29 Chapter 29: Sowing discord 1

It was the third day after Cleo returned to City K and Jin had made a lot of reflection about his love life with Cleo. Cleo has been sending him messages like she always did like morning text. She acted as if everything between them was normal.

Jin replied to her text sometimes, but his reply lacked feeling. Cleo outburst about Qiao An made him wonder if he should give Cleo another chance to redeem herself or not. Since the root of the problem stemmed from Qiao An, Jin decided to visit his sister.

Like he usually did, Jin sent messages to Qiao An to let her know about him visiting her. Jin did not bother calling since he knew Qiao An rarely answered when he called. To his surprise, Qiao An replied almost immediately. Qiao An told Jin that he could visit at seven and they could have dinner together.

Jin came to Qiao An's apartment ten minutes before seven because he knew he had at most one hour to talk and to eat with his sister. Jin knocked on the door, and Qiao An opened the door for him. Jin entered the house without realising that someone was staring at him from the staircase.

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Both of the siblings ate in silence. Jin felt that lately, it became increasingly hard for him just to have dinner with his sister. But when he thought of how some people can see and can eat dinner with Qiao An easily, he became vexed. For example, the man who lives downstairs with his sister.

"You can tell me what you want to say" Qiao An spoke first since his brother did not say anything.

Qiao An knew how well Jin treated her as his sister and Qiao An also knew that Jin would come to see her only if he had something important he wanted to tell her.

"Xiao An, if your future boyfriend does not like me or any of our family, will you choose him? Or will you choose your handsome brother?" Jin attempted to crack a joke.

"Are you stupid?" Qiao An asked back without any expression on her face.

Jin stopped eating. "So, who will you choose? You boyfriend or your brother?"

"Did your girlfriend make you choose?" Qiao An put down her spoon and stopped eating too. "You are a smart man. You probably know the answer even without even asking for my opinion".

"Let's just say for the sake of argument that I am not smart, what will you do?" Jin refused to give up.

Jin believed that everyone should be given a second chance in life and love, but he has his bottom line. Nobody can touch his family and get away from it. Jin thought whether he should give Cleo his second chance or not.

"The question lies in whether you love her enough or you love your family more? So, do you love her?" Qiao An knew her brother fell in love quickly and he also falls out of love as easy as he fell in love.

The answer was easy for Jin. Of course, he will always choose his family. He knew the answer all along, but he just feels that it was kind of a pity to leave such a beautiful girl alone.

"Being an idiot is a privilege for the people who are in love. But not you. You are not in love, so you are not allowed to be an idiot. Get yourself together. Here, eat this" Qiao An gave Jin a spoonful of fried vegetable.

From the way Jin hesitated, Qiao An knew that Jin was not really in love with Cleo. Crush or admiration, maybe yes. After all, Cleo is a beautiful lady. It was hard not crushing on her if she were a man.

But when you love someone, then you love that someone. One does not have to squeeze his or her brain juice to think of an answer to that, because the answer did not come from the brain. It came from the heart.

As he thought, his sister is always the best. Jin picked up his spoon and started eating as if all his previous confusion and clouded feeling were now gone and replaced with bright sun.

When it almost eight, Jin knew he had to return to his place. Jin came down, and his eyes darted towards the corner where Amy Shen feed the stray kitten last time. Amy Shen was not there, but he decided to check out the stray kitten.

When Jin decided to visit his sister, he suddenly thought of the kitten that Amy Shen feed in the dark corner. Without thinking much, he purchased a few packets of wet tuna food for the cat.

Jin took the wet food from his car and went to the dark corner. He could vaguely see that there were two small silhouettes of kittens sat quietly near the stairs a few steps away from Jin. The kittens retreated when it saw Jin as if they were hiding from him.

Jin looked for the melamine plate and found it a step away from him. The plate was quite clean, so Jin poured the wet food from the packet onto the plate. Jin crouched down and waited for a while, but the kitten did not come out from their hiding place.

"Brother Jin?"

Jin turned around and saw Amy Shen with a big packet of kibbles on her hand. He remembered last time, Amy Shen was feeding the cat around this time of the night.

Amy Shen looked at the wet food on the plate and smiled. "Ah, you are feeding Orange and Snowy". She crouched down and began calling for the kittens. When the kittens heard Amy Shen's voice, both dashed to reach her.

"You need to call them then only they will come out. They are a bit shy around stranger". Amy Shen patted the kittens' head while the kittens were eating.

Jin looked at the blissful expression of the kittens who got to eat wet food instead of small dry kibbles. Amy Shen suddenly turned to him and asked seriously.

"Brother Jin, did you just come from An An's house?" Amy Shen knew that Qiao An would start reading at eight o'clock, so it was only right for her to assume that Jin just came out from Qiao An's house rather than going to.

Jin nodded, but because it was quite dark and Amy Shen might not see him, he answered anyway.

Amy Shen said nothing after that, but even in the dark, Jin could see a bit of Amy, and he saw how Amy had a relieved smile on her face.

The two of them watched the kitten in silence. Nobody talked, but both of them felt relieved for some reasons.

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An hour earlier.

"Brother, what took you so long?" Amy Shen was waiting for Shen Jun Shan to returned from throwing the trash in the dumpster. She needed help with the burned-out light bulb in the kitchen.

"I talk with Yu Jing outside". Shen Jun Shan entered the house with his slipper on. "Where's the light bulb?"

Amy Shen laughed at his brother. "Brother, you forget to take off your slipper. You are the one who keeps the light bulb. I don't know where it is. Maybe you keep it in the storage room."

Shen Jun Shan looked down and hurriedly take off his slipper. "The light bulb?"

Amy Shen looked at her brother, who seemed to have his mind somewhere. Just what did he talk about with Yu Jing to make him so distracted?

'What did you and Yu Jing talked about?" Amy Shen went to the storage room to look for the light bulb. When she found it, she handed the light bulb to Shen Jun Shan. "So? What is it?"

Shen Jun Shan took the light bulb from Amy absentmindedly. "She said, a man entered An An's house. A handsome man. She also said that Qiao An looked very happy when she opened the door for the man".

Amy Shen was speechless. Isn't that just Jin?

"Sis, have you seen An An smiled happily when she opened the door for you? Because she did not, at least towards me". Shen Jun Shan walked to the kitchen and absentmindedly got the portable staircase ladder.

Well, for Amy Shen, Qiao An did smile to her, not looking 'very happy' but still smiling at her. That was just how her face usually.

"It could be Jin. Yu Jing might have exaggerated a bit about An An's expression. You know how An An did not show her feeling on her face?". Amy Shen approached her brother. "Don't trust people too easily".

Yu Jing's smiling face came into Amy's mind. Amy saw the way Yu Jing looked jealous when Qiao An and his brother were talking. Amy Shen tried to think whether Yu Jing was attempting to sow discord between Qiao An and her brother or not.

Shen Jun Shan nodded and changed the light bulb. His expression looked slightly better.