26. Hangover Morning and Night
Chi Jin was awakened by his own heartbeat.
Dong-dong-dong-dong
It was like someone beating a drum in an empty room, and every beat made my temples throb.
She suddenly sat up from the bed. On the floor, the phone was face down, a few rays of morning light embedded in the spiderweb pattern of the broken screen.
Apparently, she had turned off all her alarms in the morning.
"Oh no!" she gasped, scrambling out of bed. Her first instinct was to unlock her phone. The red number on the WeChat icon made her heart tighten, and she clicked it with a prayer. Thankfully, the work group chat was quiet, with no unread messages addressing her. She breathed a sigh of relief and rubbed her throbbing temples. The dull ache of a hangover finally hit her.
After a few minutes' pause, she quickly sent a message to Jiang Xuhuan, her fingers clumsy from the hangover weakness and residual nervousness:
[Sister Huanhuan, I'm sorry, I'm a little dizzy. I'll take annual leave today. Please, please!]
After sending the message, Chi Jin stumbled barefoot on the cool floor toward the kitchen. By this time, her roommate, Taozi, would surely have left the house. She didn't bother to wash up, just wanted to fill her stomach. The fridge was bare, so she scraped together the few remaining slices of toast, an egg, some lettuce, and the last two slices of ham, frying them up in a frying pan to create two edible sandwiches.
Chi Jin returned to the sofa with a sandwich in his hand, and while eating breakfast, he dealt with the accumulated messages as if he was clearing a battlefield.
While reading the news, she replied to everyone's messages one by one. The first ones were from two or three colleagues in the editorial department. Qin Xiancheng heard from somewhere that she had drunk a lot of wine and showed concern for her jokingly. Duan Xingche sent her a message asking for leave in the middle of the night. It seemed that this guy was also drunk and did not come to work today.
She organized her words and sent the news of Duan Xingche's request for leave to Jiang Xuhuan, and Sister Huan replied with two consecutive "Received".
Taozi also left a message.
[My God! You made such a noise when you came home last night that I thought there was a burglar! Next time if you get drunk like this, tell me beforehand and I’ll pick you up! Oh, don’t get drunk like this next time!]
What happened last night?
She clearly hadn't blacked out, but why did her memory stop when she asked Chen Yisheng, "Why is your heart beating so fast?"
Damn, why did she ask that?
Chi Jin slapped his head, stuffed the rest of the sandwich into his mouth, and hurriedly asked: Taozi, how did I get back last night?
While waiting for Taozi's reply, she considered calling her mother, but her finger paused on the dial button. If she wasn't at work on a weekday morning, her mother would definitely ask her about it. Forget it. This year, the National Day and Mid-Autumn Festival holidays were nine consecutive days, and she was debating whether to go home.
Chi Jin was from L City, not far from Jing City. The journey took four or five hours by car, or two hours on the high-speed rail. Years of studying in Jing City had made Chi Jin accustomed to carpooling with fellow villagers. However, with the long holiday this year, carpools were particularly scarce, so finding one now seemed a bit risky.
She has to attend three weddings of different sizes during the National Day holiday, so she has to go back this time.
Chi Jin resigned herself to her fate and found the "C City Fellow Carpool Group," which she had long since categorized as "Do Not Disturb." After sifting through a pile of messages asking for a ride or seeing it full, she finally found a ride leaving Jinghua at 7 p.m. on a Thursday. The driver promised to deliver it directly to her door. She quickly paid a fifty-dollar deposit, feeling relieved.
After finishing this important task, Chi Jin stretched out her body, the soreness of a hangover visible through her bones. Her first annual leave after becoming a regular employee was unexpectedly spent with a splitting headache and memory loss... Her beautiful fantasy of being an exquisite urban beauty had been shattered to pieces in the past two years of work.
Just when she was looking for a movie to watch, Taozi suddenly sent her a message that made her head buzz.
[A handsome guy in a suit brought you home, saying he was your colleague. It was 1:30 in the morning! Chi Zi!]
Chi Jin stared at the lines of words on the screen, his pupils suddenly dilated, he felt the blood in his body rushing to his head, his eardrums buzzing, and the world in front of him lost focus for a few seconds.
He… He not only sent her back, but also… he sent her upstairs?! Taozi saw it?!
Chi Jin's fingers trembled as he opened the WeChat chat box with Chen Yisheng—a dead silence. The last message was still from a few days ago, discussing the bill of materials for Beiyuan's recruitment. It was businesslike and uneventful.
Huge embarrassment, almost social death.
Chi Jin was in no mood to watch a movie. She quickly used her cell phone to respectfully send a message to Chen Yisheng:
[Editor Chen, thank you so much for taking me home so late yesterday!]
There was no movement from his end, his profile picture was silent, probably busy with work. But this silence made her even more anxious. She bit her lower lip and added guiltily, trying to make up for her loss.
[If there are any off-topic comments, please assume I'm drunk. A noble man should not take the small man's fault seriously. Don't take it personally.]
Five minutes later she brewed another sentence -
[In front of colleagues from Childhood and other media outlets, Xiao Duan and I drank so much that we lost our composure. It was truly disgraceful and brought shame to the editorial department of Faces. I'm so sorry, Editor-in-Chief Chen! (crying)(crying)]
This time he replied after a minute or two, but the content was very businesslike—
[have a good rest. ]
I'm a little confused, but it seems safe for the time being.
She let out a long, drawn-out sigh, as if a heavy burden had been lifted from her shoulders. Never mind! The more she thought about it, the more her headache grew! She simply tossed her phone aside and decided to numb herself with labor.
She forced herself to stand and began to clean up the mess she'd made in the living room the night before—sure enough, there were keys and an empty bottle of water she'd tossed on the coffee table. She also carefully cleaned and wiped the bathroom and other common areas, especially the toilet and sink. After all, she'd made so much noise last night, disturbing Taozi's sleep and causing her to worry, so doing some housework was only right to make amends.
…
When she woke up again, she found that she had fallen asleep on the sofa again. This time she slept more deeply, and when she woke up, her head didn't hurt as much, but her whole body was still sore and weak.
She had just sat up, rubbing her eyes, when she heard the sound of a key opening the door - Taozi had returned from get off work.
Taozi opened the door and was startled: "Oh my God, Chizi, you slept for a whole day and a whole night?"
Chi Jin hurriedly explained the whole story.
Taozi put down her bag, changed into slippers, and came over. She carefully examined her face and confirmed that she was fine except for looking haggard. Only then did she breathe a sigh of relief and patted her chest with lingering fear: "Oh my God, you seemed quite clear-headed last night. You actually drank so much white wine, are you going to become an immortal?"
"I won't drink so much next time." Chi Jin knew he was wrong. "Tell me quickly, what did I say to my colleagues when I came back last night?"
"She rambled on and on for so long I couldn't get a word in—" Taozi saw her nervousness and laughed, "Oh, I kid you! You just said 'drive carefully'. You looked lucid, but you looked exhausted. Who wouldn't be exhausted? You've been spending weekends in the university town, giving presentations and recruiting non-stop. Even an iron man couldn't handle it!"
After confirming again and again that he had not said anything out of line, Chi Jin finally let go of his worries.
"Well, I'll be home Thursday, so I'll pack before I leave. What are your plans for the holiday?"
"Our industry doesn't have any legal holidays." Taozi shrugged. "Maybe I'll have two or three days to hang out with my boyfriend, two or three days to spend time with my parents, and the remaining days for the company."
"You have arranged everything very neatly. Oh—" Chi Jin thought of what happened last time, "Since we have already made three rules, I will not waste any more words. There is only one rule: don't enter my bedroom."
"I know, I know. I ordered pizza takeout. Want to eat together?"
"No, no." Chi Jin walked towards the room, "I was so busy sleeping that I haven't told my mom I'm going home yet."
When the call was answered, Chi's mother was overjoyed to learn that her daughter could stay at home for nine days. She immediately talked about Chi Jin's favorite dishes. While chatting about family matters, she suddenly asked, "Is number six empty?"
"There's a wedding on the second, a wedding on the third, and a wedding on the fourth. What, there's another one on the sixth?"
She felt her wallet groan.
"Yes. Your cousin's."
Chi Jin was stunned for a moment: "Cousin Yuanyuan?" The daughter of his uncle and aunt.
"right."
"Could it be the civil servant from the tax bureau who was about to be introduced to me?"
"right."
"…Pregnant?"
"right."
Chi Jin thought that neither of them was a good person.
"It's a good thing I didn't introduce him to you. It's because you're well-educated and have foresight. It seems that a good job as a civil servant doesn't necessarily mean good character."
"So sudden."
"Yeah. Let's do it now before you show your pregnancy, so people won't gossip about it. I overheard this, so don't let it slip."
Chi Jin thought of his aunt's usual expression and felt happy.
"For your cousin's and your cousin's wedding gifts, you and your mother can just share one share, and I'll pay for it. As for your classmates' two weddings, you can handle it yourself. Do what you can and don't be too concerned about your reputation and suffer."
Chi Jin was short of money recently, so he didn't refuse: "Hey, thank you, Mom."
"It's at times like this that I know Mom is alright!"
"Hey, don't forget the scrambled eggs we promised you."
"You're just like your dad. You love scrambled eggs."
The mother and daughter have been avoiding the topic of Chi's father in recent years, and it seems like a lifetime ago when it is suddenly brought up.
"Alright, alright, Jinjin, you're tired after a long day, right? Go to bed early and don't stay up all night reading manuscripts."
Chi Jin suddenly missed his father and sniffed: "Yeah. Mom, you too."
"Don't you like the Tuan Tuan Cake I make? I've prepared the ingredients. When you leave, take some back with you and share it with your colleagues and friends. Just do some favors."
"Oh, you're already talking about leaving when I haven't even gone home yet. Do you still want me to go back?"
"You kid. Okay, I won't talk to you anymore. Go get some rest."
As soon as I hung up the phone, the phone screen suddenly lit up - a new WeChat message.
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