My Feelings Can Wait Ch.19

T/N: Hello again, friends. Quick note before we kick off MFCW’s translation: the way I translate might not be the same as the previous translators, so if there’s anything in the chapters that you want clarification on, feel free to drop a comment or ping me in the Discord channel for a quicker reply. This is a super long chapter (10k words in Chinese), so if there are any typos, please let me know. I’ll be taking a break after publishing this chapter before we officially start the translation, so I’ll see you guys probably sometime mid-August when we really kick things off.

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The next morning, Ji You Yan washed up and headed to the restaurant for breakfast. Not long after that, Jing Xiu also showed up in the restaurant, to Ji You Yan’s surprise. One had to know that Jing Xiu had purposefully avoided showing up at the same time as her over the past few days.

Ji You Yan was a little excited, but also a bit nervous. She greeted Jing Xiu and watched as she slowly brewed her coffee, before asking a little foolishly: “Is Teacher Jing not practicing this morning?”

Jing Xiu filled the water container of the coffee machine, staying silent for two seconds before she replied calmly: “I’m jetlagged.”

Ji You Yan observed her expression before carefully probing: “So is the practice time reversed?”

“Mm.” Jing Xiu didn’t want to say a single extra word.

“Changed to the nighttime?” Ji You Yan continued asking.

“Mm.”

“Then in the future, you don’t have to go out, we can jog together when we have time?” Ji You Yan’s eyes lit up as she tried to push her luck.

Jing Xiu’s eyes softened. She capped the container and turned on the power, glancing at Ji You Yan as she said calmly: “The milk is going to get cold.”

This was her subtly saying that she was being too talkative, Ji You Yan understood. She obediently quietened down and drank her milk, but she couldn’t keep the smile off her face.

She could feel it. Although Jing Xiu’s attitude was still icy, but compared to a few days ago when her face was cold and her words were barbed, this calmness was the warmness of spring.

More than that, when Jing Xiu was about to leave with her cup of coffee, she even surprisingly showed Ji You Yan concern: “Is the area that was scalded still red?”

Hearing that, Ji You Yan’s heart felt like there were fireworks going off.

“It’s fine, your medicine was very effective.” Her tone was filled with unconcealable happiness.

Jing Xiu’s lips twitched slightly in a smile, as she left without saying anything else.

Lin Yue had seen the whole process, feeling even more shocked than if the sun had risen from the west. What had happened between Ji jie and Teacher Jing that she didn’t know about, for their relationship to improve so suddenly?

She hadn’t figured out how to ask, when Ji You Yan asked her suddenly: “Is it almost the new year?”

Lin Yue replied in confusion: “It’s still a few months away?”

Ji You Yan supported her chin as she looked at the direction Jing Xiu left in, smiling gently. Her mood was good as she looked at Lin Yue: “I’ll give you a red packet^[1].”

Lin Yue couldn’t keep up with her erratic thought process.

Ji You Yan chuckled and rubbed her head, saying: “Continue studying.”

She didn’t even know that it was the new year.

It was a bit of a pity that Ji You Yan hadn’t managed to experience more of Jing Xiu’s spring warmth when she had to fly to Nan City to prepare for a spokesperson advertisement filming with an internationally renowned model, Zhou Nian.

Wei Yi Zhen had managed to obtain this advertisement for her after she had signed with Ran Wen. Ji You Yan’s ex-manager Wang Jun Chan had almost managed to sign this contract for her new artiste, Zhu Han Ying. Because Ji You Yan hadn’t extended her contract with her, Wang Jun Chan was already mad, but now that she had lost this deal, she was even angrier. She had been posting thinly-veiled comments and criticism on her social media for a few days, wanting someone to pick up the story and blow it up. But Wei Yi Zhen had come prepared, not letting it make a big splash.

Then, Wang Jun Chan was even more dissatisfied. So Ji You Yan had heard from others for a while now that Wang Jun Chan had been complaining about her behind her back.

If it was her old self, Ji You Yan would definitely have taken it lying down. Wang Jun Chan knew that she was easy to bully, that’s why she had treated Ji You Yan like this in the past. But the reborn Ji You Yan is no longer the old Ji You Yan. When she heard someone tell her this for the third time, she took the initiative to look for Wang Jun Chan, hinting vaguely: “I’ve heard Wang jie has been very free these few days, I’m planning to help Wang jie find some amusement, what does Wang jie think?”

Wang Jun Chan asked her what she meant by that, but Ji You Yan purposefully ignored her.

A few days later, Ji You Yan was told by Wei Yi Zhen that Wang Jun Chan had been panicking the last few days, asking around.

After another few days passed, Wang Jun Chan realised Ji You Yan was just bluffing and looked for Ji You Yan again in anger. Ji You Yan calmly waited, then slowly replied: “Does Wang jie know of a saying, your shoes will never stay dry if you always walk by the river, and another saying, better to settle enmity amicably rather than keep it going?”

After that, she sent over a photo. It was a photo of a hotel room door, with the room number clearly visible —— it was the room that Wang Jun Chan had booked for Zhu Han Ying when she had sent the artiste to “curry favour” a while back. But Ji You Yan didn’t have any real evidence on hand, and she had no way of getting it either. This photo had only been taken after she got Wei Yi Zhen to obtain information from the hotel.

But Wang Jun Chan was already guilty, and it was enough to scare her.

“What do you know?” Wang Jun Chan was anxious.

“I don’t know anything right now,” Ji You Yan said calmly, “But if Wang jie keeps saying so much, I might know everything.”

Wang Jun Chan’s status was stuck on “typing” for a long time, before only sending over a “you’re good” thumbs-up emoticon.

Thus, Wang Jun Chan finally settled down and stayed quiet.

When Ji You Yan told Lin Yue about it, Lin Yue laughed for a long time. Ji You Yan laughed with her, but her nose prickled after a while.

How good would it have been if she had been this confident in her past life? Now she had Tao Xing Ruo and Wei Yi Zhen as her backers, and she was no longer that humble person with no support. It was a shame, she had been foolish then, humble when she should have been proud, self-deprecating when she shouldn’t have been, so Wang Jun Chan had been able to shackle her feet and wings.

There was no “what if” in life, so she died with regrets in her last life. Ji You Yan was thankful that she actually had a chance to regret it.

… Please read at jiulian lian . word press . com 香港独立

The next day, they were taking a break in the middle of filming. Ji You Yan and Zhou Nian were sitting side by side and getting their hairstyles touched up, chatting on and off. Zhou Nian went to reshoot a few scenes, Ji You Yan leaned back and closed her eyes to rest while Lin Yue was playing with her phone.

After a short while, Lin Yue suddenly asked her in a low voice: “Ji jie, are you asleep?”

Ji You Yan didn’t open her eyes, lazily replying: “Asleep.”

Lin Yue chuckled and said quietly: “Then open your eyes for a while, Ji jie.”

Having worked together for so long, Ji You Yan knew that Lin Yue probably had something to tell her that wasn’t convenient to be said with so many people around. Indeed, when she opened her eyes, she saw that Lin Yue had put her phone in front of her, and the words on the screen said: “I just looked at the gossip work group I joined, it seems like Teacher Jing quarrelled with a student this afternoon and got very angry.”

Ji You Yan’s eyebrows furrowed as she asked in an unfriendly tone: “Why? With who?” Her heart told her that if it wasn’t Zhang Wei Ye, it was Chen Shu. On the first day when she asked Jing Xiu if they had caused any trouble, Jing Xiu had already said they had.

She regretted it, she shouldn’t have let Jing Xiu take both of them under her wing.

Lin Yue shook her head, saying: “I don’t know, they didn’t elaborate much before changing the topic.”

Ji You Yan was worried: “Pass me my phone.”

She took the phone Lin Yue handed to her and sent a message to Yao Xiao, asking what was going on. After a few minutes, Yao Xiao replied cautiously: “Nothing much, some people’s attitudes weren’t too upright, so Teacher Jing censured her a little.” She clearly didn’t want to cause any trouble.

Ji You Yan couldn’t find out anything from her, so she exited the chat to look for someone else to ask. But the production crew told Ji You Yan that filming was about to resume, so Ji You Yan could only put it aside first.

When filming ended in the evening, Ji You Yan wanted to buy a plane ticket to return immediately, but there were still a few more scenes to reshoot the next day, so she had to stay for the night.

At night, the brand had arranged a small welcome party. Wei Yi Zhen had specially flown over to attend, and the director in charge of the Asian region for the brand had also come personally with a few bigshots in the fashion world. Ji You Yan should have made her rounds with Wei Yi Zhen and built her network with these people, but she was distracted.

Because she had sent a message to Ruan Ning Wei to ask about the situation and Ruan Ning Wei hadn’t replied her yet.

She knew in her heart that Ruan Ning Wei most likely didn’t have time to see her phone. Although the program told the world that they had banned all external communications, but in reality, once the classes and practice were done, the contestants had the opportunity to use their phones off-camera.

After enduring through the meal, Wei Yi Zhen saw that Ji You Yan wasn’t in optimal condition and let her go after giving her some instructions.

Ji You Yan and Lin Yue returned to the hotel, as she finally received a reply from Ruan Ning Wei on the way back.

Ruan Ning Wei explained: “Teacher Jing did have an unpleasant encounter with Zhang Wei Ye, but anybody with eyes could tell that it was completely Zhang Wei Ye’s fault.”

“Zhang Wei Ye is like me, entering the production on invitation by the crew, right?” Ruan Ning Wei asked directly.

“Mm.” Ji You Yan didn’t hide it.

“Actually, most of us guessed it. Because her attitude is extremely arrogant and she didn’t seem to worry about others finding it out either. These few days, she’s always been skipping lessons and acting perfunctorily when arranging for our assignments. When she got the script for week two, she changed it again and argued with Zhao Qing who was paired with her, causing her to cry. Today, when rehearsing, she changed the script to add scenes for herself again, causing Zhao Qing’s scenes to be a complete mess. Zhao Qing couldn’t fight against her, so she went to look for Teacher Jing to talk about the situation.”

“Then Teacher Jing got angry?” Ji You Yan felt that Jing Xiu wasn’t someone who couldn’t control her emotions.

Indeed, Ruan Ning Wei continued: “No, Teacher Jing didn’t really get angry, everybody made a mountain out of a molehill. Teacher Jing also left some face for Zhang Wei Ye. Before the class, she called Zhang Wei Ye out to avoid talking to her in front of everybody. But not long after that, everybody saw Teacher Jing enter in low spirits with Zhang Wei Ye following behind and staring hatefully at her.”

“When Teacher Jing entered, Zhang Wei Ye was also about to enter but Teacher Jing stopped her.”

In that moment, Jing Xiu had coldly stopped Zhang Wei Ye in her tracks, clapping and drawing everybody’s attention. Then, she scanned everybody’s face as she said blandly: “Although at the start, the instructors were the ones who chose students without asking your opinions, but now, I’m asking everybody’s opinions. Is there anybody who isn’t willing to be in my class, and would prefer to be in another instructor’s class? If so, it’s still not too late to tell me now.”

It was silent below the stage, nobody dared to say anything. Someone said forthrightly: “No, when I knew that Teacher Jing had selected me, I was so happy I couldn’t sleep.”

“Me too, me too……” Many people concurred.

Jing Xiu smiled slightly and said calmly: “Alright then, I’ve asked everybody as well. Since nobody has any objections, then this will be considered all of us choosing each other. Thank you all for your trust, I’ll definitely do all I can to help you as well. I don’t have any special rules, just one that I hope everybody can remember.

“Since you’re sitting in this classroom and have acknowledged me as your instructor, then during this competition, you must listen to my instructions and obey my arrangements, regardless of how much experience you’ve had before the show.” She emphasised the word experience.

“Wei Ye, did you hear that too? Are you sure you want to enter this door?” She turned around, looking at Zhang Wei Ye coldly.

Zhang Wei Ye was standing outside the door, unable to advance or retreat, her face turning red, then white. Entering meant she was offering up her own face to be slapped by Jing Xiu, but if she left, she wasn’t sure what her financial backer Sun Ting thought of Jing Xiu and what cards Jing Xiu had hidden up her sleeve.

After all, when Jing Xiu had embarrassed her during the grading, Sun Ting had just comforted her and said that maybe they hadn’t communicated properly with Jing Xiu’s side, and he would talk to her again.

Now that Sun Ting had someone else by his side, her heart had grown cold and she had decided not to be a complacent golden canary^[2], she had coaxed him to give her some resources so she could prepare a way out after being kicked aside. If she left now, she might be losing this opportunity that hadn’t come easy.

Zhang Wei Ye endured it, gritting her teeth as she smiled and entered: “What’s Teacher Jing saying, I was wrong, I might have caused some misunderstandings for everyone before.”

Jing Xiu laughed coldly, saying: “Then I await your performance, Wei Ye.”

The more people there were, the more trouble there would be, what more in a competition. These few days, Jing Xiu had already thought of fixing the atmosphere, Zhang Wei Ye had conveniently offered herself up.

Killing one to set an example for the others, Zhang Wei Ye was considered a good sacrifice. But the others might not want to do it.

After Ruan Ning Wei told Ji You Yan what happened, she even comforted Ji You Yan: “Don’t worry, Ji jie, I asked Teacher Jing if she was okay when I got my phone too. Teacher Jing didn’t seem to be affected, even sending me a lively emoji.”

Ji You Yan immediately noticed: “You have Teacher Jing’s WeChat?” She didn’t even have it!

Ruan Ning Wei replied truthfully: “CEO Tao asked me to add it.”

Ji You Yan replied with an emoji of a slight smile. She couldn’t smile!

Ruan Ning Wei laughed and teased her: “Ji jie, the smell of your jealousy is obvious even through the screen.” She paused, with her status set to ‘typing’ for a long time before she said: “I’m someone who’s attached, don’t worry, Ji jie.”

Ji You Yan stubbornly said: “What’s there for me to worry about, I was just surprised Teacher Jing would actually add a competitor’s WeChat.”

It always felt like Ruan Ning Wei and Jing Xiu’s relationship was a little unusual. She hadn’t noticed they had any dealings in the previous life, but ever since her rebirth when Ruan Ning Wei had met Jing Xiu for that discussion, and now that Jing Xiu was willing to add Ruan Ning Wei’s WeChat, it seemed like Jing Xiu treated Ruan Ning Wei a little specially?

Ji You Yan couldn’t think of a reason, so she temporarily suppressed this doubt. Lin Yue asked about what had happened, and Ji You Yan simplified the story for her.

Lin Yue always had Ji You Yan’s best interests in mind, so her first reaction after hearing it was: “Ah, people who have relationships are too hard to handle. Lucky you weren’t the one who got her, Ji jie.”

Ji You Yan paused, feeling as if she had been doused in water, finally understanding Jing Xiu’s strangeness that day.

Lin Yue was right, if Zhang Wei Ye had been assigned to her, it was going to be difficult. Protecting her would spoil the fairness of the competition, and it might affect her own reputation after the show aired; if she didn’t protect her, Sun Ting might investigate and feel that Ji You Yan didn’t give him respect, possibly causing trouble for her in the future.

Everybody understood this reasoning, the reason Liang Zhen and Su Li Hang didn’t stop Jing Xiu was because they understood —— some favours were hard to do, it was easy to end up with both parties upset.

It was impossible for Jing Xiu not to know this.

Back then when she had seen Jing Xiu’s upright, impartial self filming with sharp words, she had just thought Jing Xiu didn’t want unfair things to happen. Thinking about it now, maybe Jing Xiu had done it to keep her out of a difficult situation.

After all…… She was the last to choose, there was a big chance that either Zhang Wei Ye or Chen Shu would have landed in her team.

If it was a few days ago, Ji You Yan wouldn’t dare to make such a guess. But after seeing Jing Xiu’s attitude towards her soften over these two days, Ji You Yan almost felt like this was the truth.

She chuckled softly, scaring Lin Yue: “Ji jie, what are you laughing about?”

Ji You Yan licked her lips: “Nothing, I’m just happy.”

She couldn’t suppress the happiness and excitement in her heart as she opened Yao Xiao’s conversation and got straight to the point: “Help me ask Teacher Jing, can I add her WeChat?”

Yao Xiao replied with a line of : “……” followed by an “okay”.

Ji You Yan bit her lip and waited patiently. Traffic noise was filtering in from outside the car window as she stared at the screen, but she felt like her own rapidly thumping heartbeat was still audible.

Why did she feel like a girl who had just given her crush a confession letter and was waiting for a response. Ji You Yan pressed a hand to her chest, laughing at herself in her heart.

Luckily, before her heart had gotten too out of control, Yao Xiao finally sent her a QR code. Ji You Yan’s heart blossomed as she sent Yao Xiao a bunch of kissing emojis in succession.

She had been scared Jing Xiu would change her mind, so she quickly saved the image, then went to scan it.

It felt like it only took a second before Jing Xiu accepted her friend request.

Ji You Yan couldn’t help but speculate, was Jing Xiu purposely waiting? She looked at the two cute words on the top left-hand corner, Jing Xiu, and her lips curved even higher. She was just preparing to send a message to Jing Xiu when she realised Jing Xiu was also typing.

So she stopped, waiting for Jing Xiu’s message.

But the “typing……” also stopped, as if Jing Xiu was also waiting for her to send a message over. Ji You Yan laughed and was about to type, when Jing Xiu’s typing status appeared again.

Ji You Yan stopped again, and Jing Xiu finally sent over a few words; “I’m fine.”

It was clearly just a few simple words, but Ji You Yan felt like it carried plenty of meaning. Jing Xiu knew she was worried, Jing Xiu was reassuring her. This knowledge made Ji You Yan’s heart feel bittersweet.

“It’s not worth it to get angry over someone like that, I’ll help you scold them next time.” She purposely teased.

Jing Xiu had received Yao Xiao’s call after she finished bathing, and she still only had a towel wrapped around her when she picked up her phone to wait for Ji You Yan’s friend request. She was almost naked, cold to the point that her cheeks were a bit stiff, but her eyes were very soft as she looked at the messages Ji You Yan had sent.

“No need to trouble yourself, I was reacting to the situation, not to anybody personally.” Jing Xiu’s rejection looked stiff.

Ji You Yan didn’t get upset, smiling as she typed, wanting to continue this long-awaited conversation.

But her hands were a bit stiff from the cold and she typed several words wrong, having to delete them and type again. In the end, before she had finished typing, Jing Xiu texted first: “I’m going to rest.”

Ji You Yan paused. She looked at the clock in the top right-hand corner showing 11pm, then deleted her message and turned it into: “Okay, goodnight.”

She waited for a long time, until she got off the car, but Jing Xiu didn’t reply her goodnight.

When she returned to the hotel room, Ji You Yan opened the conversation again and happily found that Jing Xiu had replied her: “Goodnight.”

There were 10 minutes in between! Didn’t she say she was going to sleep? Ji You Yan was happy yet a little sensitive, did Jing Xiu say she wanted to rest because she didn’t want to talk to her anymore? But soon, she comforted herself. Even if she didn’t want to talk to her, it was an improvement that Jing Xiu was willing to find an excuse to be perfunctory.

Ji You Yan opened an e-book and started her nightly reading before bed, satisfiedly telling herself: Rome wasn’t built in a day, she couldn’t be too greedy.

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After filming, Ji You Yan rushed back to Lingzhou that afternoon to inspect the rehearsals for the second week with the other instructors.

When Ji You Yan reached, the rehearsals hadn’t started yet and the instructors had just taken their seats, with the director and camera operators still discussing the problem of the camera positions by the side.

“I thought you wouldn’t be able to rush back.” Once Ji You Yan entered, Su Li Hang called out enthusiastically in greeting.

Ji You Yan laughed and replied him casually: “Then you’ll be able to bully my students, is that it?” She excitedly turned to look for Jing Xiu, but Jing Xiu had her head lowered as she read the script, not looking at her at all.

Liang Zhen was sitting next to Jing Xiu, so there was no empty seat.

Su Li Hang replied in mock dissatisfaction: “Do you think I’m that kind of person?”

Ji You Yan was a little disappointed and wanted to attract Jing Xiu’s attention. So she stood in place and pulled Jing Xiu into the conversation: “I think you are, what do you think, Teacher Jing?”

It was only then that Jing Xiu lifted her head and glanced at Ji You Yan and Su Li Hang, blandly saying: “I wasn’t paying attention to what you and Teacher Su were talking about.”

Su Li Hang’s surroundings cooled as he felt once again that Jing Xiu didn’t seem too friendly to him!

But Ji You Yan’s attention was elsewhere as she wrinkled her brows and asked sensitively: “Teacher Jing, have you caught a cold?” Jing Xiu’s voice was a bit nasal, and a bit more subdued than normal.

Jing Xiu paused, then replied: “Mm, a bit.” She had stood too long yesterday, already predicting it when she had sneezed. But it was just a bit of a sore throat and blocked nose, even Yao Xiao hadn’t realised it.

“Have you taken medicine? I have some cold medicine……” Ji You Yan said anxiously.

“Is everybody ready? We’re about to start.” Chen De Sheng’s voice suddenly floated over.

Jing Xiu vaguely hummed and changed the topic: “It’s time to start.”

Ji You Yan was too eye-catching standing there, she could only control herself and not say anything, sitting next to Su Li Hang.

There were two days left before the official filming. Because the performances wouldn’t be longer than a few minutes, so the contestants were all attending professional classes the last few years, only getting the scripts with their acting partners yesterday to adjust it. They rehearsed in the morning, then went for the official rehearsal in the afternoon.

Time was tight and without a good amount of preparation and practice, it would be easy to see each contestant’s natural talent for acting, and it would be easy to see where each contestant’s flaws were.

After the entire rehearsal, there weren’t many scenes that made the instructors feel satisfied, including some of the good contestants who had acted well in the individual scenes in the first episode. Amongst them, Ruan Ning Wei’s flaws were the most obvious.

Ruan Ning Wei’s acting partner was a male contestant who had received an A grade, Lu Min. Lu Min appreciated Ruan Ning Wei’s acting skills in the first episode, so he rejected working with other A-grade contestants and chose Ruan Ning Wei on his own. But, Ruan Ning Wei greatly disappointed Lu Min.

Throughout the whole scene, it was like Lu Min was acting to an emotionless robot. Ruan Ning Wei didn’t get into character at all and her expression was vacant, and it was clear she was just reciting her lines, causing Lu Min’s performance to be downgraded as well.

Liang Zhen and Su Li Hang were both dumbfounded, unable to understand how Ruan Ning Wei could have such a big difference from before. They suspected internally, could it be that Jing Xiu was right, she could only act out scenes she had done before, but not scenes that she had never done?

But Jing Xiu didn’t have any sharp observations this time, she was also surprised and frowned: “Ning Wei, I saw you practicing alone yesterday, your performance wasn’t like this.” Furthermore, the other teachers all had good feedback on her skills, she didn’t need to act like this.

Ruan Ning Wei’s face was pale and filled with shame as she apologised to Lu Min: “I’m sorry, I’ve dragged you down.” She looked at the instructors, her lips moving for a moment before she lowered her head, not saying anything to the instructors’ criticism and surprise.

Jing Xiu held onto her pen, drawing a big question mark on Ruan Ning Wei’s script.

Ji You Yan’s heart thumped, her instinct was telling her that this was what Tao Xing Ruo had asked her to help find —— Ruan Ning Wei’s issue when it came to acting.

After the rehearsals were over, each instructor gave their closing thoughts.

When it came to Ji You Yan, she thought of what she had seen on the stage: the undisguised ambition and competitiveness of the students. So she counselled them: “As for acting, Teacher Jing, Teacher Liang and Teacher Su have already spoken at length about it. I’ll talk about something else. All the scenes from here on out will no longer be solo scenes like in the first episode.”

“I hope everybody understands that when you’re standing on the same stage with your partner and acting out the same scene, you’re not just competitors in this show, but you’re partners for a scene. Change your attitudes, don’t think about wanting to perform even better than your partner or be even more eye-catching. You should be thinking, I have to perform well, well enough that I can motivate my partner to be even better. Forget about your selfishness, then you have a higher chance to win.”

“A good performance requires mutual achievement.”

Once this sentence left her mouth, she suddenly recalled that this was a line Jing Xiu had told her years ago.

And this sentence had a following sentence.

That year, she had accompanied Jing Xiu to make up for missing their anniversary. She didn’t care about Wang Jun Chan’s objections, clearing an entire week to rest and hide with Jing Xiu in her vacation villa by the mountains and sea.

One day, they had watched a movie together in the villa’s movie room, a foreign movie on homosexuality that had a great plot and excellent actors. When this movie had started airing, both female leads had been nominated for the Best Actress Award, but sadly, neither of them had won it. But the movie itself had won a Best Movie Award.

Ji You Yan and Jing Xiu both liked a different female lead, and couldn’t convince the other no matter what that their choice had acted better. In the end, Jing Xiu compromised: “Alright, they’re both good, this debate doesn’t have any meaning. After all, a good performance requires mutual achievement.”

At that moment, the movie had jumped to a more daring part. Ambiguous gasps and breaths came out of the excellent surround sound system, Ji You Yan’s mind was no longer on who was the better actress. She pulled Jing Xiu into her embrace and said close to her ear: “A good bed performance also requires mutual achievement.”

After that, neither of them cared about what the movie was showing. Long after the movie had ended, Ji You Yan took a break and rubbed against Jing Xiu, thanking her cheekily: “Thanks to Teacher Jing’s achievement.”

Jing Xiu made a sound and moved, unwilling to show weakness as she replied: “Mutual achievement.”

Thinking about it, Ji You Yan’s mouth suddenly felt dry. She turned to look at Jing Xiu, not expecting that Jing Xiu was also looking at her. Their eyes met before Jing Xiu turned her head away expressionlessly and tucked her hair behind an ear.

Ji You Yan’s sharp eyes realised that the ear Jing Xiu had exposed was adorably red.

Ji You Yan looked at Jing Xiu’s side profile and then looked away with a smile. A-Xiu…… always had a good memory.

After that, each instructor brought their own students back and had a class meeting.

When having dinner, Ji You Yan didn’t see Jing Xiu, only finding out then that Jing Xiu had gone to the canteen to eat with the students. According to Chen De Sheng, Jing Xiu wanted to use the relaxed atmosphere when eating to have deeper discussions with the students.

Su Li Hang was embarrassed he wasn’t as dedicated as Jing Xiu, Liang Zhen stayed silent, but Ji You Yan was feeling pained for Jing Xiu. Jing Xiu had caught a cold, her throat might have been hurting, and she still had to say so much. It was simply worsening it.

After she finished eating and returned to the room, Jing Xiu still hadn’t returned. So she went to the study and read the script, recalling the performance of her students during the rehearsals and writing feedback and reminders in the script, preparing to drill them individually on their weak points tomorrow. After writing all that down, Jing Xiu still didn’t appear like she was going to come back, so Ji You Yan could only return to her bedroom and wash up first.

Once she had finished showering and changed into her pyjamas, she pulled open the door to check, finally noticing the living room had a faint glow and sounds.

Jing Xiu had come back some time ago, sitting on the sofa and watching some footage from a projector.

Hering the sound, Jing Xiu’s eyes flickered over as she lowered the volume and asked: “Is it too noisy?” She was watching the footage that she had asked Yao Xiao to help collate, all the information of her students’ past movies and shows.

Ji You Yan could hear that Jing Xiu’s voice was a little deeper and raspier than in the afternoon, with a kind of sexiness to it. But she didn’t have the mood to appreciate it at all at the moment: “No, I came out to see if you had come back yet.”

Jing Xiu looked at her, silently. Under the dim light, her eyes were surprisingly bright, like a running stream.

Ji You Yan’s throat bobbled. She turned and entered her room, pulling open her medicine drawer and coming out quickly with a cylindrical tube.

“I guess you definitely didn’t take any cold medicine, and you wouldn’t be willing to either.” Ji You Yan said confidently.

Maybe nobody would believe it, but the calm, self-assured Jing Xiu on the screens was actually a crybaby who would tear up from medicine being too bitter.

The light from the projection was too dim, covering up Jing Xiu’s unnaturalness well. She rubbed the remote as she said calmly: “I just don’t feel that there’s a need.”

Seeing her actions, Ji You Yan’s eyes filled with tenderness as she didn’t expose her. She sat by Jing Xiu’s side and handed the tube to her: “These are effervescent tablets to boost your vitamin C, it’s not bitter. It’s sour and sweet and pretty good. I took these when I had a cold before and found that it was surprisingly effective.” Her tone was gentle, like she was coaxing a child.

Jing Xiu looked down at the tube Ji You Yan held out, her heart feeling a bit sour.

“Thank you, then.” Amidst Ji You Yan’s anticipation, Jing Xiu finally reached out and took it.

Ji You Yan’s heart immediately felt settled, Jing Xiu’s attitude towards her really had softened. She smiled radiantly and decided to press the advantage: “I have warm water in my room that I just boiled, I’ll help you brew a cup?”

“No need.” Jing Xiu refused. After refusing, her gaze moved to the projection, pausing for two seconds before she added, “I’m very full now, I can’t drink it.”

Ji You Yan had been crestfallen after hearing her rejection, then she immediately livened up after hearing the explanation.

She stared at Jing Xiu, as if discovering the warmth hidden under ice between her brows. Ji You Yan suppressed the sweetness in her heart and restrained herself: “It’s okay then, drink it when you’re feeling better. Oh, I have digestion tablets, do you want one?”

Jing Xiu skipped to the next video, acting cold on purpose: “No need, I don’t like it, I’ll be better in a bit.”

Ji You Yan didn’t force her either, following Jing Xiu’s gaze and looking at the video for a while before changing the topic: “Are you watching the scenes that the students acted in before?”

“Mm.” Please read at jiulian lian . word press . com 台湾独立

“Can I watch it with you for a while?” Ji You Yan asked for permission carefully. She wanted to stay with Jing Xiu a bit longer, even if they didn’t say anything.

The ghost of a smile flickered across Jing Xiu’s lips. She looked at the image, calmly replying: “You have half the right to use this living room, you can do what you want.”

Ji You Yan laughed: “Then I’ll sit for a while.” She sat in the middle of the sofa, then seeing that Jing Xiu didn’t react, she shifted and sat closer to Jing Xiu.

There was a reason that most of the students who joined the competition didn’t get popular. If it wasn’t because that they accepted bad scripts, then it was because they really didn’t act well. A few videos played one after another, Jing Xiu looked serious with her brows furrowed, but Ji You Yan was starting to be distracted.

Under the flickering light, Jing Xiu’s jade-carved features seemed to have a gauze veil over them, removing a bit of the coldness and adding a bit of softness that made people want to draw closer. Ji You Yan’s gaze slowly lowered until it landed on the two hands that Jing Xiu had casually placed on the sofa and on her own knee.

In the past, she liked to play with Jing Xiu’s hand. Her fingers were slender and long and the half-moon shape was clear. Now, Jing Xiu had done a gradient watermelon red colour on her left hand, accentuating the whiteness of her skin. The thumb, index and pinky fingers on her right hand had also been done, only…… the middle and ring finger were clean with her nails trimmed short and rounded.

???!!!

Ji You Yan thought of the gaze she had shared with Jing Xiu during the rehearsals, suddenly feeling the surroundings were hot. Her brain pulled out many images from her memory involuntarily, it was unsightly!

Ji You Yan scolded herself viciously, quickly stopping herself and forcing herself to think of something else.

It was coincidentally Ruan Ning Wei’s performance being shown, and thinking about how she felt Jing Xiu and Ruan Ning Wei’s relationship wasn’t normal, Ji You Yan hesitated then asked Jing Xiu: “Did you know, Ning Wei used to be our CP fan.” Jing Xiu was quite gracious with CP fans in the past.

Jing Xiu paused, clearly surprised: “Ning Wei? She doesn’t look like it.” After a moment of hesitation, she asked in a slightly heavy voice: “Didn’t you used to dislike these type of fans the most in the past?”

Ji You Yan felt awkward. It wasn’t that she disliked CP fans, she used to think it was quite interesting in the beginning. But after the competition, the CP fans and her solo fans were fighting with Jing Xiu, which did make things difficult for her.

“I…… quite like them now.” Ji You Yan said softly. Times were different, she had long since let go of those embarrassments and was only left with nostalgia.

But Jing Xiu thought of something else and her warm heart cooled down.

These few years, Ji You Yan should indeed quite like CP fans. After all, she had gotten into scandals with male celebrities one after another, and her CP fans put in a lot of effort to keep her on the hot search. She liked CP fans, just not CP fans with Jing Xiu.

Jing Xiu’s mood became solemn. But thinking of the fact that she had decided the previous day not to pursue old debts, she swallowed back all the hurtful words.

“So what if she’s a CP fan?” She asked disinterestedly.

“She made fan videos of us before and even wrote fan fics, the quality’s pretty high.” Ji You Yan said excitedly.

“Mm.” Jing Xiu replied perfunctorily.

Ji You Yan bit her lip. Seeing that Jing Xiu clearly wasn’t interested, she sensibly ended this topic and watched Ruan Ning Wei’s performance attentively with Jing Xiu.

It was late and Jing Xiu was going to return to shower and rest, so Ji You Yan reluctantly got up and returned to her room.

She dug out the fan fiction that Ruan Ning Wei had given her to do some bedtime reading, feeling a little disappointed.

She missed the days when Jing Xiu would insist on reading out the most exaggerated and mushy parts of fanfics to her.

She closed her e-reader and searched in her phone for the most treasured songs that she had sung together with Jing Xiu in the competition, lying like a dead person on the bed.

A WeChat notification rang out and Ji You Yan swiped it open casually.

“Ji jie! Teacher Jing suddenly asked me for my fanfic resource, did you expose me?!”

Ji You Yan froze, then suddenly came back to life!

A-Xiu, this fellow, her mouth said one thing but her actions betrayed her true thoughts!

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[1] It’s tradition to give juniors a red packet filled with money during the new year, and in this case, Ji You Yan is basically so happy that it’s almost like the new year (a joyous, celebratory event) has come. Jump back up.

[2] 金丝雀 – Not sure if a canary would be the correct bird choice for localisation here, but this basically means a woman who relies on a man for her living expenses and lifestyle, and is, because of that, trapped and restricted in what she can do or say, thus losing her freedom. Jump back up.

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