Chapter Thirty: The Failed Gamble

  I stood beside the taxi, and Qin Ke Yi, who was leaning against a pillar, stared at me. In fact, my request was simple: as long as Qin Ke Yi could say one soft word to me, I would immediately go over and support her. After all, supporting a beautiful woman is still a beautiful errand. However, this hypothesis obviously does not apply to girls with Qin Ke Yi's personality, and I also underestimated her stubbornness and violent temper.

  Qin Kaiyi gave me a fierce stare, then slowly began to move towards the taxi. After taking a few steps, she suddenly lost her balance and fell to the ground. I realized that this joke had gone too far. I quickly ran to Qin Kaiyi's side, preparing to help her up, but just like in school, she fiercely pushed me away. Then, with great effort, she got up from the ground herself, with tears on her face once again. The Eastern woman's perseverance and determination were perfectly embodied in Qin Kaiyi at this moment. A woman being made to cry twice by a man in one day - I think today will not be easily forgotten in Qin Kaiyi's memory.

  "Sorry, I was just kidding with you?" At this time, I really fell into a dilemma.

  "Get out...!!" Qin Ke Yi said with a fierce tone, drawing out his words as he spoke to me.

  "You're going to affect your recovery if you keep walking like that, come on, stop messing around!" I grabbed Qin Ke Yi's arm again, and after she struggled fiercely for a few times, she slowly gave up. So I wrapped my other hand around her waist and slowly walked towards the taxi.

  Qin Keyi refused to talk to me throughout the ride, turning her head towards the window as soon as she got in and staring outside. Meanwhile, I was immersed in the joy of my upcoming date with Ding Ning that night and didn't have time to consider Qin Keyi's feelings. When the car stopped at my building, Qin Keyi insisted on walking by herself, as if trying to prove to me that she could do it without me. As someone who also has a strong personality, I completely understood Qin Keyi's emotions at that moment, and in my eyes, most of the time, being strong-willed is just a foolish act of saving face, and deep down, I also hoped someone would give her an excuse to back down. So I took the initiative to go up and support Qin Keyi, and she only symbolically refused once before reluctantly allowing me to help her upstairs, occasionally shouting "Pig!" or "Lighter!" or "Slower!" along the way, but unfortunately for her, my mood was particularly good that day, so I didn't mind her behavior.

  After entering the house and closing the door, I helped Qin Ke Yi onto the sofa, then took out the medicine prescribed by the doctor for Qin Ke Yi and applied it to her while massaging.

  "Hey! Be gentle, clumsy!" Qin Ke complained to me. I just smiled at her and continued to apply the medicine and massage for her.

  "You seem quite unusual today! Why aren't you scowling at me? You don't look like yourself!" Qin Ke asked in surprise.

  "This isn't good, wasn't this what you were expecting?" The real reason is that tonight's appointment with Ding Ning has been affecting my mood.

  "That also needs a process of change, your sudden 180-degree turn, let me have no psychological preparation at all, feeling strange, at least let me adapt for a while."

  "You'd better not get used to it, I might change again tomorrow, you're so tired of coming and going in this old place!" I said, getting up and going to the bathroom to wash my hands.

  "Is that all?" Qin Ke seemed to be reluctant to let it go.

  "Ah! It's the first time, after all! Don't be so particular, it'll get better gradually." I raised my head to glance at the clock on the wall, and there was less than an hour left before my appointment with Ding Ning. So I hastily walked into the room to change clothes, Qin Ke Yi found my actions in the room very strange, so he struggled to stand up, limping and staggering to my room door.

  "What are you going to do?"

  "I have a date with a friend tonight." I said to Qin Ke Yi while looking in the mirror inside the house.

  "Ah! You're leaving, what am I supposed to do? Who's going to cook for me?" Qin Ke asked anxiously.

  "You can order takeout by phone, I'll give you a phone number in a minute. The restaurant is just downstairs, it will be delivered to you quickly!"

  "It's very dangerous for me to order takeout at home, there are many reports about single women being harassed by delivery guys at home, let alone I don't have the ability to resist now!"

  "Don't think all men are that bad, besides you won't make a phone call and ask for a lady to serve you by name!" I finally left the mirror after being satisfied with my reflection.

  "You bastard! You've got me into this state and now you're running off with a slap on the butt!" Qin Ke's emotions were starting to get agitated.

  "Or I'll make you a bowl of instant noodles, you can fill up first, and I'll cook something for you when I get back." I said, walking into the kitchen to grab a box of instant noodles, pouring hot water on it, and then handing it over to Qin Ke Yi in the living room. As I turned around to head out, I heard the sound of the noodles being knocked over onto the floor, and the bowl slowly rolling to my feet. I looked down at the bowl by my feet, then back up at Qin Ke Yi, taking a few seconds to suppress the anger rising within me. Then I walked into her room, took out her phone from her bag, and handed it to her in the living room.

  "Then you'd better order takeout, the phone number is in the magazine under the coffee table." I held Qin Ke Yi's mobile phone all along, but she didn't show any intention of taking it and just stood there silently. So I grabbed her hand, stuffed the phone into it, and then walked towards the door.

  Just as I was about to open the door, Qin Ke Yi's phone flew onto the wall beside the door, hitting it before falling to the ground with a loud crash. I stood at the entrance, taking two deep breaths in a row to keep my emotions from being affected by Qin Ke Yi. I realized that this door in front of me was no longer just an ordinary door; to some extent, it represented my choice - my choice regarding love. If I walked out, it would mean that I still had lingering feelings for my past relationship and even if the girl wasn't Tong Chen, I would stubbornly fall in love again. If I chose to stay, it was likely that Qin Ke Yi and I would develop another romance, and Tong Chen would completely disappear from my life.

  When facing this door, my heart began to hesitate. After a month of living with Qin Ke, I didn't have any feelings for her, that's nonsense. At least I dare say that if there was no Tong Chen, maybe we would be cohabiting instead of co-renting now.

  After nearly a minute of hesitation, I finally chose to open the door and walk out of the room, silently saying "sorry" to Qin Ke in my heart. As for Tong Chen's feelings, I really didn't have the courage to put them down, her mark on my heart was too deep after all. Even if Ding Ning wasn't actually Tong Chen, even if everything remained unchanged tonight and everyone went back to normal, I still didn't want to give up this one opportunity. Thinking of this, I suddenly turned to ask myself, was my current choice really a manifestation of my persistence in Tong Chen's feelings? Or was the stubbornness in my heart playing tricks on me...? Did I need this relationship? Or did I need an answer to a question that had been buried deep within my heart for so long?

  Under the disturbance of these problems, I took a taxi to Hans. After getting off the car, I looked at my watch and still had ten minutes, so I stood at the door waiting for Ding Ning's arrival.

  "Kang Jian, you're here." Just then, a voice that was almost identical to Tong Chen's rang out from behind me, causing me to quickly turn my head in surprise.

  "Hey! How did you get here so early?" I exclaimed in surprise to Ding Ning after a few seconds of reflection.

  "There's nothing to do at home, so I came early." Ding Ning said with a smile, compared to Tong Chen, she seemed more like a lady, and her eyes seemed to have a deeper sense of melancholy.

  "Oh! Let's go in!" So, Ding Ning and I pushed open the door and walked into Hans. The hostess at the entrance asked how many of us there were and had a waiter lead us to a table in the hall.

  "Miss, can we sit at that table?" I asked the waitress, pointing to a table not far from where we were standing.

  "Alright, this way, please." The waiter led us to the table.

  "This is the place where Tong Chen and I had our first formal date, and this table is also where we sat when we came here for the first time." I said to Ding Ning after sitting down. After finishing speaking, I tried to observe Ding Ning's eyes. Unfortunately, after hearing my words, Ding Ning started looking around, making it difficult for me to catch the information I expected from her eyes, and I didn't know if she was intentionally avoiding my gaze or doing so subconsciously.

  "What's your buffet choice? I'll go over and help you pick."

  "Oh, whatever, I'm here for the first time, you choose." Ding Ning said politely to me, so I stood up and walked to the self-service counter. In my memory, Tong Chen doesn't eat mushrooms, garlic, or mutton, so I specifically picked those dishes, if Ding Ning also isn't interested in these things, then tonight will be a moment of revelation, I'm not stupid enough to believe that there are so many coincidences gathered on one person's body.

  Ding Ning didn't seem to have any problem with the food on my plate, and even showed a strong interest in the mushrooms, which was disappointing for me. So I started guiding Ding Ning to have some purposeful communication with me, but the result also disappointed me. In Ding Ning's words, I couldn't find any weakness or similarity with Tong Chen except their appearance. I simply didn't believe that there could be two people who looked so similar in this world. The person in front of me was clearly Tong Chen, but I had to admit the fact because I'm not a person who relies on intuition.

  "Ding Ning, how... you've never mentioned your boyfriend?" I finally gathered the courage to ask a question that had been on my mind for a long time.

  "Oh, sorry, I'm not too keen on bringing up my personal issues with others."

  "Is he in Ha city too?" I asked further.

  "No, he is in Zhuhai. In fact, I am also in Zhuhai now, it's just that I came back recently because there was something I needed to take care of."

  After trying several methods to probe Ding Ning with little success, I completely gave up. This also made my mood not as excited as at the beginning, so I just sat there quietly listening to Ding Ning talk about some trivial things about her and her boyfriend...

  Finally, at Ding Ning's request, we ended this date. I was originally full of confidence, but in the end, I gained nothing from this date that I thought would be very rewarding. It's just like a game of gambling, perhaps I made a mistake from the start.

  After putting Ding Ning into a taxi and watching the car drive away, I got into another taxi myself. I reminded the driver to hurry up because I was eager to see Qin Ke Yi now. I wasn't clear why I had such an urgent feeling, maybe it was worry or maybe I suddenly realized something. Even when I was having dinner with Ding Ning just now, I couldn't help but worry about Qin Ke Yi from time to time and even wanted to go to the bathroom to call her, but considering that her phone's remains were lying on the living room floor at this moment, I gave up on that idea. Now I just hoped the car would drive faster.

  When I opened the door, there was no light on in the house. The instant noodle bucket and Qin Ke Yi's phone debris were still lying on the floor in their original positions, but Qin Ke Yi himself was nowhere to be found.