Tenant’s Secret Love

Chapter 32: Pay day

I waited at the entrance for nearly forty minutes, and Robben still wasn't finished. The autumn wind was blowing, and I was getting a little overwhelmed, so I wanted to go up there and hurry him along.

Just as I got up, the girl named Lily walked down the stairs, and the air was filled with the strong scent of perfume.

“Are you done?” I asked, tucking my shirt in.

She glanced at me and said unhappily, ”If it weren't for you, I'd be spending the night here.”

“Robben has to go to several bars tomorrow, so don't bother him,”

she said to me, still resentful.

“I'm just going to stay here for a while, and I'll move out as soon as I find a place,” I explained to her, feeling a little bad about it.

She nodded, and then said, ‘I forgot my wallet. Give me 50 yuan for a taxi.”

I was a little surprised. ’Why didn't you just ask Robben for it?”

“I just forgot. I don't want to go back up there. Just hurry up.” She made a motion to me again, asking for money.

“You're not a p********e, are you?”

Lily gave me a glare and said, ”Have you ever seen a p********e who only charges 50 yuan?”

“That's true,” I said, taking out my wallet from my pocket. After looking for a long time, I couldn't find a 50 yuan bill, so I took out a 100 yuan bill and waved it in front of her, as if I had slept with her.

After she left, I felt that living with Robben was not a long-term solution. After all, it was not very convenient, it was far from the company, and I still had to keep looking for a place to live.

...

When I returned to the house, the smell of s*x still seemed to linger in the air. I subconsciously glanced at the bed, but the quilt was still folded.

“I didn't have s*x on the bed, in case it made you uncomfortable,” Robben explained to me.

“Thanks for your trouble!”

Robben laughed: ‘No trouble at all, it's the same whether you're asleep or standing.”

I placed the cherries I had brought from Renee on the table and said to Robben, ’A friend gave them to me, try some.”

“Wow, imported from Chile. What a friend you have,“ Robben said, picking one up and throwing it into his mouth.

I didn't answer for a while, realizing that it was a bit presumptuous to call Renee a friend. In fact, we were only slightly better than strangers, and at least a lot of the time Renee was very annoyed with me.

“Just a friend,” I vaguely responded.

It was supposed to be a trivial matter, and Robben didn't pursue it. He took out his guitar from the guitar case, plucked the strings, looked ecstatic, and asked me again, “Didn't you use this awesome guitar to pay off a debt? How did it get back to you?”

“She gave it back to me,” I answered truthfully.

“Who is she?”

“Do I have to write a f*****g book to answer you?”

Robben smiled at me with an understanding look and said, “Relax...” and finally stopped questioning me. He then strummed the guitar strings and a song called “Cinderella” drifted out of the ten-square-meter attic on the autumn night breeze.

...

The night was quiet like a pool of stagnant water. Robben and I were lying in bed, each with a cigarette in our hands, both of us feeling lost and both of us in silence.

Suddenly, a gust of wind blew hard outside the window, dispersing the smoke that had filled the room.

I took a deep drag of the cigarette and exhaled heavily, competing with this gust of wind. The smell of tobacco began to fill the room again.

I finished the cigarette quickly and stubbed it out in the ashtray. Finally, I asked Robben, “Ben, what are you thinking about?”

“I'm thinking about a girl,” said Robben, taking a deep drag of his cigarette as well.

I teased, “Didn't you just sleep with Lily?”

Robben laughed, stubbed out the cigarette in his hand, and lit another one from the pack. After a while, he said, “I don't know how she's doing now.”

“If you miss her, contact her. Just act like an old friend who cares.”

“You and Brittany broke up more than two years ago. Do you dare contact her?” Robben asked me in return.

“What are you talking about Brittany and me?”

“The same reason. Contacting her won't change anything. Just think about it!”

“I feel sorry for you. You obviously still love her, and you were forced to by her parents, but in the end you've left a bad reputation of betrayal in her heart.”

“As long as she's happy, my little grievances are nothing.”

I lit another cigarette, took a couple of puffs, and fell silent. I didn't encourage Robben to contact the Beijing girl.

“Go to sleep, it's almost dawn,” Robben said to me as he stubbed out the cigarette he had only half-smoked in the ashtray.

I looked out the window and, as if I could see through all the darkness before dawn, I couldn't help but sigh: living is really an unsolvable puzzle, with right and wrong, true and false...

The next day, I spent another day in a flurry of activity, a kind of busyness that I hadn't experienced in the first two years at the company. It was mainly because Harlan's workload had temporarily fallen on me, but that wasn't a bad thing. If I was lucky enough to become the leader of the planning and copywriting team, then this was a process of getting used to it in advance.

In addition to a busy day, I also had other gains. Today, I finally got paid, so as I was about to go off work, I was planning how to spend this month's salary.

After much deliberation, I decided that the first thing I would spend the money on was taking Renee out to dinner. I remembered how angry she had been when I tricked her into going to Harlan's wedding the other day under the guise of dinner. There was no doubt that this was something I had done without thinking, so I had to invite her to dinner tonight with the most sincere attitude, first to apologize and second to thank her for cooperating with me in the scene at the bar the night before, so that I would not be embarrassed in front of Brittany.

I found Renee's phone number and dialed it. It took a while for her to answer, and her tone was still very calm. “Hello, is there something wrong?”

“I'd like to invite you to dinner tonight. Will you come?” I said sincerely.

“Which friend of yours is getting married this time?”

I was a little speechless. She was always so calm and would silence me. After a while, she said, “This time, it's really not a friend getting married. I just want to invite you to dinner.”

“Oh, forget it today,”

I was a little disappointed, but I insisted, “Come on, I got paid today and you're the first person I thought of. Don't refuse my hospitality.”

“My car is in for maintenance and it's not convenient to take a taxi here. Maybe next time,” Renee finally gave me a reason not to come this time.

“That's easy. I have a car. I'll pick you up. Where are you?”

“Do you have a car?” Renee asked doubtfully.

“Yes, it's similar to yours. Just do me a favor and let me take you to a really interesting restaurant tonight, I guarantee you'll like it.”

Renee thought for a while and finally replied, “Well, I'm at Willow Bank Garden, come over.”

“You live at Willow Bank Garden!” I exclaimed, because this is a very high-end neighborhood in the area, and Renee must have gone to Willow Bank Garden to stay because the bathroom sprayed insecticide yesterday and could not be used.

“What's the point of asking so many questions?“ Renee hung up after saying that.

I laughed and didn't care about Renee's attitude. I had long expected that she had other houses in Suzhou.

Putting the phone in my pocket, I said to Jack, who was still busy next door, ‘Jack, I'll borrow your little Prince Alto for tonight.”

Jack looked up at me warily and asked, ’What do you want?”

“I'll fill it up for you after you're done, hurry,” I said impatiently.

“You better not lie to me,” Jack said, taking the car keys out of the drawer and handing them to me.

...

It was getting dark, and I drove Jack's Auto towards the ‘Willow Bank Scenic Garden’ residential area. This time I really didn't lie to Renee. The car I was driving was indeed similar to hers. Hers was called an Audi, and mine was called an Alto. They were both eye-catching fuchsia.