CH 16

Chapter 16: Wedding Dress

Ruan Zhizhi thought that she had probably overestimated herself.

She really had no way of forgetting Li Sichen. So long as that person appeared before her eyes once more, she would still suffer a crushing defeat just like she did seven years ago.

She was perturbed the entire day at work. Even during her lunch break, she accidentally spilled water on herself while making tea. At her side, Lu Wanyi thought she had fallen ill and was feeling uncomfortable, so she became anxious: “Zhizhi, are you alright? I see that you’ve been in an especially poor condition all day. How about you request a leave of absence and go to the hospital for a checkup?”

Ruan Zhizhi shook her head in refusal. With great difficulty, she pulled the corners of her lips up into a smile. “Don’t worry, I’m fine. Maybe I didn’t get enough sleep last night, so today my energy isn’t too good.”

With Ruan Zhizhi’s repeated assurances, Lu Wanyi reluctantly let it go and went back to work. Ruan Zhizhi buried her head deep in the work on her desk and continued to let her mind drift.

That figure was absolutely Li Sichen. She would not accept that she was wrong.

He really had returned to City A. But he was doing well in the United States, why come back now when his career was taking off?

Memories of that person flashed through her mind in a blur, one after another. The way he laughed, the way he played basketball on the court, the way he would drink too much and embrace her shoulders with a grin, the way he would tell others that he and her were only friends.

The thoughts in her head were a chaotic mess. After Ruan Zhizhi got off work, she took a taxi home and lay on the sofa, lost in thought.

She pulled apart the curtains and looked at the lights outside the window, feeling that she was out of her mind and very foolish. Li Sichen certainly had his own reasons for coming back. No matter what they were, it had nothing to do with her at all. 

Ruan Zhizhi hugged a pillow and shrank into the sofa, her imagination running wild. She completely forgot the passage of time. After an unknown period passed, she heard her cell phone ringing. Her train of thought was forced to return to the real world. Ruan Zhizhi shifted away with difficulty, reaching out to pick up the cell phone on the coffee table. 

“Baby, what are you doing? Did you miss me?”

On the other end of the phone was Gu Nian’s voice. As always, it was youthful, coquettish, and energetic.

Ruan Zhizhi stretched her waist languidly, held the phone to her ear, and feebly replied, “I’m idle at home, do you have any instructions, Eldest Miss?”

“Since you have spare time, accompany me to try on wedding dresses. Also, in a few days, Cheng Fengjin and I will hold our wedding ceremony.”

Hearing Gu Nian’s sweet voice saying such words, Ruan Zhizhi suddenly realized that time had passed by so fast. In the blink of an eye, it would be the date of Gu Nian and Cheng Fengjin’s wedding. 

Biting her lip subconsciously, she scratched her hair and responded somewhat apologetically, “Aiya, I’m sorry my love. These past few days I’ve been so busy with work and I completely forgot the matters of your ceremony. I’m really getting Alzheimer’s.”

“It’s fine, it’s fine, I know you’ve been busy lately. The two of us are the closest, ah.” Gu Nian smiled, not minding at all. “Then you get ready and go downstairs in fifteen minutes. I’ll pick you up at your house.”

“Alright.”

Fifteen minutes later, Gu Nian’s white BMW X5 parked at the gates of the building Ruan Zhizhi lived in, right on schedule.

When Ruan Zhizhi opened the car door and sat inside, Gu Nian was tapping the steering wheel to the beat, humming a song in a good mood. She looked very pleased.

Ruan Zhizhi smiled and couldn’t help teasing her: “It appears our Eldest Miss Gu is quite satisfied with the fact that she is on the cusp of marriage.”

“Ahem, ahem.” Gu Nian turned to look at her, a rare blush on her oval face. “Aiya, don’t make fun of me. These past few days, every day, I haven’t been able to eat or sleep well. If it wasn’t for Cheng Fengjin being especially considerate and concerned about my mood, I would’ve had premarital depression already.”

“My eldest miss, you should be content. If other people came across your life situation, even if they were dreaming, they would wake up with a smile.”

A successful career, carefree without worries, and about to marry the person she loved most in this world. This kind of luck, how many people could possess it?

Gu Nian talked and laughed with her the entire way. The pair also chatted about many things from their university days. Ruan Zhizhi was on the verge of saying what was on her mind countless times, but in the end she still couldn’t tell Gu Nian about how she had seen Li Sichen.

To say it meant losing. This time, she really couldn’t repeat the same mistakes again.

They parked the car in the underground parking lot of a high-end shopping mall. Gu Nian stopped the car and the two intimately walked into the mall elevator hand-in-hand. 

The wedding dress brand Cheng Fengjin had selected for Gu Nian was second to none in City A. It was the wedding gift many girls yearned for even in their dreams.

With regards to Ruan Zhizhi, this was the first time she had set foot in a bridal shop since she was a child. Before, Ruan Zhizhi always felt that marriage was a very distant matter for her. Moreover, for a long time now, her personal stance was to marry and give birth later. Even if she was now considered to be a half-old “leftover woman”, she had never thought about getting married.

But when she really walked into the bridal shop, she finally knew the feeling that other girls had of yearning for romance and marriage. Seeing Gu Nian’s figure standing in front of the full-length mirror, trying on wedding dresses one by one, she unexpectedly felt a little envious. She envied that Gu Nian was about to step into the wedding hall with the person she liked most in the world. She envied that there was a person Gu Nian could wear a wedding dress and put a ring on for. And from now on, Gu Nian wouldn’t have to survive a lifetime alone.

She wouldn’t have to be lonely like Ruan Zhizhi.

Gu Nian’s face was brimming with a happy smile. Altogether, she tried on five wedding dresses. Finally, under Ruan Zhizhi’s suggestion, she narrowed it down to the first dress with a princess cut as well as the third dress with a fishtail design.

Ruan Zhizhi sat on one side of the sofa and looked back and forth. Because Gu Nian had a thin waist and long legs, both sets of wedding dresses looked exceptionally good on her body. But when she looked at both gowns, she always felt as if there was something missing. Since childhood, Gu Nian had been her best friend. Ruan Zhizhi naturally wished that Gu Nian could spend her once-in-a-lifetime wedding in the most beautiful manner.

“Excuse me, are all your best wedding dress designs here in your store? Do you have any other dresses she can try on? The price doesn’t matter, her husband has plenty of money.” Ruan Zhizhi thought about it for a while and still turned her head to ask such a question.

When the shop assistant with a sweet smile heard this, she was stunned for a moment. Then she immediately smiled again and replied somewhat apologetically, “There is indeed a treasure in our store which is very expensive, but it’s just that…this wedding dress is reserved by a client who ordered it two years ago. Therefore, we’ve always kept it inside and have never taken it out for other clients to try on.”

Ruan Zhizhi wrinkled her brows and asked with some doubt, “Why would someone who ordered a wedding dress two years ago not come to pick it up? Either their wedding was cancelled before, or they found a better choice and abandoned this wedding dress. Your store is too sincere…all along, you’ve actually been helping him keep it up until now?”

The shop assistant sighed and explained: “It’s not like that. The gentleman who ordered the wedding dress already paid a high deposit in advance. Sometimes he specially comes here to have a look and asks us to keep the wedding dress for him.”

Gu Nian also became curious when she heard about this. “How can there be such a strange person…Then, has his girlfriend come to try it on?”

The shop assistant shook her head. “Never.” After a pause, she added, “In fact, our employees have always felt very suspicious about this matter. However, we don’t dare inquire about our clients’ private business.”

“Then what does this man look like?”

“Extraordinarily handsome, even more handsome than a film celebrity.” The shop assistant couldn’t help the stars in her eyes when she talked about this. “Back then, when he ordered this wedding dress, the little girls in our store were going mad with envy. It’s because this wedding dress is the treasure of our shop. It was created by an overseas designer our shop admires wholeheartedly. Moreover, the wedding dress is made of pure hand embroidery and inlaid with diamonds all over. The price is extremely costly. An ordinary person might not be able to afford it even with three or four years’ worth of wages. We frequently talk about this in private and feel that his fiancée is simply too blessed. We also look forward to the young lady coming to try on the wedding dress.”

When Gu Nian and Ruan Zhizhi heard this, they became even more interested in the wedding dress, and the three of them candidly chatted in full swing. Ultimately, Gu Nian chose the graceful gown from the princess line. After all, a person of noble character couldn’t seize things other people were fond of. Moreover, that gentleman had already paid a deposit in advance. Although she was curious in her heart, she didn’t make any excessive demands.

When finally swiping her card at the front counter, Gu Nian couldn’t help lamenting: “Aside from this perfect man, I’d like to know who is so lucky to be his fiancée even more.”

Ruan Zhizhi stood beside her with a smile. She didn’t say a word, only thinking that this was a rare fairy tale in real life.

A long, long time later, Shi Yan would take her to this bridal shop again to try on the wedding dress. Only then would she know that this man had been conspiring against her for a long time, and it had already been determined that there would be a day that she would marry him.

But most of all, she would be willing to.

Translator’s Note: Coming from a younger person, I don’t know why Ruan Zhizhi and others think she’s a “leftover woman”. 25 seems really young to me still. I know there’s pressure to get married or consider marriage when you’re in your mid-twenties but I feel like that’s an age where you’re still transitioning from young adulthood. If this story was set now, Ruan Zhizhi would be born in 1996 (as she’s turning 26). That’s like the same age as Tom Holland T^T