TN: Hey! I don’t speak Chinese, I’m mtling this novel, if there’s any mistake or if you have any advice, please leave it the comments, I hope you enjoy!

Marriage contract (1)

10:40 pm, February 12, 2018, 98th floor of Yinzhu Building, office of the chairman of the Lu’s Group headquarters.

A young man in a white shirt sat in front of the office chair, his slender fingers tapping quickly on the keyboard, leaving only the rhythmic breathing and crisp tapping sounds of the man in the quiet room.

After typing the last data in the work file, Lu Yi planned to go home and get up tomorrow morning to check for omissions again. He clicked the computer’s shutdown button, and reached out to the neatly arranged bunch of keys on the desk.

However, before he could grab the key in his hand, the screen of the phone next to the key suddenly lit up, there was a pleasant and soft piano music in the quiet room. In order to better distinguish the caller, he set a grouping and special ringtone for each contact. This familiar melody told him that the person calling him was his fiance, Fang Chuan.

At 12:15 on February 14th, they will step into the palace of marriage together, exchange their promises with each other, and swear to the Lord that they will be loyal to each other in their future life.

Although the other party couldn’t see it, Lu Yi adjusted his overly serious expression that he wore at work. He gave up the keys, walked to the floor-to-ceiling window with his mobile phone and connected the call from his fiance: “Achuan¹¹, it´s so late, why haven’t you slept yet?”

The voice from the other side of phone sounded a little distorted: “It’s less than eleven o’clock. How can anyone go to bed so early? Where are you now?”

Lu Yi glanced at the clock on the wall, “there´s an important document today. I’m working overtime at the company, but I´m going back soon. It’s a bit noisy over there, are you outside? do you want me to pick you up?”

Fang Chuan was quiet for a while, and rejected his proposal: “Thank you, no need.” Looking at the ticket in his hand, the young man pressed the brim of his hat, his voice was a bit astringent: “Lu Yi, has anyone ever said that you are a good person?”

Lu Yi’s lips curled up: “Dear, are you sending me a good person card?”

Fang Chuan swallowed what he almost blurted out. After all, he was still a coward. It is already great to be able to survive until now: “No, you know, we will get married the day after tomorrow, I feel a little nervous. You know I’m not like you, always calm and collected.” Sometimes as calm as a robot, of course, this half sentence was also swallowed by him.

The corners of Lu Yi’s lips were raised higher, and he deliberately made his steady voice tremble: “Actually, I am also very nervous. After all, this is the first marriage in my life.”

“You say it as if I´m not the same”

Fang Chuan mumbled softly on the other end of the phone. Although it was not a video call, Lu Yi could see the appearance of his fiance at this time in his mind.

Fang Chuan was born very handsome. Although he was 27 years old, his clean and sunny appearance still made him look like a college student who has just come into contact with society. When he laughed, he looked very sweet and had a small dimple, when complaining, it also looked very cute.

The man cast his gaze out of the window: “Achuan, it’s snowing outside.”

“Huh?”

Lu Yi laughed in a low voice, his low voice resembling an elegant cello song: “This is the first snow in early spring, I heard people said that those who see the first snow together will be happy for a lifetime.”

Fang Chuan was sitting in the airport waiting room, only seeing the cold electronic display screen, he wasn´t seeing the snowflakes floating over City B at this time. But he didn’t want the other party to think too much so he responded absently, “Really? That’s really great.”

Lu Yi didn’t hear any surprise in Fang Chuan’s tone, it felt a little perfunctory.

But they will get married soon, and according to the original agreement, the other party will move over and live with him. It may be because the other party was not in a good mood to leave home. Lu Yi asked sympathetically, “Are you not feeling well?”

“No…” Fang Chuan was worried that he would be exposed if he went on, and he didn’t have much time left. He stood up and said, “I want to go to bed earlier, you should go back to rest earlier too, good night. “

Lu Yi responded softly: “Dear, good night.”

Did he have the courage to tell the truth? After speaking, he hung up the phone, then took out the phone card, broke it forcefully, dragged the suitcase on the side of the seat, folded the phone card in two and threw it into the trash can at the end of the row of seats.

After passing the security check, he glanced back, whispered sorry, and left without looking back.

Lu Yi didn’t know anything about it. He hung up the phone from his fiance, turned off the lights, cut off the power, and closed the door in order, then walked to the bottom of the garage, started the car and drove back to the small villa in the suburbs of City B.

After entering the door, he took off his heavy windbreaker, hung it on the coat rack and said goodnight to his mother who was sitting on the sofa watching the night soap opera: “Mom, I’m back.”

Ms. Lu, who was applying a beauty mask, put a sweet cherry in her mouth, and said two more words than usual: “Rest early today, tomorrow you have to prepare for the wedding. I wish you happiness.”

Lu Yi nodded and didn´t spend time on work anymore. He used the standard brushing method to brush his teeth for three minutes, rinsed, and went to bed. He turned on the wall lamp, steadily pulled the quilt to his shoulders, folded his hands flat on his lower abdomen, closed his eyes and went to sleep.

The milky white lights poured on the man, making him look like a handsome vampire in a fantasy story. Young, handsome, pale, and meticulous.

The next morning at six in the morning, Lu Yi was woken up by his biological clock. Try on the wedding suit, do modeling, and rehearsal, that’s his schedule for the day.

But when he went downstairs to have breakfast, Ms. Lu was on the phone and seemed to have a dispute with someone, he could faintly hear words like “son” and “marriage.”

He finished the loving breakfast prepared by Ms. Lu, wiped away the soy juice on the corner of his mouth with a napkin, and looked at his mother who hung up the phone: “Mom, what happened?”

Ms. Lu’s expression was a little distorted, she restrained herself and took a deep breath: “Son, I have bad news to tell you, so be mentally prepared.”

“I’ve finished breakfast. There will be no accidents of being choked by soy milk. Tell me.”

“Your fiance, Fang Chuan, ran away last night, and hasn´t been found. The Fang family called and asked if it was possible to postpone the wedding, they´re going to find the unfilial son and bring him back even if they have to break his legs, and then have him marry you.”

Ms. Lu finished speaking, her tone couldn’t help being excited: “They are really unreliable. Even if he apologizes, I won´t forgive him!”

*Pop* The empty glass used for soy juice fell to the ground and broke into pieces.

Lu Yi glanced at the glass residue on the ground, then looked at his mother: “Mom, what did you just say, can you repeat it again?”

Ms. Lu finally couldn’t hold back her anger, and said grumpily: ” I just scolded them too. Tell me, what is this? You have been dating for ten years, the wedding has been set, the invitations have been sent out, and the bridegroom suddenly ran away. What kind of humiliation is this? ” She was so angry that she felt like fainting.

The young man lowered his eyelashes, and his long crow-feather eyelashes cast a small shadow on his face.

Realizing that her son was a little too calm, Ms. Lu’s anger finally turned into worry: “Son, if you are angry, vent it, there is no need to harm your body for this kind of shameful people”

She just wanted to show that she could be a capable and calm mother. She held back for a while but couldn’t stand it anymore. How hard must it be for her son as the victim.

Lu Yi didn’t say anything like ‘It’s okay, I’m fine.’ Because he was in a really bad mood. “Why did he escape from marriage? Did the Fang family give a reason?”

Ms. Lu suddenly became even more strange, as if she had eaten trash: “They did. When Fang Chuan was in high school, he had a first love who he could live and die for, that person returned to China a few days ago.”

Lu Yi knew this, he and Fang Chuan had known each other for ten years after all. Who did not meet a few scumbags when they were young? Although he was very self-disciplined since he was a child, there was nothing wrong with Fang Chuan’s sensational youth.

But now it seems that his thoughts were too superficial, and he may not be suitable for such a person who was too pure and passionate.

“You mean, Fang Chuan and Yu Ke ran away?”

Ms. Lu’s tone was very depressed: “That´s not it. Yu Ke is still in the country. Only Fang Chuan ran away. But the Fang family said it was because Yu Ke returned to China that Fang Chuan struggled to escape and ran away.”

“So, Fang Chuan struggled because he felt that he didn’t really love me, he was struggling in his heart, and to protect Yu Ke so that his sweetheart would not be dragged down, on the day before the wedding, bravely escaped from the marriage?”

“That’s what the Fang family said, but isn’t this nonsense? How can anyone have such a problem?” Ms. Lu said more and more irritable, “Otherwise, you won’t get married at all, we can cancel it.”

“Mom.” Lu Yi sat on the chair, raised his head to look at his mother, his black eyes remained motionless, “We have invited all our relatives and friends, sent invitations, and invited the most influential people in City B. The sudden cancellation of the marriage will cause turmoil in the stock market and turn your son into a joke in City B.”

At the wedding, a bridegroom ran away. No matter what the remaining one did, he would always be labeled as ‘problematic and pathetic’. People would use the greatest malice to speculate that the remaining groom was abandoned because he had a problem, otherwise, how could the other bridegroom be so irresponsible?

Ms. Lu stammered, “You mean, don’t cancel the wedding? But now there is only less than one day left.” Why did she feel like her son had been overstimulated? At this time, she would rather Lu Yi yell, scream, or drop a few more glasses.

Lu Yi glanced at the watch on his left hand: “To be precise, there are still 29 hours, 3 minutes and 15 seconds.”

He pushed aside the chair and stood up: “Sorry, I broke the cup. I have to go out, I’ll trouble Aunty Wang²² to clean up. The rehearsal will be canceled. If I come back in time, I will carry out my personal styling.”

Ms. Lu was still a bit at a loss: “Where are you going?”

Fang Chuan had already run away, and the Fang family couldn’t get in touch with him, let alone Lu Yi, the fiance that the other party was determined to avoid.

Lu Yi put on his coat, buttoned the top button, and left without looking back: “Go to the source of the disaster.”

Notes

1. Putting an ‘A’ before the name, makes it more intimate, A-Chuan, it could be A-Yi for the protagonist. ↩︎
2. In the original is Mother Wang, who is probably a maid/housekeeper, so I changed it to avoid misunderstandings. ↩︎