Let Me Meet You chapter 31
Lunatic
“Li Xuan.”
As soon as Sheng Min left the classroom, he heard someone call Li Xuan’s name from behind. He froze for a moment, then turned around to see two middle-aged men at the end of the corridor.
The younger one seemed vaguely familiar, and as Sheng Min was thinking about it, a classmate who had greeted Li Xuan earlier came out behind him.
“Is the director looking for you?” the classmate asked.
The mention of it jogged Sheng Min’s memory. He remembered seeing this person’s photo on the bulletin board downstairs in the department building — the head of the physics department.
“I don’t know,” Sheng Min answered truthfully.
“I’ll head off then.” The classmate said. “Did you copy the materials to the USB yet?”
“Yes, thank you. You can go ahead. Bye.”
“You’re being polite today,” the classmate laughed and waved. “Bye.”
The two men were still standing at the end of the corridor, obviously waiting for him to approach. It was the department head who had called Li Xuan’s name, but perhaps due to years of training in dealing with different kinds of people in the entertainment industry, Sheng Min instinctively felt that the man standing beside the department head was the one who was really looking for him.
“Director.” Sheng Min walked over and greeted him calmly, then looked at the man beside him.
The man was probably in his early fifties, tall and thin for his age, wearing gold-rimmed glasses, looking serious, and dressed in fine clothing. He stared silently at Sheng Min.
Not recognizing him and unable to recall Li Xuan mentioning anyone like him, Sheng Min waited for the man to speak, but after a long silence, it was the department head who broke it.
“You two really are something. When you meet, why don’t you speak?”
Father and son?
Sheng Min’s eyelid twitched. He distinctly remembered Li Xuan saying he was an orphan, that his parents had died in a car accident when he was three. He looked at the man in front of him again. Was this his adoptive father? Sheng Min wondered.
“Li Xuan, you’re in the wrong here,” the department head said with a smile. “You don’t talk much, fine, but your dad has been waiting for you here for an entire class period. Right, Mingge?”
Li Mingge forced a smile and finally spoke, “No class today?”
“Mm,” Sheng Min responded, answering vaguely.
“Ah, you two…” The department head was about to continue when his phone rang.
“Hello… I’m in the department building… Okay, you guys go ahead, I’ll be there in a minute…” He hung up and walked over, looking a little apologetic. “Mingge, I have a meeting.”
“No worries,” Li Mingge replied. “Go ahead.”
The department head glanced at his phone, looking slightly urgent. “Alright, take your time with the kid. He’s grown up now. When Senior gave birth to him, we went to the hospital to see him. He was just a baby then, but now he’s all grown up. So, listen to what he has to say.” He patted Sheng Min’s shoulder. “Have a good talk with your dad. Between father and son, there’s nothing you can’t discuss…. Mingge, we’ll set up another time, tell Senior I said hi.”
The department head hurried away. Li Mingge then turned back to Sheng Min. “You were supposed to come home on Monday. Why didn’t you?”
Sheng Min was still trying to figure out what the director had meant by asking them to “talk,” but hearing Li Mingge’s question, he paused for a moment and said, “I had something else come up that day.”
“Something came up?”
“Yeah.” Sheng Min lowered his eyes. They had gone to record an interview on Monday, but he hadn’t heard Li Xuan mention anything about going home. Not wanting to say too much, he didn’t answer directly.
But Li Mingge seemed used to the silence from “Li Xuan” in front of him and didn’t press further. “Now that you’re free, can you come home today?”
It sounded like a question, but the tone was clearly different.
“I…” Sheng Min bit his lip.
“Li Xuan.” Li Mingge’s tone grew firmer when he saw Sheng Min hesitating. “Your mother hasn’t been doing well lately. You must come back with me today… We need to talk about other things too.”
“What’s going on?” Sheng Min instinctively asked. Li Mingge frowned at him. “Are you going to make me say it here? You’ve made up your mind not to come with me today? Li Xuan, no matter what, a man should keep his word.”
Li Xuan had never mentioned anything about his family to him, and Sheng Min had no idea what Li Mingge was talking about. He briefly thought about making an excuse to step aside and call Li Xuan.
But what would Li Xuan do? Sheng Min frowned unconsciously. He would probably tell him to leave and not worry about it, or maybe just come over directly. After all, Li Xuan hadn’t even told him he was supposed to go home.
Sheng Min quickly weighed the situation in his mind and glanced again at Li Mingge. One thing was clear: if this was something Li Xuan could decline, Li Mingge wouldn’t have come to the school.
“I can come back,” Sheng Min decided quickly. “But I have an appointment in the afternoon, and I have to leave by 1:30 at the latest.”
“We’ll see about that.”
“I really have something to do.” Sheng Min said. He wasn’t sure what exactly they would discuss, but he needed a reason to leave on time.
Li Mingge’s gaze carried visible displeasure. Sheng Min, unaccustomed to arguing with others, swallowed hard, yet his tone remained firm as he asked, “Is that alright?”
“Let’s go,” Li Mingge finally said.
In the parking lot behind the department building, reserved for faculty and staff, Li Mingge’s black Maybach was parked.
“President Li.” The driver, seeing them approach, stepped forward to open the car door for Li Mingge and nodded at Sheng Min in a familiar manner. “Xiao Xuan.”
Sheng Min managed a faint smile in response and bent down to get into the car.
Perhaps mindful of the presence of a third party, Li Mingge refrained from saying much after they got into the car. Sheng Min, having taken his antidepressants earlier, was feeling rather drained. Pressing hard on the pressure point between his thumb and index finger to keep himself from showing fatigue, he slowly began sorting through the situation in his mind.
“President Li, are we heading straight home, or do you want to stop by the office first?” the driver asked as they left the school.
“Home,” Li Mingge replied.
Something clicked in Sheng Min’s mind. He turned slightly, pulled out his phone, and began typing “Li Mingge” into the search bar.
Unsure of which characters to use for the name, he tried several variations before locking onto the correct person. As he scrolled through the information, he found that there wasn’t much on Li Mingge. However, there was a two-year-old interview mentioning him as the chairman of an optical company.
Following the interview trail, Sheng Min discovered the company’s official website. While not a massive enterprise, it was far from an obscure small business. In fact, one of the cameras Sheng Min had endorsed used lenses supplied by Li Mingge’s company.
The car cruised smoothly over a flyover and stopped near a commercial district.
Lost in thought, Sheng Min looked up, assuming they’d arrived, but only the driver had stepped out of the car. Noticing Sheng Min’s gaze, Li Mingge glanced at him. Sheng Min nonchalantly looked away.
From the tone and demeanor of their interaction, Sheng Min could tell that Li Xuan and his supposed adoptive father, Li Mingge, were not close—not even remotely amicable.
Yet the department head and driver’s attitudes suggested that they might not know Li Xuan wasn’t Li Mingge’s biological son. It was understandable for the driver to be unaware, but the department head, who seemed to have known Li Mingge for years, likely wouldn’t be in the dark about such a matter.
According to Li Xuan, the child the department head had seen at the hospital years ago shouldn’t have been him. So, where was that child? Why were people confusing him with Li Xuan?
At that moment, the car door opened, and the driver returned.
After getting in, the driver handed a finely wrapped bag to Li Mingge, who inspected it briefly before placing it on the back seat. He then addressed Sheng Min in a matter-of-fact tone, “When we get home, give this to your mother.”
‘Your mother’. Li Mingge was likely referring to the “senior” mentioned by the department head—his wife. Sheng Min noted the term with curiosity. Regardless of how outsiders viewed them, Li Mingge clearly did not act like a father in front of Li Xuan, yet he insisted on emphasizing that his wife was Li Xuan’s mother.
Why? Could Li Mingge be a stepfather rather than an adoptive father? Could Li Xuan’s mother still be alive but remarried?
Could the story about his parents’ fatal car accident have been a lie?
The thought flashed briefly through Sheng Min’s mind before he quickly dismissed it.
No, it couldn’t be. Although Li Xuan often joked with him about inconsequential matters, the pain and anger in his voice when talking about his parents seemed genuine. Sheng Min didn’t believe Li Xuan would lie about something like that.
The rows of trees along the roadside quickly blurred past, their shadows overlapping with the sunlight. Sheng Min stared out the window, feeling as though he was being pulled into a web he didn’t want to be a part of, unable to discern the truth of the situation.
The voice of the GPS broke the silence, coldly announcing, “Turn left on the current road. Your destination is 700 meters ahead.” Sheng Min adjusted his breathing, trying to calm himself.
The car had reached the city’s outskirts, nestled against a mountain. The serene environment marked this area as a well-known upscale villa district, and Li Mingge’s home was located here.
“President Li, should I park in the garage?” the driver asked after pulling up in front of a detached villa.
“Just stop at the gate,” Li Mingge replied.
The driver quickly stepped out to open the door for Li Mingge. Sheng Min followed, noticing a woman standing at the gate. Upon seeing them, she eagerly approached.
“Take this to your mother,” Li Mingge said, grabbing the wrapped bag from the car and handing it to Sheng Min before giving his shoulder a gentle push.
Before Sheng Min could react, the woman had already reached him.
“You’re back?” she said with a smile.
The moment Sheng Min saw her, some of his doubts were resolved. But almost immediately, even in the warmth of June’s outdoors, a chill crept silently up his spine.
This woman, Li Mingge’s wife and Li Xuan’s supposed adoptive mother, was a lunatic.