Waiting Upon You - Chapter 2 Act 6
Translator: PKitty
TLC: Momoe Pom
Editor: Lady Blue
Quality Check: MochiMochi95
First Published on Ainushi.
Act 6, Scandal…
After hearing that, Feng Hao thought of turning back to take a look, but was stopped by Ling Lang.
"Don"t turn back," he said.
Immediately Feng Hao understood; he looked at what was behind them through the rearview mirror, and sure enough he saw a car closely following them.
"You deserve to be called Senior, you"ve such a high vigilance," Even at times like these Feng Hao still did not forget to throw in a few praises.
"In another six months, your vigilance will be just as high." While Ling Lang was talking, the speed of the car didn"t slow down, instead it became faster. As they neared a remote alley, they turned into it without any warning. Just when Feng Hao was sighing emotionally that everyone who becomes a famous celebrity will also become a car racing master, he discovered the paparazzi behind them was also not to be trifled with; he was actually able to keep up.
Ling Lang drove while speeding all the way. Feng Hao noticed the scenery along the way becoming more and more familiar, and discovered that this was the direction towards Ling Lang"s house.
Suddenly he understood Ling Lang"s intentions; after such a long time the reason the paparazzi never found out Ling Lang"s real address was because, he had a high end residential area as a shield, all the cars coming in must be verified with the owner"s confirmation before being able to enter.
As expected Ling Lang brought Feng Hao to the entrance of the housing district. The guard saw Ling Lang"s car, opened the gates and let them enter. It blocked the paparazzi’s car outside of the compound.
It was a widespread belief by the media that this was Ling Lang"s "residence", when in fact Ling Lang didn"t live here. The speed of the car slowed down after he entered the district; he drove straight to the underground car park, and drove out from another exit – the side exit – after a short period of time.
Once again they were back driving on the main road. There was no longer even a shadow following them. Feng Hao turned his head and openly looked: "Actually the area that I stay at is also a gated residential compound, he will not be able to enter."
"In that case the media will know where you stay," after Ling Lang finished speaking, he was momentarily stunned; what has Feng Hao"s address being exposed got to do with him? Not to mention that it"s perfectly normal for two guys to travel in the same car, just what went wrong with his brain that he would do such a conspicuous action.
Feng Hao didn"t seem like he considered that much, "The poor paparazzi will have to wait outside that compound for quite some time."
Ling Lang held his forehead, he could already foresee the headlines for tomorrow"s newspaper – maybe blacklisting and blocking his manager"s phone number was a pretty good idea.
"Be careful!" Feng Hao cried out with a low voice. Reflexively Ling Lang stepped on the brakes, the both of them jerked forward due to the inertia.
In front of the car stood a foolhardy dog; perhaps due to fright, it seemed unsure of whether to advance or retreat.
The dog"s owner hurriedly ran over and carried the dog away, all while profusely making apologetic gestures towards Ling Lang.
"Really too careless," Feng Hao said blamingly; Ling Lang did not say anything, he waited until they left before starting the car again.
"Senior do you like dogs?" Feng Hao suddenly asked this question.
Ling Lang misunderstood the sudden outburst of question, relating it to the dog they just saw, he replied, "So-so"
"I really like dogs, especially big dogs," Feng Hao stared at him intently, "I"ve always wanted to raise one."
The traffic light in front turned red, Ling Lang stopped the car; that"s when he was aware of the somewhat rude stare the other party was giving him without averting his eyes at all.
"Just now, what were you saying…?"
"Raising dogs," Feng Hao replied without hesitation, without even blinking his eyes.
"…But why do you keep staring at me?"
"Hmm?" Unable to hold his laughter Feng Hao burst out laughing, "Isn"t it good manners to look at others when talking?"
When he said that, Ling Lang subconsciously looked at him; when their eyes met, Ling Lang swiftly darted away from the line of sight, he discovered that he was actually unable to look at Feng Hao face to face. Feng Hao that had somehow given him that feeling of oppression had quietly reappeared once more.
"Have I seen you in school before?" Ling Lang was forced to look at the countdown below the red light, finally he asked what was puzzling him in his heart.
"I"m afraid I cannot answer this question," Feng Hao answered laughingly, "Could it be that Senior thinks I look familiar?"
Not familiar looking, it"s another type of familiarity; Ling Lang was unable to describe it.
"Maybe I remembered it wrong," Ling Lang said in a low voice.
"There are probably not many people fortunate enough for Senior to remember them," Feng Hao teased him, Ling Lang treated it as if he didn"t hear a thing.
Ling Lang sent Feng Hao to his destination, rejecting his invitation to come into his house and take a seat. He made a U turn and then went back to the compound. This time he entered from the side entrance and left by the main entrance; sure enough that paparazzi was still waiting there, he rapidly followed along when he saw Ling Lang"s car coming out.
Ling Lang used the darkness from the dusky sky, changed directions various times and shrugged off the tail following him. Looking at the time, roughly an hour plus had been used from when he agreed to send Feng Hao home to when Feng Hao had actually left. During that span of time, the media would have enough time to embellish all sorts of things; he sighed, in the end he still chose to block his manager, at the least it would allow him a moment of peace.
Ling Lang"s ostrich plan of burying his head and not acknowledging the problem did not succeed. The very next morning he was still woken up by his phone; after looking at the caller id, he realized that not blocking his a.s.sistant"s number at the same time was a big lapse of judgement.
Sure enough, the call was made by his manager who used the a.s.sistant"s phone. After seeing the morning newspaper "The first s.e.x scandal since the King of the Silver Screen debuted 10 years ago", such an explosive news, followed by the discovery that he had been blocked by Ling Lang, one incident after another simply made the manager fly into a rage.
"I didn"t follow you for just one day, how is it that such a big commotion would arise, you even sent the person home? In the past, you would not go to anyone"s house nor would you send anyone home. Don"t you feel that you"ve made an exception for Feng Hao one too many times? h.e.l.lo, hey, you should say something!"
After hearing a few sentences, Ling Lang knew what awaited him would be a long-winded tirade; he opened a toy hamster at his bedside, that toy was a gift from his a.s.sistant, it could record and play recordings in a loop.
He placed the toy hamster and the phone together, turned and headed to the bathroom. The manager on the side had been yapping for a long time, every thirty-second interval there would be a reply of one sentence, "Alright, alright, I know.". It took a long time later for the manager to realize that something wasn"t right.
"f.u.c.k! Ling Lang you"re using the toy hamster to fool me again!"
The voice on the other line still had Ling Lang"s indifferent voice ringing, "Alright, alright, I know."
The manager knew he wasn"t by his phone since a while ago, it would be pointless to speak further; he hung up the phone angrily. Turning around, he saw words like "Going shopping together", "Heading home together", "Shrugging off reporters", "Intimate Actions" on the newspaper. It was unsure whether it was done deliberately or unintentionally; a blurred picture was attached to it, the picture once seen by an expert was easy to perceive that it was taken in a forced perspective, but readers unexpectedly liked it; suddenly he was p.i.s.sed at everything.
He threw the newspaper fiercely onto the table, "I knew that Feng Hao was definitely not simple! Ling Lang had never appeared on these types of tabloid paper, troubles appeared the moment he came!"
"He doesn"t wish for such things to occur either," the a.s.sistant still helped to speak up for Feng Hao.
"Nonsense! This is obviously purposefully hyped, I think that paparazzi was arranged by Feng Hao on purpose!"
The phone the manager had placed on the table rang; once again it was indeed the correspondent of certain newspaper. He picked up the call without asking any questions, and loudly answered, "Everything on the newspaper is sheer fiction, there is no such thing!"
"Yes, they went shopping together, Ling Lang also goes shopping with me, why didn"t you write about me?"
"So what about going home? Does it mean that going home together would mean doing shameful things? They are just practising their lines!"
"Finished filming for an old show, does it mean that they can"t practise for a new one?"
"What"s the new show? Sorry, no comments!"
"Calm down calm down," Waiting until he finally ended the call, the a.s.sistant waved her hands back and forth, "Being angry will only impair your health."
"F*ck calming down! If you"re thinking of using Ling Lang to climb to the top, you must first pa.s.s through me!"
"Hehe," the a.s.sistant laughed gloatingly, "What to do next? Are you going to look for a new show to cover up your lies?"
"There is no need, Ling Lang has already nailed the script for the next show; they will start filming next month, at that time just say that Feng Hao had been changed at the last minute and that will do."
"Hey," the a.s.sistant spread her hands, "I think you should just pray that Feng Hao would not be the one that"s swapped in at the last minute."
When Ling Lang came out of the bathroom, the call had been hung up long ago, the hamster was still tirelessly repeating the same sentence.
He conveniently switched off the hamster, wore a simple disguise and went to the nearby newstand to buy a copy of the morning newspaper.
Sure enough, it"s just like what he had imagined. The incident yesterday had been reported exaggeratedly; if he wasn"t the person involved, he would really be deceived by these spurious remarks. Especially those photos, the angle they were taken from was really good, from the moment they exited the store till when they got up the car, Feng Hao was always looking at him; there was one that even looked as though they were holding hands. There was no conclusive evidence, but it still provoked people"s thoughts.
Ling Lang threw the newspaper aside, and again diligently studied the script for the new show. The moment he saw this script,he found it to his liking; he decided on the script before he finished filming the previous show, as such the commencement of the job was particularly rushed.
He repeatedly read the interactions between him and the supporting actor quite a few times, as though remembering something, he removed his manager"s number from the blacklist and gave him a call.
The manager"s anger was still unabated, he answered the call in a bad mood and asked him, "I"m cleaning up your mess, what did you call for again?"
Ling Lang overlooked his bad tone and went straight to the subject, "Has the supporting actor for the new film been finalized?"
His manager did not expect that he would ask about this, "Ah? It has already been finalized."
"Who is it?"
"Wu Guan Feng," his manager gave him a name.
Ling Lang thought about it, the name sounded really familiar, but he just couldn"t remember who that was.
He hung up after getting the answer that he wanted; after knowing that the supporting actor was not someone he knew, for a moment he was actually somewhat disappointed.
Ling Lang switched on his laptop, he wanted to search up Wu Guan Feng; in the end, by some unexplainable reason it became Feng Hao"s name.
As a newcomer, the information of Feng Hao on the net was so little, it was pitiful. The film that had just ended was his first screen debut, other than that there was nothing on his acting experience; it was like a mysterious person had just appeared from thin air.
Ling Lang thought that the information would at least have the school that Feng Hao had graduated from; after all, to an artist the diploma from Lake Film was equivalent to a prestigious signage, every agent company would take it as a bargaining chip and would impatiently announce it. Unexpectedly, even this was left blank.
After browsing at several similar reports, Ling Lang closed the page while carrying some misgivings, completely forgetting the original intent in turning on the computer.
When he remembered the supporting actor he had overlooked once again, it was already the start of the filming ceremony for the new film. The supporting actor, who had arrived even later than the main actor, walked out from the backstage, confidently pulled a chair out and sat beside Ling Lang, not forgetting to smile at him. Ling Lang, unable to conceal his surprise, nodded his head.
The manager at the bottom of the stage fiercely glared at the a.s.sistant, looking as though he wanted to swallow her whole.
"Don"t be like this," the a.s.sistant had an innocent look on her face, "Initially I was just randomly blabbering about it, who would know that it would actually turn into a prophecy. If I knew that my prediction would be so accurate, today I would have gone to buy the lottery ticket in the morning."
The host, seeing that people had arrived, then introduced them to the reporters saying, "Next, although this actor is a newcomer, but I don’t think that everyone is unfamiliar with him; in the movie that had just ended, he performed remarkably, receiving good opinions from people in the industry and audiences alike. This is also his second time working together with teacher Ling, I believe the charisma and tacit understanding between the two of them will definitely not disappoint everyone… Let us welcome the supporting actor of the film—Feng Hao."