CH 12

Cheng Suran couldn't sleep well and had a nightmare.

She dreamt that she was being chased by a thick and black python, she ran wildly in the jungle. But her physical strength couldn't keep up and when she turned around, she saw the giant python opening its bloody mouth——

Then she woke up startled.

She opened her eyes, mind still blank for a few brief seconds, she moved her arms and legs, and a pang of soreness came from her back and she couldn't help but let out a soft cry.

"Cough cough—"

Her throat felt dry and her voice was hoarse

She propped her arms up and crawled out of the bed and looked around. This was the room where her sister sleeps, but no one else is here. She's alone again.

Lowering her head and raising it again, Cheng Suran sat there frozen, her brain is gradually waking up, the memories of last night came rushing back...

Was that person really her sister? Can a person change her face really fast?

Indifferent, fierce, merciless.

But why not? That's just the benefactor. If she is in a bad mood, she can take her anger out at will, and she can't have any complaints. Afterwards, she still has to please, cling, and greet her with a smile.  This is the fate of a canary.

She comforted herself that this was a job, and there was no way she could look at the face of the leader and not be bullied. She understood the truth very early on in life

Cheng Suran laughed at herself and climbed out of bed.

At 8:30, the morning light outside the window was dim, and the things on the table remained as they were, but the laptop's power was drained and automatically shut down.

She didn't forget that she had class at ten o'clock today, so she couldn't be late. So, she hurriedly packed her things, drank some water, and went back to the bathroom of her room to wash up.

Cheng Suran looks at herself in the mirror while brushing her teeth.

Her eyes are slightly swollen and lack energy. Although there are no new marks, the old marks have not yet disappeared. Her hair is also messy and fluffy like freshly washed fried hair. She sweated a lot last night and it felt uncomfortable. Like a tattered toy.

She suddenly stopped, and tears flowed out without warning...

…

The second the class bell rang, Cheng Suran stepped into the classroom.

In the professional class, the front row was almost full. She met the eyes of many students and walked to the back row and found a seat by the window, and lowered her head to flip through her book.

She has no particularly close friends in class, and keeps a polite social distance with everyone. She is usually busy with part-time jobs and studies, hardly participates in group activities, and is used to being alone. For a long time, everyone thought she was cold and arrogant, difficult to get along with, and treated her as a "familiar stranger".

As for roommates...

Cheng Suran looked up at Ding Yuan and Li Meiling who were sitting in the third row.

They're just ordinary roommates.

Come graduation, it would be like they've never met before.

For the whole class, Cheng Suran was absent-minded. Probably because she didn't get a good rest last night, and she cried for a long time in the morning. Her eyes were sore and dry, and felt uncomfortable after looking at the projector for a long time, and she couldn't understand what the teacher was saying.

She stayed just like that until the afternoon class.

Walking out of the classroom, Cheng Suran quickened her pace, just wanting to go back to the dormitory to catch up on sleep.

"Ranran..." Ding Yuan chased up from behind, "What's wrong with you? You look listless, are you feeling uncomfortable?"

Cheng Suran had to slow down, pulled herself together and squeezed out a smile: "No, it's because I went to bed too late yesterday, I'm a little sleepy."

Going down to the corner of the stairs, a large ray of sunlight came in from the window, shining on her innocent little face without the slightest color, but her eyes were full of bloodshot eyes, literally, like a vampire crawling out of a coffin.

Ding Yuan nodded, suddenly remembered something, and said, "By the way, Meiling said that you haven't returned to the dormitory these two nights..."

"Well, I forgot to tell you that I rented a small house outside, and I only go back to the dormitory occasionally." Cheng Suran reacted quickly, and yawned while lying, making it impossible to suspect her.

She forgot such an important thing.

She always stays out all night, without explanation, which will inevitably arouse suspicion. Although she is a junior and the school is not strictly controlled, if someone makes irresponsible remarks in private, it will cause trouble for her.

Their relationship in the dormitory was awkward, she didn't know how to bring it up, but her roommate came to ask, so it gave her a step up.

"Oh, won't Meiling be the only one in the dormitory from now on? Hahaha—" Ding Yuan turned her head with a smile.

Ding Yuan is a local, her home is not far from the school, and she has money. She is picked up by car. She has not been in the dormitory often since her freshman year. The bunk is just a place to store things. In addition, she has a lot of friends, and she usually goes out to play outside of class, and she doesn't know about many things that happen in the dormitory.

Li Meiling followed behind without saying a word, and looked at Cheng Suran suspiciously.

"..."

The three walked out of the building, and Ding Yuan glanced at the flower garden, her tone suddenly excited: "My boyfriend is here, I'll go first~" She trotted towards the tall and thin boy.

Cheng Suran also walked away quickly.

Jiang Yu disappeared from Cheng Suran's world again.

Like last time, she didn't respond to messages for a few days, didn't go to the hotel, and evaporated unilaterally. This time, Cheng Suran didn't dare to send frequent messages to disturb her, and she didn't ask Assistant Tian any more. She went to class every day and did her own thing.

She made plans for herself.

This semester, she will concentrate on preparing for the DALF-C1 exam and taking French translation classes. She has part-time experience in translation, and it will be much easier to practice.

In the next semester, most of the students will go on exchange, but she plans to stay in China to take the CATTI English Level 2 written and interpretation exams, and go to France for an exchange year in her senior year, and then go to the school there to continue her graduate studies.

*China Accreditation Test for Translators and Interpreters, Second-level translators (equivalent to lecturers) can apply for translation titles (intermediate titles), which means that they can basically stand alone and complete various practical translation tasks independently.

If she can't get a scholarship, she'll have to pay for the tuition and living expenses herself, which would cost lot of money.

Although the future is full of hope, the pressure is not small. Thinking of this, she became more motivated to study, putting herself into it, leaving her messy thoughts behind her...

An autumn rain fell, the wind blew away the heat, and the temperature turned slightly cooler.

The golden osmanthus trees planted on campus are blooming.

There was no class in the afternoon, and Cheng Suran was sitting in the library brushing up questions, concentrating, when the phone screen suddenly lit up and received a WeChat message. She unlocked it and clicked in, and caught a glimpse of the familiar gray and black head.

It is the benefactor

A location pin message, followed by another: Urgent, come here.

She froze.

The word "sister" in the ID was reflected in her eyes, and couldn't help but think of that stormy night, and there seemed to be a dull pain somewhere.

An unspeakable complex feeling welled up in her heart.

She blinked, took a deep breath, looked at the questions she hadn't finished, didn't dare to delay, immediately closed the book, packed up her things, and left with her bag on her back.

The location was a company called SIENA MODEL, Cheng Suran didn't have time to call and ask the driver to come over, so she took a taxi at the school gate and left. Along the way, she was not sure what the urgent matter was, and she was even a little anxious, thinking of the painful situation that night, she became more and more anxious.

About half an hour later, she arrived at the company.

After getting off the car, Cheng Suran saw Assistant Tian waiting at the door, who saw her and came up to her, "Miss Cheng, the boss has been waiting for you for a long time."

"Excuse me, what is it?" Cheng Suran asked cautiously.

Assistant Tian smiled mechanically: "You will know when you go up."

She led the way, and Cheng Suran obediently followed behind, looking at her curiously.

The company's interior design is very simple, with a large area of ​​white, gray, and camel solid colors combined with simple and neat lines, without too much decoration, sufficient light, and a wide field of vision. The overall look is bright and transparent.

On the right side of the hall is the model card wall, which is covered with photos of models, with ever-changing shapes and styles.

They took the elevator up to the third floor and walked through a long hallway with a white door at the end. Assistant Tian pushed the door open and entered, and said to the inside, "Sister Yu, we're here."

Cheng Suran stepped in nervously.

The room is large and slightly dark. Gray and white curtains hanging down from the ceiling, several square and round giant headlamps standing tall, soft white light hitting the curtains, a camera on a tripod directly in front, and sofas, tables and chairs and computers on the diagonal sides.

More than a dozen gazes swept over at the same time.

Cheng Suran caught sight of Jiang Yu standing next to the computer.

She is wearing a neatly tailored black suit and wide-leg trousers of the same color, with one hand in the pocket of the trousers. She has thick black half-curled long hair. She is tall and straight, with a rich rust red on her lips, a special cold charm.

Those deep eyes are like boundless black holes.

Cheng Suran met her gaze, her breath was taken, her heart beat wildly, as if there was a huge gravitational force tearing her apart.

"Kid, come—" the woman waved with a faint smile.

The girl stepped forward obediently.

Jiang Yu took her wrist, turned around and walked to another woman, "Qi Yan, what do you think of her? Is she suitable?"

The other party was fiddling with the camera. Hearing the sound, she raised her head, looked up and down Cheng Suran, and then circled around her with a surprised expression on her face. She slapped her hands and said, "She fits so well! Hurry up, change clothes, and style her!

"Sister..." Cheng Suran didn't understand what they were talking about, and looked at the people around her suspiciously.

Jiang Yu led her to the side corner until she stopped, stared at her with lowered eyes, and said softly, "Today, sister would like to ask you to be a model."

"Please——"

She even said the word "please" to her.

"But I'm not tall enough..."

"Print models don't need to go on the catwalk. Ask the photographer to take a few photos of you. They'll publish them in a magazine, and then pay you, okay?" Jiang Yu raised her hand to stroke the girl's soft hair, and her indifferent eyebrows tinged with a smile.

As gentle as before, as if the indifference had never existed.

Cheng Suran's eyelashes trembled, and when she looked into those deep pool-like eyes, she couldn't help but think of what happened that night again, her heart was stabbed, and a sour feeling surged up, full of grievances.

Her waist seems to be sore again, her throat bitter again, and there seems to be pain there again.

What is she counting on?

Could it be that she like the benefactor to apologize to her?

"Um?"

"Okay……"

"Go there and wait to change," Jiang Yu turned sideways and pointed to the small room across the room and turned back, "Then the makeup artist and stylist will help you do your makeup and styling, just pose according to what they say, it's very simple."

"Sister will be by your side."

Although she was smiling, it was only on the surface. Her smile didn't catch her eyes, and her expression was no longer the kind of pampering that she used to tease with small animals. Instead, she was doing it out of habit, wearing a mask.

The girl nodded obediently, but her heart trembled, always feeling that something had changed.

...

It was the first time for Cheng Suran to take photos in the studio. She was illuminated by a few strange headlights and stared at by more than a dozen people. She was inevitably a little nervous. She thought she had screwed up, but she didn't expect that the photographer wanted this effect——

Fresh and tender, jerky, slightly cramped, faintly revealing the taste of pure desire.

The filming process went smoothly.

It didn't end until the sun was about to set.

Jiang Yu took Cheng Suran to her office before the girl could take off her makeup and change her clothes.

"Sister..." Sitting on the sofa, she couldn't help but look around, "Is this your company?"

The office style is still simple, mainly in beige and light coffee colors, embellished with lines, and the large crystal glass curtain wall is visually horizontal and vertical, with a perfect blend of cold and warm.

"Um."

Jiang Yu responded lightly, picked up the orange-red paper box on the desk, and gently put it in front of her, "You worked hard today, a reward for the kid."

The box is printed with the logo of a luxury brand

Cheng Suran was stunned.

"The salary... is counted twice as much as the company's standard for newcomers in print modeling." Jiang Yu sat on the single sofa next to her. Her long legs lazily hitched, and her fingers fiddling on the phone screen, then, WeChat transferred three thousand dollars.

"Sister, can I not have this reward?"

"Why?"

Cheng Suran pursed her lips, looked away from the paper box, and whispered, "It's too expensive, I don't need it."

As soon as the words fell, the air froze.

The room was suddenly silent.

"It will come in handy."

"I..."

Jiang Yu looked at her with a cold gaze and said carelessly, "Can't you take it and sell it for money?"