After handing over her contribution to the household, Yang Zhiyan’s monthly salary of 8,000 yuan instantly shrank to just 3,000.
As she scanned the payment code, her heart bled.
The cashier handed her the takeout bag. She took it and turned to leave, only to notice the strikingly handsome man sitting diagonally across the café.
There was now a cup of coffee on his table, already half empty. He sat with his head slightly turned, his gaze coincidentally resting in her direction.
From halfway across the café, Yang Zhiyan’s excellent eyesight let her make out his features clearly. He had prominent brows, a straight, sculpted nose, and lips pressed together in a faint line. His demeanor was cool, refined, and aristocratic.
Compared to that balding man from earlier, they didn’t even seem like the same species.
Life really wasn’t fair. Some people were born in Rome, while others could spend their entire lives trying and never get there. But what could she do? All she could do was keep living.
Qin Yuzheng sat by the window, elegantly lifting his coffee cup for another sip.
His gaze shifted away from the glass. Reflected in the window was the figure of the woman in the plain-colored modern qipao as she walked out of the café. Her hair was loosely pinned up, exposing the graceful curve of her neck, pale as porcelain.
Last week, she’d been standing outside the window wearing a different qipao.
Today, the moment she walked through the door, Qin Yuzheng had noticed her.
The instant her figure appeared beyond the glass entrance, his eyes had been drawn to her of their own accord. They followed her, clung to her, refusing to look away.
He watched her glance around the café. Her eyes skimmed over his face before quickly moving on.
Setting down his coffee cup, Qin Yuzheng slowly traced a circle along its rim with his fingertips.
Then he saw the balding man walk in and sit across from her.
A blind date.
The moment those two words surfaced in his mind, his fingers paused.
He couldn’t hear what they were saying, but he could clearly read the man’s expression—arrogant, self-important, chin perpetually raised, like a rooster strutting during mating season.
She sat opposite him with perfect posture, her expression calm and unreadable, as though she was listening… or perhaps not hearing a single word.
Later, the man got up and left.
He stormed off so quickly it looked like he was throwing a tantrum.
Qin Yuzheng watched as she remained seated alone, staring blankly at the untouched coffee.
A waitress approached and said something to her. She nodded, stood up, and walked to the register.
When she paid, her brows knit together.
It was the unmistakable look of someone pained by spending money.
He saw it clearly.
He found her beautiful, vivid… and adorable.
Then she turned around, and for a brief moment their eyes met.
Though she quickly looked away, it was the first time Qin Yuzheng had ever felt that perhaps this face of his was actually useful for something.
By the time Yang Zhiyan got home from work, the living room was brightly lit.
Three people sat in a neat row on the sofa.
Her sister-in-law, Li Fengxia, occupied the center seat, one hand resting on her pregnant belly, looking every bit like the empress presiding over court in a historical drama.
Her older brother, Yang Yaohua, perched on one armrest with one foot on the floor and the other swinging lazily. A cigarette dangled between his fingers as smoke drifted upward beneath the lights.
Her mother sat at the far end with nothing to do, simply holding a neatly folded blanket across her knees—whether to keep warm or wipe away tears later, no one could tell.
Three pairs of eyes turned toward her simultaneously.
A full-scale family tribunal.
She’d seen this formation before.
The last time was when she graduated from college and announced she wanted to study qipao tailoring.
The same people.
The same seating arrangement.
Even the same lighting.
Even her brother held his cigarette exactly the same way.
Yang Zhiyan set down her bag, neatly lined up her shoes, and walked over unhurriedly.
She didn’t sit.
Instead, she stood across the coffee table like a defendant standing trial.
“Yang Zhiyan.”
Her sister-in-law spoke first.
She emphasized every syllable.
Normally she simply called her Zhiyan, or occasionally by her full name—but never in that tone.
“What exactly are you trying to do?”
Yang Zhiyan remained silent.
“I kindly introduced you to a suitable man, and this is how you repay me?”
Li Fengxia’s voice rose higher and higher. Her face was a mixture of grievance and outrage, lips tightly pursed, cheeks puffed as though she’d suffered the greatest injustice imaginable.
Yang Zhiyan had originally intended to endure it.
They were family. They saw one another every day. Keeping the peace brought prosperity.
Her mother had taught her that since childhood: Always give in to your older brother.
She had remembered those words for twenty-five years.
Endure for a moment and the storm will pass. Take one step back and the sea becomes wider.
How many steps had she already taken back?
So many that her own bedroom was practically no longer hers.
So many that more than half her monthly salary disappeared into someone else’s pocket.
She didn’t want to retreat anymore.
“Kindly?” Yang Zhiyan lifted her eyes, her voice sharp and edged with mockery. “I’d say your intentions were anything but kind.”
The living room fell silent.
Li Fengxia’s face instantly changed color.
It turned deathly pale, then flushed bright red, as though she’d just been slapped in front of everyone.
Yang Zhiyan continued,
“I’m twenty-five years old. Setting me up with a thirty-two-year-old is one thing.”
She pulled out her phone, opened the photo, and held it up for the three of them to see.
“Take a good look yourselves. You seriously called this man handsome?”
The face in the photo had cramped features squeezed together beneath a shiny bald scalp.
She’d spent fifteen agonizing minutes sitting across from that face this afternoon.
Looking at it again now still made her stomach churn.
“This is catfishing.”
She placed the phone face-up on the coffee table, the screen still glowing.
“You showed me this picture and kept telling me how good-looking he was. Then I showed up and saw…”
She didn’t finish.
The air in the living room seemed to solidify.
Li Fengxia’s face alternated between red and white. She opened her mouth, then closed it again, as though something were lodged in her throat.
Three or four seconds later, she finally forced out a reply.
“That’s called being mature and dependable! What do you know?”
“Mature and dependable?”
Yang Zhiyan almost laughed.
“If you like him so much, then you marry him.”
Those words were like kicking a hornet’s nest.
Yang Yaohua exploded.
“How dare you talk like that?”
He shot to his feet from the sofa arm. His cigarette nearly fell to the floor. As he waved his hand, ash scattered all over the coffee table, but he didn’t even notice.
“Your sister-in-law went out of her way to introduce someone to you. She was doing you a favor! It’s one thing if you don’t appreciate it, but how dare you speak to your elders like this?”
Yang Zhiyan looked at her brother.
Yang Yaohua was four years older than she was.
In most families, parents taught the older brother to look after his younger sister.
Not in theirs.
Their parents had always taught her to give in to her brother.
When they were children, even if Yang Yaohua voluntarily washed the dishes, Yang Zhiyan would be the one scolded.
“You lazy girl! How can you let your brother do chores? Don’t you have hands?”
As soon as those words were spoken, her father would beat her with a stick.
From then on, Yang Yaohua never had to do another chore.
Every household task became Yang Zhiyan’s responsibility.
Even then, Yang Yaohua still wasn’t satisfied.
“Get out of my house!”
He pointed toward the door, his finger nearly poking her in the face.
Yang Zhiyan didn’t flinch.
She lowered her eyes to that finger.
The nails were unevenly trimmed.
A wedding ring circled his ring finger.
There was a thin layer of calluses on his fingertips.
“I’ll move out in a couple of days,” Yang Zhiyan said calmly.
“But, Brother…”
“When are you going to pay back the 100,000 yuan I lent you for your down payment?”
The air in the living room froze instantly.
Yang Yaohua’s finger stiffened in midair.
His expression changed several times in rapid succession—confusion, then shock, and finally the anger of a man cornered with nowhere to retreat.
“When did I ever borrow money from you?”
His voice rose so high that the last word cracked.
“That money was your contribution to our parents! What does it have to do with me?”