After the Real Young Miss Became My Canary - Chapter 8

Chapter 8: The “Deserved Retribution” of Miss Song

◎ “Shen Ying, let me tell you, that woman surnamed Song, I heard she got her comeuppance and disappeared! Hahahahahaha!” ◎

Song Zhi was fumbling to gather everything, when she suddenly remembered she should put the stool down first. She held tools in one hand and reached for the stool with the other.

All the while, she pretended to be oblivious and called out, “Who is it?”

Although, based on the attitude of the woman across the hall, she had already deduced that the person outside could be no one but Shen Ying.

But this was the best delaying tactic she could think of on the spot.

She quickly collected the tools scattered all over the floor while the person outside was silent.

The person outside was quiet for a moment. After a full minute, her calm, clear voice came through the door.

A slightly muffled voice sounded from outside. “It’s me.”

With no space left, Song Zhi shoved everything under the sofa.

There were too many things. A hammer wouldn’t fit. Just as she was looking around for a place to put it, there was another knock on the door.

She couldn’t make Shen Ying wait any longer. She stood behind the door and opened it with one hand hidden behind her back.

As soon as Shen Ying entered, she was met with a smiling face. Song Zhi’s eyes were curved, and a shallow dimple at the corner of her mouth made her look utterly adorable.

But within this cuteness, there was an unmistakable air of trying to cover something up.

Shen Ying walked in, greeted by her smiling gaze.

She didn’t need to ask; it was obvious this person had caused trouble.

But she couldn’t see what the trouble was, so she just pretended not to notice.

As soon as she entered, she was about to sit down to change her shoes when Song Zhi eagerly helped her.

Song Zhi said without hesitation, “Let me, let me. Why would you need a stool when you have me?”

Shen Ying was certain the problem was with the stool. She wanted to see what kind of trick Song Zhi was up to, so she didn’t expose her and just went along with her into the room.

Song Zhi backed against the door, carefully pressing herself against it to get around.

Then she slowly pressed her back against the door to close it.

“Why are you still standing there?” a voice suddenly said.

Song Zhi jumped in alarm. It was her first time doing something like this, and her palm was sweating. She almost dropped the hammer she was holding, but at the last second, her pinky finger hooked the handle, just barely saving it.

Shen Ying asked calmly, “What are you standing there for?”

Song Zhi gave an awkward laugh. “I…”

She realized something was wrong. “I like to stand by the door. What’s wrong?”

The trick didn’t work. It seemed she was still on her guard.

Shen Ying took the groceries she just bought into the kitchen. “Nothing. I’m going to make dinner.”

A guilty Song Zhi eagerly said, “I’ll help!”

Shen Ying glanced at her, didn’t refuse, and gestured with her eyes for her to come in.

Song Zhi walked over happily. As she reached the curtain, she suddenly remembered the item in her hand and the poor stool that had died an untimely death.

She leaned back against the wall, looked up at the ceiling at a 45-degree angle. “I’m used to walking behind. You go first.”

Shen Ying didn’t say anything and went into the kitchen. Not until the thin black curtain separated them did Song Zhi finally let her guard down. Her eyes darted around the room, finally settling on the sofa.

She immediately went to the sofa and squeezed the items into the crevices of the simple couch.

“Help me get some scallions.”

Song Zhi shot up, blocking the sofa, and looked back in a panic. Her pupils, in her glistening eyes, widened. Only when her gaze met the person standing by the dining table, getting something, did she relax.

Song Zhi answered, “Okay, I’m coming.”

Shen Ying, who had been observing her the whole time, naturally didn’t miss her reaction.

Shen Ying came to a conclusion.

She was hiding something.

And whatever she was hiding, she clearly didn’t want her to know about it.

Although public safety was much better than before, the number of attacks on women living alone had been on the rise in the past two years.

And this person had suddenly latched onto her, with a phone of unknown origin.

She couldn’t let her guard down.

At that moment, Shen Ying’s vigilance soared.

She deliberately turned her back and went into the kitchen. The small curtain blocked their line of sight, but it didn’t block her from peeking from the side.

She saw Song Zhi purposely take a blanket and cover the sofa, patting it down to conceal everything, and then she went into the back room.

Shen Ying stood with her arms crossed, leaning against the wall, watching her for a while before turning away.

She had planted scallions on her window sill. If Song Zhi really wanted some, they would be in her room. She was giving Song Zhi this chance.

To be honest, her family had lived here since before her parents and grandmother passed away. In the small neighborhood, a tiny thing could be retold a hundred times with countless versions. It was even more so for her family’s big event back then.

After that incident, none of the neighbors dared to approach her. The family closest to hers avoided her as if she were a ghost, occasionally cursing at her to try and make her move away.

Song Zhi was the first person in all these years who dared to approach her. She would rather believe that Song Zhi knew the truth and was approaching her with a purpose than believe she was someone who knew nothing and just wanted to be with her on a whim.

Shen Ying’s windows, like those of other residents, had iron wire mesh to prevent thieves. On this tightly woven mesh sat three paper-board planters with small vegetables.

The plants were all green and short, looking exactly the same at first glance, and still the same on a second look. Song Zhi stood in front of them, unable to tell which was which.

After looking for a bit, she just randomly plucked a little from the top of each plant.

When she left the room, she still walked straight out, eyes forward.

She tried not to glance at the room.

When she was at home, she always hated it when people went into her room. She felt that anything someone else had touched or even looked at would get tainted with a bad scent, turning from fragrant to foul. It was fine when she was abroad; she arranged everything herself, and no one would enter her room. But in the Song family, her room had been entered three times in just two days.

She had lost a lot of things because of it and had used it as an excuse to throw a fit, giving the people she already couldn’t stand a good beating.

Since she was like this, she assumed Shen Ying, a person who perfectly fit her aesthetics from the outside in, was the same way.

She was confident that nothing in this world would go against her will.

This confidence lasted until she put the items into Shen Ying’s hand. Although Shen Ying showed no expression, from her quiet reaction, Song Zhi felt a kind of “looking at an idiot” vibe.

Shen Ying held the handful of things no bigger than a fingernail, not understanding how these things, shorter than hair stubble, were supposed to go in the pot.

After a moment, she looked at Song Zhi’s expression, which went from confident to confused, and at her fine fingertips without a single hangnail. She felt she had made a mistake in her judgment.

Could someone like Song Zhi possibly pose a threat?

She felt she was wronging the deceased stool by even thinking that way.

In fact, she hadn’t known the stool was broken at first. The door was open, and she couldn’t go out. But every time Song Zhi walked past the sofa, she would look left and right with a guilty expression and then cautiously lift the blanket to check on something.

At that moment, Shen Ying finally understood what she was up to.

It was a methylcobalamin tablet.

She seemed to be a bit mentally unsound.

But no matter what, Song Zhi couldn’t stay here long.

She didn’t want anything to happen to the people around her again, regardless of whether their relationship was good or bad.

A pale, delicate finger waved in front of her face, and she suddenly snapped back to reality.

She saw Song Zhi tilt her head slightly, and after Shen Ying looked up, she lowered her eyelashes, looking wronged. “Did I do something wrong?”

Shen Ying was shocked by her acting.

Not to mention knowing her for only a few days, even if they had known each other for over a decade, she couldn’t have made such an expression.

She also didn’t believe that someone could form an emotional attachment in just a few days, but she still didn’t understand why this person was pretending to be like this.

Song Zhi couldn’t cook. After helping a few more times and just making things worse, Shen Ying, having reached her limit, chased her out from behind the curtain.

So she went from a hard-working bird trying to feed her child to a baby bird waiting to be fed.

She sat on the sofa, looking on eagerly, occasionally poking her head out like a small bird waiting.

At that moment, her stomach, which had been too hungry to feel anything, and her brain were completely taken over by the faint aroma wafting from the kitchen.

Only when she relaxed and leaned back did her expression change drastically.

She suddenly realized a problem.

She hadn’t cleaned up the things she had hidden under the sofa.

She stealthily glanced at the kitchen, where she couldn’t see anything.

She felt sure Shen Ying couldn’t see her, so she confidently put the salvaged items back. As for the stool, she would just secretly buy an identical one when Shen Ying wasn’t looking. Shen Ying couldn’t blame her, could she? She couldn’t kick her out for this, could she?

She always felt that Shen Ying had this idea. In Shen Ying’s eyes, she was useless and couldn’t do anything.

No, she had to show her usefulness and make Shen Ying abandon that idea.

She was well aware that given the Song family’s background, no one in the entire Hong Kong City would be so kind as to defy the Song family for her sake. Most hotels were also properties of the Song family.

Besides, Shen Ying’s appearance was really to her liking. Sometimes, just looking at Shen Ying made her want to eat two extra bowls of rice.

So, just as Shen Ying finished one dish.

She was met with a pair of smiling, crescent-shaped eyes.

Those eyes always seemed to be filled with water, and they glistened. When they stared at her, Shen Ying didn’t even dare to meet her gaze.

Shen Ying turned her head, focusing on her pot, and then she heard her voice, deliberately lowered, ask, “What?”

Her heart suddenly grew cold.

No, this isn’t the attitude I should have toward someone who is about to leave.

So, she reverted to her expressionless state, giving Song Zhi a cold side-glance.

Song Zhi’s eyes were sparkling, completely unaware that Shen Ying’s sudden change in attitude was anything out of the ordinary.

Song Zhi said, “I’ll bring the dish to the table for you.”

Shen Ying held the dish down. “You don’t have to.”

Song Zhi pulled the dish toward herself. “Yes, I do, I do.”

The struggle between the two ended with Song Zhi winning by using the dish as a threat.

Song Zhi brought the steaming dish to the table. Shen Ying’s cooking seemed to be good. The plate of stir-fried tomatoes and eggs was fragrant. She could even see that the tomatoes had been cooked down into a sauce. The red and yellow colors blended harmoniously on the plate, and it looked delicious.

Her long-starved stomach belatedly began to rumble.

There weren’t many people, so Shen Ying didn’t bother to make too many dishes. She only stir-fried two. When she finished washing the pot and went to get rice, she found that half of the rice in the pot was already gone. When she looked out of the kitchen, there were two bowls of rice and two sets of chopsticks neatly arranged on the table, and the person was sitting upright at the table, just waiting to eat.

Shen Ying looked at the steaming dining table and the person with crescent-shaped eyes sitting there, and she felt a moment of trance. She picked up her bowl and, as she lowered her head, said, “You can just eat first next time.”

Song Zhi’s voice was clingy. “No way. I…”

A huge, ringing sound ripped through the air from the room all the way to the dining table.

Song Zhi’s expression faltered, and her face turned cold. She almost performed a face-changing act for Shen Ying right then and there.

Luckily, she reacted immediately, walking into the room a step faster than Shen Ying, who had just picked up her chopsticks. She eagerly answered the flip phone and held it to Shen Ying’s ear.

When she handed over the phone, she was crouching by Shen Ying’s feet. When Shen Ying looked down, she couldn’t help but see Song Zhi’s face looking up at her.

Her skin was fair, her nose was straight and turned up. Her almond eyes were round and always seemed to be wet. When she looked up and smiled at her, the corners of her eyes unconsciously drooped. Looking up like this, she appeared very docile.

Song Zhi was furious inside. Even her cheeks puffed up with anger.

She wanted to throw this broken house and this broken phone out.

So these things wouldn’t be so clueless and keep interrupting her!

She was so close to eating.

Shen Ying’s gaze shifted away from her eyes, and for some reason, she was a little afraid to look at her.

“Don’t crouch there. Go eat.”

Song Zhi let out a small “oh” and was not affected by her coldness in the slightest.

She obediently went to her seat.

The call had been answered the moment the phone was taken. So, as soon as Shen Ying spoke, a voice from the other end came out like a string of firecrackers.

“Shen Ying, let me tell you, I heard that woman surnamed Song got her comeuppance and disappeared! Hahahahahaha!”

As soon as Song Zhi sat down, her eardrums were assaulted by this string of laughter. She looked up in alarm.

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