The next morning.
Daylight broke. No one knew what time it was. A cell phone had been ringing noisily somewhere, either on a bed or table, for some amount of time.
Ring, ring, ring.
Ring, ring, ring.
Suddenly, a sleepy female voice started mumbling.
"Whose phone is that?"
"Shanshan, Shanshan."
"Your cell phone is ringing."
On the other side of the bed, another female voice replied sleepily, "That"s not my cell phone"s ring tone. It should be yours. Quickly turn it off. Hu, I want to sleep a bit more."
"It isn"t mine either."
"Then whose is it?"
"Just turn it off first."
"Where is the phone?"
The two of them were talking.
Suddenly, another voice sounded from the bed, "Huh? That sounds like my cell phone. Who the h.e.l.l is calling so early in the morning?!" Zhang Ye lifted up the blanket that was covering his face as he ranted impatiently.
Dong Shanshan shouted beside him, "Hurry up and turn it off. I need to sleep!"
"OK," Zhang Ye replied subconsciously.
Suddenly, the entire room went quiet!
Yu Yingyi was immediately jolted awake at the other side of the bed. She felt shocked as she sat up straight from the bed and looked dumbfounded at Zhang Ye who slept together with her and Dong Shanshan in the same bed.
Dong Shanshan also finally realized what was going on as she looked at Zhang Ye, then rubbed her eyes as though to confirm again.
"Zhang Ye?"
"Zhang Ye?!"
Zhang Ye was the last person to react. He looked shocked at Dong Shanshan to his left and glanced at Yu Yingyi to his right. He was the most startled one among them and nearly fell off the bed in shock. He exclaimed in panic, "Aiyo, my G.o.d! Why are the two of you are sleeping in my bed?"
Yu Yingyi nearly fainted. "That"s what I should be asking!"
Dong Shanshan looked at Zhang Ye and said, "This is my bed!"
"Didn"t you tell me to sleep in this room?" Zhang Ye stared.
Dong Shanshan said in a speechless manner, "Who said you could sleep in this room? Yingyi and I were to sleep in my room. I arranged for you and Ma Xufei to sleep in another room. Didn"t you come up first and bathe?"
Zhang Ye said very a.s.sured, "Yeah, I crawled into bed right after bathing. How would I know which room was for Ma Xufei and me? I thought this was our room."
Dong Shanshan rubbed her forehead. "You mean you couldn"t even feel that there were two human beings in the bed? And you still had the cheek to crawl into the bed?"
Zhang Ye defended. "But neither of you said anything when I crawled into the bed too, right?"
Dong Shanshan returned, "Yingyi and I had too much to drink, so how would we know that someone had crawled into the bed after us?"
"I drank a lot too and didn"t know that there were people in the bed either." Zhang Ye countered, "I fell asleep as soon as I hit the bed!"
Yu Yingyi smacked Zhang Ye in annoyance and stated, "Aiyo, you"re really great, huh. I really have to give it to you." Then she told Dong Shanshan, "Shanshan, let"s stop reasoning with him already. Hurry up and put on our clothes!"
The two of them were not wearing many clothes.
But Zhang Ye had even less on.
Only when Yu Yingyi mentioned it did Zhang Ye start to feel embarra.s.sed. But he still gave a quick glance at the both of them and that set his heart racing, though he quickly curbed it by thinking other thoughts by looking in the direction of the foot of the bed. But there were also some rather inappropriate things that he saw lying over there, like a pair of stockings that were thrown there by someone, as well as red and purple underwear. Some were lying on top of the blanket, some were on the floor, and there was also a piece hanging off the ledge of the foot of the bed. The other clothes were entangled within the blanket where Zhang Ye"s feet were. He could feel the clothes there when he wiggled his toes.
Zhang Ye withdrew his legs quickly and sat up to put on his clothes in a hurry. "Where are my clothes?"
However, Dong Shanshan pushed him back down and said, "Stay under the blanket for now and let us get dressed first."
Yu Yingyi was putting her clothes on. However, with Zhang Ye still beside them, she could not stand up straight and wear her clothes in the open. She was grabbing hold of the blanket to cover herself while putting on her clothes with the other hand.
Noticing this situation, Zhang Ye simply covered himself with the blanket and said, "You two go ahead and put on your clothes first."
Initially, he thought that it would be total darkness under the blanket and he would not be able to see anything. This action was also to tell Dong Shanshan and Yu Yingyi: You can put on your clothes without worry of me watching. But when he covered himself with the blanket, he found out that he could still see through it judging by the light rays coming in. Dong Shanshan was sitting at the other side of the bed while Yu Yingyi was in a half-sitting and half-bending position at the other end of the bed. She was still holding onto the blanket but Zhang Ye could still see everything from where he was. It even looked like he could see everything more clearly than before.
Fine, he decided to close his eyes instead.
Zhang Ye had a rather good sense of consciousness this time.
Thinking about it, last night"s matter was really too coincidental. Zhang Ye had talked on the phone groggily with Yao Jiancai for a long time before he went to bathe. Dong Shanshan and Yu Yingyi who he reckoned to be drunk as well did not know there was someone else in the bathroom, so they fell asleep after getting into bed. When Zhang Ye came out of the bathroom, he just lifted up the blanket and crawled in without even thinking. At that time, he thought that the warm feeling he had was because it was an electric mattress.
Hai, this was all fated.
Next to him, he heard the two women gossiping about him.
Yu Yingyi remarked, "This rascal is terrible."
Dong Shanshan replied, "I think he did it on purpose."
Yu Yingyi agreed, "Hmph, I think the same as you."
Zhang Ye could no longer bear to listen. "Hey, can you two not be like that?"
Suddenly, the thud of approaching footsteps came from outside the room. Then someone knocked on the door.
Dong, dong, dong.
"Shanshan? Yingyi?" It was Ma Xufei"s voice.
w.a.n.g He also said, "Are you two awake yet?"
Yu Yingyi was stunned. Then she said to the door, "I just woke up, what"s the matter?"
Behind the door, w.a.n.g He said, "There"s a cell phone downstairs which I think is Shanshan"s. It was ringing for a long time, so I had a look at it and saw more than a dozen unanswered calls. I brought it up for Shanshan."
Dong Shanshan immediately said, "Place it outside first. We haven"t put on our clothes yet."
w.a.n.g He said, "Uh, alright then."
Another set of footsteps could be heard coming upstairs. Then, from outside the door, someone asked, "Where"s Zhang Ye?" It was He Kui"s voice.
Ma Xufei answered, "I don"t know. I don"t remember seeing him since last night. I went to bed after singing and didn"t see him beside me when I woke up in the morning."
He Kui inquired curiously, "Then where did he go? His car is still parked outside."
Ma Xufei asked, "Shanshan, Yingyi, did the two of you see Zhang Ye?"
Yu Yingyi thought to herself, Of course we saw him. This guy was sleeping in the same bed as us for the entire night. "We didn"t see him."
Dong Shanshan laughed. "I think he took a taxi back home by himself last night."
Ma Xufei acknowledged, "I see. Alright then, what are the two of you going to do then? Shanshan, don"t you have something today? I recall that you told Zhang"er that you have a rehearsal today for the Spring Festival Gala?"
Hearing that, Dong Shanshan was startled. "Aiyo, what time is it now?"
w.a.n.g He said from the hallway, "It"s already 9.30 AM."
"Oh no! Oh no! I"m running late!" Dong Shanshan could no longer be bothered with Zhang Ye"s presence as she leaped off the bed. She jogged to the front of the wardrobe and pulled open it. Taking out a random skirt, she immediately slid it over her legs.
When the people outside heard that, they said, "Then you should hurry up. Attending your job is more important. Us guys will just leave first. Let"s have another reunion some other day if there"s time. We"re all in Beijing anyway."
"We"re leaving, Shanshan."
"Yingyi, we"ll see you again at the next reunion."
The three of them went downstairs and left.
Yu Yingyi knew that Dong Shanshan was in pressed for time as the Spring Festival Gala was the biggest annual event of a television station. It was also the first time that Dong Shanshan got to be the host for a Spring Festival Gala, so no matter what, she must not be delayed any longer. After she put on her pants, she hastily handed some clothes to Dong Shanshan.
"Is this OK?"
"Anything is fine, anything is fine!"
"Don"t worry about your hair, I"ll help you to comb it."
"Thanks, Yingyi."
"Don"t worry about it. Hurry. I hope you can still make it on time."
"I definitely won"t make it in time! The rehearsal was scheduled to start at 9 AM!"
While Dong Shanshan was putting on her clothes, she remembered something. She looked at the direction of Zhang Ye who was still covered by the blanket. "Don"t just sit there, get up quickly. Don"t you have to go to the dress rehearsal too?"
Zhang Ye could only uncover his head as he coughed and quickly started looking for his clothes. In the end, he remembered that he"d left his clothes in the bathroom last night, so quickly went to the bathroom to change. After he put on his clothes and came out, Dong Shanshan and Yu Yingyi were also ready. When the three of them faced each other, Yu Yingyi felt the most embarra.s.sed, followed by Zhang Ye, then Dong Shanshan. As Zhang Ye had slept in the same bed with Dong Shanshan before, even though he had a girlfriend now, it was not that embarra.s.sing between them. However, Yu Yingyi was different. Having spent the night with their faces so close to each other, how could she not feel awkward?
As Yu Yingyi was an easygoing person, after the awkward moment, she said, "Alright, we"ll settle the score with Zhang Ye in the future. Both of you hurry up and leave first!"
Dong Shanshan quickly picked up her bag and said, "Alright, let"s go!"
"Hurry!" Yu Yingyi urged.
Dong Shanshan"s cell phone rang. She rapidly dragged Zhang Ye downstairs while she answered the call. "h.e.l.lo, Brother Hu."
Hu Fei questioned in a slightly angry manner: "Where are you?"
Dong Shanshan said: "I"m about to arrive. I"m stuck in a traffic jam now because of an accident ahead. The cars aren"t even moving."
"The dress rehearsal has started already. Everyone is waiting for you."
"I"m sorry, Brother Hu, I"ll be right there!"
"Hurry up, the execs are getting impatient!"
Dong Shanshan really could lie without blinking an eye.
Then, Zhang Ye"s cell phone started ringing as well.
The moment he answered the call, the angry voice of Yao Jiancai surged out at him. "Little Zhang, you must have overslept, right? What time is it already? How many times have I called you? Why are you not here yet?"
Zhang Ye used the same excuse as Dong Shanshan and said: "It"s a traffic jam….A traffic jam! I"m about to arrive!"
Yao Jiancai shouted: "What do you mean "about to arrive"? I can hear the sound of your footsteps going down the stairs!"
Zhang Ye said embarra.s.sed, "Help me delay a little bit. I"ll be there very soon."
"All the other celebrities and actors have already arrived. It"s just you left now. Some of the Beijing Television"s execs have already come over to ask me, but I don"t even know how to explain to them. Ai, you are making us seem too unprofessional. Besides, we haven"t even practiced our lines together, so how are we going to perform later?"
"Let"s do it spontaneously."
"Anyway, just hurry up!"
"Sure."
As they had too much to drink last night, they could not possibly drive in their current condition. As a result, Zhang Ye and Dong Shanshan decided to get a taxi and frantically rushed to the television station.
Dong Shanshan was holding up a compact to touch up her makeup in the taxi. She said, "I"m in deep trouble because of you."
"Ah? Why are you blaming me?" Zhang Ye didn"t know whether to laugh or cry.
"I will be getting chewed out by them later." Dong Shanshan said worried, "If anything goes wrong, I might just get excluded from hosting the Spring Gala Festival this time."
Zhang Ye also knew that Dong Shanshan"s transgression this time was not exactly light. As she was still a newcomer and not a veteran host yet, how could she be late by almost an hour for such a major gala rehearsal? This was really unacceptable. Zhang Ye was fine with it since it wouldn"t make a difference to him. He didn"t have much of a reputation anyway, so what was the big deal even if he got there late? Furthermore, with his current status and diverse abilities in the industry, Beijing Television would definitely not take it up with him over such a trivial matter. However, it was different for Dong Shanshan. They wouldn"t dare reprimand Zhang Ye, but why wouldn"t they reprimand her?
Zhang Ye said, "Don"t worry about it. I"ll help you explain later."
Dong Shanshan looked at him. "And how do you propose to do that?"
"I"ll let you know when we get there," Zhang Ye simply said.