Mad Dog

Chapter 24: She Also Wants To Take Care Of Jiang Qi

On weekends, Zhi Qi went back home.

Her home was in the East District, quite a distance from the university town. Zhi Qi didn’t call the family driver to pick her up, but instead, she rented a car back early in the morning.

It was almost a two-hour journey, and it was after nine o’clock when Zhi Qi entered the door and found silence inside. As she was taking off her shoes, Mei Ran came downstairs wearing silk pajamas. The woman must have just woken up, her fluffy hair was not meticulously tied up as usual, and her eyes were sleepy.

Seeing Zhi Qi, she immediately became alert.

“Darling? When did you come back?” Mei Ran hurried downstairs to Zhi Qi, her eyes holding a hint of surprise. “Why didn’t you tell Mom, so Uncle Liu could pick you up.”

Uncle Liu was the family’s driver.

“No need, it’s troublesome,” Zhi Qi muttered, walking to the sofa and sitting down. “It’s the weekend, so I came back.”

“You still remember to come back, you ungrateful child.” Mei Ran quickly asked the housekeeper to bring over the chilled bird’s nest drink from the refrigerator, but couldn’t help but complain. “You haven’t been back for almost a month this time. Are you so busy with your studies?”

At Mei Ran’s words, Zhi Qi almost choked on the bird’s nest she was drinking. A hint of guilt flashed through her lowered eyes. Actually, this month, she wasn’t as busy with her studies as before. She had just spent this time… chasing stars.

“I’ve bought you a bunch of stuff during this time, clothes and electronic products, I’ll bring them back later.” Ever since Mei Ran became familiar with online shopping, her greatest pleasure was buying things every day, especially buying various new clothes, accessories, and electronic products for Zhi Qi—and hypocritically not buying them for Zhi Qi’s brother.

She only treated her daughter like a little princess and her son like a porter.

Mei Ran said confidently, “If you hadn’t come back today, I was thinking of having your brother send them to you in a couple of days.”

…

Zhi Qi couldn’t help but feel amused and helpless, slowly sipping the bird’s nest.

“Don’t trouble your brother,” she said obediently. “I’ll take them back myself.”

In fact, most of the things Mei Ran bought for her were things she couldn’t use. Many of them were gathering dust under her dormitory bed. But she was willing to buy them, and Zhi Qi didn’t want to ruin her mother’s enthusiasm.

Moreover, these things could be “put to good use” now. Some of them could be given to Jiang Qi. For example, the Kindle could be used by him to read scripts, and the wireless earphones could be worn by Jiang Qi. Also, things like the Apple Watch, she couldn’t use them, so she could send them over for Jiang Qi to use…

Zhi Qi finally understood why there were so many fans crazily sending gifts to their favorite “idols”.

She really wanted to “sponsor” Jiang Qi, preferably to take charge of everything according to her own aesthetic tastes.

Zhi Qi chuckled at her own imagination.

As if in line with what Zhi Qi was thinking, the large TV in front of the sofa happened to be playing the entertainment channel of the local Lin Lan TV station, and there was coincidentally news about Jiang Qi—

The host was talking incessantly, “Recently, due to the sudden fame of ‘Gazing at the Sky,’ the newcomer Jiang Qi has been sought after by major companies for signing contracts. However, it’s rumored that he has already signed with ‘Chen Ding Entertainment,’ and his next film will be the new movie being prepared by Director Qiu Heng…”

Accompanied by the host’s clear voice, the TV also flashed several paparazzi photos of Jiang Qi. The young man wore a cap, and his half-profile under the dim light revealed sharp and delicate lines.

The living room of the Zhi family suddenly fell silent. It was not just because the name Jiang Qi held profound meaning for Zhi Qi, but because everyone in the Zhi family was too familiar with him. Zhi Qi listened in a daze, unconsciously gripping the porcelain bowl in her hand tighter, almost afraid to turn around and see Mei Ran’s expression.

Because she was afraid of seeing disgust on the woman’s face.

Zhi Qi knew that before she was seventeen, Mei Ran and Zhi Minglin were actually not against her association with Jiang Qi, after all, the young man was her “savior.”

But in the second year of high school, everything changed. Zhi Qi didn’t know if her parents’ thoughts were the same as her brother’s now—they all considered Jiang Qi, who had been in prison, “dangerous and scary.”

After a while, Zhi Qi heard Mei Ran seem to let out a soft sigh.

“I actually wanted to ask you about this before, but then I forgot.” Mei Ran stared at the screen, her voice faint, without any discernible emotion. “This kid is a star now, huh.”

Zhi Qi’s nails involuntarily sank into her palm, unsure of how to respond.

“Qiqi,” Mei Ran asked calmly, “Do you still have contact with Jiang Qi? Have you met?”

Zhi Qi didn’t want to lie, but she also didn’t want to… tell the truth.

But sometimes, silence actually equaled agreement.

“Qiqi, look at me.” Mei Ran forcefully turned the girl’s face towards her, her beautiful bare face serious. “Whatever happened before is one thing, if you like Jiang Qi, your father and I don’t object. But the premise is that he hasn’t committed any crimes, and now…”

“Mom, he hasn’t committed any crimes.” Zhi Qi’s voice trembled, her black eyes stubbornly staring at the woman. “You know, he hasn’t committed any crimes.”

Seeing her daughter about to burst into tears in the next moment, Mei Ran was momentarily speechless.

The woman pursed her lips and finally told Zhi Qi a plain fact with determination: “Involuntary manslaughter is also a crime.”

The implication in Mei Ran’s hesitant words made Zhi Qi’s pupils contract sharply.

No one had been willing to tell her the full story of what happened four years ago, everything was always vague and ambiguous. Even after Jiang Qi got into trouble, Zhi Minglin and Mei Ran directly transferred her to another school, cutting off any possibility of contact with Jiang Qi. Later, when Zhi Qi finally managed to find out about Jiang Qi’s only relative, his uncle Jiang Shi, he didn’t say anything either…

Her contact with Jiang Qi was forcibly severed, to the extent that Zhi Qi had been kept in the dark for so many years. Zhi Qi understood her parents’ efforts to focus on her studies, but that didn’t mean she could condone their arbitrary decisions.

Back then, did Zhi Qi ever not oppose and resist? But as a seventeen-year-old girl, everything she did was futile.

Until today, Zhi Qi finally couldn’t help but ask, “What crime did Jiang Qi actually commit?”

She really wanted to know what happened back then. The reason she didn’t ask Jiang Qi was because she was afraid of triggering his bad memories. But faced with Mei Ran, who seemed to know the whole truth, Zhi Qi couldn’t hold back anymore.

“I don’t know the specifics either,” Mei Ran sighed, her gaze complex. “But the police verdict back then was ‘violent self-defense resulting in manslaughter.’ This couldn’t possibly be a wrongful conviction.”

Zhi Qi’s heart skipped a beat, lips pursed in silence.

“Qiqi, promise Mom.” Mei Ran held Zhi Qi’s tender hand, her gaze hopeful, her voice trembling slightly. “Stop having contact with Jiang Qi, okay? I’m very grateful to him for saving you back then, our whole family is grateful too. But, he’s a dangerous person.”

“Even if he hasn’t committed crimes and been to prison, you can see from his eyes, Jiang Qi is not an ordinary teenager.”

Perhaps all parents under the sun simply want their children to be safe and sound, free from calamities and misfortunes. However, a girl like Jiang Qi seemed out of place with these keywords like ‘happiness’ and ‘peace.’ Mei Ran couldn’t convince herself to let go of her worries, even though she knew Jiang Qi had indeed helped their family.

But if she needed to ‘repay’ him, Mei Ran was willing to do it with money or anything else… except for Zhi Qi. Even though Mei Ran knew her daughter actually liked that dangerous teenager.

But can youthful passion withstand the test of time?

The morning sunlight poured into the living room, warm and cozy, but Zhi Qi’s heart felt as if it had been covered with a layer of frost, cold. The girl sniffed, thinking to herself that as expected, Mei Ran was biased against Jiang Qi. But…

“Mom, you’re wrong.” After a while, Zhi Qi gently freed her hand from Mei Ran’s grasp and smiled faintly.

“Jiang Qi is not a dangerous person.”

“I’ve seen him, he’s still the same good person.”

She could doubt if the stars were torches, if the sun would change its course, if truth was falsehood. But Jiang Qi would never hurt her, and Zhi Qi wouldn’t doubt that.

*

Staying at home until the afternoon, Zhi Qi and Mei Ran actually parted on bad terms.

When Zhi Qi carried a large box of things back to the dormitory, Meng Chunyu was applying a face mask. She saw Zhi Qi’s tense expression and asked in a muffled voice, “Darling, are you back home?”

Every time Zhi Qi came back home, she brought back a box of things, and after three years, Meng Chunyu had gotten used to it.

…and she had also gotten used to waiting for the little fairy to feed her.

“Yeah,” Zhi Qi smiled, taking out a bunch of “internet-famous snacks” from the box and tossing them to Meng Chunyu.

Mei Ran was willing to buy anything she saw, especially snacks for her, but Zhi Qi had a small appetite and didn’t like most of the things. Then she leisurely organized the things in the box while Meng Chunyu exaggeratedly cheered on the side. Zhi Qi was petite, and when she crouched beside the box, she looked almost smaller than the box itself, like a pitiful little hamster—then she stretched out her little paws.

The girl sorted out the headphones, watches, and the previously dusty Kindle from the box, intending to give them all to Jiang Qi the next time she went to see him.

Meng Chunyu, beside her, was so charmed by her appearance that she subconsciously took out her phone and snapped a picture. Zhi Qi heard the sound and looked up, glaring at her.

“Sweetie,” Meng Chunyu finally took off the face mask and could speak freely, immediately skipping over to Zhi Qi’s side to share her “masterpiece,” exclaiming, “You look so adorable in this!”

Under the dim light of the phone screen, the long-haired girl crouched beside the box, her arms and legs slender, her slightly upturned face delicate and gentle.

The composition of the whole photo had a strong “atmosphere,” like those old photos printed instantly.

Zhi Qi looked at it and suddenly said, “Send it to me.”

Then she went to send it to Jiang Qi.

*

After finishing work in the evening and returning to the car, Jiang Qi, his stomach slightly aching, saw the WeChat message sent by Zhi Qi.

It was just a photo of the girl.

After staring at it for a while with a dumbfounded expression, Jiang Qi finally relaxed his furrowed brows and chuckled softly. The photo sent by Zhi Qi seemed like spiritual nourishment. His stomach, which had been hurting as if he hadn’t eaten all day, didn’t ache as much anymore. Jiang Qi earnestly saved this photo of the girl in his album.

It became the first photo in his phone’s album.

—Like a hamster, a cute girl.