CH 38

Su Chang caught a glimpse of her actions but wasn’t entirely sure, so she picked up her own phone and entered Xiang Wan’s profile through Yu Zhou’s Weibo. Then, she fell silent.

Xiang Wan was scrolling through comments while feeling slightly puzzled.

How could this be? Miss Su was indeed very pretty.

Yu Zhou came out carrying a plate of fruits, sensing the subtle atmosphere between the two as she went over to Xiang Wan to look at her phone.

At a glance, she was almost scared enough to drop her plate.

Damn! What’s going on?

She snatched Xiang Wan’s phone before quickly scrolling through the comments below. There were already hundreds of them within moments – initial astonishment, which slowly turned into more pointed remarks.

“May I ask if Miss Su knows about this photo?”

“I feel like it’s not really appropriate to post someone’s sleepwear photos online… It seems like Changchang doesn’t know about it. [Sweat.jpg]”

After all, Su Chang hadn’t followed her.

Fans paying attention to Su Chang’s privacy was understandable, but Yu Zhou couldn’t help but feel her heart pounding while her hands shaking. She couldn’t imagine what kind of commotion this would cause and she didn’t know whether to delete the photo or not. Deleting it would make it seem even more suspicious, similar to celebrities secretly announcing their relationships by posting photos with their partners accidentally.

She looked at Su Chang, somewhat panicked, but Su Chang just smiled at her as she pressed the bottom of the phone screen and began to speak.

“Are you up?”

Calm and unperturbed as if she wasn’t troubled at all.

After a while, she seemed to have received a message. Su Chang glanced at it while softly continuing, “Take a look at Weibo. Put on your sleepwear and come to Lu Yun Garden now. I’ll treat you to lunch.”

She put down her phone and looked at Yu Zhou before saying, “Xiangzhi is coming over now, probably about 15 minutes. Shall we go out for lunch later?”

The day before, Yu Zhou had said that nobody in real life would say “Shall we” like this, but she was wrong. Su Chang would say it and it sounded very gentle, not pretentious at all. However, she only spoke like this when comforting someone.

Yu Zhou calmed down and didn’t dare to look at the online comments anymore. She also told Xiang Wan to put down her phone, rested her arms on the table and propped up her chin with them, staring blankly.

Su Chang and Xiang Wan started eating grapes.

Those fifteen minutes were tough for Yu Zhou. Unable to resist, she went to a corner before secretly opening the forum that F had told her about previously.

Several posts had been opened, some of which were doubts as Su Chang rarely exposed her private life online, so it was hard to see her private side. There wasn’t any caption, so it was also unclear what the meaning was. Some people who loved drama fanned the flames, saying they had flipped through the girl’s Weibo and found a similar single photo that was beautiful. Could this be an official announcement for a relationship?

There were even more cheeky ones, asking: “Come out and take a few steps, iChang[1], if this is the sister-in-law of your sis Chang, are you satisfied or dissatisfied?”

After several arguments, a few emotionally unstable fans were enraged and cursed directly at Wan: “Where did this unknown person come from, to create drama for herself?”

There was even a comment mixed inside: “Putting the sister-in-law aside for a moment, doesn’t anyone think Su Chang’s pajamas look nice? What brand, seeking the same style.”

Because the title contained “sister-in-law,” the first reply was quite aggressive: “Why ask? As if you could afford it.”

And then a fight broke out between the two.

Onlookers eating sunflower seeds commented:

“Are iChang sick? Biting whoever she catches. Someone is only asking for the same style.”

“She’s anxious, the more anxious she is, the more likely the person is the real sister-in-law. [Pushing glasses.jpg]”

“Are you sure this is the sister-in-law, although her photos appear innocent, her gaze is somehow uncomfortable, seemingly pretentious. Your Chang, don’t be fooled.”

“Which innocent sister-in-law sends people sleepwear photos? [Laughably ridiculous.jpg]”

Yu Zhou sighed as she scrolled, worried about the impact on Su Chang on one hand, and on the other hand, she felt that Xiang Wan’s road to becoming a voice actress would be difficult now.

Not even debuted yet and her image was already that of a little Fox spirit[2].

Yu Zhou put down her phone and decided to find something else to do.

She stood up as she asked Su Chang and Xiang Wan, “Would you like more grapes? I can wash some for you.”

Su Chang didn’t pay attention to these forums and Xiang Wan was completely unaware of them, so the two girls’ facial expressions were still fine, even gazing at her with a little concern.

“Aren’t you going to eat?” Xiang Wan asked her.

“No, I’ll go wash some for you both, since Director Peng will come too later.” She went to the kitchen.

While washing the grapes, she suddenly remembered a small event.

It was just a few months after she and Su Chang had confirmed their relationship. One time, when Su Chang came out of the bathroom after taking a bath, Yu Zhou thought Su Chang looked especially beautiful while chatting with Yu Zhou as she dried her hair. She took a few photos and shared one of them on her Wechat moments.

When she posted it, she had asked Su Chang which photo looked better. Su Chang was a bit busy at the time and hadn’t looked carefully, so she said it was up to her.

So she posted it, making it visible to a select group, intentionally hiding it from her family.

There were dozens of likes as people asked who the girl was. Yu Zhou was too embarrassed to answer directly, so she said it was a friend.

Fortunately, her friends hardly paid attention to this circle, but unexpectedly, one of them asked her, “Hey, is this Su Chang? Do you know Su Chang?”

She replied, “Yes, a friend.”

The friend didn’t reply to her again.

Su Chang rarely checked her friends’ moments and only saw it about a week later. She then told Yu Zhou, “Delete it.”

Yu Zhou was a bit taken aback, but Su Chang said, “This photo is not very good-looking, I’ll give you a better one later.”

She then asked the friend who left a message asking if it was Su Chang, “How close are you to her?”

Yu Zhou said she was her college classmate who was from the next dormitory over, and although they had a good relationship, they didn’t contact each other much after graduation.

Su Chang said, “Hmm, you can contact her less.”

Later, Su Chang forgot about this matter and never gave her another good-looking photo. From then on, Yu Zhou’s Wechat moments never contained Su Chang again.

Later still, remembering how Su Chang subtly advised her to contact friends who recognized her less, Yu Zhou didn’t really want to post Su Chang’s photos anymore.

Yu Zhou felt a little bit at a loss for words about the situation; back then, Su Chang didn’t want to expose their relationship, so they hid it very well. But now, amid the stormy gossip outside, there was another imagined lover in people’s minds.

In the eyes of everyone, it seemed that Yu Zhou and Su Chang had never known each other before the audio drama.

Turning off the water, Yu Zhou carefully absorbed the surface droplets with some kitchen paper, feeling a little petty about the matter, a small thing that had bothered her for many years.

But the cruel truth is that many things didn’t seem like a big deal or even worth mentioning at the time, however, after many years had passed, she realized that it had actually affected her, but it was already too late.

So many opportunities for communication had been missed.

These opportunities were clearly a boost from heaven for their relationship; if they had acted promptly, it might not have been beyond remedy.

She laughed mockingly to herself and brought out the grapes as  Peng Xiangzhi arrived.

The moment Peng Xiangzhi walked in, she uttered a string of “WTF” and then hurriedly went to the bathroom to change her clothes. After checking her semi-natural make-up, she sat at the dining table beside Su Chang and picked an angle, gently looking into Yu Zhou’s camera lens.

After her swift selection, she edited the photo for two minutes and sent it to Xiang Wan.

So, within 30 minutes of Su Chang’s photo being sent out, Xiang Wan posted another photo of Peng Xiangzhi on her Weibo without a caption.

Ten minutes later, Peng Xiangzhi posted a group photo of the three of them on her Weibo, saying “All-night script reading? × All-night gossiping√, let’s do it again next time.” She tagged Su Chang and Xiang Wan.

Su Chang gave her a like.

Personal Weibo accounts usually had relatively harmonious public opinions. The comments of “Long live friendship” warmed people’s hearts while the other half was saying, “Take me with you next time.”

Yu Zhou was vacuuming cat hair from the carpet nearby.

Just now, Peng Xiangzhi had originally suggested a group photo for the four of them to make it look more formal, since the trio seemed a bit like they were trying to salvage the situation. However, Su Chang said that Yu Zhou wasn’t in the circle and she had never shown her face on Weibo before, which might make her feel uneasy.

Yu Zhou thought for a moment and agreed, adding that “Shrine” had not been officially announced yet, having her in the photo seemed like they had confirmed her to be part of the crew.

Hence, she remained nameless.

Yu Zhou could imagine the direction the online forums were taking now. Most people were probably dubious.

There were netizens who insisted that Xiang Wan’s Weibo post was inappropriate, accusing her of trying to ride on the hype. However, there were others who defended her, arguing that she had barely any fans, did not tag anyone in the photo and did not include any keywords either. If Su Chang’s fans had not dug it up, it might have just been a casual glimpse of her daily life with friends.

The netizen said, reasonably, all she did was post a single photo. Weren’t all those speculations merely concoctions of people’s overactive imaginations and gossip?

Amidst the chaos, there were even some enthusiastic shippers who maliciously asked, “Can I breathe a sigh of relief and start shipping them now? A perfect love triangle, simply irresistible.”

Yu Zhou, holding her vacuum cleaner, locked her phone screen.