Xu Zhi’s phone chimed, and she slid down the screen to see an electricity bill overdue notice from the utility app. She watched it for a moment, then withdrew five hundred yuan from WeChat and paid the bill.
She couldn’t stay home.
She was slowly eating up her savings.
She would trust the young lady’s character just this once; she had personally promised last night not to ring the bell.
Xu Zhi rode her bike into the bar’s back alley, stopped, and hooked her foot to deploy the kickstand.
Zhao Chuchu happened to be coming out with large bags of fruit peel trash. Seeing her, she immediately smiled and greeted her, “Sister Know is here?”
Xu Zhi glanced at her, responded with an “Mm,” and squatted down to lock her bicycle.
“Sister Know,” Zhao Chuchu remembered the beautiful girl she had seen when passing the bar counter. She tentatively asked, “Your friend is here. She looks like she’s been waiting for a while.”
Xu Zhi finished locking up and casually put the key in her backpack’s side pocket.
She stood up, looked at Zhao Chuchu, and asked, “The one who paid the compensation?”
It was a redundant question. She never made “friends” at the bar, and the only person she had extra interactions with was Qi Yaoyao.
Zhao Chuchu saw that Xu Zhi could figure it out just from a simple hint. She tightly gripped the trash bag in her hand, went to dispose of it, and returned to confirm it. Then she asked, “Sister Know, are you two very close?”
Xu Zhi thought for a moment: “Not too familiar.”
Zhao Chuchu instantly cheered up again. Since Sister Know said so, they really weren’t close. But the thought of the other girl’s attire tonight made her feel a little disappointed. She probed again, “But she is really beautiful, right?”
Xu Zhi: “Mm.”
As soon as Xu Zhi agreed, the image of those bright, captivating eyes automatically surfaced in her mind—they were especially lovely and moving when she smiled, full of infectious charm.
Xu Zhi thought: Arrogant, self-willed, but beautiful.
Zhao Chuchu’s eyes darkened when she heard the confirmation, and she muttered discontentedly, “She just knows how to dress up, I guess. If you have money, you can buy expensive skincare products and beautiful dresses.”
Xu Zhi didn’t agree or respond further. She simply walked into the bar’s side door to change into her uniform in the changing room.
Zhao Chuchu watched her figure and returned to the bar, seeing the beautiful girl still seated at the bar counter from a distance.
She was wearing a light pink halter dress, exposing her delicate collarbone and smooth, slender shoulders.
No matter the angle, the line of her figure was perfectly graceful—not too much, not too little.
She clearly held herself with a superior air.
Yet, every casual glance she cast around still drew the frequent attention of both male and female customers.
Some even approached her with wine glasses to strike up a conversation, only to be dismissed with an eye-roll.
As more people tried to approach, she simply brought out two bodyguards—tall men of one meter ninety, with muscular builds. They stood with their hands behind their backs, looking menacing. No one dared to easily disturb her again.
“Why isn’t she here yet…” Qi Yaoyao rested one hand on her chin, the other idly scrolling through WeChat. She had already messaged Xu Zhi.
Xu Zhi said she was coming.
But half an hour had passed, and there was still no sign of her.
—”Sister Know.”
Qi Yaoyao sharply caught those two words amidst the loud bar music and her eyes immediately lit up. She followed the sound.
Xu Zhi had indeed arrived, wearing that sharp, captivating bartender uniform. Her figure was well-proportioned and tall, and her long black hair was pulled back into a ponytail. Tonight, as before, she was wearing a pair of gold-rimmed glasses.
“KnowKnow~” Qi Yaoyao smiled widely and waved at her.
Xu Zhi’s attention had been on her colleague the moment before, but it was immediately called away by Qi Yaoyao.
The young lady had a new makeup look today. Her cherry lips were full and glossy, slightly pouting, and her bright, deep-set eyes were not pure black but a hint of brown, making her look like a carefully adorned Barbie doll in a storefront display, designed to attract customers.
Xu Zhi sighed inwardly, but her expression remained unchanged as she walked over.
Qi Yaoyao was about to start acting spoiled, but she remembered something and turned to wave at her two bodyguards.
Upon receiving the command, the two bodyguards stopped overtly guarding the young lady’s back and concealed their tall figures within the colorful darkness of the bar.
After dismissing the bodyguards.
Qi Yaoyao spoiled her, saying, “Sister KnowKnow, I’ve been waiting for you for so long~”
“Speak normally.” Xu Zhi took over from her colleague, looked at the two orders on the table, and immediately started scooping ice to make cocktails as she spoke.
Qi Yaoyao said, “I am speaking very normally right now!”
Xu Zhi didn’t correct her. After mixing the two cocktails, she called out the orders, and they were quickly claimed by the customers.
Only Qi Yaoyao remained in front of the bar, along with… five, six, seven, eight cups of cocktails of various colors on the counter. The napkins underneath them were already slightly damp.
Xu Zhi: “Whose drinks are these?”
“Mine.” Qi Yaoyao blinked.
Xu Zhi: “…If you’re not going to drink them, don’t waste them.”
“I wasn’t going to drink them myself; people who came to chat me up tonight bought them for me.” Innocence flashed across Qi Yaoyao’s beautiful face, and she quickly added, “It’s your fault for being so late! I’ve been flirted with 10086 times!”
“‘Flirted’?” Xu Zhi asked casually, “Who could possibly ‘flirt’ with you.”
“Exactly, I’m not easy to mess with!” Qi Yaoyao said smugly. Her manicured finger pointed at the few cocktails, and she commanded, “Pour them all out. I want to drink the drink you mix for me~!”
Xu Zhi sighed inwardly at the waste of resources. She picked up three glasses in each hand and headed toward the sink to pour out the cocktails.
After cleaning the glasses, Xu Zhi returned and placed them in the sterilization cabinet.
Qi Yaoyao saw this and took the opportunity to state her drink requirement. “I want a blue cocktail tonight~”
Xu Zhi stood up, pushed the menu across the counter to her, and helped flip to the page with Blue Curaçao liqueur.
Qi Yaoyao didn’t even look, pushing the menu back. Her brown-pink pupils looked at Xu Zhi, arrogant yet pleading. “I don’t want anything on here. I want you to mix me a unique cocktail, one that’s exclusively for me~”
Xu Zhi thought: Even if you order the ones on the menu, the proportions I mix for you are already special and unique.
But she didn’t say it.
Xu Zhi only asked, “What flavor do you want, sour or sweet?”
Seeing her agree, Qi Yaoyao’s eyes curved. “Sweet and sour, but leaning toward sweet. And I want to drink it with a straw~”
Xu Zhi added ingredients based on her request.
Xu Zhi remembered the recipes for the cocktails on the menu, but she didn’t know exactly what each resulting flavor was like.
She added a little extra syrup and mixed a light blue cocktail.
Qi Yaoyao took a sip through the straw, and her face instantly scrunched up. “Wow… that taste!”
Xu Zhi’s heart inexplicably tightened. “Does it not taste good?”
“How should I put it… it’s very special…” Qi Yaoyao looked troubled. With a wrinkled little face, she pushed the glass toward Xu Zhi, adjusted the straw, and directed it toward her. “You try it.”
Xu Zhi looked at it and frowned slightly. “If it’s not good, I’ll mix you another one.”
She said this and picked up the cocktail, intending to pour it out.
Qi Yaoyao immediately said, “But you haven’t tasted it. How will you know what to adjust?”
Xu Zhi asked her, “Is it too sour?”
Qi Yaoyao quickly shook her head, the curled wisps of hair on her cheeks bouncing delicately.
“Too sweet?”
Qi Yaoyao paused but still shook her head vigorously.
Xu Zhi: “Too much alcohol, or too little? Or too much soda water?”
Qi Yaoyao shook her head at everything. She directly lifted the coiled straw and put it into Xu Zhi’s mouth, then said earnestly, “You’ll know if you just taste it! That taste is truly unique and so hard to describe. My vocabulary is too limited.”
Xu Zhi: “…” The bar has plenty of new straws.
Qi Yaoyao seemed completely oblivious to the inappropriateness of the action. She blinked her watery eyes and hurriedly urged, “Hurry up, hurry up, Sister Zhizhi.”
Xu Zhi had no choice but to take a sip of the cocktail through the straw.
Xu Zhi didn’t know what cocktails generally tasted like, but this drink was a lemon-flavored soda, with a faint alcohol warmth, slightly sweet, and cool with the help of the ice.
Xu Zhi looked at Qi Yaoyao, still unable to figure out what was wrong with the flavor.
Qi Yaoyao, however, watched Xu Zhi drink it, then immediately reached out and grabbed the glass back to her side.
She struggled to suppress a smile at the corner of her mouth, took a sip from the straw that Xu Zhi had just had in her mouth, and said innocently, “Huh? You can’t taste it? It’s just… specially delicious~~”