Chapter 55
"Your mother said you cheated on her, why don't you explain?"
Leng Qingxiu stopped pulling the handlebars and put the phone's jack close to his ear.
"Who cheated? Me?"
Leng Qingxiu held his forehead. Yang Kan had gotten him drunk tonight, and his head was a bit dizzy. And now, his mother had accused him of cheating for no reason. Leng Qingxiu simply explained, "I didn't cheat. Tell Mom not to think too much."
From childhood to adulthood, Leng Qingxiu felt his emotions were constantly suppressed by his mother. Whether he wanted to date or marry, his mother always wanted to be involved. It could be said that every time he fell in love, he was fighting against the oppression his mother imposed on him.
He was no longer the eighteen-year-old boy, and he knew how to confront his parents. For more than a decade after he became an adult, he knew what his mother was doing, but he remained indifferent.
Leng Qingxiu knew very well that his mother would call every girlfriend he dated to talk to her, simply to see if she was satisfied or liked them. If she was dissatisfied or didn't like them, she would disregard his opinion and try to persuade them to leave.
It doesn't matter, he doesn't care.
But this kind of supervision felt suffocating. He had no high hopes for married life, and he had no set choice for a future wife. He felt it was time to make a choice, so he obeyed his mother's wishes and married someone she liked. He didn't care whether she liked him or not, as long as she didn't cause him trouble and didn't interfere in his private affairs.
Leng Qingxiu knocked on the window and said to the driver, "Let me smoke a cigarette before getting in the car." He took out a cigarette and a lighter from the car, lit the cigarette and put it in his mouth.
Looking at the empty, silent parking lot, bathed in a halo of white light, Leng Qingxiu felt a sense of sadness and loneliness, a loneliness he couldn't confide in. Leng Qingxiu walked outside the parking lot and sat down on a stone bench. As the night grew colder, his heart grew increasingly gloomy, and the events of the past surfaced before his eyes one by one.
As he exhaled, smoke swirled around his mouth, and the white mist in the air dissipated with the wind. Leng Qingxiu recalled the complicated feelings he had towards his mother Leng just now, and then thought of Hong Xu.
Hong Xu was the first girl he liked. After Leng's mother contacted her in his senior year of high school, she contacted him before going abroad and said to him: "The person I like is Kong Zhuo. I don't like you. Don't let your mother contact me."
Leng Qingxiu still hasn't forgotten her expression, which showed anger towards him, embarrassment for him, and ridicule for his delusion.
At that time, he felt lost, unwilling, and confused. He felt lost because the person he liked didn't like him, and his wishes were dashed. He also felt resentful when he tried to seize an opportunity and was rejected, unable to compare to Kong Zhuo. He couldn't understand why Hong Xu would fall for Kong Zhuo, who was idle and had one girlfriend after another. And why did his mother want to find Hong Xu?
He went home to find Leng's mother and asked her about it. He knew what his mother had done, and he was immediately disappointed with Leng's mother and felt helpless because of his own weakness.
Later, Leng Qingxiu went abroad as an exchange student in college and happened to meet Kong Zhuo. The two got to know each other because of some things. After more than a year of getting along, Leng Qingxiu learned about Kong Zhuo's feelings for Hong Xu.
In Kong Zhuo's own words, "I'm not interested in her because we're too similar. We're both strong-willed people, neither of us willing to give in. It would be tiring to get along with her."
Memories from many years ago are like this smoke, lingering in our memories for only a few seconds.
At this moment, a white mist like a veil covered Leng Qingxiu's eyes. For a moment, there was no emotion in Leng Qingxiu's eyes. He seemed to know that the person before was no longer within his sight.
Leng Qingxiu put out the cigarette, smiled, then stood up and straightened his coat.
In the past, he imitated Kong Zhuo and tossed around randomly, thinking that he had let go, but in fact he couldn't. Now he feels that he can't let go, but in fact he has long forgotten it.
—
"Sir." Aunt Zhao opened the door, saw Leng Qingxiu's slightly red cheeks, smelled some alcohol, and asked, "Have you been drinking?"
"Well, I had a social event today, so I drank a little." Leng Qingxiu walked in and took off his coat. "Auntie, you should go and rest first. I don't have anything to do here."
Leng Qingxiu threw his coat on the sofa and sat down to relax.
"Okay, sir." Aunt Zhao went to the kitchen to pour Leng Qingxiu a glass of water and put it on the coffee table.
Leng Qingxiu glanced at the glass of water and said, "Thank you."
Li Qingzhu, who was in the room, heard a noise downstairs and put on her shoes and came down.
"You're pretty busy tonight."
Li Qingzhu went to the kitchen to pour a glass of water and saw Leng Qingxiu leaning tiredly on the sofa. "What's wrong with you?"
Hearing Li Qingzhu's concerned tone, Leng Qingxiu raised his head and replied to her: "I drank a little."
Li Qingzhu saw that he had drunk more than just a little. His face was flushed, and his body slumped in the corner of the sofa, looking completely exhausted.
She sat on the other side of the sofa with her water and took a sip. "Your mother came tonight and said a lot of things. I suspect she knows you've found a new love, so she bought a lot of things to comfort me." Speaking of this, Li Qingzhu thought of the contract and smiled. "Is your mother suspicious of you? Or does she know you very well?"
Thinking of the call from Leng's father just now, Leng Qingxiu probably knew that Leng's mother had contacted Li Qingzhu. He felt a little irritated, but he suppressed his emotions and explained to her, "I don't know what my mother said to you, but I have a social event tonight at a bar, and the other party invited a few people."
Leng Qingxiu reached out and picked up the water on the coffee table. He took a few sips, and his head felt less uncomfortable. He looked at her with dark eyes, without any ripples in his eyes, and then said, "I didn't cheat."
He didn't actually need to explain to Li Qingzhu, but he still wanted to tell her the truth.
He didn't know what was going on, but he probably felt he couldn't just throw away the responsibilities of marriage.
"Okay, I understand." Li Qingzhu smiled when she heard this.
She had already taken a shower and was lying in bed when she heard a noise downstairs. She took the opportunity to drink some water to check on him. She was wearing a light blue nightgown and a white lambswool coat because it was cold.
"Are you going to sleep?" Leng Qingxiu saw Li Qingzhu smile and couldn't help but look at her a few more times. He looked at the nightgown underneath her coat. The light blue color made the skin around her collarbone look translucent and fair.
He glanced at his watch. It was a little past eleven forty, which was a bit late.
"Mr. Leng, it's getting late now." Li Qingzhu put down the cup in his hand.
"Why do I feel like you're a little distracted tonight? Are you in a bad mood because your mother misunderstood you?"
He was about to laugh at Li Qingzhu's words. Seeing her looking at him with interest, was she trying to make fun of him? Or was she trying to enlighten him because he was in a bad mood? Leng Qingxiu teased her with a joking tone, "As a husband who cheated on me, you actually asked me if I was feeling okay. Shouldn't you, as a wife, be angry and sad about me?"
Leng Qingxiu turned around and sat face to face with Li Qingzhu.
Maybe it was because of drinking, or maybe he was too tired, Leng Qingxiu relaxed at this moment and chatted with Li Qingzhu.
"To be honest, your mother came here to talk to me tonight because I guessed that you might have found true love. I thought about it, and if you really cheated, I would feel uncomfortable. Although our relationship is a bit complicated, you found the next one so quickly, and I can't interfere, but my heart feels like something is blocking it, and I can't breathe. It's uncomfortable." Li Qingzhu spoke of their relationship vaguely. She was afraid that Aunt Zhao had not slept yet and might be eavesdropping in a corner.
"True love?" Leng Qingxiu scoffed at the word. He would never touch the concept of true love.
It wasn't because of Hong Xu. He hadn't known for some time that he wouldn't find a woman to spend the rest of his life with. It wasn't because of Leng's mother's control over him. Now, if he wanted to, she wouldn't interfere with anyone or anything around him. Ultimately, it was because he didn't care enough that he allowed Leng's mother to do what she did.
"What? You have had so many girlfriends, but isn't there any one that you like mutually?" Li Qingzhu's curiosity was aroused, and her words also had a tentative meaning.
Leng Qingxiu stared at Li Qingzhu, with an emotion in his eyes that she couldn't understand. When she heard him chuckle, that chuckle contained nostalgia and confusion.
“Before, the people I liked didn’t like me.”
"Now, those who like me, I don't know if they really like me."
Leng Qingxiu said these two sentences in a calm tone, and Li Qingzhu immediately understood the information contained in them - love that cannot be obtained.
Perhaps it was because he had been hiding it for too long and had no one to confide in, so Leng Qingxiu felt particularly eager to confide in Li Qingzhu tonight, and he vented everything he should and shouldn't say to her.
He didn't know why he said these words to her, maybe because he saw the same thing in her. Since childhood, they were both children controlled by their mothers, and even when they grew up, they still couldn't escape their parents' "care".
"I liked a girl in high school, but she didn't like me. My mom went to her and gave her some money, asking her not to get close to me. The girl took the money and left to study abroad. She told me about this before she left. Actually, I was the one who kept getting close to her, and my mom thought it was the girl's fault."
Li Qingzhu recognized this as a real-life version of the "Evil Mother-in-Law Throwing Check" episode. The only difference was that the heroine didn't like the hero and didn't tear up the check.
"Later, when I went abroad, I met the boy she liked."
Hearing this, Li Qingzhu's heart skipped a beat. This triangle encounter was so exciting!
Leng Qingxiu didn't notice Li Qingzhu's subtle expression and continued, "However, they didn't get together. Instead, I became friends with that boy. I don't know why I wanted to be friends with him." At this point, Leng Qingxiu sneered.
"He doesn't like Hong Xu. He's actually quite smart and has a clear goal. Suddenly, I understand why Hong Xu likes him. He's also quite helpful. He spent the entire afternoon looking for my cat in the park." At the time, Leng Qingxiu had a white cat while abroad. Once, he hired someone to move something, and the door wasn't closed tightly, so the cat escaped. Kong Zhuo saw him looking and joined him. It wasn't until evening, after asking many people, that they finally found the cat in a meadow.
It was also at that time that they had frequent contacts.
"You still have a cat?" Li Qingzhu didn't expect that such a person who gave people a frivolous image would have a cat.
"What? You didn't expect someone like me to keep a cat?" Leng Qingxiu raised his eyebrows slightly, as if he was proud of others' contrasting behavior towards him.
"It's now at the home of Kong Zhuo, my friend from abroad. He's raising it for me." He originally hadn't intended to take the white cat back home, thinking of giving it to the old lady next door. But Kong Zhuo fell in love with the white cat and brought it back home.
"So you learned...promiscuity from your friend?" Li Qingzhu remembered that Kong Zhuo was also a playful person. She didn't expect Leng Qingxiu learned it from him.
"Promiscuous?" Leng Qingxiu frowned unconsciously when he heard this.
Realizing that she knew he had so many girlfriends, he laughed and said, "Having so many girlfriends means I'm promiscuous?"
He wanted to tease Li Qingzhu, but Li Qingzhu lectured him seriously: "Didn't you say that you didn't have anyone you liked? Why did you agree to her? You gave her a chance, but let her wish go unfulfilled? Although it's a matter of mutual consent, this behavior is not very good." At the end, Li Qingzhu saw that Leng Qingxiu's eyes were dim and his tone was a little weaker.
"Your tone does have some of the spirit of a political teacher. But it's good that you resigned. I really feel sorry for you." Leng Qingxiu said coldly.
Li Qingzhu immediately understood that Leng Qingxiu was mocking her for meddling in other people's affairs. She suddenly realized where his boundaries were; he didn't like others controlling him.
Yes, in what capacity do I manage him?
Knowing that he was meddling too much, Li Qingzhu was too embarrassed to speak up.
Leng Qingxiu felt that the atmosphere was not right. Thinking of his sarcastic tone just now, he realized it and felt a little embarrassed. After all, what the other party said was quite right. He did not take the feelings of those women to heart.
"I'm sorry for being so harsh." Leng Qingxiu rubbed his head.
"It's okay. I overstepped my bounds. Go to bed early. I'll go upstairs first."
Looking at Li Qingzhu's lonely back, Leng Qingxiu slowly closed his eyes. He is not a good person, so Li Qingzhu, please don't like me.
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