"No, no, I'm willing!" Gu Kuankuan said hurriedly. "I mean, yes, I'm willing. Let's go, right now, to the civil affairs bureau!"
Afraid the man might change his mind, Gu Kuankuan quickly dragged him outside.
Half an hour later.
Gu Kuankuan and the man walked out of the civil affairs bureau.
"Lu Sui…" Gu Kuankuan murmured quietly, reading the name on the marriage certificate. Frowning, she muttered under her breath, "Thirty-three years old… a bit old. That's an old cow grazing on young grass. According to research, once a man passes thirty-five, his sexual function declines sharply…"
Lu Sui asked in a chilling voice, "Gu Kuankuan, what did you just say?"
"Huh?"
Gu Kuankuan raised her head in fright and met Lu Sui's icy, man-eating gaze. Only then did she realize she had accidentally spoken her thoughts out loud!
"I… um, ah! Right… the b-betrothal gift! I forgot to discuss it with you." Gu Kuankuan swallowed and quickly changed the subject.
"How much do you want?" Lu Sui asked coldly. Gu Kuankuan thought for a moment, then weakly held up one index finger.
"Two hundred million?" Lu Sui guessed in a hard, cold tone.
Gu Kuankuan shook her head frantically. "No, no, that's not it."
"How much? Speak." Lu Sui had no patience for more guessing.
"Two hundred thousand—is that okay?" Gu Kuankuan asked, shrinking her neck.
She had no idea what Lu Sui's financial situation was like.
A betrothal gift of two hundred thousand wasn't too much.
Lu Sui was speechless. "…"
Seeing him silent, Gu Kuankuan assumed it was too much, so she took a step back.
"Then… how about one hundred thousand?"
"Your bank card number," Lu Sui said coldly.
Gu Kuankuan, flustered and excited, pulled her bank card out of her bag and handed it to Lu Sui.
Lu Sui took out his phone, snapped a photo of the card number, and sent it to his secretary…
Soon, Gu Kuankuan received a text alert from the bank.
It was two hundred thousand!
Her father's medical bills were settled for now!
Gu Kuankuan instantly wept with joy. "Th-thank you, Lu…"
Mid-sentence, her phone screen lit up with an incoming call. It was Lin Shumin.
"Sorry!" Gu Kuankuan said to Lu Sui, then answered the phone.
"Auntie…"
"Gu Kuankuan, where are you? Why didn't you go to the blind date?" Lin Shumin demanded furiously.
Gu Kuankuan was a bit dazed as she replied, "Auntie, I did go to Yunshui Cafe. I've already gotten the marriage certificate with Mr. Lu."
"President Lu Zhikun never saw you at all. Who did you get the marriage certificate with?" Lin Shumin roared.
"Huh?" Gu Kuankuan went completely blank, her scalp tingling. "He… he isn't Lu Zhikun…"
Lin Shumin was so furious she nearly vomited blood.
"This idiot is going to be the death of me. Gu Kuankuan, go divorce that man right now, then get back to Yunshui Cafe and meet President Lu for your blind date!"
Beep, beep, beep—Gu Kuankuan stared at the disconnected call, then looked up at Lu Sui.
"Um… I got the wrong person. You're not the one I was supposed to marry. Let's turn around, go back to the civil affairs bureau, and get a divorce, okay?"
"Say that again?"
Lu Sui's brow furrowed, and the temperature around them plummeted.
"I…"
Gu Kuankuan had the instinct that if she dared mention "divorce" one more time, she might drop dead on the spot.
She gritted her teeth and steeled herself, thinking: Whatever. Marrying anyone is still marrying.
Most importantly, the money was already in hand.
"The two hundred thousand—you really gave it to me?" Gu Kuankuan confirmed with him once more.
Lu Sui pressed his thin lips together. "Mm."
At that moment, Gu Kuankuan's phone rang again.
It was her mother calling.
"Mom…"
"Kuankuan, did you manage to borrow the money?" Mother Gu asked, her voice exhausted.
Gu Kuankuan remembered that her father's medical fees were only paid up through yesterday.
If she didn't renew the payment today, the hospital would stop his medication.
At this thought, Gu Kuankuan said as she ran, "Mom, I got the money! I'm coming to find you right now!"
Lu Sui stood where he was, watching his new bride…
run away.
…
At the hospital.
Gu Kuankuan ran to the payment window and paid 100,000 yuan in one go, leaving 100,000 yuan remaining.
Then she went to find her mother.
"Kuankuan…"
"Mom, don't worry, I've renewed the medical fees for now." Gu Kuankuan comforted her mother by holding her hand.
"Really?" Mother Gu could hardly believe it. "Your uncle was willing to lend you the money?"
"I didn't borrow it from my uncle, I borrowed it from… my boyfriend."
Gu Kuankuan told her mother a lie.
If her mother knew that she had entered a flash marriage with a stranger to pay for her father's medical fees, her mother would be devastated.
So, for now, she'd say she had a boyfriend.
After a while, she would tell her mother that they were planning to register the marriage.
"Kuankuan, when did you get a boyfriend? Why didn't I know about this?" Mother Gu was extremely surprised.
"We've been together for… a few months now. I didn't tell you and Dad because we had just started dating, and I wanted to wait until things were stable before telling you."
Gu Kuankuan suppressed her guilt and kept lying.
"How much did your boyfriend lend you?" Mother Gu asked again.
"A hundred thousand…"
"That much?"
"He said if it's not enough, I can borrow more from him."
Gu Kuankuan was laying the groundwork so she wouldn't have to explain again when it came time to pay the fees later.
With her husband's medical fees renewed for now, Mother Gu breathed a sigh of relief.
Then she asked, "Kuankuan, did you write an IOU for your boyfriend?"
"No." Gu Kuankuan shook her head.
Since the money wasn't actually borrowed, there was naturally no IOU.
Mother Gu said seriously, "Later, remember to write an IOU for your boyfriend, okay? Your boyfriend is a good man, willing to lend us money without even asking for an IOU. But when we borrow money, we should offer to write one on our own initiative. It shows our sincerity and determination to repay the debt, and puts the other person's mind at ease!"
Gu Kuankuan nodded. "I understand, Mom."
Mother Gu added, "Ask your boyfriend when he's free. Invite him over for a meal at our home, to thank him for being willing to lend us money!"
"Okay, I'll ask him later."
Only then did Gu Kuankuan remember that she didn't even have Lu Sui's phone number, nor did she know where he lived…
She had taken Lu Sui's 200,000 yuan betrothal gift and run off without a word to him.
Would Lu Sui think he'd been scammed and report her to the police as a fraudster?
At this thought, Gu Kuankuan hurriedly said, "Mom, I have to go now—I need to get to my part-time job."
Gu Kuankuan wanted to rush back to the civil affairs bureau to see if Lu Sui was still there waiting for her.
"I'll walk you downstairs." Mother Gu wanted to spend a little more time with her daughter.
As they walked, she said with concern, "Kuankuan, remember to eat your meals on time, and rest when you're tired, okay?"
Ever since Father Gu's car accident landed him in the ICU, money had been draining away like water.
As if that weren't bad enough, misfortune kept piling on.
Because the industry was in a slump, Mother Gu made a trivial mistake at work, and her boss used it as a pretext to fire her.
The burden of the whole family suddenly fell on Gu Kuankuan's shoulders…
Gu Kuankuan went to work Monday through Friday, and after work she did a part-time job delivering food, not daring to rest even on weekends.
"Mom, I know." Gu Kuankuan nodded.
"Ah… who knows when your father will wake up." Mother Gu sighed sorrowfully, then gritted her teeth in anger. "That perpetrator is truly despicable—he hit your father and fled without even calling an ambulance. If your father had received treatment in time, it never would have gotten this serious."
Gu Kuankuan comforted her mother. "Mom, we don't have the energy to track down the perpetrator right now, so please stop dwelling on it. It'll only add to your worries and make you feel worse."
They were an ordinary family with no ability to investigate the perpetrator themselves; they could only leave it to the police.
Right now, all she hoped was that her father would wake up soon.
Gu Kuankuan took her mother's arm, and the two of them walked out of the inpatient building…
She suddenly saw, just a few meters away, a tall, well-built man standing in front of a black sedan.
It was Lu Sui!
How had he found this place?!