The Green Tea Supporting Girl Is Still Playing Her Role Today (GL) - Chapter 49

Chapter 49

In the blink of an eye, Xie Zhifei’s birthday arrived. She busied herself at the company for most of the day before she had time to head to the hotel.

Zhao Xiaojing had been waiting there early. When she saw Xie Zhifei arrive, she pointed to the changing room and said, “Go change out of that work outfit. It’s bad luck.”

Xie Zhifei: “……”

Some friends arrived one after another. Most of her old classmates were still at work, so they could only come for dinner in the evening.

Xie Zhifei chatted with these friends while admiring the venue that Zhao Xiaojing had set up. Everyone praised it endlessly, almost flattering Zhao Xiaojing to the skies, which delighted Zhao Xiaojing to no end.

Everyone took out their gifts one by one. Zhao Xiaojing gave a custom-made handbag.

“Thanks,” Xie Zhifei said.

Zhao Xiaojing said smugly, “Li Feng got this for me on a business trip abroad. He had to scramble for days to get it. I don’t even have one myself.”

“Then why don’t you take it and carry it first?”

“Really? Then I won’t stand on ceremony!” Zhao Xiaojing took it with a grin, kissed the bag, hugged it to her chest, and started stroking it, which drew laughter from the whole room.

Everyone gathered to chat, talking about luxury brands, luxury cars, luxury homes, and celebrity gossip from wealthy families. Xie Zhifei listened for a while and found it a bit boring, so she made an excuse to go to the upstairs lounge.

“President Xie, Gu Zhizhang and Li Feng have arrived, along with Wang Wan. They’re looking for you.” Fang Ningshu pushed the door open and reminded her.

“Got it.” Xie Zhifei stood up listlessly and went out to greet the guests.

“Ah Fei, happy birthday.” Gu Zhizhang came forward with a smile as soon as he saw her and handed her a gift box.

“Thanks, Brother Gu.”

Li Feng also reciprocated with a gift and then went to find Zhao Xiaojing.

“Sister Fei.” Wang Wan handed her a box too. “A gift.”

“Thanks.”

“Aren’t you going to open it and see?” Wang Wan asked obediently.

Xie Zhifei knew she was up to something from the moment she called her Sister Fei, so she handed the box to Fang Ningshu. “You open it.”

Wang Wan’s face changed at once. She hurried to say, “You’re the birthday girl. You should open it yourself.”

“She’s my secretary. What’s wrong with having her open a gift for me?” Xie Zhifei said.

Wang Wan glared at her in a huff, but Fang Ningshu had already neatly unwrapped the packaging and opened the box. A creepy little doll suddenly popped out and bit her finger with its mouth.

Xie Zhifei’s mouth twitched.

Fang Ningshu impassively pressed the switch. The creepy doll opened its mouth, and she withdrew her finger without a change in expression. She handed it to President Xie. “The gift is opened, President Xie. How do you want to handle it?”

“You decide,” Xie Zhifei said.

“Yes.” Fang Ningshu tossed it straight into the trash can. “President Xie, it looks like Li Hongyan has arrived. I’ll go greet him.”

“Okay.”

Fang Ningshu nodded to them and turned to handle the other guests.

“Sister Shu, Sister Shu, I was wrong. I wasn’t targeting you!” Wang Wan chased after her to apologize. “Really, you have to believe me!”

Gu Zhizhang watched Fang Ningshu’s retreating figure and asked, “How is she doing with you?”

“Pretty well. She adapted quickly to the new job. The employees have all witnessed her capabilities, and she’s already established a certain authority in the company.” After praising her, Xie Zhifei feigned modesty. “It’s all thanks to Brother Gu being willing to let go and hand over an assistant you’d cultivated for years to me.”

Gu Zhizhang smiled awkwardly. “If it weren’t for her… I really wouldn’t have been willing to let such a good assistant go.”

“Brother Gu, every loss comes with a gain.” Xie Zhifei comforted him. “Though you lost Secretary Fang, you gained an assistant who’s not as good as her.”

Gu Zhizhang laughed instead of getting angry. “Yes, the new assistant really isn’t as good as her. I don’t know when she’ll be fully up to the job.”

Xie Zhifei felt even more smug inside. She thought to herself that he had no idea what a formidable assistant he had discarded. A woman who could carve out so much drama among all these supporting characters naturally had exceptional abilities.

“It’s just that Wanwan has been making a fuss lately about going to find Fang Ningshu.” Gu Zhizhang rubbed his brow, looking a bit headache-y. “She still doesn’t know why I fired Fang Ningshu and keeps urging me to bring her back.”

Xie Zhifei didn’t respond, suspecting he might be wavering too.

After losing such a capable assistant as Fang Ningshu, he would surely realize that both his work and life lacked someone who could handle everything perfectly. Things just wouldn’t go as smoothly. Besides, Fang Ningshu only liked him. On second thought, once he calmed down, it seemed like it didn’t do him any harm—except maybe make Wen Pinghan think he might change his heart.

But the problem lay right there. If Wen Pinghan had ever felt even a flicker of attraction to him, he wouldn’t feel this unwilling now.

As it was, he hadn’t won Wen Pinghan’s heart, and he’d thrown away his most capable assistant.

“I’m afraid that’s not possible,” Xie Zhifei said suddenly.

Gu Zhizhang was stunned. He asked, “Why? You don’t want to let her go?”

“It’s not about whether I let her go or not. She’s just my employee, not my property. Whether she stays or leaves depends on her own wishes.” Xie Zhifei said.

“Then do you think she’ll come back to Gu Corporation?” Gu Zhizhang asked.

“If you understand her, you’d know that while she can fulfill every demand her boss makes, she’s not without opinions. She has some backbone too. What you said last time was too harsh. Not only did it reject her feelings, but it also denied all the effort she’d put into her work over the years. For her to come back to work at Gu Corporation, there’s probably only one possibility…”

“What?”

“That you marry her.”

“……”

“Are you willing?”

“Of course not. Work is work, and feelings are feelings!” Gu Zhizhang said.

Xie Zhifei: “So? She’s already invested her feelings in the previous job. Do you still plan to bring her back?”

Gu Zhizhang thought deeply for a moment and said gravely, “You’re right. Neither she nor I should get involved in each other’s affairs anymore.”

Xie Zhifei smiled faintly. After he left, she turned to Fang Ningshu, who stood in the corner. “You heard all that?”

Fang Ningshu nodded and walked forward. She picked up a glass of champagne from a waiter’s tray and drank more than half of it before saying, “Thank you.”

“For what?”

“For letting me see his attitude clearly once more. And… when you mentioned having him marry me, I asked myself what my feelings would be if he really did want to marry me.”

“What feelings?” Xie Zhifei asked.

Fang Ningshu raised her glass and gently swirled the pale yellow liquid. She gave a wry smile. “Like this champagne. It looks beautiful, tastes sweet. Before I ever tried it, I always wanted to know what it was like, so I stayed by the champagne every day, fantasizing about how I’d possess it. That intense longing makes you overlook so many things—like how there are plenty of alternatives, or how I never used to drink at all. I was just drinking for the sake of drinking.”

Xie Zhifei turned to look at her.

“Pretty ridiculous, right? I used to never touch alcohol, but now I can drink a thousand glasses without getting drunk.” Fang Ningshu drained the rest of the wine and slowly curved her lips into a smile. “I just heard the voice in my heart—I don’t want to marry him. I know what kind of person he is, his private quirks and temper, but I automatically ignored them all. Because he was the dream of my youth. But he was only the dream of my youth. I’ve clawed my way through reality for ten years, and only in that moment did I figure it out: dreams and reality can’t be mixed.”

She paused, then said, “I don’t want to work to make him regret anymore. I should work for myself.”

Xie Zhifei raised the glass in her hand and clinked it against Fang Ningshu’s empty one. “Congratulations. You’ve been reborn.”

“Thank you.” Fang Ningshu smiled with relief.

“By the way,” Xie Zhifei glanced around behind her, “where’s that little tagalong Wang Wan? Not following you?”

“Gu Zhizhang took her away.” Fang Ningshu got a headache just mentioning her. “Do you think I should tell her about what happened between me and Gu Zhizhang? That way, she probably wouldn’t dare bother me anymore.”

“I don’t know.” Xie Zhifei shrugged. “I don’t understand her as well as you do. You decide.”

“If I’d known, I wouldn’t have pretended to be nice back then. She’s someone who’s extremely starved for love. Give her a bit of steamed bun, and she’ll taste delicacies from land and sea.” Fang Ningshu sighed. She saw a group of people entering through the main door and asked, “Are those your classmates?”

“Yes.” Xie Zhifei stood to go greet her classmates. For some reason, she turned back, pointed to her watch, and asked, “Why hasn’t she come yet?”

Luckily, Fang Ningshu understood right away who she meant. She said, “She’s still busy with work.”

“Annoying. Who’s piling all that work on her anyway?” Xie Zhifei grumbled.

“…Though it’s her boss who assigned the work, it’s obviously because of you at the root.” Fang Ningshu said.

“Sigh, I really hate myself!”

Zhao Xiaojing hurried over from the other side too and chatted idly with the old classmates. They had all attended a noble private middle school back then, so the classmates were all from well-off families. Only someone like Xie Zhifei had a background that put her at the very top of the pyramid.

Everyone had long heard that she had gone to Qisheng, and they all praised her in person for being capable and gave her plenty of support.

But everyone said the same things. Xie Zhifei accepted all the compliments with a smile on her face, then found another excuse to leave. As soon as she turned away, she pinched her cheeks—they were almost numb from smiling.

Sigh.

“Why the sigh?” A voice suddenly sounded behind her.

She turned back in delight. “Sister, you’ve come!”

“Sorry, I’m late.” Wen Pinghan wore a coat and carried a laptop bag on her hand, clearly having rushed over straight from the company. She looked Xie Zhifei up and down and smiled. “Happy birthday. You look really beautiful today.”

“Thanks.” Xie Zhifei smiled shyly and hurried to lead her to the lounge. “Put your bag here. It’s pretty heavy.”

“Okay.”

“You haven’t eaten yet, right? Eat something here first.” Xie Zhifei opened the door, called a waiter to send a dinner over, then sat beside her. She gazed at her intently, very curious about what gift she would give her.

“This is something I made myself. It’s my first time making chocolate, and it was really hard to get right.” Wen Pinghan pulled a box of dark chocolate from her bag and handed it to her.

“Wow, you made it yourself?!” Xie Zhifei took it joyfully. It was a big box. She opened it, took one from the very middle, and ate it. Her whole body swayed. “It’s delicious! Sister, you’re amazing!”

“I’m glad you like it.” Wen Pinghan smiled, then said, “Actually, there’s another gift. I was too embarrassed to bring it up. It’s in my car.”

“Why embarrassed?”

“The friends here should all be either rich or noble…”

“But I don’t have many true friends. No matter what you give me, Sister, I’ll like it!” Xie Zhifei said eagerly. “You eat here, Sister. I’ll go get it myself.”

“Then go get it yourself.” Wen Pinghan handed her the car keys.

“Hee hee, okay! I’m already looking forward to it!” Xie Zhifei gripped the keys, lifted her skirt, and ran out.

“Ah Fei, where are you going?” Zhao Xiaojing called.

“To get a gift!” Xie Zhifei’s voice rang out high-spirited, her expression full of joy.

Wen Pinghan watched her back, her skirt hem fluttering and her hair flying. A thick smile welled up in her eyes.

“Beep—”

Xie Zhifei pressed the car key and quickly found Wen Pinghan’s car. She opened the front and back doors but saw no gift anywhere. Instead, she rummaged through the glove compartment in the front seat and found over a dozen lottery tickets, which made her chuckle.

Since there was nothing here, it must be in the trunk, right?

She went to the back and opened the trunk. The door pulled up slowly, revealing a pile of colorful fresh flowers inside.

“Wow.” Xie Zhifei blinked slowly, covering her mouth in surprise. Amid the flowers sat a box and a tennis racket.

She opened the box first. Inside was a brand-new pair of sneakers, worth several thousand on the market. To rich people, it was just a drop in the bucket, but to a working stiff—especially one like Wen Pinghan who bought near-expiry yogurt at the supermarket—it was absolutely not a cheap gift.

There was also a note in the box—

If high heels wear you out, take a break.

Good thing Wen Pinghan hadn’t followed her down, or she would have seen Xie Zhifei’s face twisted in happiness right now. It must look hideous.

She picked up the tennis racket beside it, which also came with a note. The handwriting was beautiful, and it read—Don’t deliberately lose to others anymore. You’re the best (crossed out).

Xie Zhifei stood there in a daze for a good while before she reluctantly closed the car door and turned to go back to Wen Pinghan.

But as soon as she pushed open the lounge door, she saw Wen Pinghan eating dinner while Gu Zhizhang sat right across from her, trying hard to strike up a conversation with Wen Pinghan.

Damn, are you a dog? Did you smell your way over here?!

Xie Zhifei cursed inwardly and blurted out, “Duel!”

Wen Pinghan and Gu Zhizhang both looked at her in confusion.

“I mean—” Xie Zhifei waved the racket in her hand. “Brother Gu, let’s have a showdown to the death!”

Gu Zhizhang: “Huh?”