Qian Fei casually asked, "Just got back?"
Li Yifei nodded.
Then a duet of voices sounded in the living room.
Qian Fei: "Didn't Gui Lili come back with you?"
Li Yifei: "Has Gui Lili come back?"
Qian Fei paused, noticing Li Yifei also seemed taken aback.
Li Yifei appeared somewhat angry as he tossed a bag to Qian Fei. "Here's some tea. I don't need it—you can have it."
Qian Fei, who was desperately sleepy at that moment, felt Li Yifei was like some haughty angel sent by the heavens to save her—usually not very likable but capable of shining at critical moments.
"Is... this really okay?" she hesitated, eyeing the exquisitely packaged tea.
"Just take it," Li Yifei shoved the bag into her hands. "What are you worried about? It's not worth much. Even if I regret it later and ask for it back, you won’t have to sell your house or land!"
Hearing this, Qian Fei took the bag without further hesitation.
She returned to her room. Through the door, she faintly heard Li Yifei calling Gui Lili. He raised his voice: "Where are you? Why aren’t you home yet at this hour? What do you mean I’m always out late too? I’m a man—how can you compare? No one bats an eye if I’m out entertaining clients late, but if you’re out with your boss at midnight, I’m worried people will gossip about me behind my back! How am I being harsh? If you weren’t acting questionably, I wouldn’t have to say these things! Gui Lili, what’s happened to you? Can’t you just live properly like a decent girl anymore? Get back here now, or don’t bother coming back at all!"
Qian Fei had been sleepy enough to tear open the tea bag for a brew, but eavesdropping on this call jolted her awake. She thought Li Yifei’s sharp tongue was truly something else—he didn’t hold back at all when arguing with his girlfriend. Of course, Gui Lili was no pushover either; every time, they fought like their lives depended on it.
She couldn’t help but feel exhausted on their behalf. The man was spoiled rotten, never lifting a finger at home, and quick to lose his temper if things didn’t go his way, firmly believing men shouldn’t do household chores. The woman, on the other hand, loved dressing up and acting cute more than actual work, outdoing everyone in sheer delicacy. These two high-maintenance individuals trying to make a relationship work was nothing short of a miracle.
She set the tea aside, untouched, and went back to work.
About forty minutes later, Gui Lili returned.
She could hear the two arguing through two closed doors, catching fragments of Gui Lili’s shouts and sobs.
"Li Yifei, how dare you say that to me! Don’t you go to bars with your colleagues all the time? Don’t tell me you’ve never had drinks with other women! My colleague said they’ve seen you flirting with some film school girl!"
She heard Li Yifei retort, "Stop twisting things! That girl wasn’t even with me—we were just sitting together having a drink. Your colleague? More like your boss! How would he even know she’s from film school? Probably tried to hit on her and failed! Besides, when I go to bars, no one’s trying to sleep with me. But when you go, the guy taking you there definitely is! Wake up!"
Gui Lili kept crying. "Li Yifei, why do you always have to say such awful things to me? Can’t we just get along? Why have you been picking fights with me ever since we came back to China?"Li Yifei seemed to have kicked the coffee table, and Qian Fei heard the sound of something hitting the wall.
Who would have thought that stuff bought on Taobao could be so sturdy? It had endured Li Yifei’s kicks without falling apart. She decided to go online tomorrow and leave the seller another positive review.
"Fine? Haven’t I been fine enough? I’ll tell you—I regret being too fine! You said you wanted to rent a place together, so I rented with you. You said you wanted it near Guomao, so I rented near Guomao. And what happened? I came back in the middle of the night, but you still weren’t home! What kind of business requires you to accompany your boss to a bar at this hour? Gui Lili, you’re really something!"
Listening to their argument made Qian Fei’s head throb.
The fight next door went on for a while longer before gradually dying down. Based on the signs, Qian Fei guessed Gui Lili had probably cried herself unconscious.
Her sympathy must have gotten lost in the middle of the night because she didn’t feel the slightest bit sorry for Gui Lili.
Rubbing her temples, she went back to working overtime.
※※※※※※
The next morning at the office, Xiaoyuan told Qian Fei, "Sister Jin wants you to see her later. She said she has something to discuss."
After submitting the "Investment Banking Quarterly Business Statistics," Qian Fei went to find Sister Jin.
Sister Jin pulled her into the hallway and whispered mysteriously, "Remember when I introduced you and Hu Zining, and I mentioned their hotel was planning to go public? I just heard that our firm and another securities company might jointly take on this project as co-sponsors for the IPO! Right now, most of the company’s staff are tied up in other projects, so we’re short on hands. So, Feifei, there’s a chance you might get to participate in this one!"
In her first few years at the company, Qian Fei had worked in the back-office support department, handling administrative tasks like relaying meeting notes, uploading the latest industry regulations to the company website, and compiling weekly market updates to email to all employees. Later, she realized that the back-office department was always the most overworked yet the least rewarded—no project bonuses, just a fixed salary. So, she got her professional certification and wanted to transfer to the project department. But Wang Ruohai had said, "If a woman is always traveling for work, how is she supposed to have a life?" So she shelved the idea.
It wasn’t until after their breakup, when she bought an apartment and the mortgage payments forced her to take life more seriously, that she finally requested a transfer to the project department.
But even in the project department, whether a team had five or six members made a huge difference in how bonuses were distributed. So, in the year and a half since her transfer, she had remained a peripheral figure, never fully integrated into any project team from start to finish. Usually, she was just called in to help when a team was short-staffed—running errands, organizing work files, doing odd jobs. When it came time to distribute bonuses, getting a token 8,000 or 10,000 yuan for her efforts was considered a decent outcome.Over the past year or so, the task she had become most adept at was organizing work files. She had already helped several project teams tidy up their documentation. She genuinely enjoyed hearing her colleagues praise her: "In our company, when it comes to organizing work files, no one can beat Qian Fei! Her work is meticulous, efficient, and flawless!"
She had always considered this a skill of hers, even taking pride in it at one point. That was until one day, while fetching water in the pantry, she accidentally overheard two colleagues chatting privately: "It's such a shame about Qian Fei. Every project team wants to use her for free to organize their files, yet none of them want to give her a decent bonus!"
"Yeah, in the two years she's been in the project department, all she's done is organize files. Spending two years in investment banking just organizing files—what a waste of time!"
It was then that she truly began to understand the situation she was in.
So if what Sister Jin said was true, Qian Fei really wanted to seize this opportunity.
She asked Sister Jin, "Sister Jin, I really want to officially join a project team and stop being an outsider on the sidelines! Tell me how I can do it!"
Sister Jin gave her some advice, "Why don’t you find a chance to sound out Director Kong from the project department? See if he can slot you into this project team? If this project succeeds, even if you're the smallest fry, you’ll definitely get a decent bonus!"
Qian Fei’s heart raced at the thought.
"But how should I approach Director Kong?"
Sister Jin thought for a moment. "Director Kong is sharp—nothing gets past him. There’s no need to beat around the bush; it might even backfire. Just be direct and tell him what you want. Oh, and he likes tea—buy him some good-quality tea!"
That evening, back at home, Qian Fei posted on a forum: "If I want to give a gift to my boss, what kind of tea would be appropriate?"
A string of replies followed: "Expensive ones."
She rolled her eyes at her computer.
As she did, her gaze somehow twisted toward the bag Li Yifei had given her the day before.
A thought struck her. She pulled out the elegant tea gift box from the bag, its packaging adorned with the words "Wuyi Rock Tea" in an antique style. She found the barcode and scanned it with her phone using a price-checking app.
A beep later, the screen displayed the price: 18,888 yuan.
Qian Fei’s knees nearly buckled, and she almost collapsed to the floor.
That little spendthrift next door had said she wouldn’t have to sell her house or land if she ever wanted to return it... At this price, she’d at least have to sell half a bathroom!
Qian Fei thought that if the tea had cost under a thousand yuan, she might have swallowed her guilt and kept it, pretending not to know the price. But now that she knew how expensive it was, she was sure she’d lose sleep every night if she didn’t return it.
She texted Li Yifei: "I heard the tea you casually gave me yesterday costs 18,888 yuan. It’s too expensive—I don’t dare keep it. Take it back!"
Less than a minute later, she got a reply: "A buddy gave it to me—didn’t cost me anything. Just keep it."
Qian Fei pursed her lips.
"Just take it back."
Half a minute passed.
Li Yifei: Then throw it away.
Qian Fei hesitated.
"You didn’t pay for it, but your buddy did!"
Li Yifei: He didn’t pay either. He got it as a phone bill promotion.Qian Fei's mouth hung open in shock without her even realizing it. Just how much phone credit had he recharged?!?!?!
With utmost sincerity and reverence, she typed out a line on her phone and sent it to Li Yifei:
"Is your buddy married? Or if he's unfortunately already married, does he have any unmarried brothers?"
Then there was no reply.
Two hours later, just as she was lying down to sleep, she actually received a response from Li Yifei: Yes, me.
Qian Fei decided maybe she should just throw away the tea leaves after all.
Author's note: Li Yifei you little scoundrel, you little rascal, what are you trying to pull here?!?! The author asks with righteous indignation—
Ahhhhh girls I love you all so much!!! The flowers you showered yesterday were too amazing, I was so moved I almost cried!!!
Keep it up! Keep it up! You must keep it up!!! Look at my hopeful, tear-streaked face!!!
OpenNovel