Starlight Has No Past
Chapter 2 Part 2
Zhou Tingshen paid for his purchase first and left. Ye Qiao brought her
medicine to the register, ready to say goodbye to him. Unexpectedly, he
returned to the store, strode back next to the counter, and grabbed the
clerk’s hand under the counter.
Ye Qiao turned her head, stunned.
The clerk shouted as she struggled: “Let go of me! What are you doing!”
There was no sympathy in his eyes. He pried open the clerk’s tightly clasped
fingers and took her cell phone, deleting the first two pictures on the phone.
“You’re crazy, it’s none of your……” The clerk shouted; before she could
utter the word ‘business’, she withered under his chilling glare.
Ye Qiao quietly observed at the side. When she saw his eyes-- --The way
he furrowed his eyebrows was quite frightening, as if he was a fierce animal,
born to kill.
He released the clerk’s wrist, leaving the skin red. Tears welled up in the
clerk’s eyes from the pain. What was the big deal of taking a picture of an
actress and a man coming into the drug store and sending it to her friends?
She stared at him and cursed in a low voice.
Ye Qiao understood what had happened and exchanged a look with him
without saying a word. Even though he was doing her a favor, Ye Qiao still
thought that it was too violent of a reaction.
She paid for her medicine and walked out of the store. With the night breeze
blowing, she felt more peaceful and looked back at him: “Thank you.”
“No need.” Zhou Tingshen sat down on the edge of a flower bed by the
roadside, without paying attention to Ye Qiao. He opened a bottle and
swallowed an anti-inflammatory pill. Then he started to apply alcohol to
his wounds with little expression.
Ye Qiao quietly watched with hands in her pockets.
He had more injuries over his body than it seemed. There was a slash on
his right shoulder near the neck. It was difficult to reach, but he finished
hastily applying alcohol over it. He was rough on himself as well, acting like
a fugitive.
But despite being a fugitive, he couldn’t paste on the bandage over the
slash accurately.
Ye Qiao went up to him and took the bandage: “Let me help you.”
She peeled off the paper slips and bent over to apply it for him.
They were so close together that they could smell the other, the fragrance
of a women’s hair and the smell of alcohol mixed with the faint smell of
tobacco and blood on the man.
The man didn’t smell pleasant, yet Ye Qiao wasn’t disgusted by it. Maybe it
was because his body was warm and his rough skin gave her a sense of
dependability.
Unfortunately, appearances usually turned out not to be true.
“It’s done.”
She straightened up and put all the trash into a plastic bag: “I’ll throw them
away for you.”
He lit up another cigarette again and squinted at her: “Sure.”
Ye Qiao turned around to walk away, then threw the bag into the trash can.
Zhou Tingshen’s eyes quietly followed her. She suddenly paused, pulled
out her cell phone from her pocket. Her back obviously stiffened a bit.
There were several missed calls and one text message on her phone screen.
Ye Qiao didn’t even bother to check the message, deleting it and blocking
the sender at the same time.
When she went back to Qianxi’s place, Qianxi was sitting in the living room
talking on the phone: “Ah, she’s at my place. Yeah, she’s fine. She’s gone
out to get medicine. Ah, she’s in a good mood. It’s normal medicine, en, right……”
Ye Qiao went over to grab the phone out of Qianxi’s hand: “Gu Jin, how long
are you going to linger around?”
Before the other side could say anything, she hung up the phone.
Qianxi led her to sit down on the sofa: “Ahhh, cousin, don’t get angry at me…...
I didn’t mean to talk to him on the phone. He said that you left the banquet early
and no one answered the phone at your place. He’s afraid that you got too
depressed……”
Ye Qiao sneered: “Does he have to be so full of himself? How old am I now,
I would jump from the building just because of a breakup?” She tried her best
to control her emotions and wanted to take her pills. But her hands were shaking,
spilling the pills out of her palm.
“Don’t, don’t, don’t.” Qianxi seized all the pills. “If you take too many of these,
it will be exactly what that jerk’s hoping for!”