Yu Xiaxing pulled out her phone and searched, “Can I list high-end cigarettes and cigars I’m not using anymore for sale on Xianyu?”
All that came up were laws, regulations, and warnings about the risks:
“Individuals are prohibited from selling any tobacco products privately! It’s illegal!”
“Having a friend with a tobacco retail license sell them for you? That’s illegal too! Licenses may not be transferred or loaned out!”
“Can’t finish them yourself? The safest option is to throw them away! Otherwise, give them to relatives or friends as gifts!”
The more Yu Xiaxing read, the more she hated the things.
Throwing them away seemed wasteful, keeping them was pointless, selling them was illegal, and giving them to friends or relatives would only do them harm.
Just as she was debating whether to toss them back where she had found them, she suddenly spotted a man passing by the courtyard gate in the distance, carrying something in his hand.
Huh? That looked like her fourth sister’s boyfriend, Su Hao.
What he was carrying was a tea-cake wrapper woven from bamboo strips. The brand seemed to be a fairly good Pu-erh tea.
Su Hao was a director in his thirties. He had been dating her fourth sister for several years, and every project he had made was funded by her. The two of them were currently discussing marriage.
Her fourth sister had fallen for him because she was artistic and admired Su Hao’s supposed talent.
But in Yu Xiaxing’s opinion, Su Hao had no talent to speak of.
The films he made were all the kind of vague, artsy productions that were neither commercially viable nor particularly artistic.
If her fourth sister hadn’t thrown money at him, he would never have gained any recognition.
Still, Yu Xiaxing’s poor impression of him wasn’t only because of his lack of talent.
It was even more because of what he had done in her previous life—a textbook example of biting the hand that fed him.
At the time, her fourth sister was awaiting sentencing over the case in which an elderly man had been driven to death after the property management company cut off his utilities.
The boyfriend who had repeatedly promised, “No matter what happens, I’ll stay by your side,” had turned around and been photographed by paparazzi kissing another woman in a car late at night.
For him to move on so seamlessly, he must have been cheating long before that.
It wasn’t as if a man was obligated to wait around after his fiancée went to prison… But that had been the lowest and most humiliating point of her fourth sister’s life. The least he could have done—if he had even been remotely human—was wait a little longer, right?
After learning about the affair in prison, her fourth sister repeatedly asked people to persuade Su Hao to visit her so they could talk face-to-face. Su Hao refused to go.
She missed him terribly and cried herself to sleep every day. Her mental state deteriorated by the day.
Prisoners were required to perform labor, and one day, while operating a machine, she was so distracted that she injured her hand and had to have it amputated.
By the time she finished her sentence, she would be disabled.
Their grandfather was still alive then. Determined to avenge her, he had planned to ruin Su Hao and his mistress.
Unfortunately, the mistress had been protected extremely well. In the end, they never even managed to find out who she was.
Yu Xiaxing disliked her stiff, self-important fourth sister, but she disliked a spineless ingrate like Su Hao even more—someone who ate from the bowl, then turned around and cursed the person who filled it.
People like him deserved to be beaten to death.
She immediately chased after him. “Fourth Brother-in-Law!”
He and her fourth sister weren’t married yet, but they were engaged, so calling him that was perfectly appropriate.
Su Hao studied Yu Xiaxing for a moment before remembering that she was his girlfriend’s cousin.
He had always been fond of pretty young girls. With a faint smile, he said, “Hello, Xingxing.”
Yu Xiaxing’s gaze naturally fell on the tea bag in his hand. “Fourth Brother-in-Law, did you bring some good tea for Fourth Sister? The packaging is so unique.”
At that, Su Hao’s smile deepened.
When he spoke again, his modest tone was tinged with unmistakable pride. “I bought this at an auction when I was visiting the southern province for inspiration a while back. It’s a ‘Bai Cai Tuo’ from the Menghai Tea Factory, made in the late 1990s. It’s top quality. Since I’m here today, I thought I’d bring it for you sisters to try.”
Yu Xiaxing raised the box of cigars in her hand. “Fourth Brother-in-Law, I heard from Fourth Sister that you like cigars. Do you want these?”
Su Hao’s eyes widened.
He knew his cigars, and he was a seasoned connoisseur.
That box of Cohiba Esplendidos was absolutely worth more than a hundred thousand yuan.
Was this girl offering to give it to him?
He looked at Yu Xiaxing again. His gaze now held the faintly superior scrutiny of an older artsy man sizing up a pretty young woman.
He assumed Yu Xiaxing was like all those young girls who worshipped artistic geniuses, trying to curry favor with him—or get close to him—through a gift like this.
He took the box. “Then, thank—”
Before he could finish, Yu Xiaxing snatched the tea from his hand and casually handed him the cigars.
“Then let’s trade!”
Her eyes curved into a bright smile, clear and sparkling. There wasn’t the slightest trace of flirtation or adoration in them.
Su Hao froze, momentarily at a loss for words.
Yu Xiaxing acted as though she hadn’t noticed. Hugging the tea cake to her chest, she waved cheerfully. “Goodbye, Fourth Brother-in-Law.”
Then she turned and walked back inside.
Su Hao stared at the cigars in his hand.
That tea cake had cost him more than three hundred thousand yuan at auction. It seemed he had come off a little worse in the exchange.
But as a man, he was too embarrassed to haggle with a young girl and make himself look petty.
He could only swallow the loss for now and leave with the cigars.
Yu Xiaxing carried the Pu-erh tea, its package exuding the fresh, natural fragrance of bamboo and wood, and her mood brightened again.
She hurried back to her room.
When she opened it, she found two cakes of Pu-erh tea, each carefully wrapped in woven bamboo strips. Each one looked like a small round shield. The dark-brown wrapping paper bore the tea factory’s logo and glowed with the warm luster of something that had aged for many years.
She picked up one cake and brought it close to her nose. Even through the wrapping, she could faintly smell its aged fragrance.
Not bad. A fair trade.
She stared at the two tea cakes for several seconds before the image of Yu Zheng casually dumping the cigars out last night flashed through her mind.
Quitting smoking must be pretty uncomfortable, right?
Since she had picked up the cigars from Fifth Brother’s trash and traded them for this tea, she supposed she could be magnanimous and share a cup with him!
She picked up one of the tea cakes, walked out of her room, and knocked on Yu Zheng’s door.
“Come in.” His lazy voice drifted from inside.
Yu Xiaxing pushed the door open.
Yu Zheng was leaning by the window with a tablet computer in his hand.
He had probably already begun working hard on Mission Two.
Yu Xiaxing walked straight over and held out the Pu-erh tea. “Here.”
She lifted her chin slightly, indicating that he should take it.
Yu Zheng accepted it automatically. It felt heavy in his hand and carried the fresh fragrance of tea leaves.
A slow smile spread across his face. “Are you worried that I won’t have anything to keep me alert after quitting smoking, so you specially dug this out for me in the middle of the night?”
How could Yu Xiaxing tell him that she had picked it up from his trash and traded it for the tea…?
She didn’t bother explaining. “If you don’t want it, give it back.”
Yu Zheng lifted the tea cake high above his head, his smile growing wider. “Can’t you admit that you’re worried about me? You were afraid quitting smoking would be hard on me, so you specially got me something to keep me awake. Is it really that difficult to admit you care about me? The tsundere act is outdated, you know.”
Yu Xiaxing: “…”
What on earth was wrong with this world?
Why did everyone around her—both at home and at work—love making things up in their heads?
When Yu Zheng saw that she didn’t respond, he took it as shyness.
He didn’t press her further. “All right, I’ll keep the tea. Thanks, little sister. I’ve got work to do. I absolutely won’t let you win this round’s reward.”
The moment Yu Xiaxing heard that, her mood brightened instantly. She nodded repeatedly, careful not to disturb him while he worked, and turned to leave.
The corners of Yu Zheng’s lips lifted uncontrollably.
If he’d known that a simple apology to his little sister would have patched things up—and earned him such blissful pampering—he would have flown to the country where she studied long ago to beg her forgiveness.
