Difficult to Complete chapter 13

Gu Yan ate a bowl of double-eggplant noodles at a small noodle shop downstairs from the company. When he got to the office, his secretary brought in a file:

“Mr. Gu, this is the designer profile that the HR department just sent over. If you’re satisfied, they can start working at the company next month.”

Gu Yan was hanging his coat on the rack and glanced at the secretary when he heard this: “Next month?”

The design department was understaffed, and the designers below were constantly complaining to Gu Yan.

Each of them was either saying they were losing hair from working late, those with spouses were grumbling about being so busy that their spouses were about to run off with someone else, and those without spouses were saying they didn’t have time to find a partner and demanding Gu Yan find them a boyfriend or girlfriend…

The still-single Director Gu was getting a headache from all the whining. He had just talked to HR half a month ago, asking them to hire a designer as soon as possible.

Now they had finally found someone, but they still had to wait a month. The designers in the department were going to jump up and flip his office upside down.

“This designer is currently still employed as a… history teacher.” Secretary Zhang seemed to find the situation quite unbelievable herself and responded hesitantly.

HR had spent half a month carefully selecting from over a hundred resumes, and in the end, they hired a teacher.

If it weren’t for the fact that they had no grudges with HR, and the relationship between their boss and the HR boss was pretty good, she would’ve thought HR was doing this on purpose.

But that’s the way it was. Secretary Zhang sneaked a glance at her boss, afraid that he might tear up the resume in anger and storm downstairs to HR for a showdown.

This was just absurd.

Gu Yan was indeed in a bad mood. His requirement for HR was that the designer could be a newbie but had to be talented, with impressive design work.

Now they were sending him a history teacher? Even an art teacher would be more appropriate.

He frowned as he started flipping through the resume, and as soon as he opened the first page, his frown deepened—it turned out that the designer HR had hired was… Tan Xiaolei.

Gu Yan actually wanted to convince himself that it was just someone with the same name, but the two-inch, blue-background ID photo was right there in the top right corner of the resume, with Tan Xiaolei smiling at him, showing eight teeth.

This really was…

Having slept uneasily on the sofa last night and waking up early this morning, Gu Yan was feeling a bit of a headache, so he waved his hand at the secretary and said:

“Let me think about it. You can go out first, and bring me a cup of coffee later.”

“Yes, Mr. Gu.”

As soon as Secretary Zhang left, Gu Yan took a photo of the resume on the desk and sent it to Tan Xiaolei:

“Tan Xiaolei, what are you up to?”

Gu Yan knew better than anyone why Tan Xiaolei would give up a stable job to come to their company as a junior designer.

But they were no longer impulsive teenagers. They had long outgrown the age of blindly and recklessly pursuing love. It wasn’t necessary, rational, or worth it. He really didn’t approve of what Tan Xiaolei was doing.

He had prepared himself to have a serious talk with him, but whether Tan Xiaolei was sleeping or in class, he didn’t reply for a long time. So Gu Yan stopped waiting and turned to the work on his desk.

…..

The one who suggested dinner was Shen Qi, but the one who quickly finalized the details was Zhao Lingling—after agreeing to Shen Qi, she immediately reserved a table at a nearby restaurant.

The restaurant was located inside a landmark building in City A. It was a revolving restaurant, and if you sat by the window, you could overlook the entire area.

Inside the restaurant, the candlelight was dim and warm, while outside, the city lights sparkled. Dining in such an environment with someone else—it was undeniably romantic.

Zhao Lingling believed wholeheartedly that this was the moment she would finally soften the hard-hearted Shen Qi. To this end, she had even left work early, gone home to fix her hair, and changed into a beautiful outfit.

But Shen Qi was destined to disappoint her.

After they finished a dinner that could be considered satisfactory, Shen Qi cut straight to the point and said to Zhao Lingling:

“Lingling, I really appreciate that you like me. It’s an honor, but I’ve thought it over and still feel it’s necessary to make things clear between us…”

“Shen Qi, what do you mean? Are you trying to give me the ‘nice person’ card?” Zhao Lingling interrupted him before he could finish, her eyes narrowed as she asked, “If it’s such an honor, why won’t you accept me?”

Shen Qi was speechless.

“Shen Qi, be honest with me. Do you have someone else in your heart? I’ve noticed for a while now that every time we’re together, you seem distracted. When I try to get close to you, you avoid me like the plague.”

“I…” Shen Qi instinctively wanted to refute, but the words got stuck in his throat, and he hesitated for a long time without saying anything.

Zhao Lingling took his silence as a tacit admission. As a proud and pampered young lady who had always been treated like a princess, she had never suffered such humiliation, and her features twisted in anger.

“Shen Qi, you jerk, you’ll regret this!”

The evening ended, of course, on a sour note. Zhao Lingling stomped off in her high heels, while Shen Qi stayed seated alone, staring through the clean, bright floor-to-ceiling windows at the rolling river in the distance and the night sky of the city. But all he could think about was the scene when Gu Yan confessed to him that year.

…

At that time, he and Gu Yan had only known each other for three months and had barely considered each other friends. Then, on Christmas Day, Gu Yan confessed to him.

That night, Gu Yan had also reserved a rather famous restaurant. When Shen Qi was led to the private room by the waiter, he immediately saw Gu Yan sitting at the table, grinning foolishly at the door, with… a huge bouquet of red roses in his arms.

It was truly a massive bouquet. If Gu Yan hadn’t been trying so hard to peek over the top, the flowers would have completely obscured him. Shen Qi later learned that there were exactly 520 roses in that bouquet.

After a few months of getting to know each other, Shen Qi knew that Gu Yan was straightforward, but he hadn’t expected him to be so bold and direct with his confession.

As soon as the waiter closed the door to the private room, Gu Yan stood up, holding that bouquet of roses, and took two steps toward Shen Qi.

He shifted his leg, tried to kneel, but quickly stood up straight again, looking a bit embarrassed.

Shen Qi figured he was trying to imitate the way male leads propose to female leads in movies or TV shows by getting down on one knee, but the bouquet of roses was just too big, making the kneeling position quite difficult. After thinking it over, Gu Yan gave up on the idea.

It was somewhat amusing, but Shen Qi couldn’t quite remember whether he had laughed at the time. Maybe he had, maybe he hadn’t.

Gu Yan had hesitated for a moment, then presented the bouquet to Shen Qi and asked, “Shen Qi, I like you. Will you be my boyfriend?” His tone was open and sincere, but with a hint of nervousness, as if afraid of being rejected.

Shen Qi, having grown up receiving countless confessions from girls, had never experienced a confession from someone of the same sex. Faced with this sudden situation, he panicked and stood there, dumbfounded, looking at Gu Yan, then at the flowers in his hand, completely at a loss.

It took him a while to regain his speech, and he foolishly asked, “Why do you like me?”

He genuinely couldn’t understand why Gu Yan would be interested in him.

He wasn’t particularly handsome, and his personality was dull and boring. But Gu Yan? Gu Yan was a shining star at school, good-looking and with a great personality. Everyone liked him.

What reason could Gu Yan possibly have to like him?

It was too unbelievable.

But Gu Yan said, “I just like you. There’s no why. If I had to give a reason… I don’t know if you remember, but the first time we met was actually in a KTV room. I thought you were really good-looking, so it must have been love at first sight. The more I got to know you, the more I liked you. I like everything about you.”

At that moment, Shen Qi finally understood that all the coincidences and chance encounters before were actually Gu Yan’s deliberate attempts.

What did he say to Gu Yan back then? It was probably something similar to what he said to Zhao Lingling tonight. He said:

“Gu Yan, I really appreciate your feelings, but…”

“But don’t give me that ‘nice person’ card, Shen Qi. I like you because I want to. If you’re willing, then accept it. If you’re not, I’ll just keep trying.”

His words were like a shameless rascal’s, but they successfully blocked the “but I don’t like men” that Shen Qi had been about to say.

And then… and then for many years afterward, he never had the courage to say those words to Gu Yan.

Author’s note:

Gu Yan: So it’s still my fault???