Chapter Six: The Misunderstanding Resolved

Li Guifang was a rural schoolteacher, with a voice so loud and penetrating that the moment those words rang out, they drew many stares at once. It was the rush hour for work, with people coming and going, and they were right at the entrance of the company. Among the crowd were several people from the same department as Yu Youchu, and even two interns who had joined at the same time had already recognized her.

“Hey, isn’t that Yu Youchu? What is that woman saying just now?”

“Seems like she said she’s been kept by a rich second-generation heir? Since when? What a case of judging by appearance alone!”

“I always thought she was an honest girl. Never expected this...”

“Who knows? Ugh, I despise this kind of person most. Forget it, let’s go, let’s go. If we’re late punching in, we’ll be the ones to suffer.”

Yu Youchu’s brow twitched. Once she understood what was happening, she forced herself to remain calm and said to her mother, “Mom, come over here and listen to me. It isn’t what you heard.”

She tried to soothe Li Guifang and lead her away from the company entrance, but Li Guifang was already blinded by rage and gave Yu Youchu no chance to explain.

Li Guifang was, by nature, a traditional and conservative woman. What’s more, the claim that Yu Youchu had gone looking for a rich second-generation heir for money had come straight from Shen Wang himself. How could she possibly calm down?

“What do you mean it isn’t like that?! Youyou, come home with me right now. Even if I work myself to death, I still won’t take the money from selling yourself to treat your father’s illness! Listen to me, let’s go home, all right?”

As she spoke, she reached out to grab Yu Youchu. Her right hand clamped down on Yu Youchu’s wrist like an iron vise and yanked hard. Caught off guard, Yu Youchu stumbled, nearly colliding with a passing employee.

“If you’re going to quarrel, do it somewhere else. Don’t block other people from going to work, all right?”

The employee, narrowly avoiding a collision, impatiently waved a hand, disgust plain on his face. Yu Youchu hurriedly apologized. “I’m sorry, we’ll leave right away...”

The employee glanced at the badge on Yu Youchu’s chest, shook his head, and walked off, saying, “Young people these days—there’s really every sort.”

Li Guifang froze in place. Her already ugly expression turned even more livid, flushed with both anger and embarrassment. This little disturbance had broken up the orderly stream of people entering the building, causing a commotion. Seeing that the situation was spiraling beyond control, Yu Youchu felt wave after wave of helplessness surge through her. She pulled Li Guifang to the side of the entrance and tried to keep her voice steady, though in truth she was already on the verge of exploding.

She took a deep breath and asked, “Did Shen Wang tell you all this?”

Seeing Li Guifang’s eyes flicker away, Yu Youchu felt her temples throbbing. That shameless man, Shen Wang, kept lowering her opinion of him with every passing moment. She must have been blind to have ever fallen for him!

“Mom! I’m not going back. All of that was nonsense Shen Wang made up. He said it to you on purpose because he couldn’t stand it in his own heart. I was never kept by any rich second-generation heir! You raised me with your own hands—don’t you trust me at all?”

Little did she know, those words only made things worse for Li Guifang.

“Youyou! I know what kind of person Xiao Shen is! It’s precisely because I raised you myself that I know you can’t bear to lose face right now. Come home with me, and I’ll pretend none of this ever happened!”

Yu Youchu’s face, already flushed with embarrassment and anger, turned pale. Her mother would rather believe Shen Wang than her own biological daughter! Suddenly she thought of everything she had gone through these past days. Her throat tightened, and a sour ache rushed straight up into her nose. She opened her mouth, but feared that before her defense could come out, her tears would.

Yu Youchu could feel the crowd around her surging and churning, countless eyes like sharp blades converging on her.

She looked up at her mother. The malice of those surrounding gazes could not truly wound her all that much; it was the disappointed, hate-that-could-not-be-forged look in her mother’s eyes that made her mental defenses collapse at a devastating speed.

Just as Yu Youchu was on the verge of breaking down, a voice suddenly came from behind her ear.

“Madam, I’m sorry to interrupt.”

“If what you’re referring to is this morning’s matter, in which Mr. Shen Wang maliciously slandered your daughter and me, then I can no longer stand by and allow you to continue misunderstanding your daughter.”

Yu Youchu lifted her eyes and looked over.

It was Pei Jiayin.

His tall figure had somehow appeared beside her, angled as if to shield her from every probing gaze. Against the backlight, his expression was calm as still water, and the air about him carried a reassuring steadiness. Yet the sharp lines of his features added a touch of severity, like a blade not yet drawn from its sheath, and Yu Youchu somehow found herself calming down.

“After all, this concerns my own reputation as well. Since this has implicated Miss Yu to such an extent, I can’t simply stand by and do nothing.”

As he spoke, Pei Jiayin glanced at Yu Youchu.

In the early spring weather, she was so anxious that sweat had broken out on her, fine glistening beads appearing on the tip of her nose. Her entire face was as pale as fresh snow, with a faint flush on her cheeks, like some small, flustered creature.

He cleared his throat. “I’m Miss Yu’s roommate. It’s just that after Miss Yu and Mr. Shen broke up, Mr. Shen misunderstood our relationship, so the message he passed on to you was probably distorted.”

Yu Youchu keenly detected a trace of displeasure in his tone. But when her searching gaze turned to Pei Jiayin, his expression made her wonder if the earlier unease had only been her imagination.

“However, we already ‘spoke’ with Mr. Shen this morning, and Mr. Shen also expressed his understanding. If you don’t believe it, we can confront Mr. Shen face-to-face. As for the matter of sharing an apartment, Miss Yu and I did sign a contract. It can’t be faked.”

When the man spoke again, his voice was even and his tone perfectly normal. Yu Youchu gave a subtle shake of her head. It must have been the words Pei Jiayin had said in the car earlier that had made her unable to stop herself from overthinking.

He seemed to possess that steady composure by nature. Standing beside her, Yu Youchu could clearly feel her mother’s momentum being completely suppressed.

Li Guifang looked at the man standing beside her daughter. There was not a single detail about him that was not refined. Not only were his words reasonable and convincing, but even the force of his noble and imposing bearing made it obvious that he was no ordinary person. Then she looked at her own daughter, still young and somewhat immature, and by now she had already believed most of it.

“But I clearly saw her get out of a car! She only just graduated—where would she even have a car from?” When Li Guifang spoke again, she was no longer as certain as before.

Yu Youchu hurriedly seized the opening. “Mom! I really did get out of his car. He happened to be here on business and kindly gave me a ride. Now look at this—I’ve ended up delaying his time instead...”

She knew that Li Guifang feared troubling other people the most. She still knew her mother’s temperament quite well.