First Marriage Then Love 《先婚厚爱》Chapter 22 Translation

022. Sleeping

An Ran watches his figure disappear behind the door, and the heart that had been half-lifted is finally settling down. 

She turns around to survey the room. The snow-white wall clearly hasn’t been dressed up with wallpaper, or any decorations for that matter. The 1.8 metre bed is covered with an ash grey sheet, the cabinets are also all sharply angled. On the room’s balcony there is a small coffee table and a wicker chair. The entire room carries an ice-cold, simple, masculine aura.

An Ran opens the black and white armoire, which contains shirts and suits of monotonous colours, neatly hung in a row. From another cabinet, An Ran finds the t-shirts he wears at home, and like before, the colours are monotonous. While she’s at it, she grabs a black t-shirt and measures it against her chest. It’s at least one size bigger than she is. Actually, objectively speaking, Su Yi Cheng’s figure is pretty good; not too big, but not too thin. Only he’s tall, 189 cm, and when compared to An Ran’s 167 cm, it’s obvious that he’s taller by a half of her.

An Ran keeps on rummaging through the armoire. All of the t-shirts are practically the same size, picking out another one that doesn’t fit her. Ultimately, she can only choose from these, so it’ll have to make-do.

>

The bathroom attached to the room isn’t that big. It doesn’t have a bathtub, there’s only a small room-like alley for the shower. The support of the opaque glass outside of the shower room was very cleanly put in order. On the platform of the opaque glass is a cup that holds the toothbrush and lotion for men. There isn’t even a hint of any feminine stuff.

An Ran showers quickly, and puts on Su Yi Cheng’s t-shirt. The t-shirt was so big that it could pass as a dress on her, albeit more comfortable.

Actually, An Ran was quite worn out today, as she didn’t get much sleep last night, and the incident from the construction site this afternoon had beaten her and made her powerless, even though it’s not too late in the night right now.

She lifts up the quilt and settles down on the bed. There was a hint of mint inside the quilt, very clean and pleasant. Her eyes closing, An Ran doesn’t take too long to fall asleep.

Inside the study room, Su Yi Cheng is still handling the paperwork for work. The words on the documents are densely packed together; looking at it gives anyone a headache. But, he’s made it this far on his own, so he’s already perfected the skill of speed-reading.

 The cellphone on his desk rings. It’s from Jun Qu compound, so there’s no need to pick up. He already knows that it’s the main lady of the house that’s calling.

“Hi Mom.” Su Yi Cheng answers the call, leaning against the back of the chair from exhaustion, his hand massaging the space between his eyebrows.

“Yi Cheng, this evening I heard Yi Jiao say something about a sister-in-law. You really have a girlfriend?” Qin Yun asks in a head slice. She was still under the impression that he was joking yesterday, after all since then he hasn’t said anything more about a girlfriend. Furthermore, his contact with friends of the opposite sex is all limited. Talking about marriage is a far cry. She changed her profession to introducing a partner to him, but he hasn’t been taking the opportunity, making her anxious to death.

Su Yi Cheng stifles a sigh. He shouldn’t have put his hope on Yi Jiao earlier, that girl doesn’t know how to keep a secret. She made the promise at noon, and now half a day later, she sold him out. However, this is good, since he doesn’t intend to keep the thing with An Ran a secret.

“Yes, I have a partner. So Mom, from now on, don’t worry about me and the marriage stuff.” Su Yi Cheng says.

Upon hearing this, Qin Yun beamed, quickly asking, “Ai yah, really! Who’s daughter is it? How old is she? What does she do? Is she pretty?”

“Mom.” Su Yi Cheng couldn’t help but laugh, without any other option he shakes his head, only saying, "She’s from a normal family. A really good girl."

“Normal is normal, it doesn’t matter, what’s important is that their family background is clean and her personality is good.” Qin Yun warns.

“Yes, I know.” Su Yi Cheng nods.

“Ah Cheng, you’re coming back, aren’t you? How about, how about you go get that young lady and tell her to come here so I can take a look at her.” Qin Yun was really impatient. She has longed for a daughter-in-law for so many years, thinking of the sons of other people in the compound. By the time they were 32, their grandsons were running around, going to school. As for her family, she’s been worrying about it for so many years yet she hasn’t even seen a single shadow.

“Mom!” Su Yi Cheng was really at his wit’s end by his mother, she says one thing yet does another. “Mom, look what time it is. I’ve been exhausted this entire day, and I just got back. Furthermore, An Ran is quite tired right now, she’s already asleep. How about tomorrow. I’ll bring An Ran home tomorrow.” He suddenly thought of something, and corrected himself. “Uh, I have a campaign tomorrow evening. How about this, the day after tomorrow, the day after tomorrow I will definitely bring her home so you and dad and grandpa can meet her. You can be rest assured this time I—“

“Hold on, hold on!” Not waiting for Su Yi Cheng to finish speaking, Qin Yun appears to have heard something weird. She quickly interrupted him and asks, “You said she was tired? She’s sleeping?”

Upon hearing this, Su Yi Cheng could tell what she was about to ask, but he really doesn’t know whether to cry or laugh. How could he not know that his own mother has become this modern; her way of thinking is faster than the youngsters. He forces a smile and asks, “Mom, aren’t you overthinking it?”

“Aiyah, I wasn’t thinking of anything. You were the one who said it.” Qin Yun stated, laughing out loud, and asks, “Son, are you saying that lady is in your house right now?”

“Yes, but it’s not what you think.” Even though just a while ago it almost became that way, but in the end it wasn’t successful.

“Okay okay, mother gets it. I wasn’t thinking too much of it.” Qi Yi chuckles. She’s in a good mood. “Alright, alright. It’s late, I need to go to sleep too. You should sleep early too, don’t tire yourself out too much.”

The corner of Su Yi Cheng’s mouth twitched, especially those words ‘don’t tire yourself out too much’, oh god, now he’s thinking of it!

He hangs up. He’s not in the mood to look at the documents again. Recalling those last few ambiguous words his mother had just said, and remembering that embrace earlier that softened his heart, made the bottom of his stomach rise in heat. “Damn it!” Su Yi Cheng mutters a swear. He puts down the document in his hands and goes to the bathroom outside. The him right now really needs to cool down.

He takes a quick shower and returns to his bedroom once again. Pushing the door open to go in, he sees An Ran lying down on one side, steadily sleeping, her breathing long and deep. Su Yi Cheng goes to the other side of the bed and lifts the blanket, gently lifting her head up. His arm stretched out under her neck, allowing her to rest her head on it. The other arm circles her waist, pulling her into a hug.  

An Ran must’ve been really tired, as she was in a deep sleep. Even if Su Yi Cheng does a series of movement, she won’t wake up at all.

In the dark Su Yi Cheng’s mouth rises into a small smile. He dips his head to the centre of her hair and lands a kiss on it, then he smells the scent of her hair. He closes his eyes and falls asleep with her.

That night An Ran had a good sleep; she didn’t dream and she didn’t wake up. But while she was sleeping soundly, she was woken up by a noise that frightened her dearly.

The doorbell hooted in chaos, even knocking on the door while the doorbell was still going ‘ding dong ding dong….’. An Ran jerked up. Her eyes still not yet opened. She lifts the blanket and prepared to get off the bed.

Suddenly, a strength from behind pulls her back, speaking into her ears, “Go back to sleep, I’ll get it.”

Hearing this, because she had just woken up and the dazedness dissipated in an instant, she suddenly opens her eyes to see, in front of her, a man that’s smiling yet not smiling. She couldn’t help but widen both of her eyes, crying out in surprise, “Su Yi Cheng, why are you here!”

---END OF CHAPTER---

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