Jiang Meilin stopped where she was.
She pricked up her ears and listened carefully for a while.
After hesitating a moment, she turned around and went back downstairs.
She thought that this summer she would have to find a time to talk to her daughter about the things that go on between men and women. The girl couldn’t be left knowing nothing at all.
In the room.
Chen Qingqing finally managed to shove Xu Ye off. She rubbed her head and asked, “Do you have to go to the factory for work every day now?”
“There’s nothing to do at home anyway.” Xu Ye laughed. “Though I’m a boss now too, so I can go in whenever I like. It’s fairly free.”
“Friday is the tenth.”
Xu Ye made a sound of agreement. “I haven’t forgotten. I’m planning to book out a screen and bring your mom and dad and little Yuxin along.”
“What about your mom and dad?”
“They have to work on Friday.”
“That’s a relief, then.”
Xu Ye didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. “Are you really that frightened of meeting the parents?”
Chen Qingqing was too embarrassed to answer and simply pretended she hadn’t heard.
Xu Ye rolled over and lay flat on the bed, that trademark wicked grin coming over his face again. “How is your bed this comfortable to lie on? Can I sleep in your bed tonight?”
“No. Get lost.”
“Qingqing, you didn’t used to be like this. Why is it ‘get lost’ at the drop of a hat now?”
“Whose fault is it that you keep making me angry.”
“Then let me hold you a minute and I’ll coax you out of it again.”
“Get lost~”
“Don’t be like that. I was lying on your hair just now — so to make it up to you, how about you lie on me?”
“You sick pervert. Get up. You’re not allowed on my bed.”
Xu Ye lay there on the bed like a dead pig, and however Chen Qingqing pushed, pulled, thumped and hit, he didn’t move an inch — the very picture of a man with no shame at all.
…
The next day.
Monkey King: Hero Is Back had already gone on advance sale. Xu Ye took his lunch break to go straight to the cinema near the Wanda and talk to the manager about booking the place out.
The manager naturally agreed to it all the moment he heard, since Jiangzhou was not a first- or second-tier city and even in the summer break the cinema didn’t fill up.
Xu Ye paid a deposit and went back to the factory to work in the afternoon.
Once Zhang Xiaonuan had finished the job Xu Ye had given her, she brought a list over to him. “Boss Xu, I’ve contacted everybody you told me to. Half of them don’t want to take our business. This is the other half, the ones who do. I asked about price in passing, but they all seem to want a percentage.”
Xu Ye reached out and took the list. The screen names on it were Little Cute Bunny, Aning Loves to Dance, Lin Xiaoqi…
These were all people Xu Ye had picked out himself. One look at the list and he knew that most of the internet celebrities on it were uploaders from Bilibili’s dance section.
The one that had stayed with him most was this Little Cute Bunny. She had over 1.7 million followers, and the work on her home page was all anime dance covers, every video with a great many comments from shut-in men underneath it.
Xu Ye picked up his phone and got ready to call these people. Seeing that, Zhang Xiaonuan added quickly, “You’d better add them on WeChat and talk to them there. They don’t like phone calls.”
“Right, understood. You can go do other things now.”
Once Zhang Xiaonuan had gone, Xu Ye got in touch with them one after another on WeChat. What surprised him slightly was that the internet celebrity with the screen name Little Cute Bunny actually knew the Youwei brand. The arrangement he settled on with them in the end was a rebate in the form of commission.
They would film a video wearing Youwei clothes and put the Taobao link under the video, and for however many people clicked through the link under their videos and paid for something, Xu Ye’s side would owe them a commission of five yuan per order.
Xu Ye spent two hours settling terms with each of these internet celebrities.
Then he called Tang Bowen at the company and had him put together a business contract. Along with mailing the contracts to the internet celebrities, Xu Ye also had warehouse keeper Shen Mengmeng send each of them a batch of sample garments, and made a point of having Qin Zhiwei check the quality.
Pei Youwei didn’t put a hand in anywhere in all of this. She trusted Xu Ye one hundred percent.
Seeing Xu Ye at a loose end, Pei Youwei propped her cheek on her hand and said, smiling, “Xu Ye, get your girlfriend out tonight and let’s all go for skewers.”
Xu Ye didn’t decline today. He agreed to it readily, then made a voice call to Chen Qingqing.
Chen Qingqing was at home on her tablet watching Wu Xin: The Monster Killer, which had premiered only in the last couple of days. Seeing that Xu Ye was calling, she picked up quickly.
“What is it?”
“We’re going out to eat tonight. Tell your mom. I’ll be at your place at six twenty to pick you up.”
“Just the two of us?”
“Boss is treating.”
“Oh. Understood.”
Once the call was done, Xu Ye went to pick Chen Qingqing up early, before the end of the working day. He had meant to bring Qin Zhiwei along too, but there had been another order spike on the Taobao side today and the warehouse couldn’t keep up, so Xu Ye didn’t take him.
The moment Chen Qingqing hung up she put the tablet down and went to wash her hair first, and once it was six she went back to her room and changed her clothes.
On top she wore a loose beige T-shirt with the hem tucked into her waistband, and on the bottom something that looked like a short skirt but was actually a pair of shorts. All in all the outfit made Chen Qingqing look very pure and very girlish.
Jiang Meilin saw Chen Qingqing come down from upstairs in a different set of clothes and guessed she was going out shortly, so she asked, knowing the answer perfectly well, “Going out?”
“Yes, we’re going out to eat this evening.”
Jiang Meilin asked in passing, “Do you want to take some money with you?”
Chen Qingqing said, with a touch of pride, “No need. He’s very rich now.”
…
Half past seven in the evening.
It had already gone dark.
Outside a street stall on the night market, Pei Youwei, Zhang Xiaonuan, Xu Ye and Chen Qingqing found a table and sat down together.
The barbecue place was run by a husband and wife. Once they had sat down the wife came over with paper and pen and asked, “What would you like to eat?”
Xu Ye knew they had small appetites and wouldn’t get through much, so he ordered only a few portions of each kind of skewer, thinking that if it wasn’t enough later they could order more, and if it was too much it would only be wasted.
The wife wrote down what Xu Ye wanted one item at a time, and at the end she added, “Our oysters and lamb kidneys are the specialties. Do you want to give them a try?”
Xu Ye waved his hands hurriedly. “No, no. We’re not used to that sort of thing.”
“That’s fine. You sit for a bit and I’ll bring you a plate of salt-boiled peanuts to line your stomachs.”
“You got it.”
Pei Youwei soon struck up a conversation with Chen Qingqing. It was all perfectly proper at the start, but later Pei Youwei took advantage of being the older woman and began teasing Chen Qingqing, asking one question after another that put her on the spot — until Xu Ye couldn’t stand it any longer and cut in outright. “Hey, hey, hey. Boss, don’t put on this act of knowing everything. You’re still a singleton yourself.”
“I wasn’t talking to you. What are you getting so worked up about?”
“My Qingqing’s face has gone completely red and you’re still going on. What is it — business got bigger and your skin got thicker with it?”
“Tch, tch, tch. Listen to my Qingqing. However thick my skin is, it’s nothing to yours.”
Xu Ye smiled. “Boss, can I ask you a question?”
“Ask, then.”
“I hear that seventy percent of girls watch porn before they go to sleep. So what are the other thirty percent doing?”
What kind of question is that?
Pei Youwei frowned. “How would I know? Why are you asking me that? Why would I know?”
Xu Ye nodded, with the look of a man who had just seen the light. “Well, since you don’t know, you must be one of the seventy percent.”
Pei Youwei didn’t quite catch up.
But the onlooker saw clearest. Zhang Xiaonuan heard it and immediately started laughing with both hands over her stomach, and it took Pei Youwei a long moment to work out that Xu Ye had set her up. She immediately threw Chen Qingqing a look. “Qingqing, hit him for me!”
Chen Qingqing really did do as she was told. She reached over and patted Xu Ye lightly on the thigh.
Pei Youwei was lost for words. “I told you to hit him, not stroke him.”
Chen Qingqing gave an embarrassed laugh, and didn’t raise a hand again.
(End of Chapter 258)