Chapter 102: Can’t You Trust Lu Huaiyu?
Ning Li bent over and took the items out of the boxes, unconcerned about Wei Songze’s question.
“I told the guy that we are out of stock and that I’ll contact him when we get any new stuff. Speaking of which, Sister Lili, it’s been a while since you drew anything. It’s been around three months right?” Wei Songze said.
Other than the last-minute help at Tsinghua Cup, he had not seen Ning Li pick up a paintbrush. Even he wanted to see her painting again, let alone the art collector.
Ning Li froze. Actually, it was not just three months. Since her past life, she had not picked up a paintbrush for such a long time that she almost forgot how it felt to draw a stroke on the canvas.
“I’ve been a little busy lately. We’ll see,” she replied.
Wei Songze was not surprised as well. “I guess so. You are the genius of Second High, and you have to maintain the first place. I bet you have to study hard.”
As far as he knew, good students had to work hard in order to keep up their excellent results. The score on the test paper determined whether one loved or hated studying.
Ning Li thought about it and said, “It’s manageable, but I’ve been quite busy lately.”
Wei Songze found her reasoning strange. “Huh?”
She had moved all her things here from Lincheng. Other than studying, what else could she be busy with?
“I have to go to the capital next Saturday,” Ning Li merely said.
…
After Wei Songze left, Ning Li stayed behind and unboxed all the parcels.
A lot of the boxes contained books from mechanical blueprints to astrophysics textbooks; some of them were even printed versions.
On top of that, there was even a disassembled easel, a bunch of paints, and a stack of sketches.
She took all of them out and arranged them nicely before she locked them up in one of the rooms. Then, she took out the pajamas from Lu Huaiyu, washed them, and dried them on the balcony.
After that, she bagged all the sketches and returned to the Ye family.
She was not 18 years old yet, so she was renting the place under Wei Songze’s name. Nevertheless, it was not appropriate for her to stay here for long. However, the place was a decent storage option for the time being.
Besides, she had other plans to stay in the Ye family.
…
When she returned home, Su Yuan was doing a flower arrangement in the living room.
Su Yuan had stayed up late last night because of Ning Li, and it was Cheng Xiyue’s phone call that finally made her calm down and succumb to rest.
However, Ning Li leaving the house without telling her made her mad, so she could not go to sleep at all.
After a quick nap in the morning, she went to have a facial treatment and a full body spa to ease her tension.
When she heard Ning Li walk through the door, she put the last dendrobium into the vase, adjusted its height, and turned around to her daughter. Glaring at her, she asked, “Where have you been last night?”
Ning Li walked upstairs without pause. “Why ask if you already know?”
Ye Ci already knew that she had gone to Lu Huaiyu’s place, so Su Yuan would have known as well.
Su Yuan planned to have a good conversation with her and even felt bad when she saw the gift from Ning Li yesterday. She planned to apologize to her daughter, but after what the girl did last night, she changed her mind.
Aside from leaving the birthday dinner on her own, Ning Li did not even come back last night.
“Ning Li!” Su Yuan frowned. She strode upstairs and stopped Ning Li.
She was arranging flowers to improve her mood, but now it was ruined again.
“It’s fine if you don’t want to join the party, but why are you sleeping over at someone else’s place? You are just 17. Where are your manners?”
The whole mansion was quiet, thus Su Yuan’s scolding echoed loudly.
Evidently, she was frustrated.
Even though the man was Lu Huaiyu, if news of this went out, it would only cause unwanted rumors. She would be criticized for her ability to raise a daughter.
“Someone else’s place?” Ning Li chuckled. “I don’t have a house in Yunzhou anyway, so every place is someone else’s place to me.”
“You—”
“Besides, it’s not my first time staying out for a whole night. I did that many years ago and never stopped doing it, so why are you so angry about it?” Ning Li sounded frivolous as if she had nothing to do with this.
Su Yuan was silenced for quite a while before she said, “You were staying with your grandmother last time, and how she brought you up is none of my business. But you are here with me now and you must listen to me.”
Su Yuan could tell that subtlety did not work with Ning Li, so she had to do this the hard way.
Ning Li decided to be frank with her mother. “I’m afraid that’s a little difficult.”
Su Yuan did not know how to continue the conversation. Ning Li was stubborn and never listened to people’s advice.
Aunt Zhao came in and tried to ease the conflict. “My, my, Madam, Miss, calm down. Have a seat and we can talk this over peacefully. Why the argument?”
“Miss, Madam is just worried about you. You went to a man’s house alone, after all. That’s a little—”
Ning Li had a glance at Aunt Zhao. “It seems like you don’t trust Second Master Lu, Aunt Zhao.”
Aunt Zhao was shocked. Lu Huaiyu was such an influential person that even Ye Ming had to be courteous in front of him and call him Second Master Lu. On the contrary, Aunt Zhao was just a nanny.
If Lu Huaiyu knew about this…
Aunt Zhao nervously said, “Miss, you’ve misunderstood my meaning. I didn’t mean that. I’m just—”
Ning Li did not say a word as well. She stared at Aunt Zhao with a cold gaze.
Aunt Zhao was petrified as she did not know how to continue the conversation. Now, it seemed like criticizing Ning Li’s behavior would be indirectly questioning Lu Huaiyu’s character.
“Mom!”
Ye Cheng came from the side and stared at Ning Li cautiously. “Just forget about her. She can stay out as long as she likes. Why are you doing this?”
Su Yuan was a lot gentler in front of the boy. She caressed the kid’s head and said, “Lil Cheng, don’t say something like that. She’s your sister, after—”
“She’s not my sister!”
Ye Cheng only had one sister, and it was Ye Ci.
Ning Li was not in the mood to see the mother and son show, so she went upstairs.
Su Yuan wanted to hold her back, but the words that Ning Li said stopped her. She looked at Ye Cheng and said, “Your teacher told me your Mathematics is getting worse. What happened?”
Ye Cheng got angry when his mother mentioned his studies. “I knew all those questions, but I was just careless.”
She frowned. “It’s fine if you are careless once or twice, but you keep doing it. You—”
“Aaargh! The teacher already told me about it at school and now I have to hear it from you again? Mom, please, you are giving me a lot of pressure.”
Frustrated, Ye Cheng shook Su Yuan’s hand away.
Su Yuan said after a soft sigh. “Okay, okay, I’ll stop. You know what you should do, and if you keep getting poor scores, I will have to hire a tuition teacher for you. Got it?”
Ye Cheng rejected the idea, “A tuition teacher? I can just ask Sis to teach me.”