Stepmom didn’t pay any attention to Zhao Ran’s movements, simply watching him solve problems and using her slender fingers to point out any mistakes he made.
Stepmom’s voice was truly gentle. In fact, Zhao Ran genuinely disagreed with Zhao Ping’s habit of placing his friends on equal footing with Stepmom. A woman as wonderful as her—no man could possibly bear to raise his voice at her.
Zhao Ran had seen how, on Teacher’s Day, some of Stepmom’s students would come to visit her. She always received them with such warmth and kindness.
It was clear that the group of students sincerely adored her, never leaving without leaving behind piles of fruit and chocolates.
As the weather wasn’t too hot today, the air conditioning wasn’t on. The fan behind them blew slowly, carrying not only a cool breeze but also the natural, intimate scent of Stepmom’s body.
Stepmom’s phone buzzed. She glanced at it and picked it up to reply, which reminded Zhao Ran of that Deputy Director Li from before. He wondered if that guy was still harassing Stepmom.
The reason Zhao Ran knew about this matter was because, on a previous occasion, Stepmom had issues with her phone and asked him to help fix it.
That day, after Zhao Ran had taken a shower and returned to his room, he turned on his computer, browsed the internet for a while, and chatted with a few old classmates. Just as he was about to log off, Stepmom entered the room looking for him.
“Xiao Ran, could you take a look at my phone? I don’t know what’s wrong—WeChat keeps closing automatically. I’ve restarted it several times, but it’s still happening.”
Normally, if restarting didn’t work, the only solution was to delete and reinstall WeChat. So, Zhao Ran backed up the WeChat chat history onto his computer, deleted the app, and then used a data cable to restore the backup to the phone.
After the restoration was complete, Zhao Ran tested it to make sure it was working. Then, he casually opened a few chat logs to check if everything was functioning properly.
The first few were some of Stepmom’s work groups, her close friends’ group, and her chat histories with Zhao Ping and a few relatives. They all opened without issue. Zhao Ran called out, “It’s fixed. You can test it in a bit.”
Stepmom was in the shower and told Zhao Ran to just leave it for now. After locking the phone, Zhao Ran began tidying up the desk. Just then, Stepmom’s phone received a WeChat message. Even though the screen was locked, he could still see the preview.
“Xiao Zhao, regarding your situation, you’re a smart woman. You know what I mean.”
The rest of the message wasn’t visible. Zhao Ran found this person’s words strange, so he unlocked Stepmom’s phone and opened WeChat.
Stepmom had this person saved as “Deputy Director Li.” Some of their chat history was voice messages, some was text. Zhao Ran skimmed through it roughly. It seemed Stepmom was participating in some evaluation for an advanced professional title, and this person had been explicitly and implicitly hinting that she didn’t quite meet the qualifications, but he would help her find a way. At first, Stepmom thanked him, but he later hinted that his influence was limited and that it would require some “effort” on her part. Stepmom said if it was too troublesome, it wasn’t necessary. The man said it wasn’t troublesome at all—he just hoped to have a meal with her to discuss it further.
Stepmom seemed to catch on to his implications and politely declined. Then, this person began persistently pestering her, saying that if she didn’t get this title, her teaching evaluation scores wouldn’t improve, and it would be difficult for her to advance into the Education Bureau or similar opportunities in the future.
Stepmom declined again, saying she didn’t want to trouble others. She would strive for it if possible, but if not, it was fine—she could just work harder in the future.