Atlas Studios

  Atlas Studios

  She widened her eyes in surprise; why was this man suddenly interested in her hands?

  In any case, she was still washing the dishes. Her hands were covered in detergent and grease. Did he not find that dirty?

  Besides, her hands were not particularly nice-looking; why was he staring at them?

  In reality, she did not need to do much housework when she was young.

  After the Yun family lost their riches, she started to do household chores. While in university, she became more diligent and did part-time work.

  She remembered that there was a manicure fad during her university days. Almost every girl in the class would happily go for a manicure once it hit the holidays. This was not for her, though. She needed to work and manicured hands would be inconvenient.

  Back then, she washed dishes mainly, scrubbing up to a few thousand plates in a day. That was a back-breaking job, and as her hands had to soak in the greasy soap water the whole time, they turned rather coarse.

  There was a time when she was depressed over how her nice-looking hands were tormented to such an extent.

  His staring was starting to make her feel awkward, so she tried to retract her hands, only to have him hold them tightly without letting go. Antagonized by his action, she chided, “Why are you staring at my hands?”


  The man chuckled gently out of the blue and casually replied, “Your hands are terribly ugly.”


  Her face turned sullen and she retorted through gritted teeth, “Mu Yazhe…… you! Are my hands as ugly as you made them out to be?”


  He smiled. “But then again, they look rather nice at a second look.”


  She was taken aback and almost took his words for a hallucination. “Hah?”


  He criticized her hands one moment and then complimented them in the next. How could a man be…… so contradictory?

  “Why are there so many old calluses?”


  Slapping away his hands hard, she retracted hers and was unwilling to answer his question. She started to wash the dishes again when, forcing a relaxed tone, she answered out of the blue, “I used to wash dishes a lot. My hands might’ve grown these when they were soaked in greasy soap water for long periods. Eh…… My life circumstances dictated that I must work hard then. I even did manual labor.”


  “Manual labor?”


  “In a moving company.”


  “You even did that?”


  “I have no choice. The pay is good so……” She could not go on.

  There was only silence in the kitchen for a while.

  The man did not utter a word and she continued neutrally, “You are born with a silver spoon in your mouth. How can you possibly understand the plight of poor ordinary folks like us? For someone who is used to fine dining, how is it possible for you to imagine that there are people in the world who have to move bricks in exchange for a meal?”


  She suddenly raised a brow. “I had a classmate who used to hold several jobs during her studies. As for you, you don’t have to worry over things like this, so Mu Yazhe, we live in two different worlds since young, yeah?”


  There was no sound or movement behind her at all, though his breathing was still as soft and warm as before.

  There was only the sound of water flowing from the tap inside the kitchen.

  After a long, long time, there were still no words from him. She was starting to think that she might have aggravated him with her words when she suddenly heard him say, “That’s why I met you by god’s will.”


  She was stunned.

  “The heavens felt for you and thought that you deserve some happiness, so they let you meet me.” He smiled. “And the heavens were jealous of my good fortune, so they let me meet you.”


  She could only open and close her mouth in surprise; no words would come out from her throat.