“Good.” Yan Bin lit the cigarette without a shred of hesitation and blew a long stream of smoke in Jiang Hansheng’s direction. “You remember me, don’t you?”
Jiang Hansheng said nothing.
“Haven’t seen each other in years,” Yan Bin said. “But looking at you now, I still find you just as unpleasant.”
A child’s dislike never requires a strong rationale. Back then, it had taken nothing more than Jiang Cheng saying once that Jiang Hansheng was strange — and from that day on, Yan Bin couldn’t look at the boy without his hackles rising.
Jiang Cheng had considered Yan Bin beneath his notice, but Yan Bin had been more of a troublemaker as a child and openly admitted he lacked that kind of restraint — so he had done more than a few things he wasn’t particularly proud of.
Thinking back on it now, Jiang Hansheng hadn’t really done anything that warranted it. But even now, facing him again, Yan Bin felt no great remorse.
Because he had become Zhou Jin’s husband.
If Zhou Jin’s final choice had been some stranger, Yan Bin wouldn’t have thought anything of it — he would have offered his blessings with a genuine heart. But the fact that it was Jiang Hansheng left a peculiar feeling sitting at the bottom of his chest that he couldn’t quite put words to.
A peculiar coincidence.
“There’s a saying I’ve always liked: the dog that bites doesn’t bark. Back then you were following Zhou Jin around like some kind of obsessive, day after day, and she wouldn’t even spare you a glance — yet somehow you’ve ended up married to her…”
Yan Bin leaned forward and fixed his eyes hard on Jiang Hansheng. “Why are you with her? Is it because you genuinely care about her — or because you couldn’t stand to lose?”
Men like Jiang Hansheng, Yan Bin had seen plenty of. Accustomed from childhood to getting whatever they wanted with ease, everything smooth and untroubled — and then they encountered one woman they couldn’t catch, and that woman became everything.
Was that love? Not necessarily.
In Yan Bin’s eyes, the only person who had truly ever loved Zhou Jin was Jiang Cheng.
Jiang Hansheng smiled faintly.
Yan Bin’s eyes narrowed. “What are you smiling about?”
“Yan Bin. Neither of us is a child anymore. Petty, juvenile provocation doesn’t do anything for me.”
The smile remained — but his eyes shifted in an instant. Something cold and nearly predatory surfaced within them.
Jiang Hansheng raised his hand and slid the ashtray across the table toward Yan Bin. Yan Bin moved on instinct to catch it — but the ashtray came straight and fast, and thudded squarely into his ribs with a dull impact.
Yan Bin’s face twisted in pain, brow cinching tight. He looked at Jiang Hansheng. “What the—”
“I told you,” Jiang Hansheng said, his voice flat and cold. “I mind.”
Yan Bin stared at him for a moment, and felt something he hadn’t expected — a flicker of unease.
He suddenly remembered the eyes Jiang Hansheng had turned on him all those years ago. Black and white, sharply defined. Cold in a way that didn’t belong to a child’s face — no excess emotion of any kind.
In that gaze, it had always felt as though it was Yan Bin who was the pitiable one — the wretch being pushed around.
“…”
Yan Bin sat there, a breath stuck in his chest, fury with nowhere to go. He picked up the ashtray and set it back in place, then ground the cigarette out with force.
“Thank you,” said Jiang Hansheng.
A short while later, the server arrived with the two pitchers of beer.
Yan Bin tipped his head back and took several long, deep swallows, dousing some of the fire in his gut, then said: “In my eyes, you don’t come close to Jiang Cheng.”
“What you think of me doesn’t concern me,” Jiang Hansheng said.
Yan Bin let out a short, scoffing laugh. “And Zhou Jin? Does her opinion concern you?”
“…”
“If it weren’t for her parents getting on in years, and her being the only one left at home — marriage wouldn’t have crossed her mind.” Yan Bin said. “You lived in Gardenia Alley. You know who she cared about.”
“…”
Jiang Hansheng’s silence was answer enough. Yan Bin raised his glass in his direction, an expression on his face like a man watching a show play out. “I’ll drink to you, then. Cherish what you have.”
Zhou Jin finished her call and pushed back into the private room, lifting the door curtain — just in time to see Jiang Hansheng pick up the glass, tip his head back, and drain it in a single swallow.
The tips of his ears flooded red in an instant. His voice, however, stayed steady. “I will,” he said, brief and certain.
Yan Bin stared at him. “…”
Zhou Jin startled and reached quickly for Jiang Hansheng’s back. “I thought you don’t drink?”
For some reason, Yan Bin suddenly burst out laughing. He waved Zhou Jin over to sit down. “He’s fine! Of course he can drink!”
He snapped his fingers and called the server back in to order a bottle of baijiu.
Zhou Jin couldn’t work out what Jiang Hansheng was trying to prove — but every time Yan Bin clinked his glass, Jiang Hansheng accepted without flinching.
The sharp burn of alcohol scorched a path from his throat all the way down to his stomach. He bore it with only a slight tension in his brow, cup after cup, without slowing.
Zhou Jin sat beside him, growing more unsettled with every passing minute.
She hadn’t known Jiang Hansheng for a long time, but she knew he was always a measured, controlled person — someone who didn’t touch alcohol. To be drinking like this on what must be his first time, throwing back glass after glass — it wasn’t right. Something wasn’t right at all.
Before long, Zhou Jin couldn’t hold back any longer. She closed her hand firmly over his glass and said sharply: “Enough. We’re going home.”
She stood and reached for Jiang Hansheng’s arm to help him up.
Yan Bin was already well into his cups, and the liquor had loosened whatever remained of his filter. “Let him drink. He overestimates himself — who’s to blame for that?”
The sharpness of Yan Bin’s hostility was barely concealed at this point. Zhou Jin’s eyes went cold quickly. “Did you say something to him?” she asked, her tone clipped.
Yan Bin shrugged. “What could I have said? Just brought up some old things.”
Old things. What old things could there be, other than Jiang Cheng?
Zhou Jin gave a slow nod, then said through her teeth: “Yan Bin. You’ve got nerve.”
Hearing his full name said without any warmth — without even a trace of it, only something close to hostility — Yan Bin’s temper surged. The liquor was already pushing from behind, and the last of his restraint gave way.
“I’m doing this for you!” he shouted. “Zhou Jin, what the hell kind of marriage is this?!”
“To ease your parents’ minds, you just grabbed whoever was available?! This is your whole life we’re talking about! Do you even know him?! Do you know that this guy is out of his—!”
“I don’t know him.” Zhou Jin’s hands were trembling slightly. “I thought I knew Jiang Cheng. What good did that do me? I thought I knew you too — which is why I brought him here to meet you.”
Yan Bin’s voice died in his throat. “…”
“If you want to say something for my sake, say it to me,” Zhou Jin said. “Jiang Hansheng has nothing to do with any of this. Don’t take it out on him.”
“XIAO WU! ZHOU JIN——!!” Yan Bin’s face was blazing, and he was half out of his seat.