time, allowing Zhou Jinqin to escape from him.
Once her feet touched the ground again, her tense heart finally felt a little more at ease. Zhou Jinqin glared at him fiercely, thinking to herself, "You're pushing your luck!"
Liang Minghe looked at her leisurely and mimicked her tone, saying, "You're such a stingy person!"
In an instant, Zhou Jinqin was furious. She stomped her foot in annoyance but couldn't find a rebuttal. So she simply made an excuse to go to her room to calm down: "I'm not going to argue with you. I'm going back to sleep."
Zhou Jinqin certainly couldn't sleep. She rarely slept, and having just woken up, she naturally wasn't sleepy at all.
What's more, Liang Minghe's provocations, which lacked any sense of martial ethics, made her heart pound and she couldn't calm down at all.
"Bang bang bang~"
There was a sudden knock on the door. Zhou Jinqin was lying on the bed, her resentment still lingering. She said in a muffled voice, "Liang Minghe, I don't want to see you yet."
There was a sudden silence outside for a few seconds, followed by an elderly voice that couldn't hide its laughter: "Xiaoqin, it's me, Grandpa. Xiaoming made you angry, so don't hate me too and disappear as well."
Upon hearing the familiar voice, Zhou Jinqin's brain briefly went blank for a few seconds. For a moment, she even suspected that her grandfather outside was Liang Minghe in disguise, after all, voice actors are all monsters, able to handle all kinds of voices with ease.
But upon closer inspection, something seemed off. Listening carefully, she could hear her grandfather questioning Liang Minghe about what he had done to upset her, along with Liang Minghe's nonchalant and irresponsible replies.
Zhou Jinqin was startled, fearing that he might say something he shouldn't. She hurriedly got up, scratched her hair, and ran to open the door.
It was indeed her maternal grandfather standing at the door, carrying a large bag to show her, smiling kindly.
"Xiaoqin, Grandpa brought you loquats. Aren't you happy?"
The loquats were still covered in fresh morning dew, clearly freshly picked. Zhou Jinqin felt a warmth in her heart and quickly accepted them, saying, "Thank you, Grandpa."
Yesterday, the two elderly people saw that she loved eating the loquats grown at home, and they wished they could pick all the fruit from the tree and bring them to her home on the spot. However, Zhou Jinqin and Liang Minghe were in a hurry to go to work. If they had accepted the fruit then, it would have meant that the loquats would have to survive in the trunk of the car for at least four or five hours in the nearly 40-degree heat, and they would have spoiled. So, the plan didn't work out. The elderly people had been thinking about it all day, and as soon as they heard that the two of them had some free time, they immediately brought them over in person.
Grandpa was happy to see her happy, and he asked, "Did Xiaoming upset you? Why did you stay in your room just now? If he has done anything wrong to you, tell me and I will teach him a lesson for you."
Zhou Jinqin was too embarrassed to admit that the two of them had gotten into trouble while playing a kissing game. Her face flushed, and she made up a lie: "No, we were just playing a game."
“Grandpa, we’re very much in love.” Liang Minghe nodded with a smile, then casually picked a loquat from the bag, peeled it, and fed it to Zhou Jinqin. “Right? Jinqin.”
Under the old man's burning gaze, Zhou Jinqin smiled and agreed, but while swallowing the loquat, she secretly bit Liang Minghe's fingertip hard.
Like a kitten playing, a ticklish sensation on his fingertips made Liang Minghe's eyes crinkle with delight.
Grandpa had no idea about their private fun. He just got angry when he saw his grandson laughing and joking around and not doing anything productive. He would scold him for not wearing his pants properly like a beggar, and he would scold him for being a rascal who idled away his days.
Even Liang Ming's co-designed sofa, which he bought for 180,000 yuan, was dragged out and compared to the golden nanmu sofa, which was a truly undeserved disaster.
When my grandfather passed away, he left behind a large bunch of keys and told Liang Minghe to collect the rent. He said he couldn't stand seeing him doing nothing and wanted him to at least do something decent in front of his wife.
Liang Minghe, holding the jingling bunch of keys, asked Zhou Jinqin, "Do you also think I haven't been doing anything productive?"
Zhou Jinqin blushed slightly as she recalled his "malicious" behavior, and nodded emphatically in agreement: "Isn't that right?"
Knowing that the other party was unhappy with his overstepping his bounds today, Liang Minghe laughed in anger. He pretended to think and said, "It seems that I have no choice but to collect this rent today."
He brazenly made a demand: "You come with me."
"Why?" Zhou Jinqin opened her eyes wide, wondering how this had involved her again.
Liang Minghe leaned closer and said with a smile, "Didn't Grandpa say that I have to do proper things in front of my wife? What's the point of me doing these things if you don't witness it?"
"..."
The building for rent is an old-style residential building that has not yet been demolished, also known as an urban village. Because the building is quite old, the water and electricity meters do not have the function of automatic counting and uploading, so manual meter reading and billing are required.
Grandpa left them a notebook containing detailed monthly water and electricity data for each tenant. They only needed to register the data for the current month, then use a computer to subtract the previous month's meter readings and multiply by the unit price to calculate the actual cost. They could then report the cost to the tenants along with the rent.
The two worked together, with Liang Minghe reading the forms and Zhou Jinqin registering them.
"Number 101, electricity, 2361.3 kWh."
After reading a table, Liang Minghe paused for a moment to give Zhou Jinqin time to write it down.
However, he completely underestimated the other party's ability. In the short time he had been there, Zhou Jinqin had already marked the electricity fees that users needed to pay on the back of the form.
"Why don't you continue reading?" Zhou Jinqin asked him hesitantly. "Did I miscalculate?"
She frowned and mentally recalculated: "2361.3 minus last month's 2197.1, multiplied by the unit price of 0.6998, and rounded down to 114, should be correct."
My grandfather never made a profit on the difference between water and electricity bills. He strictly followed the Shenzhen regulations for combined meter users and charged a fixed price for electricity, which is why the figure was so precise: 0.6998.
This is precisely why the calculations became more difficult, but Zhou Jinqin still managed to calculate them easily in seconds, proving she is indeed a top student.
Liang Minghe shook his head, blinked, and praised her in an exaggerated manner: "You're really amazing. Do you usually think I'm an idiot when you look at me?"
"If you used the same effort you put into deceiving others on studying, you'd find it's an incredibly simple thing." Zhou Jinqin swallowed the word "kiss" for the rest of her sentence.
"I didn't lie to you. Weren't you doing it willingly back then?" Liang Minghe looked at her and smiled, his tone tinged with reproach and complaint. "Besides, I told you there was no one else but you. Why don't you believe me?"
"Ahem! I don't disbelieve you..." Zhou Jinqin muttered softly, her face flushed as she quickly changed the subject, "Are you still going to work? We still have to go and collect debts later!"
According to my grandfather, there is a tenant on the third floor who has not paid rent for six months. This time, we asked them to go and see if the tenant is having any difficulties.
The two copied down the schedules for the entire building before knocking on the tenant's door.
Someone was home; the door opened from the inside after only two knocks.
Quite by coincidence, the woman standing inside was Liu Xiaoyue, the one Zhou Jinqin had saved last time.
Liu Xiaoyue was also surprised to see the two of them. She subconsciously looked at Zhou Jinqin's injured arm and assumed that the other party had come to hold her accountable because the injury had worsened.
Zhou Jinqin waved her hand: "I'm fine, the injury on my hand has almost healed."
"So what brings you here this time?" Liu Xiaoyue asked nervously.
Liang Minghe took out the keychain at the right moment, and Liu Xiaoyue immediately understood the purpose of their visit.
She tugged at her clothes, awkwardly trying to usher the person inside.
"It's hot outside, come in and have a seat." She added, worried that Zhou Jinqin might be scared, "My husband isn't home."
Zhou Jinqin also wanted to know how Liu Xiaoyue had fared since that day, so she stepped inside.
The house was a small studio apartment. Grandpa had installed low-energy air conditioners throughout the building, and the electricity bill was more than half that of most landlords. But even so, Liu Xiaoyue couldn't bear to turn on the air conditioner, and she only turned on the fan when they came in.
The baby, probably only a few months old, was lying quietly asleep in the middle of the bed, next to a small advertising fan given away by the roadside.
Liu Xiaoyue had new injuries on her face, and her left eye socket was bruised and purple, covered with only the cheapest medicine.
She brought over two glasses of water and stood in front of the two of them like a child who had made a mistake, her whole body tense.
Tears welled up in her eyes: "The landlord has been very understanding, only charging us four hundred coins a month, but I still can't afford it..."
Liu Xiaoyue's husband works in an electronics factory, and his salary is actually enough to make ends meet. However, he always hangs out with his friends, which has led to the family's difficult situation of not being able to make ends meet.
“You left me all of A-Qiang’s compensation last time. In principle, it would be enough for me to pay the rent, but I didn’t want the child to go hungry, so I held onto the money tightly. I’m sorry to you.”
Liu Xiaoyue rummaged through drawers and pulled a cloth bag from the bottom of a broken pickle jar. Inside was all the money she had secretly saved: "I'll pay off the debt right away. Could you please not kick us out for now? It's getting hot, and the children can't stand being outside. Besides, I don't have any extra money to pay the rent and deposit for the new house..."
She pretended to kneel down: "I've been looking for work outside all this time, whether it's washing dishes or cleaning toilets, as long as someone asks me to bring my child along, I'll go..."
Zhou Jinqin pulled her up, her heart softening again. Although they were the same age, Zhou Jinqin always saw the shadow of her own mother in her.
But sometimes she was really afraid that Liu Xiaoyue would grow up to look like Lü Jianying. Because of her failure as a husband, Zhou Jinqin always played the role of a husband in her mother's life. Ambitious, devoted, attentive, companionable, obedient, loyal... Zhou Jinqin had to have all the qualities of the ideal husband in her mother's mind.
She didn't want Liu Xiaoyue to become her mother, nor did she want the child in the bed to become herself.
Zhou Jinqin said, "I'm not here to rush you. Your health isn't good either. The most important thing right now is to take care of yourself and the child. I'll lend you the money first. As for when you'll pay me back, I'll wait until you're successful."
Liu Xiaoyue cried her heart out, but Zhou Jinqin didn't comfort her or shed a single tear. She simply grabbed Liang Minghe and left without looking back.
In the car, Zhou Jinqin was very downcast. Leaning against the window, she asked Liang Minghe in a muffled voice, "Don't you think I overstepped my bounds? It's your house, but I took it upon myself to make decisions for you. You should scold me for being ungrateful, especially since I haven't even found a job yet..."
“This might be something I want to do.” Liang Ximing looked at her intently. “We are family now, and I’m glad you’re willing to act as my confidant.”
He took her hand and placed it on his chest, asking, "What do you feel?"
Zhou Jinqin closed her eyes and carefully felt for a moment before answering: "A warm, vibrant heart."
Liang Minghe smiled, then took her hand and placed it against her heart again. The warmth of his palm flowed seamlessly through her hand and into her heart, making it feel warm and cozy.
Zhou Jinqin looked at him, puzzled.
Liang Ming smiled gently, his eyes crinkling: "I also have a heart that beats as warmly and vigorously as yours."
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Author's note: Thank you everyone for the nutrient solution! [laughing]
Two loving hearts will resonate in unison. [heart emoji]
It's gotten really cold lately, and I've had a bad cold, so my brain just isn't working properly. I'll have to take some time off work, I'm so sorry. Everyone, please remember to keep warm! [heart emoji]
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