Chapter 42

Auction Venue

Feng Yu’s arrival drew the attention of others. More than half of those present knew him; after all, he was the second son of the Feng family. He had been abroad for the past few years, so his sudden appearance was quite a shock.

Zheng Mingyue couldn’t hide her surprise either: “Why are you here?”

Only when facing Ji Qingyu did Feng Yu lose his rational control over his emotions. At this moment, she wasn’t there, so he seemed to revert to his old self with a naturally composed expression that no one could fault. “Big brother asked me to come. He had to leave early and asked me to take you home.” He said this in a voice that was just loud enough for those nearby to hear.

Everything is in moderation. Even though Zheng Mingyue wanted to use this occasion to show others that the Feng family was doing well and that her two sons were still harmonious, the sudden situation left her at a loss for words. She could only nod and smile, “Alright, he takes the first half, you take the second half.”

Feng Yu sat beside her and casually asked, “What did you bid on?”

“Nothing much,” Zheng Mingyue replied. “Your sister-in-law bid on a ruby necklace to give to Yuan Bao as a gift to be kept in the safe.”

Feng Yu’s expression remained unchanged, “Does the child like this? I thought she would prefer car models and Barbie dolls.”

“It’s a birthday gift. It’s not the only one.”

“Is her birthday coming up?” he asked.

Zheng Mingyue nodded, “In a little over a month.”

Feng Yu seemed disappointed and regretful. “I should be back in Mexico by then. How about I ask Big Brother to give me an extra month’s leave?”

“Ask him yourself,” Zheng Mingyue said with a smile in her eyes, “Your father and I can’t control that.”

While the mother and son were whispering, another piece of jewelry named “Newlywed” was being auctioned. Zheng Mingyue wasn’t very interested, but the bidder was Luo Xuan, which piqued her curiosity and made her look back. She withdrew her gaze and looked at her son sitting beside her.

Feng Yu’s eyes showed no emotion as if this person was an unrelated stranger, not his long-time friend.

“Last I heard, Luo Xuan was getting married, right?” Zheng Mingyue asked softly.

Feng Yu smiled, “Not sure. I’ve been too busy and haven’t been in touch for years.”

Zheng Mingyue didn’t ask further, but a trace of melancholy crossed her heart. Some things shouldn’t be pondered too deeply, nor should one think about “what if.”

No one competed with Luo Xuan for this piece of jewelry; everyone knew she wanted a good omen.

Feng Chengze navigated to the nearest fruit store. After parking the car, he walked into the store with Ji Qingyu.

“What do you want to eat?” he asked, standing in front of the refrigerated display, looking at the colorful, neatly arranged fresh-cut fruits in disposable containers.

He was about to reach out and grab some when Ji Qingyu quickly grabbed his hand. “I want to choose myself.”

With the hot weather, she couldn’t tell if the fruits were freshly cut or from the morning, but she couldn’t say this in the store. She could only use her eyes to command him not to move.

“Okay.”

He tried to hold her hand, but she slipped away like a fish, lightly moving to another section. She knocked on a watermelon with her knuckles, thought for a moment, and decided against it. They were going to watch the stars and chat later, and eating too much watermelon might mean searching for a restroom in the hills—if there even was one, which would be awkward. She wouldn’t allow that to happen.

Durian was also out of the question. Although she spotted a few with excellent shapes, she suspected that if she brought one into the car, Mr. Feng might throw the car away.

The fruit store was brightly lit, and Feng Chengze stood aside, watching her intently. She wandered through the store, carefully selecting the fruits she wanted to eat.

Ji Qingyu seriously picked out a box of blueberries, cherries, and cherry tomatoes—all her favorites.

Nowadays, fruit stores offer washing services. She stood there eagerly, not watching the staff wash her fruits, but rather another staff member opening a durian for a customer.

“The shape is so good!” Ji Qingyu said to the person next to her.

“Right? I thought so, too! I picked it out after a long search!” The woman, who had just gotten off work, looked at the staff expectantly, her fatigue swept away.

“Wow~”

Both women exclaimed simultaneously as a large section of fruit was revealed. Ji Qingyu said enviously, “It looks like there are six sections, and they all look very full.”

“So happy!!”

Feng Chengze saw her chatting with someone and walked over to take a look. He understood everything—she was someone who enjoyed watching the excitement.

The staff finished washing the fruits she bought and packed them in a transparent box. The colors were well-matched and looked very appealing.

“Would you like to try some?” the woman with the peeled durian invited Ji Qingyu warmly.

She quickly waved her hand, “No, thank you. I’ve been feeling a bit overheated lately.”

Feng Chengze went to the cashier, scanned the code, and paid. He checked the navigation and saw that the convenience store was nearby, so they decided to walk there.

The sign of the Youwei Convenience Store was very bright. The store was busy, with a constant stream of customers.

“You still have a chance to back out,” Ji Qingyu reminded him, tugging at his sleeve as they stood outside the store.

“It’s just a snack,” Feng Chengze said. He wasn’t in the mood to find another restaurant for dinner, so he walked straight into the store. He wasn’t very interested in the fragrant oden, so he glanced at it briefly and then picked up a rice ball and a bottle of water. Considering he didn’t like the smell of food in the car, Ji Qingyu pulled him to sit at a high table.

This was a novel experience for her. She had never imagined that one day she would be eating with Feng Chengze in a convenience store. He unwrapped the rice ball with a detached expression, his movements clumsy, as if it were his first time. Under her curious gaze, he took a bite, eating both the rice and the seaweed, but hadn’t reached the filling yet.

“Is it good?” she asked, resting her chin on her hand.

“It’s okay.”

For Feng Chengze, it was just a fistful of rice wrapped around a chopstick’s worth of meat with a piece of seaweed on the outside. It wasn’t particularly bad, but when someone has no appetite, a cheap rice ball and a gourmet meal taste the same. He finished eating in a few bites, twisted open the bottle cap, tilted his head back, revealing his Adam’s apple, and drank half the bottle of water.

Ji Qingyu watched him while eating cherries. Neither of them spoke again. She thought she wasn’t the only one feeling tired. After a simple dinner, they got back in the car and set off again. Although she was also a native of Jing City, she didn’t know the terrain as well as he did, so she let him drive her to the mountainside.

The place wasn’t deserted, and the road was well-maintained. However, it was clear that there weren’t many people in Jingcheng who would drive here to watch the stars.

“Could there be snakes?”

As they exited the car, Ji Qingyu looked around at the pitch-black surroundings and the vegetation, feeling uneasy. She whispered her question. If she wasn’t worried about him looking at her like she was an idiot, she would have asked if there might be ghosts, too.

“…” Feng Chengze said, “If you’re worried about snakes, you should be more concerned about mosquitoes.”

He was also puzzled about why she wanted to come to the mountainside to watch the stars, but he didn’t have the energy to question it today. Wherever she wanted to go, he would take her.

“… I’m particularly attractive to mosquitoes.” Ji Qingyu was already regretting it. In her imagination, this was supposed to be a romantic experience, but she hadn’t thought it through. “I think a mosquito has bitten me. It’s really itchy.”

“Then let’s get back in the car.”

“But we’ve already come all this way.” They had driven for over half an hour and had been there for less than three minutes.

“I didn’t say we were leaving.” Feng Chengze opened the back door of the car. “My car has a sunroof and a starry ceiling. You can see any stars you want.”

Ji Qingyu didn’t hesitate for a second and immediately climbed into the back seat, even urging him, “Hurry, hurry, don’t let the mosquitoes in!”

Feng Chengze got in the car too, and after closing the door, he asked, “What stars do you want to see?”

Ji Qingyu perked up, “Can we see both kinds?”

“Sure.”

The sunroof curtain slowly rolled back, and she looked up. The mountain was indeed a great place to watch the stars. In the city, tall buildings seemed to cover the sky, but here, even sitting in the car, the starry sky made her lose herself for a while.

Feng Chengze also looked up, following her gaze. He didn’t find it particularly interesting, but before he knew it, he had been looking for several minutes.

“Actually, on the day Feng Yu took me to your house, no, even before that,” Ji Qingyu suddenly said softly, “To be precise, after he introduced me to you, I felt that my relationship with him wouldn’t last long. It was intuition, a sixth sense. So, breaking up seemed normal. I wasn’t shocked. Nowadays, few people can truly have an amicable breakup. It’s too difficult. Usually, one person has to be completely disappointed in the other before they part ways.”

“So, don’t worry. Even five years ago, this wasn’t a big deal to me.”

It was just a breakup. After a few days of sadness, life goes on. Even if she went back to that time and experienced all those emotions, she wouldn’t be devastated, crying every day, right?

“I’m fine now. Knowing the reason for the breakup is good. If there’s a family gathering next time, I won’t avoid it, and I shouldn’t lose my composure.”

After saying this, Ji Qingyu felt much lighter. She hoped Feng Chengze would believe her and that she was speaking from the heart.

However, after a moment of silence, Feng Chengze turned to her and asked thoughtfully, “Why did you feel that after meeting me, your relationship with him wouldn’t last?”

“…” Ji Qingyu blinked, thinking she had misheard.

But, after all she had said, was this the main point?

“You didn’t even look at me properly back then.” She spoke calmly, but a hint of resentment slipped through her words. “From start to finish, you only said four words to me: ‘Hello’ and ‘Goodbye.’ Who wouldn’t lose hope in the relationship after that?”

Recalling their first meeting, Feng Chengze didn’t have a strong impression of her either. He was swamped that day. He knew about Ji Qingyu because Feng Yu had mentioned her multiple times, both on his phone and at the dinner table, hoping to get his approval and arrange a meeting to solidify the relationship and show his commitment to being with her forever—

“When she graduates, I plan to propose… She’s a bit afraid of our parents and you, big brother. How about I bring her to have dinner with you first?”

“She’s really great. You’ll definitely like her.”

Feng Chengze wasn’t someone who liked to impose his views on others.
Given the current trajectory and scale of Yisheng Group, whether it was him or Feng Yu, a marriage alliance with a family of equal standing would be ideal. But if Feng Yu didn’t want to take that path, as someone groomed to be the heir from birth, he wouldn’t force his only brother.
However, at that time, he still didn’t think Feng Yu and Ji Qingyu had a future together. They were both too young. Ji Qingyu was in her early twenties and hadn’t graduated yet, and Feng Yu was only twenty-four. If they were together for three, four, five, six, or seven years and then talked about marriage, he would definitely consider the young girl waiting anxiously in the restaurant as his sister-in-law. But Feng Yu, after only a few months with Ji Qingyu, was already talking about marriage. Anyone with a sound mind would suspect it was a whim. Throughout the dinner, he didn’t say much, and Ji Qingyu, sitting opposite him, also spoke very little. Only Feng Yu was enthusiastically chatting and livening up the atmosphere. He remembered when Feng Yu mentioned borrowing one of his island villas for an engagement party the following spring, Ji Qingyu looked up in surprise. Their eyes met for just two seconds, and his gaze was so calm that it didn’t even carry a hint of scrutiny.

“Sorry.”

Feng Chengze didn’t think Ji Qingyu needed his explanation, but he felt he had to clarify, “I wasn’t targeting you, nor did I dislike you.”

“You just thought my relationship with your brother wouldn’t last, so you didn’t want to waste your precious time,” she calmly added for him.

“Are you angry?”

“Not really,” she replied, because things had indeed turned out as he had predicted.

Feng Chengze let out an almost imperceptible sigh of relief. “So, in your heart, is it over between you and him now?”

“That’s strange,” she countered, “Hasn’t it been over for a long time?”

“I’m asking about in your heart.”

“…Yes.”

“Good.” He nodded slowly. At this moment, he thought he should ask her for a promise or assurance, but since he wasn’t sure what kind of promise he wanted, he remained silent. Besides, until now, she hadn’t asked him for any promises either.

No matter how beautiful the stars are, they can become tiresome after a while. Ji Qingyu stretched her neck and poked the still-pensive Feng Chengze with her finger, “I want to see the other kind of stars.”

Feng Chengze agreed, closed the sunroof curtain, and suddenly, the ceiling was filled with twinkling stars. She looked at them in surprise, her eyes reflecting the tiny lights. Just as she was about to turn her head to praise him for how beautiful it was, he leaned over, his hand resting on the seat behind her, almost enveloping her with his body. He didn’t advance as directly as he had in the past. After all, they had just discussed a rather unpleasant topic.

All night, Feng Chengze’s chest felt hot and damp. At the fruit store, he had even looked down to check, but she hadn’t shed many tears; they had long dried up. It was just an illusion. He couldn’t calm down. Even while doing what used to captivate him the most, he was distracted and very irritated by the distraction.

Ji Qingyu moved away from him, creating a bit of distance. Her beautiful eyes flashed with doubt, but after a few seconds, she smiled, releasing his tie and gently removing the glasses perched on his nose.