SWG Chapter 8
by VolareInside The Fourth Kind of Primary Color——
Xiao Wenyu pointed to the illustrations in a brochure, her voice gentle, “Look, these scenes of the Little Flower Fairies are perfect for capturing your child’s growth journey. And these ones…”
The customer held the brochure in one hand, browsing along with the explanation from the gentle beauty in front of her. She also held a somewhat timid little girl in her arms.
The little girl curiously examined her surroundings, occasionally putting her little fingers into her mouth, only to have her mother, holding the brochure, swat them away.
Xiao Wenyu pulled over an armchair and said softly, “Why don’t you sit down and take your time looking? There’s no rush.”
The customer returned a slightly apologetic smile, “Am I keeping you from getting off work so late? I’m so sorry. I have to work during the day, and I’m raising her alone…”
“It’s alright, it’s always a bit harder raising a child alone. Take your time looking, I’m not in a hurry here.”
As she spoke, Xiao Wenyu, wanting to ease the customer’s burden, walked to the side and began organizing the many photo albums on display for the day. Many of them were photos she had taken before her marriage, and after her divorce.
The inner covers of the albums all had dates carefully marked by her. Most of them stopped two years ago. The traces left by her enthusiasm for writing on the covers with a bright gold pen at that time seemed so glaring now.
She imperceptibly took a deep breath, slowed down her sorting, and gave the quiet mother and daughter enough time to browse.
Suddenly, her phone vibrated twice again.
Customer: “Boss, your phone is ringing again.”
It was hard to know how many times it had rung in a short period of time. Her family wouldn’t contact her proactively, and customers wouldn’t send messages so frequently…
Xiao Wenyu smiled faintly, “It’s alright, it should be a customer. After all, quite a few people came to inquire today.”
The customer gave a light “oh” sound, and the little girl in her arms suddenly spoke, pointing her finger at a snowy background, “Snow… Snow Princess…” Her childish voice was intermittent, a little timid, but it expressed her wish.
Xiao Wenyu walked over and gently rubbed the child’s head, “Do you want to be photographed as the Snow Princess?”
The girl shook her little braids, expressing her agreement.
So Xiao Wenyu smiled even more gently, and said softly, “Then ask your mommy, okay?”
The little girl’s big eyes flashed with a pleading light as she looked at her mother, humming softly as if to coax her.
The customer smiled helplessly, pinching her nose, “Oh dear, I can’t say no to you!”
“Thank you, Mommy~”
Xiao Wenyu stood aside watching such a joyful scene, and imperceptibly raised her hand in front of her, gently covering her lower abdomen.
It’s not that she didn’t understand many things. After all, she had experienced those feelings one by one a few years ago, and had fallen into the pits one by one, using lessons of blood and tears to tell her how ridiculous those things were.
In the end, a person can only rely on themselves.
And it can only be themselves.
She… maybe she can’t trust anyone else anymore, at least not right now.
The mother and daughter laughed happily for a long time, and the mother pinched the little girl’s nose again before coming over to discuss the follow-up arrangements with Xiao Wenyu.
Customer: “I’m hoping to schedule it for the weekend. Are you free on the weekends…?”
Xiao Wenyu: “I’m open from ten in the morning to ten at night, with no days off, so don’t worry. But next week is the Mid-Autumn Festival, and there will be a lot of people making appointments around then. If you want to book for Mid-Autumn Festival, you can send me a message in advance to confirm the time.”
The price wasn’t a major point of negotiation. Xiao Wenyu’s new store already had discounts. Looking at the little girl’s innocent and lovely appearance, she was moved and silently gave a further discount of half price, ultimately taking the package at 80% off and paying a 5% deposit first.
At least this week’s meals are secure.
Her material desires weren’t high at the moment, but there was a big expense right now, and she could only focus on that first.
Xiao Wenyu looked at the payment information on her phone screen, saw the guest out, and ended her business for the day. After lying in bed, she started thinking about how to enable the payment sound effects commonly used in stores.
She opened WeChat, and the glaring messages were pushed to the very top.
Lin Simu: My mom said it’s been more than a month and a half since we had that brain problem and took medicine.
Lin Simu: Remember to check it out. If you’re pregnant, I’ll go with you to get rid of it. The family won’t allow a child to be left out there.
Lin Simu: I’ve checked myself, and I’m not pregnant, so you can relax.
Lin Simu: Oh yeah, I heard you’re tinkering with that photography studio of yours again? Do you need me to help you promote it in the company group to drum up some business? Even if we can’t be lovers, we can still be friends, so you, who doesn’t know how cold it is these days, don’t go out and freeze to death.
Every message was like the most extreme form of irony. Even with Xiao Wenyu’s excellent personal cultivation, she couldn’t help but let out a mocking laugh at this moment. She bit her lip tightly so that tears wouldn’t fall down her face.
Look, what kind of person had she trusted in the past?
Xiao Wenyu didn’t want to recall the past. She selected the second message and replied, “I’m not pregnant either. The probability is very low. Don’t contact me unless it’s important.”
Lin Simu didn’t know where she was hanging out, but the voice message she sent couldn’t be converted into text. Xiao Wenyu could only endure her already extremely nauseous reaction and click on the voice message.
Amidst the noisy music and urging to drink, the woman interjected, “Good that you’re not! Then we’re even, okay?”
In the background, there was also the voice of her friend, asking which little sister she was messaging again. A snort immediately followed, Who else could it be, but that desperate…
The voice message ended there, but Xiao Wenyu certainly knew the rest of the words.
That desperate ex-wife who wanted to rely on taking medicine to have a child in order to tie down Miss Lin.
The increasingly intense emotional reaction lost its suppression at this moment. She covered her mouth but still let out intermittent sobs, not daring to curl up completely, but lying on her side, trying to minimize her presence as much as possible.
How absurd.
How absurd.
But even adults don’t have the freedom to cry. With blurry, tear-filled eyes, she had to brace herself and process messages. There weren’t many people sending messages, but many people had added her as friends today, mostly to prepare to inquire at any time. She couldn’t leave others waiting too long.
Xiao Wenyu quickly clicked “accept” for all the friend requests, and the tears gradually subsided. Only then did she get out of bed and quickly change her pillowcase.
The so-called three-story shop here only had the first floor facing the street. The second floor was a room connected to the residential area behind, only half the size of the first floor. The attic was just the size of a bedroom carved out of the terrace.
Fortunately, the entire shop had plumbing. She divided the second floor into two halves, one half for storage, and the other half for some living necessities, such as the washing machine, a small kitchen that Ruan Shengyi didn’t know about, and a simple place to take a shower by boiling water herself.
Xiao Wenyu stuffed today’s clothes and the pillowcase from just now into the washing machine, leaned against the washing machine, and her gaze fell on the full-length mirror on the opposite side.
To be precise, it fell on herself in the mirror.
It was all too early, there were no traces yet, but after a moment of contemplation, she went downstairs to get her camera, lifted her shirt, and took a picture of herself in the mirror, from the side.
There weren’t many traces yet, but every day of this well-behaved child deserved to be recorded.
She held the camera in one hand, and in the dim light, she lowered her head to look at her still-flat abdomen.
This was just her child, and it had nothing to do with anyone else.
Her long curly hair fell from one side, and the dim light shone through the sparse strands, outlining a very soft profile. Her glassy, moist eyes carried a bit of genuine, heartfelt smile.
Time seemed to stop for a moment.
Even though her eyes were still red and her stomach was aching.
She put away the camera, planning to print the photo tomorrow morning, and when she returned to the attic, she noticed that the attic across the street had also turned on a dim night light.
The brilliant first and second floors made the dim light in the small attic seem a little pitiful, and also made Xiao Wenyu discern a bit of surprise.
Why was Boss Ruan willing to rest so early today?
Just then, her phone dinged.
SY: It’s me.
A headless, tailless sentence.
But the identity was easy to guess.
This made Xiao Wenyu think of this afternoon when Xie Yu had complained to her with a pained expression about her boss’s personality, which was so dense that you couldn’t get a word out of her even with three sticks, and that she should be sent to the matchmaking corner to train properly.
Xiao Wenyu couldn’t handle such a lively treasure, and the admiration in her heart for Ruan Shengyi increased a lot.
But she still wanted to tease Ruan Shengyi.
Boss Ruan was still very easily teased and very cute.
Moreover, Ruan Shengyi’s request was floating at the top, it was the last “ding” she had heard just now. So much time had passed, and she had indeed made Boss Ruan wait too long.
She felt a little bad about it.
She pillowed her arm, and typed a response with her free hand.
*
Jiao: You are? If you have booked a package at our store, you can send me the package name and phone number. If you want to pick up photos or inquire about photos, please contact us after ten o’clock tomorrow.
Ruan Shengyi had drunk alcohol, but wasn’t too sleepy.
Her alcohol tolerance used to be not very good, but after opening the bar for so many years, she had trained it up a bit, so she was only slightly dizzy at the moment, but her consciousness was still quite clear.
Probably?
She read the message sent by Xiao Wenyu on her phone screen again, and turned over in disbelief.
The WeChat name was the abbreviation of her name, and the profile picture was a side view of her mixing a drink that a guest had taken before. Although there was no face, it shouldn’t be too hard to recognize, right?
Xiao Wenyu, really didn’t recognize her?
She didn’t believe it.
Ruan Shengyi simply sat up cross-legged and stubbornly sent it again—
SY: It’s me.
The other side immediately popped up with “typing…”, and after a long time, it was another quite official sentence:
Jiao: There were really a lot of customers today, you might as well say a little more. If you really want me to guess.
Ruan Shengyi: …Heh.
Xiao Wenyu definitely recognized her. She could even imagine what Xiao Wenyu’s expression was when she sent this message. She was still that gentle appearance, but she must be holding back a smile. Those beautiful eyes carried a little warm smile.
Probably beautiful.
But this beauty had provoked her now.
Ruan Shengyi ignored her and turned to open the Tonight Intoxicated work group, sent a message and threw her phone aside, raised her hand and turned off the dim light.
Anyway, someone would relay it to Xiao Wenyu. It just so happened that the alcohol was faintly rising at this time. She would sleep first and talk about it tomorrow morning.
A few minutes later…
Ruan Shengyi groped for her phone, glaring with sleepy eyes.
No message.
This time, the alcohol really hit her. She pinched her phone and fell asleep, even forgetting to turn off the screen.
She had set the longest screen lock time, so the screen gradually dimmed after a long time, reflecting the dim light of the attic across the street.