AM Chapter 25

25 Numerous Quarrels

During the days Chen Mo couldn’t see Liang Jingren, he also had company—he would first buy two cups of coffee at a private coffee shop near Daxing Group, then cross the street to harass Xu Yilin at the flower shop opposite.

Chen Mo’s inner thoughts were: My heartbreak from being rejected by Liang Jingren still needs to be healed by flowers!

And the superficial words he said to the flower shop owner Xu Yilin were: “Good afternoon~ Here to bother you again~ I brought you coffee. May I admire the flowers that Boss Xu has painstakingly cultivated today?”

Xu Yilin would usually politely say, “Sure, if you like any, pick one to take!” Then Chen Mo would really impolitely pick from the most beautiful and expensive buckets of flowers.

The flowers he picked usually weren’t delivered to Liang Jingren. Although he would pass by Daxing Group’s building on his way back to the apartment, Liang Jingren wasn’t there. So, these flowers would be left at the front desk.

Chen Mo remembered the first time he handed flowers to the ladies at the front desk, they were surprised for a moment, then revealed shy expressions. Chen Mo didn’t want them to misunderstand, but a slight misunderstanding was okay, so he smiled and said, “These are flowers I got with the coffee, please don’t feel burdened. I want to apologize for my previous rude remarks and hope the three of you can forgive me.”

“In the future, whenever there’s a ‘buy coffee, get flowers’ event, I’ll bring the flowers over. You can put them in a mineral water bottle and display them on the counter, so you can see them every time you turn your head while working, and your mood will become beautiful.”

They really did so, and even prepared a beautiful crystal vase for the flowers—after all, the flowers Chen Mo carefully selected were too beautiful, with long stems, green branches, heavy flowers, and bright leaves. Using only a mineral water bottle would be a waste.

In this way, Chen Mo re-established a good relationship with the ladies at the front desk. Every time he came to the building’s cafeteria to eat, they would greet him, and he would respond with a smile and a nod. More importantly, it became more convenient to get information about Liang Jingren’s work schedule and movements.

However, while Chen Mo maintained a good relationship with the front desk, his relationship with the flower shop owner underwent some subtle changes: Xu Yilin’s attitude gradually changed from being extremely welcoming at first to being not very welcoming now, two months later.

One day, Xu Yilin saw Chen Mo push the door open and directly thrust a broom head at him, saying with a gloomy face, “Get out if you’re not buying flowers.”

Chen Mo raised both hands in surrender, showing the coffee hanging on his hand, and said with a wry smile, “There’s no such thing as forced buying and selling these days, right?”

Xu Yilin narrowed his eyes, his gaze revealing sharpness, “Then get out.”

“Okay…” Chen Mo lowered his hands and shrugged.

He didn’t like dealing with people who were too smart, Chen Mo thought, or with shrewd people who were too calculative.

Seeing Xu Yilin put down the broom, Chen Mo smiled, “I’ll patronize you and buy a bouquet of flowers today!”

Xu Yilin was stunned for a moment, then frowned slightly as Chen Mo walked into the store with a smile, and slowly said, “Welcome…”

That day, Chen Mo looked back and forth for a long time in the corridor formed by buckets of flowers, and finally chose a bouquet of carnations with white petals and purple edges. He didn’t look at any other accompanying flowers and directly asked Xu Yilin to wrap them up for him, just a simple wrapping.

While Xu Yilin was wrapping the flowers for him behind the workbench, he devoted some attention to Chen Mo, who was squatting next to a certain bucket of flowers, “You’re getting off work early today.”

“Yeah, it’s Friday today!” Chen Mo said with a grin.

“You can get off work early on Friday? What kind of company do you work for?” Xu Yilin asked.

Chen Mo said proudly, “Just a normal company, but our boss is good. He said it’s rare to have a Friday and everyone has worked hard, so we should get off work early today and have dinner together in the evening, then a small KTV team building session. But I didn’t want to go, so I took leave and sneaked away!”

Xu Yilin was shocked, “Damn, how come I’ve never met such a good boss!”

Chen Mo was also a little surprised, “Have you ever worked?”

Xu Yilin looked at this “naive young master” with a very speechless expression and said, “Of course, I’m already in my thirties. This flower shop has only been open for less than five years.”

Chen Mo suddenly thought of something and stood up to ask him, “Were you a salesperson before?”

“Ah.” Xu Yilin nodded.

“No wonder~”

Xu Yilin carefully and slowly sorted out the edges and folds of the kraft paper wrapping after tying the last ribbon knot, “It wasn’t like I was a salesperson from the beginning. I only switched careers later when I was short of money. Sales have high commissions…”

“Short of money? What do you need so much money for?”

Xu Yilin sneered and said, “Everyone needs money.”

“It’s not necessarily like that…”

Chen Mo pressed his hands on the workbench, leaning his upper body closer to the hard-working flower shop owner, and stared at him with a pair of sincere and inquisitive bright eyes, asking, “Tell me, if you still have any difficulties now, you can tell me too, although I’m not very rich.”

“Tch!”

Xu Yilin suddenly laughed, then suddenly smashed the wrapped flowers at the faceless person in front of him. Chen Mo nimbly caught the bouquet with both hands. After being startled, he shouted, “Can’t you talk properly?! What did I say to offend you?!”

Xu Yilin put his arms in front of his floral apron and looked at him, “Saying you don’t have money, don’t you even look at what brand of car you drive? Don’t tell me you picked it up from a used car junkyard.”

As he said that, Xu Yilin slowly lowered his eyes and answered Chen Mo’s question in a lowered tone, “My predicament is that I don’t have a house or a car… I almost didn’t get married because of this back then…”

“And then?” Chen Mo was focused on listening to the story, and didn’t care about the flowers that almost hurt his face.

“Then my girlfriend died suddenly! Haha! Are you happy now?” After Xu Yilin finished speaking, the veins on his forehead were about to pop out.

Chen Mo swallowed, left a “sorry” and wisely chose to leave.

Xu Yilin would definitely urge him to pay for the unpaid flowers. He could just transfer the money later anyway, since the two of them had exchanged names, contact information, and added each other as friends long ago.

After spending a wonderful weekend lying flat, on a bright Monday morning, Chen Mo, who was already at work in the office, received a call from Liang Jingren. He confirmed it several times in disbelief—it was indeed Liang Jingren calling.

Liang Jingren had never called him in the morning. Chen Mo thought something great was about to happen. After all, Liang Jingren had accepted the bouquet of carnations he sent last Friday, so could it be that Liang Jingren had thought it over after a weekend and decided to accept his confession?

His uncontrollable smile seemed to be competing with the chandelier on the ceiling. The employee who was giving the morning meeting report was stunned by his bright smile. The boss turned his head and also noticed his offline state, using his eyes to hint at the colleague next to him to poke him with a pen.

If it were elementary school student Chen Mo who was poked, the colleague might not know which trash can the pen would be thrown into the next day, but the current Chen Mo had not only grown taller, but was also in a great mood.

He came back to his senses and immediately stood up to bow and apologize to the boss and other colleagues, then said that he had some stomach discomfort and needed to go to the restroom immediately. Then, he ran out excitedly with his vibrating phone, leaving the colleagues behind him whispering:

“How can someone who has a stomachache smile so happily…”

“Did he eat mushrooms for breakfast?”

“By the way, can our cafeteria add a breakfast window?”

“I won’t eat if there’s no subsidy.”

…

Making phone calls in the restroom really didn’t suit Chen Mo’s personality. He would rather run a few more steps and turn into the stairwell of the fire escape.

As a result, as soon as he answered the phone, the other party was already impatient. Without an opening greeting, he directly announced, “I’m going on a business trip this week, eat dinner by yourself.”

Chen Mo was stunned and repeatedly confirmed, “This week? A week? The whole week? Seven days?”

Liang Jingren “hmm”ed several times, like he was perfunctory and coaxing a child, “Yes, yes, yes, you didn’t count wrong, you’re really amazing.”

“Is it because I gave you flowers? Are you hiding from me again!” Chen Mo was anxious, and his voice echoed throughout the closed stairwell.

Then, Liang Jingren’s voice, without the speakerphone on, also bounced off the walls of the stairwell—”Damn, what does my business trip have to do with you! I’m going to make money, stop trying to flatter yourself!”

Chen Mo’s eardrums were almost pierced, but he couldn’t bear to take the phone away.

“Then, I…”

He hadn’t thought of what to say, and stammered twice. As a result, Liang Jingren hung up the phone directly without mercy.

When the morning meeting ended, Chen Mo returned to his workstation with a dim expression as if he had eaten something wrong and was vomiting and having diarrhea.

Seeing this, the colleagues began to whisper again:

“Does his stomach really hurt?”

“Doesn’t look like it’s fake.”

“I told you not to eat mushrooms for breakfast!”

“Are you crazy, which breakfast shop sells mushrooms?!”

“I know there’s a place selling fried oyster mushrooms at the F line subway entrance, they open at seven in the morning!”

“Wow, that’s so early, the fried food store near my house doesn’t open until noon…”

…

Pushing open the glass door of the flower shop that was open for business, a clear male voice was already heard before the owner could see who was coming: “Welcome!”

“Xu Yilin…” Chen Mo said faintly.

Hearing the voice, the boss who was sorting out packaging materials looked up and saw a ghostly fellow floating into the store weakly.

Xu Yilin was still kind and didn’t directly dismiss this uninvited guest like before, and even asked with concern, “What’s wrong with you?”

Only to see Chen Mo open his mouth and say something that made him regret not being ruthless enough to drive him away: “Can I get a refund for the flowers from last Friday?”

Xu Yilin’s forehead twitched and the corner of his mouth twitched. He said righteously, “No.”

Chen Mo languidly wandered to the workbench and sat down on a round stool, seemingly not planning to get up.

“Are you now being a rascal in my store?” Xu Yilin stared at him across the workbench with his arms folded.

“Sorry,” Chen Mo apologized, “I’m in a bad mood today.”

It was the first time Xu Yilin heard him say the three words “I’m sorry”, and he was immediately fooled.

It should be known that when Chen Mo squatted next to the flower bucket to look at the flowers, he moved all kinds of flower materials around, and even broke off the flower heads of two A-grade imported roses during the period. At that time, let alone compensating money, Chen Mo didn’t even apologize. He was still smiling and trying to gloss over it, saying that his flowers were blowing air conditioning all day and had become “weak”. He put on a serious attitude to reason, but Chen Mo turned around and got angry with him, pulling on the fact that “I even bought you so much coffee”. But no one asked him to buy any coffee in the first place.

Chen Mo also lectured him eloquently: “Don’t be calculative, calculative people don’t have good results~”

Xu Yilin insisted, “I’m not being calculative, I’m being numerously calculative. Who told me I’m a flower seller?”

It was from that time that Xu Yilin didn’t want to receive this fidgety guest anymore.

So, today Chen Mo actually apologized so simply and so directly? This wasn’t right, very—wrong!

“You, what’s wrong with you?” Xu Yilin guessed and asked hesitantly, “Were you… dumped?”

Chen Mo sighed and didn’t speak.

Xu Yilin clicked his tongue and said, “Was it that bouquet of flowers that didn’t suit your girlfriend’s taste? I said it long ago, why pick carnations…”

Chen Mo shook his head and said, “I don’t have a girlfriend, only a boyfriend.”

“Ah… Ah?????” Xu Yilin leaned back and was stunned.

Chen Mo glanced at his expression and immediately snorted with laughter, with a condescending attitude, “What? Is it so surprising? What age is it? The same-sex marriage law has been implemented for so long, isn’t it normal to choose someone of the same sex as a lover? You always thought that the person I was talking to was a girl, that’s because you were prejudiced from the beginning. You’re still not attentive and understanding enough to your customers!”

Xu Yilin: “…”

How did I still get taught a lesson by him? The more Xu Yilin thought about it, the more wrong it felt. He turned his head and immediately retorted, “Oh! Ho! No wonder you got slapped in the face back then, that was actually the father slapping you, right? You’re going to end their family line!”

“Hmph. Ignorant,” Chen Mo glanced at him, turned his head away, and added two more sentences: “Stubborn. Old-fashioned.”

Xu Yilin: “…”

Not changed, not changed at all! Still as annoying as ever! What to do, I really want to hit him!!!

After taking a few deep breaths, Xu Yilin stabilized his mentality. He looked at the “uninvited guest” with a bland expression and said in a flat tone, “Chen Mo, are you here to make fun of me?”

“Yeah,” Chen Mo tilted his head and answered quickly.

Xu Yilin’s mask cracked a little. He smiled fakely and said, “Oh, I see, you must have been dumped, dumped by your boyfriend, right?”

Chen Mo turned around and leaned his head on the workbench to look at him, smiling, “Yeah, so I came to find you as a substitute.”

Xu Yilin laughed in extreme anger, laughing several times, “Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! You deserve to be dumped!” He knew that if he showed he was breaking down now, it would only make Chen Mo feel better and himself feel worse.

Looking at Xu Yilin’s fake waist-akimbo smiling appearance, Chen Mo thought: Still a little short… No, it’s a lot short.

Of course, the “substitute” thing was just something he blurted out. Liang Jingren didn’t have a substitute, otherwise why would he be worth his four years of obsession?

Chen Mo looked up and down at the flower shop man in front of him, looking at the section of arm exposed from the rolled-up sleeves, and thought again: Actually, his figure is not bad… If he actively begged himself to go to bed with him, it’s not like he couldn’t consider it.

It would be even better if Xu Yilin could turn back to when they first met and first got to know each other, as gentle as he was then.

Xu Yilin was completely unaware of Chen Mo’s arrogant delusion at this time. His mind was full of grasping words and organizing language to prepare to give the other party a fierce counterattack.

However, before he was ready, Chen Mo started a new round and somehow opened up a new topic:

“Do you usually work out?”

“Hmm, doesn’t moving flowers and arranging flowers all day count?” As he said that, Xu Yilin rolled up his sleeves and clenched his fists, “My grip strength is still quite strong now, do you want to try arm wrestling with me?”

Seeing Xu Yilin’s smug smile on his face, Chen Mo wouldn’t agree, “I won’t try, it’s rude.”

Xu Yilin: “…”

“Ha? You actually say a flower shop owner is rude? Simply unreasonable!” Xu Yilin said unhappily, “You have the ability to ask people on the street to judge, everyone still feels sorry for my hands being stabbed by flower thorns all the time, becoming more and more rough, right? You? Would anyone feel sorry for you?”

The last sentence really hit home. Chen Mo “hmph”ed and didn’t respond.

In terms of language, he couldn’t strongly suppress the other party, and neither could he use side tricks to make the other party fall into an emotional trap and willingly submit. Sometimes he would even be retaliated against. That’s why he didn’t like dealing with people who were too smart.

But, he didn’t have many friends in this city. It was really boring to go out alone. If he didn’t come to the flower shop to find Xu Yilin, where else could he go?

Suddenly, Chen Mo thought of someone, a truly genuine fool boss in his heart—Jiang Jinhao!

He wondered if Jiang Jinhao, who had become a car dealership owner after so many years, had improved. If he went over, could he trick him into driving a cool motorcycle?

Oh right, he hadn’t taken a motorcycle license yet! …Anyway, if something happened, Jiang Jinhao, the boss, would be responsible. He was just going to catch up with an old classmate, he didn’t plan to buy a car~ Then it was happily decided!

Seeing Chen Mo, who had been silent, suddenly smile while looking at the door, Xu Yilin was a little worried about his flower shop’s tempered glass door, which wasn’t expensive but wasn’t cheap either.

He quickly called Chen Mo twice, asked him if he had eaten, and told him to go home and eat quickly, it was getting dark.

Chen Mo turned his head and smiled at him, “Not yet, have you eaten? I’m in a better mood now, I can treat you, it just so happens that I forgot to buy coffee today, consider it compensation.”

Xu Yilin refused and said, “Actually, I’m so-so about coffee, you don’t have to bring it in the future.”

“What about milk tea? Or fruit tea?”

“No need…”

“Could it be that you like warm milk?”

“…”

“No way? Really? How childish!”

“…You’re so annoying.”

“But without me, aren’t you just alone in this flower shop with no customers, lonely and swatting flies?”

“I have customers, they’ll come when you leave.”

“Liar! I’m not leaving hehe~”

The corners of Xu Yilin’s mouth twitched, and he prepared to find a broom.