Chapter 5 Birthday Plan

Donna hesitated for a moment and said slow and sad, "Your father... He will not like it."

York Nalan was a university professor and the head of the Nalan family, he had always possessed a strange temperament.

Jonny wasn't good at study when he was still a student. His family had never been supportive of his choice to be a star. York Nalan had declared he would never use any money his son earned pursuing this path, and thus far, he had stuck to that. He hadn't used so much as a penny from Jonny over the last few years.

"He..." Jonny's heart sank. "I'm his son too and I make money as well. Why does he look down on me? He doesn't spend my money, only my brother's. I..."

"Don't worry about it, it doesn't matter. We just won't let him know it's you who's done that for us," Donna said sweetly, comforting her son.

Jonny smiled back, "Okay. Mom, you love me the most, don't you?"

"Of course I love you. You're my little boy."' Tears welled up in Donna's eyes and she said, pained in her heart, "I hate seeing you hurt like this."

Suddenly, what had happened at the hospital earlier that night jumped into Jonny's mind and he could not help but laugh.

"Why are you laughing? I thought you'd be in pain? Your brother says he gave you seven stitches!"

"No, I'm not laughing at this..." The more he thought about it, the funnier it got. Eventually, he managed to speak, "Earlier tonight, when I went to have my hand stitched, Jacob had a pretty heated argument with my agent. I really never expected my usually so stoic and boring brother to get into a fight with someone and even snap at my agent so viciously. He was actually quite awesome."

Donna looked at him in disbelief. "That's impossible. He's always been the sort of person to punch someone if he's angry. But an argument... I just can't believe it."

"I swear, it happened. But it was with a woman. He's good at taekwondo, there's no way he'd actually hit her. He mocked her and spoke in all kinds of insulting tones. I've never seen him behave like that."

"He's never acted like that before..."

"That's why it's so funny! It was really strange." Jonny rolled on the sofa lazily. "They say my agent is capable of persuading even the dead, and yet she was like putty in his hands and turned all pale with anger. She was far from her usual self in front of him. I had no idea my brother was such a quick-witted smooth talker! They were like enemies, yet I think they would make a weird perfect match."

Jonny might not have meant what he said, but Donna took those words very seriously.

She widened her eyes, her interest piqued. "Which agent are you talking about? Is she... married?"

"Mom, what are you doing?" Jonny asked, speaking over her bubbling enthusiasm. "She's a woman, the same age as me. She doesn't even have a boyfriend..." he continued.

His mother got so excited she took his hand and squeezed it tight.

Jonny squealed like a pig, yelping in pain.

"Oh no, I'm so sorry, I didn't mean to... I'm just so excited. When will you bring your agent over so I can meet her?"

Jonny squinted at his mother warily and said with suspicion, "Don't you try and set me up with her." They had been working together for five years and no spark had ever ignited between them. It must have meant she was not his type.

"No, I won't. Just bring her here sometime," Donna replied anxiously.

She was not worried about Jonny finding someone, he was surrounded with women all the time. The silent Jacob was who she was concerned about.

"Okay," Jonny said, turning over to hug his mother. "Since you've promised me I can take care of your 55th birthday party, I'll ask Cherry to come over and be in charge of organizing the whole thing. Don't worry, she'll take care of everything for you."

A grin stretched across Donna's joy-filled face from ear to ear. "Okay! The moment I heard the name I liked it."

Jonny was a little uneasy now.

Should he tell her that the argument between Cherry and Jacob was not a happy or even all that civil one?

Jonny informed his agent of what he needed her to do for his mother's birthday. One week was more than enough time for the incredibly capable Cherry to plan the party.

But before the big day, he arranged a meeting between her and his mother.

Donna noticed her gentle smile and could not help but ask, "Miss Cherry, have we met before?"

"Auntie, please, just call me Cherry," she replied with a friendly smile. "And no, I don't think we have met. I'm sure I would never forget someone so kind and beautiful."

Jonny really detested his mother's tactics.

She was using the oldest trick in the book to try and get her to be her daughter-in-law.

"Mom," Jonny interrupted, trying to brush her brazenness under the rug and smooth things over. "Perhaps you saw her in some of my interviews. She is my agent after all."

"No, that's not it..." Donna frowned and was about to continue, "I really..."

"Well, I'll let you two chat. Feel free to ask her for anything. I'm going to get the driver to take me for a spin," He wanted no part of all this fixing up his mother was trying to do.

"Really?" Donna said in surprise. She smiled with embarrassment, "Thank you."

"I majored in planning," Cherry said. "If you need anything at all, if there's anything you want, just tell me. I'll do my best to arrange it for you," she added.

Jonny had asked her to handle this event instead of hiring an outside planning company for a couple reasons. On the one hand, he wanted to protect his privacy. On the other, he wanted this birthday party for his mother to be special, and he trusted Cherry to pull that off.

"I only have one request..."

Cherry pricked up her ears, eager to please.

"Save money. I don't want it to be too expensive."

The smile on Cherry's face froze, she had not expected that. "Oh, of course. Don't worry about that. I would never make it too extravagant or over the top."

She then asked D

onna for some family photos and pictures.

The only trouble with them was that none of the photos had their negatives or any digital data of them. Producing a new clean image would require some work.

But this wasn't a difficult problem to solve for Cherry.

She passed them on to the tech department to handle and afterwards, not only was she able to blow the images up to a much larger size, but she was also able to save a copy of the negatives and sent it to Donna for her to keep.

She hadn't expected the mother of the famous, excessive Jonny, to be so easily satisfied.

She was so happy she burst into tears of joy.

"I know how hard this must have been to do. I wanted to save these photos a long time ago, but year after year I never got to it and they just got older. I was afraid they'd get all yellow and discolored by the time I would want to show them to my future grandchildren..."

"It was really nothing," Cherry said modestly. She then comforted Donna in a soft and gentle voice, "Auntie, if you want more copies to keep, just tell me and I'll get them made for you, okay?"

In the photos were images of the lives of two people, three people, four people, five people...

It was only then that Cherry realized Jonny had three siblings.

Surprisingly, the most outstandingly good-looking person in the pictures was not the star, Jonny.

It was in fact the stone-faced Jacob.

It seemed he had always had the same cold expression on his face since he was a child. There was not a single photo where he was smiling.

But that did not detract from his handsomeness in the slightest.

Cherry was able to pick him out even if she just glanced the photos quickly.

He had been handsome since he was a child, and his features hadn't changed at all.

He grew up normally and had not lost any of his attractiveness.

The only issue was that he had an annoying personality and a foul mouth with a horrible way of speaking to people.

When Cherry looked at him in the photos, she didn't seem to hate him as much. They truly lived in a world where people were judged by their appearance.

Donna noticed Cherry looking at the photos and smiled, "That's my eldest son." She moved her fingertips up to point at Jacob, Cherry not paying much attention to her. "He graduated from Medical University and now he works at the hospital in H City. He's the smartest of my four children. He's single right now though..."

Cherry concealed her surprise and looked away as if she hadn't been staring at the photos before. "He seems really impressive. You must be proud. I'll take care of these photos. Please just be patient. You can check back after a week to see how they've come out."

Out of all the family members, only Jacob asked about the arrangements for his mother's birthday. "Why don't I ask Jonny to come out for a meal with us on that day?"

Donna smiled and replied, "Don't worry about it, the planning company I've hired will take care of it."

Jacob nodded, "Then give me their phone number. Let me talk to them."

"No, no, it's fine," Donna protested. She was afraid her husband would find out it was all Jonny's idea. "It's not your birthday, I'm the one who should tell them what I want and what to do."

Jacob cast a confused glance at his mother and said nothing more.

Donna felt a little guilty.

Time was running out, would Cherry really be able to plan and throw her party in time? And would it be any good?

Cherry had rented a beautiful villa nestled in the mountains.

The lawn and garden was big enough to accommodate more than a hundred people, which was much more space than they would need.

Only close relatives and friends were invited. Celebrities and media were not included in this event.

On the afternoon of her birthday, Jacob drove his mother to the hillside. As he pulled up, the decorations and furnishings surrounding the venue lit his eyes up. He was blown away by what he saw.

The entrance was an iron archway decorated with purple silk flowers and gardenias. Both sides of the passageway were lined with blue and purple crystal vases with irises and gardenias in them, and decorated with a milk white silk ribbon. The path was a lush pink and white carpet dotted with rose petals.

Most special of all was the photo display corridor that led from the entrance right to the guests' seats.

The photos were framed in an exquisite western aesthetic style, in the colors of milk white, blue-purple, smoky pink and other warm tones. They were all placed on a specially made rack of milk white, surrounded by pink, white and purple roses.

They were pictures of Donna and the whole family and placed in chronological order, a clever and thoughtful idea.

The lights of deep yellow, light purple and more milk white mixed together to create a warm atmosphere throughout.

The birthday table was also arranged with his mother's favorite light purple color, an elegant and simply lovely display.

This planning company had good taste it seemed to Jacob.

He couldn't help being impressed and appreciating the decor and work that had been done.

Cherry saw Donna making her away over and immediately walked up to her and said, "Auntie, you're here? I'm sorry I had to ask you to come here earlier. You need to change your clothes."

Jacob was a little taken aback and frowned at her. "What are you doing here?"

Just how many identities did she have?

She was a prostitute sometimes, an agent other times and now she was on the staff of a planning company?

"Mr. Jacob, I'm sorry, but could I please ask you to help out. The guests need to sign their names later on. We have staff responsible for this but I'm going to need you to supervise it."

In other words, he was nothing more than a door man welcoming guests in!

Donna looked between the two of them and could not help but chuckle.

Her son just stared back blankly at the woman in front of him without saying a word.