Chapter 4 Part2 (1/2)
Haha, It's obvious Jia He is giving her idol preferential treatment, but I think Jia He is getting more than just “fan benefits,” don't you? And the last scene is ?
Chapter 4.2 — The Power of Gossip (2)
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Gu Yu's words caused Jia He to remember Yi Wenze's instructions.
It turned out that one sentence of ”The day after tomorrow, three o'clock in the afternoon,” was referring to this matter. While everyone was still speculating over the secret reason for their marriage breakup, the two were already taking advantage of breaks in their filming schedules to complete the formal procedures. Then, they would do a public statement about it, and that would be considered enough of an explanation for all the fans. But, would that be enough of an explanation for themselves? Who would know? Who would care about this?
Gu Yu said some more pointless words before they at last ended the call.
As a result of the huge news that she had unintentionally learned from her question, Jia He also ended up tossing and turning for the entire night, and only when the sky was hazily lit did she fall asleep. At ten o'clock, however, she climbed out of bed right on time, asked Xiao Ou for the schedule, and checked to see which scene Yi Wenze was filming today. Xiao Ou thought she wanted to go to the filming location, and beaming ecstatically, she specially explained that the director, considering that it had snowed so hard yesterday, had made some last-minute changes and scheduled the horse-riding-and-rescue scene to be shot today.
The group that was doing the filming of that scene had gone out very early in the morning. If Jia He wanted to go see, she would need to call and get a taxi.
Hurriedly interrupting her, Jia He told her that she was merely asking.
In fact, she was simply worried that if Yi Wenze had too much idle time today, he would inevitably think about the matter that would be taking place tomorrow. Though she had no personal experience in divorce, she had written quite a few scripts on love and marriage and had also once lost her love and fallen into despair. Just thinking about the idea that her idol would feel dejection brought a sense of emptiness and a dull ache into her own heart, and she wanted to do something.
”Screenwriter, do you need to call a cab?” Xiao Ou had already pulled out her mobile phone.
”No thanks.” Jia He smiled. ”Where's the motorhome?”
With a ”Huh?” Xiao Ou stared bewilderedly at Jia He, not understanding what she meant.
Jia He contemplated for a moment. ”It's snowing, and filming today is also outside. Everybody definitely is really cold. If they could have hot pot, that would be awesome.” Afraid that Xiao Ou might get some mistaken ideas, she hastily added, ”Qiao Qiao and Director Jiang both quite like to eat that.”
Cluing in, Xiao Ou beamed and answered her, ”Great idea! The motorhome's here anyway, so it'll be easy to get the stuff.”
Seeing that she had agreed to the idea so readily, Jia He could at last breathe out in relief. Xiao Ou called over two a.s.sistants who had stayed behind, and they began discussing what things they should buy. While they were at it, they gave Qiao Qiao a call to ask for permission to carry out the plan. Qiao Qiao was currently being tormented by the G.o.dawful frigid weather, so when she received this call, she instantly became extremely exhilarated and declared that she needed to personally review the menu. Right before the call was ended, Qiao Qiao finally told Xiao Ou to hand the phone to Jia He.
”Oh yeah, you're good.” Inside the phone, there was the whistling of the whipping wind. Sniffling, Qiao Qiao commented in a quiet voice, ”You're thoughtful enough and certainly put in enough effort. Alas, I once more have become your excuse.”
After laughingly shooting back a couple sentences of retort, Jia He hung up the phone and with Xiao Ou began carefully drawing up the list of food. In that period, she would every so often receive text messages from Qiao Qiao, one moment saying she wanted to eat tripe and yanpi dumplings[1], another moment saying she wanted wood ear mushrooms and winter melon. It was not until Jia He sent back a text, berating her to consider the hards.h.i.+ps of the people doing all the legwork and to stop being so picky, that some restraint was shown on that other end.
After some time, Qiao Qiao sent a text message to Jia He individually: You don't need me to tell you what Yi Wenze likes to eat, right?
In outrage, Jia He fired back her own message: Shut your trap.
Jia He, of course, knew very clearly what Yi Wenze liked to eat. This knowledge came not simply from his celebrity profile; there were also all these years of entertainment news on him, so there were bound to be pictures of him eating. Jia He had long ago committed his taste preferences to heart, to the extent that sometimes, as she thought about the fact that her idol liked to eat a certain thing, she would end up eating a little more of it, too, until gradually she had developed the same taste preferences as him.
The remainder of the work, she handed off to the a.s.sistants to prepare. Jia He merely went with Xiao Ou to personally select the soup base for the hot pot. Yi Wenze liked spicy foods, but his preference was for the sour-spicy flavours of the Yunnan and Guizhou regions, and he did not really eat the numbingly spicy flavours of the Sichuan area. As a result of this, the two of them ran around to several different places before they were able to find this type of soup base.
”Screenwriter.” Xiao Ou finished paying, then stuffed the soup base into her bag. ”I heard Qiao Qiao mention that you're from Beijing. How come you like spicy foods this much?”
”Actually, it's okay to me. I just thought a spicy pot of soup would help dispel the chilliness.” Jia He gave this offhanded answer to brush over the question.
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By the time they had finished all this busy work, it was already the afternoon. Jia He and Xiao Ou arbitrarily ordered a few boxed meals, and after eating them with the a.s.sistants, they brought the various ingredients into the motorhome and then drove to the outdoor shooting location.
Overnight snow brings the most frigidness. The vehicle had only just come to a stop before Jia He saw Qiao Qiao, who was all wrapped up like she was some wanted criminal, those large eyes that showed from beneath the layers staring in through the motorhome's window and madly blinking and blinking at Jia He. When the engine was shut off, Qiao Qiao jumped over to open the door for her first. ”A warm welcome to our leader who is here to do her inspection visit.”
”It's so cold.” Before Jia He had the chance to even respond to her, she was first given such a chill that she shrugged her shoulders up to hide her neck.
”Yup.” Qiao Qiao's lips were covered by her scarf, so her words came out m.u.f.fled. ”I'm almost frozen to death. The horse isn't being obedient either. We've had countless NG takes. Even I wish I can eat that animal's flesh alive, but your idol is actually still able to smile in all this. I've figured it out now. You must have created this character just for him. A disposition so refined and warm it is like that of the l.u.s.tre of jade. A man who remains unperturbed even if the seas are billowing and cras.h.i.+ng around him… He fits all those descriptions.”
Jia He reached over and gave her a pinch, a hint that there were still people following behind them.
Qiao Qiao originally had merely been trying to get some amus.e.m.e.nt. Seeing that Jia He was vexed, she hurriedly asked what soup base they had bought, hoping to change the subject. Jia He could not be bothered to even pay her any attention. Roughly sweeping her eyes over the surroundings, she very soon spotted Yi Wenze in that white expanse.
He was sitting on a horse, leaning forward, gently stroking the horse's neck in an attempt to appease this animal that was cross because of the cold. That horse seemed to truly understand his intent and was not at all disobedient like Qiao Qiao had described. Rather, it was over and over rubbing itself against Yi Wenze's hand, acting so terribly friendly and cozy.
Watching from a distance as that horse behaved so docilely, Jia He said with a smile, ”See, isn't that horse being good?”
Qiao Qiao stood there by the vehicle door, rummaging through all the ingredients they had bought, not even lifting her head as she answered, ”A horse is unlike the gra.s.s or the trees[2]; naturally, then, it likes the good-looking ones.”
Her idol was just complimented. Jia He's mood, naturally, became quite good.
With a sunny smile, Jia He gave her a pat. ”It's time for you to do some hard labour. Start moving things.”
Right as she was speaking and about to turn around, over on the other side, the person on the horse seemed to hear the noise here and, straightening back up, took a glance in their direction.