At around 4 o’clock in the afternoon, Ji Chaozhou received a WeChat message from Cheng Liu. She asked him if Guyu Restaurant was okay for dinner. 

He hadn’t even agreed to have dinner with her.

Ji Chaozhou’s fingertips landed on the screen and typed two words, then clicked on the send button. But when he was about to press it, his fingertips paused and moved to the dialog box to delete those two words.

After a while, he typed another word.

But it was not sent out in the end because someone came.

Ji Chaozhou heard the doorbell ringing and stood up to turn on the video display.

Standing outside the gate was a young woman with long wavy hair hanging over her shoulders. She wore large sunglasses on her face, and her delicate face could only be vaguely seen.

The young woman took off her sunglasses, looked up and smiled at the surveillance camera, “Chaozhou ge¹, Aunt Yun and I are here to see you.”

If Cheng Liu were here, she would definitely recognize the young woman as her love rival for the man she once thought was her boyfriend—the popular actress Yun Fei.

Unlike her bold red lips at the airport, today, Yunfei’s makeup and clothes were more gentle as she stood in front of the villa while pushing Yun Se’s wheelchair.

Ji Chaozhou’s eyes saw Aunt Yun, and he immediately pressed the door button. He walked out quickly and welcomed, “Aunt Yun.” 

Yun Se was in good spirits today. She looked at the young man who came out of villa gates and asked with a gentle smile, “I came to see if courtyard has been tidied up?”

“Yes.” Ji Chaozhou took the wheelchair from Yun Fei and pushed Aunt Yun in.

“Chaozhou ge, I was filming a program in a closed setting last week. I didn’t know about what happened to you until I got home today.” Yunfei had a look of sadness and guilt on her face, but she soon smiled again and took something out of the trunk of the car. It turned out to be a big bag of vegetables. “Fortunately, you’re okay. Aunt Yun and I bought vegetables today and we can have it for dinner with Chaozhou ge later.”

Yun Se also turned and patted Ji Chaozhou’s hand. “I was thinking last time that we should have a meal together. It’s good you happened to be at home today.”

Ji Chaozhou did not refuse. “Aunt Yun, next time I will just go to your house. You don’t have to rush over here.” 

“I also want to get some fresh air. It’s too boring to stay at home all day,” Yun Se said. She noticed the two fruit tree seedlings in the otherwise bare corner of the courtyard and was a little surprised, “What kind of flowers are they? Why were they planted there?”

Ji Chaozhou lowered his eyes. “They’re pomelo seedlings.” 

“Did the garden designer place them there?” Yun Se frowned. “Why not plant an adult tree? And pomelo trees? These two seedlings are not suitable for your place.”

Two small pomelo tree seedlings were occupying the left side of the courtyard, but the right side was full of flowers—the whole thing really looked unbalanced.

Ji Chaozhou did not mention Cheng Liu and only said, “They will grow up in two years.”

Yun Se did not interfere with him anymore and forgot about it after having said it. Ji Chaozhou pushed her into the living room, and she looked at the newly improved layout, feeling satisfied.

In just a few days, Chaozhou made many changes in the villa, which was better than she imagined.

Before coming, Yun Se thought she would see an empty courtyard and an even emptier living room.

Yun Fei, who had been following behind, carried the vegetables to the kitchen. When she passed the living room, she turned her head and took a look at the things on the table.

Is he mixing perfume?

The smell in the living room was completely different from the scent Ji Chaozhou carried all year round.

“Let’s go help Xiao Fei,” Yun Se said to Ji Chaozhou behind her.

Although she had told her nephew not to be bothered by Yun Fei’s feelings before, she had adopted Yun Fei when she was still a child. The two of them had grown up together and could be regarded as brother and sister.

Ji Chaozhou would never reject Aunt Yun’s words, so he naturally pushed her towards the kitchen.

“Chaozhou ge, help me with this…” 

Yun Fei was about to hand the green vegetables to Ji Chaozhou when she suddenly stopped, “Is your hand injured?” 

Aunt Yun immediately turned to look at him. “You’re injured?” she asked, clearly anxious.

“It’s just a scratch.” Ji Chaozhou put away his right hand, “It’s almost healed.” 

“I’ll handle everything here. Aunt Yun, why don’t you and Chaozhou ge go back to the living room,” Yun Fei said, putting vegetables back on the counter.

“No need.” Ji Chaozhou turned around, “I’ll get gloves.”

He quickly walked out of the kitchen, walked to the living room cabinet, opened the drawer, and took out a PVC glove.

Ji Chaozhou was about to put it on his right hand when he suddenly stopped. He took out his phone, deleted an unsent word in the dialog box, and sent a new one.

He hesitated for a moment, sent another message, and only then put on his gloves and walked back to the kitchen.

… … translated by Maela @ whitemoonlighttranslations.com

Cheng Liu sat in the office and worked frantically, trying to finish all the work for this week. Unfortunately, some people’s reports were not finished yet.

At the same time, she occasionally glanced at the mobile phone on the table, waiting for Ji Chaozhou’s reply.

Finally, the phone vibrated. Cheng Liu stopped what she was doing, quickly grabbed the phone, and clicked on the message.

Boyfriend: [I have guests over, I won’t go.]

Boyfriend: [Next time.]

Cheng Liu’s heart was broken when she saw the first message, but when she saw the second one, her heart was suddenly healed.

He said next time!

This means he asked her out!!

They’ll have a candlelight dinner together next time!!!

Cheng Liu pondered. Well, Guyu Restaurant did use a lot of lighted candles. She was right, this could indeed be considered as a candlelight dinner.

Young President Cheng immediately continued to work harder. She wanted to save all the spare time she could for her boyfriend!

Seventh Year of My Secret Love for You translated by Maela @ whitemoonlighttranslations.com

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FOOTNOTE:

¹Ge or gege means ‘older brother’. I’m keeping it in pinyin here because it’s a common enough word that readers should know if they’re into c-novels, but also because ‘Older Brother Chaozhou’ reads very unwieldy and typing it out for the nth time was driving me nuts 😂 ↩︎

T/N: From what I know, calling a non-family-related older guy ‘Surname + ge‘ leaves them directly in the friendzone while calling them ‘gege’ or ‘Name/Surname gege’ is more cutesy and leads to pitter-pattering of hearts. But I guess it doesn’t apply here because Ji Chaozhou and Yun Fei grew up together and he is her older brother by adoption

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