Mad Dog

Chapter 30: Taking The Blame

When Zhi Qi returned from Yunnan, it happened to be the day of the opening ceremony of Jiang Qi’s movie “Jiao Si”.

The girl directly contacted Qiu Mi and went to the press conference venue. Qiu Heng’s opening ceremony was very particular. He had to go to the temple on the mountain to hang banners and offer incense. So, as soon as Zhi Qi got off the mountain and rushed back by plane, she immediately climbed a mountain in Lin Lan.

Fortunately, during the past half month, she had been jumping up and down, climbing mountains every day. Sometimes, she had to endure a whole day to observe the hatching process of bird eggs in the wild, so her physical strength had greatly increased and become very strong.

For her, this kind of activity was nothing at all.

After the plane landed, Zhi Qi entrusted her luggage to a classmate to take back to school and ran over herself with a backpack on her back and sneakers on her feet.

Qiu Mi had specifically sent staff to wait for Zhi Qi. As soon as she arrived, she was spotted by the staff who had seen her photos. The latter’s eyes lit up, and he immediately waved his hand, “Miss Zhi!”

Zhi Qi smiled and greeted them, and then the two of them started… climbing the mountain.

Jiang Qi might have really become famous. From the foot of the mountain to the mountaintop, there were fans holding banners with his name densely packed along the way. Obviously, the opening ceremony was not open to the public, and it was unknown why this enthusiastic group of girls had come.

Zhi Qi glanced around with some emotion. She found that the higher they climbed, the fewer people there were, until she followed the staff to the perimeter of the shooting site guarded by security.

In order to achieve complete confidentiality and formality, the crew even exaggeratedly used electric fences to surround the outer perimeter, and every staff member wore laser pens to prevent aggressive fans and media who made a living by taking unauthorized photos from breaking in.

Before entering, the staff also gave Zhi Qi one.

“Miss Zhi,” he said seriously, “if someone wants to take a photo of you, just open this.”

…

Zhi Qi inexplicably felt like she had entered some mysterious “special forces organization,” and she couldn’t help but smile.

When her eyes curved like crescent moons, they were soft and obedient. The old faces of the staff couldn’t help but blush slightly, coughing lightly to shift their gaze, and led Zhi Qi to where the main cast was taking a group photo.

However, he somewhat understood why Qiu Mi was so concerned about this girl and even went out of his way to ask someone to help pick her up—this stunning girl who was no less than a star naturally had to be cherished, and some of the staff even thought that Zhi Qi was Qiu Mi’s girlfriend.

Unfortunately, he didn’t see Qiu Mi nodding and bowing hastily after seeing Zhi Qi.

“Miss Zhi,” Qiu Mi hurriedly led the girl to the left side of the inner circle, where the view was best. He slightly raised his chin and pointed to the figures bowing in front of the incense altar.

Although there were many people bustling around, Zhi Qi saw Jiang Qi at a glance.

The young man had indeed lost ten kilograms as requested by the director, making his originally slender figure even more angular, as if only a large frame supported his clothes. Jiang Qi was wearing the clothes of the character Chen Si in the movie, a pure white hoodie and white pants, all white, which seemed softer compared to the usual black clothes he wore.

They hadn’t seen each other for nearly twenty days. When she was busy, Zhi Qi didn’t think about it, but now that she saw him, she realized that she really missed him. The longing to rush over and hug him, unfortunately, there were too many people around, so she felt a little embarrassed and pursed her lips slightly.

Then she saw a girl next to Jiang Qi, wearing a black suit jacket, tiptoeing to say something to him.

The young man had no expression on his face, just moved a little further away, and then the girl’s expression seemed a bit lost.

…

Having an extremely handsome face was troublesome; it could attract girls wherever you went.

Zhi Qi couldn’t help but pout unconsciously, feeling a little annoyed.

As a “fangirl,” of course, she had long searched the internet to learn about the lineup of Jiang Qi’s new movie and knew that the girl in the black suit jacket was Xue Ling, who played the female lead, Meng Li, in the movie.

In the movie, the male and female leads had two different peculiar personalities. The male lead had gender identity disorder, and the female lead hid her homosexuality, so the two of them didn’t have any romantic scenes together.

Zhi Qi naturally understood this logic, but it still made her feel somewhat unhappy after watching it.

Ah, maybe she would have to get used to it sooner or later.

Since Jiang Qi was an actor, it meant that he would hug, kiss, and even film explicit scenes with other girls in the future… Oh, it was really heartbreaking to imagine.

Zhi Qi’s eyes unconsciously turned into “resentment” as she stared blankly at Jiang Qi, who stood not far away in the midst of the crowd, like a “photograph” without emotions.

As she watched, she involuntarily suppressed her bad temper and smiled before Jiang Qi finished his work and looked over. Jiang Qi saw Zhi Qi, and for the first time today, a hint of “smile” flashed in his otherwise indifferent eyes.

However, in front of everyone’s eyes, surrounded by the director and the production team, the young man couldn’t just run over regardless of everything.

The girl understood the frustration in Jiang Qi’s eyes, smiled knowingly, and sent him a text message before lowering her head: [I’ll wait for you in the car.]

After watching Jiang Qi offer incense here, it’s good enough. There’s no point in staying because I can’t stand next to him even if I wait. After Zhi Qi sent the message, she asked Qiu Mi next to her to take her to Jiang Qi’s car, and the assistant naturally followed her instructions.

The car assigned to Jiang Qi by Chen Ding was a large seven-seater nanny car, with the back row directly expanded into a small area of connected seats, where people could lie down for a short rest — this was also specially modified to accommodate Jiang Qi’s preference for sleeping in the car, in consideration of his cervical spine.

When Zhi Qi got into the car, she saw the familiar Kindle and wireless headphones in the back seat, all of which she brought last time to give to Jiang Qi.

Seeing that he was willing to use them now, Zhi Qi couldn’t help but smile with relief. In addition to these, there were some blankets, soft pillows, and some essential items like laptops, pads, and so on.

“Miss Zhi, you can lie down and rest in the back for a while. It’ll probably take another hour for brother Qi to arrive.” Qiu Mi helped Zhi Qi onto the car and continued to advise her carefully.

Then he hurried back again, as a working person always on the go.

Zhi Qi sat in the car for a while. The extreme noise from earlier had now turned into extreme quietness, and the sudden contrast seemed to relax the tightly wound nerves of the young girl all at once. She suddenly felt that she had been quite tired for the past half month.

And this spacious nanny car’s back seat seemed very appealing.

As sleepiness overwhelmed Zhi Qi, she felt her eyelids fighting against each other. She yawned as she crawled to the back seat and curled up to lie down. She pulled the blanket over herself, instantly feeling like she was enveloped in a soft cotton ball, feeling even more inclined to sleep in this scene.

“Just a short nap, and I’ll wake up when Jiang Qi arrives.”

Before falling asleep, Zhi Qi kept silently reminding herself like this.

Unfortunately, she forgot that once she got sleepy and leaned on a pillow, she loved to sleep, and once she fell asleep, nothing could wake her up.

In high school, Zhi Qi had a ‘natural enemy.’

—Her history teacher.

For some reason, Zhi Qi felt that the kind-looking female teacher seemed to have some sort of magic. Every time she had history class, listening to the history teacher’s lecture, Zhi Qi felt like she was being hypnotized, unable to resist the urge to sleep.

Even though she went to bed early and woke up early and wasn’t tired, as soon as she heard the history class, she felt sleepy. But she didn’t feel this way in other classes. Zhi Qi had good academic performance, so the history teacher didn’t think much of it the first or second time, just frowned and scolded her a bit and let it pass.

But after it happened repeatedly, even the patient teacher became irritated.

During one history class, Zhi Qi was once again deeply asleep, vaguely feeling the table being loudly pounded.

“Zhi Qi! What’s the matter with you!” The young girl opened her drowsy eyes to see the history teacher standing in front of her, angrily roaring, “You fall asleep every time you come to my class, and I can’t even wake you up! Did you stay up late last night or do you have some problem with me?!”

…

Zhi Qi couldn’t explain why she felt so sleepy during this ‘mysterious’ time, so she could only silently stand up and endure the teacher’s criticism.

Then she obediently apologized, “I’m sorry, teacher.”

“Sorry? Will you do it again next time?” The history teacher’s nose was almost crooked with anger. “Is this what you mean?”

The surrounding students were immediately amused by the teacher’s ‘humor’.

Zhi Qi remembered she wanted to laugh at that moment too, but it was a bitter smile — because she really didn’t know why she felt so sleepy whenever she saw the history teacher, feeling unfairly treated.

But in the whole class, only Jiang Qi didn’t laugh.

The boy couldn’t bear to see the girl criticized in front of the whole class and not able to come down from the platform, so he stood up and helped her “take the blame”.

“Teacher, it’s my fault,” Jiang Qi’s voice was cold, and he lied with his eyes open, “I gave her cold medicine before class, and she got drowsy after taking it.”

Zhi Qi was stunned and turned to look at him blankly.

“Cold medicine?” The history teacher hadn’t expected this twist, looking at Zhi Qi with suspicion, “Are you feeling unwell?”

Zhi Qi couldn’t bring herself to say “yes” to let Jiang Qi take the blame, so she just remained silent.

In the end, both of them remained tight-lipped like a closed jar, and the history teacher didn’t manage to find out the reason why Zhi Qi fell asleep in class, so he angrily sent them out to stand outside the classroom together.

Outside the classroom, Zhi Qi whispered to Jiang Qi, “When did you give me cold medicine? Why did you take the blame?”

“It’s nothing.” The boy seemed indifferent, just smiling, “This way, you can sleep openly.”

…

Jiang Qi really cared about her, resorting to all means to ‘help the wicked’.

During their first and second years of high school, those were probably the happiest times they spent together.

It’s just a pity that happy moments are fleeting, and dreams can become bizarre.

Jiang Qi… Jiang Qi…

Zhi Qi suddenly opened her eyes, startled from her slumber. She sat up abruptly, as if in countless nightmares before—fortunately, the ceiling of the large vehicle was high, so the girl didn’t hit her head.

In these four years, she couldn’t sleep as soundly as she used to.

“Qiqi.” Zhi Qi was sitting in a daze, her chest rising and falling slightly, when she heard a clear voice of a boy next to her, “Awake?”

It was Jiang Qi’s voice.

The car was very quiet, with only the two of them.

The girl turned her head and saw Jiang Qi sitting in the front seat looking at her. Only then did Zhi Qi realize that she didn’t know how long she had been sleeping. The sky outside the car window was already dark, and the boy’s amber-colored eyes still sparkled in the dim light.