Charity - Chapter 3

I asked Lili if I could keep working at her club.

“Didn’t you turn it down before? What’s changed?”

“I have no money.” I gave a self-mocking smile. “Honestly, there’s less than five hundred in all my bank accounts put together. I can’t even afford the fare home.”

“The factory work is too hard on my body. I can’t manage it right now. I can’t go back.”

“But it’s almost the end of the month. I have to send my aunt money, or they’ll throw Grandma out.”

My mother had been promiscuous when she was young. To this day, I didn’t know who my father was. Later, she fell ill and died, and Grandma raised me. My uncle and aunt had always resented that.

Now Grandma was old and could no longer live on her own. She also refused to come to the city with me. So I’d arranged to pay my uncle and aunt three thousand a month to look after her.

The money had to reach their account on the twenty-fifth of every month, on time. One day late, and they’d turn her out.

Lili had probably heard about my family. She said nothing, only told me to be at the club at six that evening, sharp.

After I changed into my uniform, she asked, “Have you broken things off with Jiang Yi?”

“No.” I smiled. “To be honest, I’d love to walk away without a backward glance, the way women do in TV dramas.”

“But I can’t even afford rent. Where could I go? Sleep under a bridge?”

Lili sighed softly. She seemed about to say something, then held back.

I didn’t ask if I could stay with her for a while. We weren’t that close. And you couldn’t go through life relying on other people to help. Finding me this well-paid job was already more than generous of her.

While I was working part-time at the club, I saw Jiang Yi twice more.

He still didn’t recognize me. He still threw money around like water. He still sat at the very center of the crowd, basking in everyone’s attention.

I saw his other side more and more clearly. Or rather, I was finally seeing who he truly was.

On the twenty-fifth, I scraped together enough and transferred it to my aunt. I still had a little over a thousand left. I thought I could find a cheap place over the next couple of days and move out.

Jiang Yi had noticed how quiet I was becoming. He’d asked many times if something was troubling me. I didn’t know how to answer. Perhaps I was a coward, unable to bear the raw, bloody mess of exposing the truth. Better to leave without a sound.

But fate had other plans. The evening before I meant to go, my uncle called.

“The old woman fell down the stairs. Shattered a bone.”

My mind went blank for a moment. I stood helplessly where I was. It took another couple of seconds before I could force out the words.

“I’ll come back right away—”

“What for? Got money to burn? Save the fare and send it to me!”

“How much?” I asked, trembling.

“Send twenty thousand first. I’ll ask for more if it’s not enough.”

“Hurry up. The hospital keeps asking for payment!”

He hung up.

I had no idea how long I stood there in a daze.

Jiang Yi came home. He looked at me, then at the half-packed suitcase beside me. His brow furrowed at once.

“Yanyan, what are you doing?”

I snapped out of it. My voice was hoarse. “Jiang Yi… Grandma fell down the stairs. Uncle says they need twenty thousand.”

“Could you…” The words were painfully hard to say. “Lend me some money?”

He fell silent. Standing where he was, he avoided my eyes.

“Yanyan, it’s not that I don’t want to help. But you know I took out that online loan. My credit record’s ruined.”

In that instant, I wanted so badly to demand an answer.

One bottle of your wine costs a hundred and eighty thousand. You open so many in a single night. I’m asking to borrow twenty thousand. Borrow it, not take it.

I’ve cried with you, fought with you, laughed with you. I’ve given you every one of my firsts. I’ve even had an abortion for you.

And still you turn me down so readily.

Couldn’t you at least—at least hesitate for two seconds?

In the silence, I nodded. “All right. I understand.”

He came over and asked what I planned to do.

“It’s fine. I can take out online loans too.”

But I knew how precarious my finances were. I’d always been careful with the various payment platforms, rarely daring to spend money I hadn’t earned. So they hadn’t given me much credit.

Still, it was all right. If I tried hard enough, I could piece the money together.

I sat quietly in a chair, completing one facial verification after another, adding up how much I could borrow.

Jiang Yi silently made me a bowl of noodles.

He’d always been hopeless in the kitchen. In the beginning, he hadn’t even known how to trim vegetables. When he peeled an apple, there was often nothing left but the core.

I’d never held that against him. I’d thought it was normal for a man to be careless and bad at housework. If I knew how, I could simply do more. I’d believed that being together meant supporting each other, without keeping such a careful score.

“Can you get enough?” he asked cautiously. “If you really can’t, shall I ask my friends?”

I looked up at him.

He began making calls in front of me. Every call was on speaker. Every answer was no. Usually, he’d barely said “borrow some money” before the person either hung up or explained that they too were having financial trouble lately.

“Forget it, Jiang Yi. I’m very tired.”

I had no strength left to watch him perform for me.

He looked at me, opened his mouth, then closed it again.

Eventually the noodles clumped together and went cold. I didn’t throw them away. I added a little hot water, stirred, and ate them.

When you’re poor, you can’t afford self-respect.

I couldn’t bear to waste the food.