First Marriage Then Love 《先婚厚爱》Chapter 93 Translation

093. Parting calls


In the car, Su Yi Cheng had put on some calming music. He was concentrated on the road before him. The car wasn’t going too fast, but rather very steadily.

At the traffic light, the car slowly came to a stop. He turns to look at the sleeping An Ran beside him, he can see the tiredness and darkness beneath her eyes that couldn’t be concealed. He slightly frowns, feeling sorry for her.

Last night she had spent the night designing, so An Ran did not sleep at all. She drank cup after cup of coffee throughout the night, even though she hated bitterness she was more afraid of falling asleep, so she would rather brave the bitterness. Finally only after 5 in the morning did she finish up her draft. When she got to the bed she immediately fell asleep. As a result, because he was afraid that she wouldn’t sleep soundly, he didn’t go for a morning exercise, but accompanied her to sleep until 8 o’clock.

She was truly tired. Since getting on the car to falling sleep, not even a minute had passed. Actually, with the whole Lin Li debacle, made her very tense, and so she hadn’t slept very well these days.

He sweeps her bangs aside, and calmly gazes at her. The car behind him honks its horn. He looks up ahead of him, and the light had already turned green.

The car slowly starts forward. He doesn’t accelerate, and tries his best to be as smooth as possible, so it doesn’t jolt. This way, it wouldn’t disturb her sleep. Finally when the car stopped in front of ‘Jing Cheng building’, An Ran still hadn’t awaken. She was still against the seat, apparently in deep slumber, even slightly snoring.

Su Yi Cheng looks at his watch. Even though he hates to wake her up, but he knows that if he doesn’t then she would be very late.

“An Ran, An Ran, wake up. We’re at the company.” Su Yi Cheng softly pats her face.

An Ran wakens up from her slumber. Her eyes were still incredibly heavy. She turns to look outside, aware that she was already at her company. She rubs her eyes, and tries her best to sober up, and drive away that slumber. She looks at her watch.. If she doesn’t go up now she’ll be late. She hastily turns around and gets her briefcase from the backseat, and quickly turns to look at Su Yi Cheng, “I’m going first.”

Su Yi Cheng looks at her. He pitied how exhausted she looked, and says, “If you’re too tired just ask for a sick day.” He also couldn’t stand that she was this tired.

“Can’t. There’s a meeting today, and anyways, I've always wanted to do cases like this, and to me this is a huge opportunity, I have to seize this nicely.” She says as she gets out of the car. She leans over to the window, and gives him a slight smile, “Alright, I’m going up. Drive carefully. You don’t need to pick me up tonight, I might need to go to the site tonight with a colleague, so I’ll be late.”

Su Yi Cheng nods. He suddenly remembers that he had bought her milk and bread on the way, and quickly calls out to her, “AN Ran, wait.”

An Ran halts. She turns to look at him, and puzzledly asks, “What’s up?”

Su Yi Cheng carries the bag out of the car. He goes around the car to give her the bag of milk and bread, and softly says, “Eat this when you’re up there. You can’t miss breakfast.”

An Ran accepts the small bag. She has a small smile on her face and nods at him. She steps forward, with a slight blush on her face, she quickly gives him a peck on his cheek, and rapidly says, “I’m going up.” She turns around and avoids looking at him as she enters the building.

Su Yi Cheng stared into space for a while. This was the first time that she initiated the kiss. This kind of knowledge and awareness made the corner of his mouth rise. He rubs the spot that she had just kissed. His mood immediately became joyful, that even his eyes were smiling.

When he was about to start the car to leave, he suddenly heard someone call him from behind.

“Brother Yi Cheng!”

Su Yi Cheng turns around, to see Ling Lin coming out of the car, accompanied by a chauffeur. He was caught off-guard, but immediately nods his head at her. His smile changes into a polite and distant one.

“Brother Yi Cheng, why are you here?” Ling Lin can see that Su Yi Cheng’s mood was rather good, so she smiles back at him.

“I was sending my wife to work.” Su Yi Cheng faintly responds. Then he asks, “Do you also work here?”

Hearing that, Ling Lin’s complexion changes. Unhappiness was written all over her face. She nods slightly and replies, “En.”

Su Yi Cheng just nods slightly. He smiles gently at her and says, “Well I will take my leave first, I should hurry to work.” Saying that, he opens the door and gets in his car. It wasn’t that he didn’t see her emotion, it’s just that it had nothing to do with him. She isn’t anything to him. Strangers - he doesn’t inquire much or cares much about them.

An Ran gave Huang De Xing her draft for him to look over. He looks at the blueprint earnestly. The corner of his eyes rise, and even the corner of his mouth slowly starts to point up. A while later, he couldn’t help but nod and say to An Ran, “Good, very good. Your composition is very bold, new and original. If we open up the ceiling for the children’s area, not only does it allow the children to breath, it gives a fresh atmosphere, and even arouses the childrens’ interest. Not bad, this idea is not too bad.” He puts down the blueprint. Huang De Xing smiles from ear to ear, “I knew you could do it, An Ran, you really did not let me down.”

An Ran holds back her smile, and just says, “If director thinks there’s no problem with the design, then I will modify it, so this afternoon they can start building the prototype and sample."

Huang De Xing nods his head, “En. We should rush, the tendering deadline is close. However, even though we have to rush, the quality should still not be compromised. This is an international project, the quality that everyone is expecting will be very high. If we manage to win this project, to you, to this company, will be of great significance.”

An Ran nods, “I got it.” Saying that, she turns around to leave. However, Huang De Xing calls out from behind.

“An Ran, wait.” Huang De Xing gets up from his seat, and smiles as he makes his way over to her.

“Is there anything else Director?” An Ran asks.

Huang De Xing smiles and looks at her. With intention behind his words, he says, “I heard recently that the municipal committee had officially passed the proposal for Ke Ji City. Construction will probably be starting within the next few months.”

An Ran was taken aback. She naturally heard the meaning behind his words. She bows her head slightly, not giving a reply to his statement.

In response, Huang De Xing smiles again and says, “I heard the committee had selected Special Assistant Su to take over the case. He will probably transfer posts within the next few days, at that time Special Assistant Su will indeed get a promotion.”

Hearing that, An Ran raises her head to look at him. She just smiles slightly, and shakes her head and says, “Actually regarding Yi Cheng’s work, because of the special nature of his work, Yi Cheng very rarely talks about it with me. So, about whether or not the construction of the newly built Ke Ji City was passed, and regarding whether or not Yi Cheng is taking over, to be honest with you, I’m still not too sure.”

Huang De Xing also smiles, and says, “I’m just gossiping. However, if this nomination really does happen, when the time comes please give Special Assistant Su our favour. You also know, these projects, our company is capable of competing for them too.”

An Ran looks at him. She smiles, but doesn’t know how to answer. She understood the meaning behind his words, she isn’t stupid, it was loud and clear. In fact she personally is disgusted by such injustice and unfairness through nepotism. Since you can only obtain these projects if you have the connection, then why bother with the pretence of tendering, toying with those who have no connections and only have this chance during tendering, where is the fairness and impartiality in that. But it seems like society is just like that, not just in relying on connections to fight for projects, even when children go to school to study, if you don’t gift the right people red envelopes, it will be difficult for the child. This kind of practice is very bad, but the present society is already accustomed to it.

“An Ran, don’t be burdened, I don’t have any other meaning, I just want to do good for the company. If the company is well then everyone will be well, besides, the strengths of our company is not lacking, our reputation is one of the best, you know that. Of course, you don’t have to do anything, but just wanted to ask you to pull some strings with Special Assistant Su. Additionally the company board members are also interested in you. When the time comes be prepared to come down.” Huang De Xing laughs.

An Ran doesn’t answer. Carrying her blueprint she has her eyes on the ground. She hates it when he speaks this way, but she can’t refuse to his face. Actually she also knows, nowadays, just knowing that she was Su Yi Cheng’s wife, so long as they know that Su Yi Cheng will be in charge of the newly built Ke Ji City, every single person will try to slyly get close to her, thus holding onto a thread connecting to Su Yi Cheng.

A while later, does An Ran slowly lift her head up. She looks at Huang De Xing, and steadily says, “Director, if there’s nothing else, then I will take my leave first.”

Huang De xing looks at her profoundly. She has been with him for 6 years, so he has some understanding of her. She and Xiao Xiao are two completely different people, it can be said that they are opposites. Xiao xiao was an expert at social interaction, so naturally, he doesn’t care about her methods, but she is very good at interacting with people. She doesn’t have the gift of designing, so even though she is eager to study and work hard, but everything she designs, is too reserved, too rigid, nothing novel, while An Ran was the opposite. An Ran has a unique gift in designing, every time she designs something would make people’s eyes shine, however regarding her social interaction, she was always too stiff, not smooth enough. He reckons that even this time’s attempt at roping Su Yi Cheng through her failed. Perhaps he should try another method, perhaps, another route would be more practical. If he could be a part of the Ke Ji City case this time, at the year-end CEO selections, he will probably have a very big God looking over him.

Only after a while does Huang De Xing nod. He still carries a smile on his face, and says, “Alright, there’s nothing else. You should make the most of this physical activity manor, you should pay special attention to the sample and prototype.”

An Ran nods, and retreats from his office. The moment she closed the door, she let out a long sigh. Then she turns to go back to her own office.

The afternoon was spent with the builder to construct a sample, and the model was beginning to get constructed. Knocking off work, when she left her office, she bumped into Xiao xiao. The two faced each other coldly, remaining silent, both turning their eyes away.

The two silently wait for the elevator. When they left the company doors, Xiao xiao looks at her with a meaningful smile, and says, “I advise you, if you have time you should look after your man better.” After speaking, she turns and leaves.

An Ran bewildered, watches her purposefully swing her hips as she catches a taxi and leaves.

When An Ran returned Su Yi Cheng was already home, speaking on the phone with somebody.

An Ran changes her shoes and enters the room, only to see him hurriedly end the call, “Alright, I got it. I’ll ask An Ran about the move, I’ll get back to you later. Oh right, these past few days Yi Jiao has been hounding me about looking for you, she seemed serious, what did you say to her you rascal?”

Ye Zi Wen was taken aback. Slightly diffident he says, “I, what could I say to her. Alright, alright, I still have matters, not going to talk to you anymore.” He hangs up first.

She places her briefcase on top of the coffee table. An Ran sits on the sofa, staring at the man sitting across from her.

Su Yi Cheng puts away the phone. He looks at her, a small smile hanging at the corner of his mouth. He reaches out to her, “Come.”

An Ran calmly walks over to him. She puts her hand into his large palms, and was pulled by him so she sat on his lap. An Ran was still not yet used to this kind of closeness. She half pushes him, only to have him hug her even tighter, so that there wasn’t much struggle, so she had no other choice but to let him hug her tightly. She sighs. Leaning against him, she says, “I handed in my blueprint.”

“En.” Su Yi Cheng faintly replies. He asks, “What did they say?” His wife had worked so hard all night, if they dared reject her, heng, he won’t stand aside!

“Huang De Xing seemed to be very pleased.” An Ran steadily stated.

Behind her, Su Yi Cheng nods slightly. The corner of his mouth seemed to have no smile, but in fact he enjoyed this moment of quietness and happiness.

An Ran slowly turned around. She looks at Su Yi Cheng, and steadily says, “Huang De Xing says you will be getting promoted.”

Su Yi Cheng subconsciously frowns. He looks at her. Distracted, he asks, “What’s going on? What did he say?” My goodness, news sure does spread fast. His side hadn’t even carried it out yet, and those outside already know it like the back of their hand. As it relates to their interests, always attracting their attention, this is not at all a good thing.

“He wants me to say favours to you, and on behalf of the company entice you, so that it creates more benefits for work, and even promised, if I help the company fight for the project, I would have a chance for promotion.” An Ran honestly confesses to him.

Su Yi Cheng looks at her and gently smiles. He just asks, “Then what did you say?” He can ignore other people’s attitude, as he’s encountered these types of people many times, these issues, he’s heard it countless times. He doesn’t care about anything else, what’s important is her attitude towards this issue.

An Ran looks at her for a while. Finally she shakes her head, forthcoming, she says, “I didn’t say anything. I can’t just carelessly guarantee others in your place.” His status was too special, to be regarded as his wife, she’s afraid to talk too much, to say the wrong thing.

“Besides.” An Ran looks at him. She lowers her head and faintly says, “Besides I don’t really like this kind of thing. I think things should be fair and equal, but what is this, those with the skill and strengths are not considered, only because they don’t have the connections, and can never get what they fairly deserve.” She shakes her head, and whispers, “I don’t like it.”

Su Yi Cheng smiles softly, he reaches out to lift her head. Then he lowers his head and kisses her on the lip, tightly affixed on her lips, he says, “The internal committee has been talking about it. Secretary Zhang had also told me the news, so I can make the proper preparations, but the nomination probably won’t be happening until next week. But no matter if it was me in charge of the city’s urban construction, regarding the project’s tendering, I don’t plan to be swayed by personal affairs, even if it were you asking for favours, or Ye Zi Wen, all should go through the procedures properly, I will not make it easy for you guys, or secretly select you guys, otherwise the tendering will all be but a show for others to see. I have no such plans, you understand what I mean?”

Hearing that, she stares at him. The corner of An Ran’s mouth slightly rises, as if she had worries that existed for a while, but only until now was it completely put to rest. She has always known that the political darkness was no better than the business world, how much officials collude with each other, only for their own benefit. Some even go into the position only for that reason, doing it for their own friends and family to monopolize the business. She hated such behaviour, and it was fortunate that he was not like that. His sense of justice let her worries down.

Su Yi Cheng pinches her nose lovingly. He suddenly remembered of Ye Zi Wen’s call about the apartment, that it was all ready and even the furniture and appliances were already bought and installed, and only need to pack up and move in at any time. With them delaying the moving, he still has to find someone to take a look at the area, this inconvenience was giving him a headache, so these past few days he has been urging them to move soon.

Thinking so, Su Yi Cheng asks without thinking, “An Ran, Zi wen said that the apartment is already finished, when do you think we should move, en?”

After he said that, An Ran only then remembered that Ye Zi Wen had asked the same thing to her, and also remembered that there was another thing he had said. She withdraws from his embrace, and fixes her eyes on him. An Ran’s expression was serious.

Su Yi Cheng looks at her in confusion, not really understanding why she was suddenly looking at him like that. “What’s wrong?”

She looks at him for a while, only then does An Ran start to ask, “Before I met you at the blind date, we met each other, right?”

Su Yi Cheng was surprised, not quite understanding why she was asking, but still thought about it earnestly. He asks back, “You mean when you were forced to kiss and happened to pass by and saved you?”

“Wh-who’s talking about that.” An Ran pouts. “Before that, you’ve met me right?”

Su Yi Cheng stares at her, and asks, “An Ran, what are you thinking?”

An Ran lowers her head and looks at her fingers. She slowly starts to say, “Ye Zi Wen said that you guys were there at my blind date that day, sitting behind me. You witnessed everything during the blind date.”

Su Yi Cheng chuckles, and asks back, “Is that really important?”

An Ran shakes her head, and says, “Sometimes I just think, that if it were another woman who had proposed, maybe you would have also agreed, and if so then you’d be another woman’s husband.” The thought that he could have been another woman’s husband, she started to feel this uncomfortable feeling in her heart. Really, she has to admit, it was easy to fall in love with him. He’s too beautiful, too considerate, it’s very hard to reject this kind of man. Obviously when she proposed to him she did it freely, but recently, from time to time she started to think, if the person he met wasn’t her, if it were another woman who took the risk to propose a marriage to him, then would he have agreed?

Su Yi Cheng stares at her. Only after a while does he shake his head, and pokes fun at her, “Nope. There wouldn’t be anyone else who’d be so brazen, proposing a marriage upon the first meeting.”

“I’m just saying if.” An Ran glares at him. The point isn’t whether or not someone would do that, but if he would agree or not!

Looking at her, Su Yi cheng laughs. He shakes his head, “I wouldn’t, because I knew it was you, so that’s why I said yes.” Thinking about it now, maybe it was because he knew it was her, which was why he didn’t think twice and just said yes. However he was afraid that if he hadn’t agreed, perhaps, she would go find another man to ask.

Hearing that, An Ran looks at him, the corner of her mouth faintly displayed a pretty dimple. Regardless if it was true or not, hearing these words, really does sound nice.

Su Yi Cheng laughs and rubs her head, “Alright, let’s eat. After that you have to get right to bed for me, you have to make up for last night’s sleep.”

An Ran laughs. She looks at him and asks, “Then are you going to go to sleep with me?”

Su Yi Cheng raises his brows. He gazes at her for a while, seeming to struggle for a bit. He then shakes his head, “I’m afraid if I accompany you, we won’t simply be sleeping, you probably would stay up another night, and be even more tired.”

An Ran was shocked, then finally heard the meaning behind his words. She reacts, her face turning incredibly red. She glares at him, “Pervert!” Saying that, she turns around to walk over to the kitchen, her face still incredibly hot, it looked like you could cook an egg on it.

Su Yi Cheng plops down on the sofa and lets out a hearty laugh, you could see that he was in a very good mood.



Today An Ran was discussing about the engineering of the sample building with Constructor Chen, and explained the details about the design, working hard.

At this time Lin Li’s call started to come in. These past two days because of the engineering stage of the project, An Ran hadn’t the time go to the hospital to see Lin Li, but she still called her everyday to check up on her condition. Through the phone she could hear Lin Li’s laughter, and she could finally feel relieved.

“Hello, Lin Li, what’s up?” An Ran used her head to press her phone against her shoulder, at the same time using her hands to give directions to Constructor Chen.

“An Zi, I’m call you right now to tell you that I’m preparing to go back, after that, don’t miss me too much ah, if you really miss me you come over and find me okay.” On the other side, Lin Li tried to speak as softly as possible.

An Ran was shocked. She suddenly stood up, and takes her phone into her hand. She raised her voice and asks, “What’d you say?” Constructor Chen beside her was startled by her action, he looks at her oddly.

“Hehe, I’m already at the station, the 3 o’clock one.” Lin Li laughs weakly. “Because I don’t like parting, so that’s why I didn’t dare tell you the time, so only before going did I call you.”

An Ran looks at her watch. It was already 2:45. She puts down her pen, and leaves the model room, while running she says, “Where are you? Train station? Bus station?”

“An Zi, don’t come. I don’t want to see you cry.” Lin Li says, choking with emotion.

“Tell me where!” An Ran roars. She was really going insane, she unexpectedly, she unexpectedly thought that she could secretly sneak away, not even letting her say farewell. What is this, what is this!

She ran until she got to the elevator. The elevator was still on the first floor, even after she pushed it for a while it wasn’t coming. She can’t take up any more time, so she decided to run down the stairs instead. The her right now, had apparently forgotten that she was on the 15th floor!

“An Zi, thank you for walking with me through this journey all these years, from school to society, because I had you, I wasn’t that lonely. These ten years, we learned, slowly grew up, you gave me so much, so much beautiful memories. Even if the entire world left me, you would still be there with me, encourage me, comfort me, because of you I understand the meaning of ‘true friendship’. From now on we’ll be in different cities, from now on we won’t be able to see each other anytime we want or go out to eat anytime we want, but I don’t believe that our relationship will drift apart because of the distance, because I think when I’m bored I will disturb you from time to time, when I’m lonely and unhappy the first person I’ll think of is you, just telling you first, no matter what you’re doing, you aren’t allowed to ignore my calls ha.” Lin Li purposely tried to speak lightly, but An Ran did not miss the faint sob from the other side of the line.

“Lin Li, don’t give me that damn nonsense, I’m telling you, you can’t go! Don’t go, you hear me!” An Ran shouted into the phone, her tears uncontrollably streams down her face.

Lin Li also couldn’t contain her tears, she was also emotional. She sobbed uncontrollably, “An, An Zi, th-thank you for the ten years, I-I have to go now, forgive me for only calling you now, because, because…..” Lin Li couldn’t hold back her emotions, and only after a while does she take a deep breath. She continues, “I don’t want to see your parting figure, or else I wouldn’t be able to leave.”

An Ran was also weeping. She tried to keep it down, holding onto the phone standing in the corridor of the stairs, she powerlessly leans against the wall, finally squatting at the corner. She chokes up as she says, “Then don’t leave, stay!”

On the other line, a deep breath. With great difficulty, Lin li stops her tears, and pulls out a smile, speaking into the phone she says, “An Ran, goodbye!”

---END OF CHAPTER---

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