No one replied to the message. After the screen went dark, the light in the car also dimmed. Xie Li sat in the car, looking at the deep night sky in the distance. The phone in his hand suddenly lit up. For a moment, he even felt that the white light reflected from the screen was a bit dazzling. He closed his eyes for a moment before swiping open the screen.

It was a reply from Tang Man: [Aren’t you going to work?]

He could imagine that Tang Man must have already finished her shower at this time, lying on the bed or sitting cross-legged on a blanket, leaning against something, and sending him this message carelessly.

Xie Li’s fingers hovered over the phone for a long time and sent a sentence: [I will have my assistant clear out two days for me.]

The drooping eyelashes covered the emotions in his eyes, making everything difficult to decipher. The shadows cast by the late-arriving summer night made the inside of the car obscure and unclear, as if also covered with a layer of indiscernible gloom.

No more messages were replied. Before the early arrival of the summer sunrise, Xie Li drove away from this street.

And after replying to Xie Li’s message, Tang Man received a call from Yang Qing. At that time, she was lying on the bed applying a face mask. When she answered the call, the phone almost slipped from her hand due to the vibration and hit her face.

As soon as she connected the call, Yang Qing’s crying and miserable voice came through, “Manman.”

Tang Man’s head started to hurt.

In her eyes, Yang Qing was a troublemaker, especially the current Yang Qing. Pregnant women were all sentimental, and the pregnant Yang Qing was even more sentimental and sorrowful.

“Mom, what’s the matter?”

There were a few sobs on the other end. Tang Man moved the phone a little further away. “Manman, Mom has decided to have surgery.”

Tang Man’s hand, which was patting her face, paused. She tilted her head, glanced at the phone beside her that showed a call in progress, and then asked, “Did you tell Gu Yuanke?”

With Yang Qing’s brain, it was very likely for her to do something like not informing Gu Yuanke.

But to Tang Man’s surprise, Yang Qing hmmed and said, “I told him that I don’t want this child.”

She actually knew her own temperament. She couldn’t be a good mother. When Tang Man was young, she didn’t fulfill her responsibilities as a mother. Perhaps because of this, she always had a bit of apology and guilt towards Tang Man. But this guilt and apology were not very deep. This was due to Yang Qing’s nature. From the time she was born until now, she seemed to have this kind of personality.

Actually, for a beautiful woman, this kind of personality was sometimes not a bad thing. At least in general, Madam Yang could be considered a heartless person. She always loved herself more than loving others.

Tang Man asked, “Then have you scheduled a time for the surgery?”

“It’s scheduled,” the voice came from the other end. “It’s about a week from now.”

After a brief silence, Yang Qing’s somewhat light voice came through, “Manman, I’m a little scared.”

She didn’t know why, but she was just very scared. During this time, she often woke up in horror at night and didn’t sleep well, all because of this piece of flesh in her belly. But now that she had made up her mind to have surgery, she was still uneasy.

“I’ll come over then.” After hearing Yang Qing’s heavy unease, Tang Man’s voice also softened a bit. “Don’t worry, abortion is just a minor surgery, and it won’t go wrong in a regular hospital.”

Yang Qing hmmed, but the other end of the phone still fell into an unusual silence. This might be another Waterloo in Madam Yang’s life after the storm of marrying Tang Zhengfeng in college with a child and then divorcing him two years later. And Tang Man believed that this Waterloo should be able to leave a longer-lasting lesson. On this point, she very much agreed with Madam Hu Haiying.

However, soon Gu Yuanke’s voice came from the other end, very light and gentle, calling Yang Qing’s name, and then the phone was suddenly hung up. It seemed that Madam Yang had found a quiet place to cry in the middle of the night, which was a bit hard to imagine.

As everyone knew, Madam Yang’s ability to make a big fuss out of small matters was not low, and she would also take advantage of the situation to climb higher. Now she was hiding and crying to Tang Man about her unease, so it seemed she was really very scared.

After all, Madam Yang had never had a serious illness in her life, at most just a cold or fever, which was not as bad as being in the hospital. She would rather drink a few more mouthfuls of bitter medicine at home than get an injection. The most painful experience in her life was giving birth to Tang Man, but that was all ancient history from decades ago. Women were good at forgetting pain, otherwise there wouldn’t be so many mothers willing to have a second child.

After hanging up the phone, Tang Man looked at the phone with the screen off and suddenly felt, for some reason, that this matter with Yang Qing was not over. After all, even if Madam Yang suddenly changed her mind while lying on the operating table under anesthesia, she wouldn’t be surprised.

She was about to turn off her phone and go wash her face when she suddenly saw Xie Li’s message pop up on the screen. She thought for a moment, realizing she should be free at that time, so she agreed to Xie Li’s invitation.

Madam Hu Haiying had already said that she would stay here for a while longer. Even if Madam Yang annoyed her, she was still a piece of flesh that came out of her belly, so she wouldn’t completely ignore her. It was just that sometimes she felt a bit disappointed, but luckily, up until now, Yang Qing had never been tricked out of money by men. As for being tricked for sex, Tang Man and Hu Haiying recalled the several boyfriends of Yang Qing they had seen and felt that this aspect was also debatable.

In the following days, when Tang Man had time, she would also call Xie Li for a brief chat. In fact, there wasn’t much to talk about. Sometimes they just talked about trivial matters. In the past, most of the time it was Xie Li who actively called her, but for some reason, Tang Man clearly felt that Xie Li was a bit different from usual this week.

So, on Friday evening, Tang Man invited Xie Li to dine together. They hadn’t seen each other for a week, and with Xie Li’s usual temperament, he should have come to find her long ago.

But unexpectedly, Xie Li fell silent for a moment and declined, “I’m meeting a business partner later, I have an appointment and I’m afraid I can’t get away.”

Tang Man also fell silent for a moment, then hmmed. Just before she was about to hang up the phone, she couldn’t help but ask softly, “Xie Li, did something happen to you recently?”

Xie Li’s side was quiet for a moment, and then a very soft voice came through, “Why do you ask?”

Tang Man laughed and teased him, half-jokingly and half-seriously, “I thought you had a change of heart. If you regret it, you can tell me in time. I won’t cling to you and not let go.”

Xie Li’s side was so quiet that she could hear his shallow breathing. After hearing Tang Man’s somewhat joking tease, Xie Li’s face had no smile. He stood in front of the floor-to-ceiling window on the high-rise building, overlooking the bustling traffic below. One skyscraper after another rose from the ground, and a huge suspended bell hung on the tower in the distance, with the hour hand still moving and the minute hand ticking non-stop.

He spoke, so solemnly, as if making a vow, “Tang Man, the one who says give up first will definitely not be me.”

He had finally plucked the bright moon and held the stars in his hands, so the river could not flow back, the mountains could not be overturned, and his love would not disappear.