rsvt_12

"Why aren't you surprised at all? It's like you already knew." Su Zhizhi watched Mu Qi gather up the cards and asked, "Why'd you put them away already, weren't we supposed to be checking when I'll get married in the future?"

"You really want to know?"

Su Zhizhi nodded.

She'd heard every word Mu Qi had just said clearly, and it was exactly what she'd been thinking. There was no further room for her to advance in her career, and on top of that, there was the matter of her concealed age, a latent crisis that was bound to explode into the open one day.

The best option she could think of for now was to give up on her career, get married and build a new family of her own, then fade back into an ordinary civilian life.

She'd come onto this dating show with a genuinely serious attitude this time, but at the same time she was afraid, afraid that once she told the other person her real age, they'd start looking at her differently. But on the other hand, she also tried to convince herself she might get lucky, that maybe the other person wouldn't care about her age at all.

Still, in the end, the fear remained, and it was with these conflicting thoughts that she'd come onto the show.

Seeing Mu Qi on the first day had made her genuinely happy, Mu Qi was a blogger she'd been following for over two years now, someone who regularly shared little skincare and makeup tips online, and whenever she was bored she'd scroll through her Weibo to check for new updates, watching her follower count climb had made her happy too, the particular joy of watching someone grow.

So seeing her in person had suddenly given her a sense of warmth and familiarity.

Su Zhizhi had never thought she'd be able to speak her secret out loud, let alone to someone from the industry, but with Mu Qi, the words had come out naturally.

Mu Qi, for her part, wasn't shocked by any of it, she felt a touch of surprise, yes, but also something close to being moved. There wasn't a trace of judgment in the way she looked at Su Zhizhi, as if she'd simply said something perfectly ordinary.

"You said just now that my choice would ruin the rest of my life?"

Mu Qi nodded, then asked, "Your contract with the company expires next year, and you'll leave the entertainment industry after that, right?"

"Mm." Su Zhizhi nodded, then said, alarmed, "How do you know my contract expires next year?"

"I told you, I'm really accurate." Mu Qi said with a smile, "You believe me now, don't you."

"After you leave the industry, someone will propose to you, and you'll say yes without really thinking it through." Mu Qi pictured the man's face in her mind and frowned slightly. He wasn't remotely a match for Su Zhizhi, and just from the fact that she'd said yes to him at all, it was easy to imagine just how carelessly Su Zhizhi was treating something as significant as marriage.

"You'll hold the wedding next year."

"Mm." That matched what she'd been thinking. Su Zhizhi had planned to settle the major question of her life within three years, shutting everyone up once and for all, so she could finally live a peaceful, comfortable life.

"But..."

Mu Qi's expression darkened, "Married life won't actually go well for you. A marriage in name only, practically widowed while your husband's still alive. You'll have three children, exhausting yourself at home taking care of them, while your husband carries on living it up outside. On the surface you'll tell yourself that's just what marriage is, but deep down you'll still be longing for his care and love."

"Your husband will come home drunk and hit you, and you'll start thinking about divorce. But your family won't understand, and that will break you completely, your mother will even want you to just endure it, and feeling like no one is on your side, in the end, you'll choose—" Mu Qi paused.

The image she'd seen surfaced again in her mind.

Su Zhizhi pouring an entire bottle of sleeping pills into her palm, then swallowing them all down in one go. The leftover pills scattered on the floor, her back turned to the scene, her figure looking utterly despairing.

"To end your own life."

Looking now at the woman in front of her, with her long hair flowing like seaweed and her sweet, youthful face, Mu Qi felt a wave of desolation.

It was as if she'd just witnessed the entirety of Su Zhizhi's life, suffocating and tragic all at once.

Su Zhizhi said nothing for a long while after hearing this.

"Sigh......" Su Zhizhi let out a long breath.

"This doesn't even feel like tarot, it's basically straight-up prophecy, but, it is scarily accurate. I really did think, might as well just marry whoever and live out my life like that, after all my own parents' marriage was like that too. But... hearing you put it that way, I'm starting to get scared." Su Zhizhi drew her knees up and buried her face against them.

"There's one thing you got right though, my family doesn't understand me, but honestly, they never have, not since I was little, my mother..."

"If they still haven't changed even after I get married, then why should I get married at all." She murmured to herself.

"Are you crying?" Mu Qi rested a hand on her shoulder.

"Mu Qi, can it be changed? I don't want to die." Su Zhizhi suddenly grabbed hold of her hand.

Her eyes had reddened slightly.

Mu Qi nodded firmly, "Of course."

"Let me help you work through this."

Having seen the full picture of Su Zhizhi's life, Mu Qi understood exactly why she'd come to think the way she did.

She was someone starved for love.

Her career couldn't break her, but love could.

Su Zhizhi was the firstborn child in her family, and in that era, her parents' deep-rooted preference for sons over daughters ran bone-deep. Ever since she was a child, Su Zhizhi had always wanted to be the best at everything, to make her parents see that even as a girl, she could still achieve great things.

But due to financial constraints, even after Su Zhizhi had been accepted into university, she hadn't been able to attend, her mother had sent her out to work instead, to earn money so her younger brother could go to school. Su Zhizhi worked herself to the bone, handing every cent she saved over to her family, but her parents still complained it wasn't enough.

So Su Zhizhi took on even more part-time jobs, somewhere around seven or eight different ones over time. After clocking off at night, she'd rush to watch over a convenience store, during the busiest stretches she never once got a proper night's sleep, and even in her spare moments, she'd go help the store deliver takeout orders.

Seeing this, Mu Qi felt a certain kinship, this level of work intensity was something she herself could relate to.

Then, by sheer chance, while delivering takeout to a film set one day, she caught the eye of a talent scout from what was now her agency, and went on to become an actress.

Money wasn't so much of an issue for her anymore by that point, and Su Zhizhi began to crave love instead. She'd thought once she started earning money, her parents would finally look at her differently, but instead, the very next thing that came was pressure to get married.

"What's the point of being this good-looking, becoming a star even, if you can't get married off?"

Last year, back home for the New Year, her mother had called her out in front of a whole crowd of relatives, leaving her utterly humiliated, with nothing to do but force an awkward smile. The relatives all felt her mother had gone too far and spoke up on Su Zhizhi's behalf, but she still felt hollowed out inside.

Heartbroken.

"And look at you too, over thirty already, are you planning to keep playing campus heroines on TV forever? You really think you'll never get old?" Once everyone else had dispersed, her mother said this to her.

"Mom, but I haven't met anyone I actually like yet."

"All you need to do is get married, the liking part can develop afterward. Just look around at the people in your industry, pick anyone and marry them, it's not like actors are hurting for money."

Su Zhizhi bristled, "Mom!"

"What 'Mom'? Look at everyone else your age, their kids are already in elementary school. Even your younger brother's married already, and you're the only one giving me grief, think being a star makes you so great?"

"......"

"You're such an embarrassment to me."

Even just hearing this secondhand left Mu Qi feeling suffocated, let alone what it must have been like for Su Zhizhi, her own daughter, to hear it directly.

Such frighteningly old-fashioned thinking. It made Mu Qi think of her own grandmother, who wasn't nearly as conservative as Su Zhizhi's mother. Her grandmother believed all that mattered was having a job and being financially independent, marriage was something you couldn't force, it would come when it came, no rush.

The gap between one person and another could really be this enormous.

This particular exchange had clearly left a deep mark on Su Zhizhi, which was why Mu Qi had been able to see the scene so clearly. It seemed her mother had wounded her to the core.

But at the same time, her mother had also successfully manipulated her psychologically, and that was exactly how this tragedy had taken shape.

The first step to breaking free of that tragedy was to get away from its source.

Namely, her parents.

"I can't get away from them, they're still my parents after all." The moment Su Zhizhi heard Mu Qi suggest distancing herself from her parents, she shook her head quickly.

"I'm not telling you to cut them off, I mean becoming independent in your own mind." Mu Qi sighed, "You just listen to them too much. Whatever they say, you let it get to you too easily. And you don't owe them anything, they're the ones who brought you into this world, they never asked for your consent on that, did they? And on top of that, you've worked yourself to exhaustion earning money, you've made your family's financial situation this much better, you haven't wronged them in any way."

"I understand all of that logically, it's just hard in practice."

"It's fine, you can take it slow. You'll get there, I'm sure of it. For one thing, you're already financially independent, so being independent in your own mind isn't far off either." Mu Qi reassured her.

"But my career's about to hit rock bottom soon, and once my real age gets exposed... I've already mentally prepared myself for that, but my mother's going to be even angrier." Su Zhizhi pressed down on her own knees, but then her thoughts drifted back to what Mu Qi had said about mental independence.

"Right, I can't keep living like this, my life is my own, not my mother's, and if I end up unhappy, she's probably not going to be the one to understand or comfort me anyway, all she wants is for me to get married, whether my life after that is good or bad is entirely my own business."

"You could actually try having an honest conversation with your mother, tell her what you really think."

"She won't listen." Su Zhizhi shook her head, "She's never properly listened to what I think, not once, my whole life."

The words caught in Mu Qi's throat.

A wave of sadness washed over her.

"I hope you can come clean about your age yourself, when you're ready. Fans who genuinely like you won't care, and besides, this new generation of young people these days is a lot more open-minded."

"I will. Once my contract with the company ends, I'll speak up about it myself, that was always the plan anyway."

"As for marriage, don't just settle for anyone. And... Zhizhi, do you actually like being an actress?"

Mu Qi calling her Zhizhi closed the distance between them a little.

Su Zhizhi lowered her head, lost in thought for a moment.

"I do."

"Then that settles it." Mu Qi said with a smile, "As long as you have the courage to start over from scratch, nothing can really touch you."

"Honestly, I'm not even worried about your career. You've got the talent for it, the title of idol-drama princess wasn't handed to you for nothing. As long as you have the courage, even if your career does hit a setback, I believe you'll be able to climb back up again. The real thing is... you're craving your mother's care and attention."

Watching Su Zhizhi's eyes still glistening with tears, Mu Qi let out a sigh, "I hope you'll stop hoping for your mother's love, and focus on yourself instead, learn to love yourself."

There really were parents in this world who simply didn't love their own children, and no matter how hard the child tried, that relationship was never going to improve. All you could do was love yourself well, become independent in your own mind, and stop letting their words affect you.

"Mm." Su Zhizhi nodded.

She wiped her tears away with her sleeve.

"I will. Thank you, Mu Qi." She smiled, "I feel a lot less anxious now."

Mu Qi quietly watched her. There wasn't really anything substantial she could do to help Su Zhizhi, all she could offer was to talk her through it.

She hoped Su Zhizhi could truly walk out from under the shadow of her family of origin one day.

Her phone buzzed.

Mu Qi glanced at the clock.

It was already midnight.

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