“Wait for me outside.’
Bang!
Without giving Susan time to respond, Ian slammed the door shut in her face and proceeded to get dressed.
Delighted, Susan hurried downstairs to the kitchen to retrieve two eggs she had boiled earlier before waiting for him at their rendezvous point.
Not long after, the sound of the door opening prompted her to look up, only to have a handsome young man clad in a white shirt meet her gaze. Looking like he had just stepped out of the pages of a comic book, Ian descended the stairs with grace and aplomb.
“Are you all set? Let’s get going, or we won’t be able to catch the minibus to the market.”
Urging him, Susan beamed as she handed him the two hot eggs still in her hands.
Ian did not refuse.
The pair soon arrived at the bus stop. Due to the market that day, many villagers already stood in line.
I didn’t think it would be such a long queue! Would he feel irritated?
Familiar with his aversion to crowds, Susan began to worry.
Fortunately, the villagers parted in the middle to allow the two university students to ascend the minibus when it arrived. They were still very impressed with how Ian made the farmer a third more than he would usually earn with the sale of timber.
“Have your nephew sit over here, Ms. Jadeson. It’s a prime seat on this bus.”
“This seat is fine too, Ms. Jadeson.”
The villagers were simple, kind-hearted folk who wouldn’t think twice about paying kindness shown to them forward.
Susan and Ian finally decided on a very comfortable position by the window. Although the softness in the seats was wanting, Susan did not notice any discomfort in her companion along the journey.
“Why don’t you eat the eggs?” she asked after a while. “Aren’t you hungry?”
“I’ll have them now.”
Seated next to her without a word, Ian finally picked up an egg hesitantly as he feared the unsanitary implications of eating in public.
Not to mention it also seems awfully impolite.
Determined to make that day an exception for Susan’s sake, he took the peeled egg handed by the young woman beside him.
Just then, one particularly daring villager gathered enough courage to ask the question his fellows were dying to ask. “What’s the age gap between you and your nephew, Ms. Jadeson? You seem to be the same age. Do you have many older siblings?”
Upon their initial arrival, the villagers had assumed that the handsome pair of university-educated youngsters were a couple.
Only later did they discover through the Villagers’ Committee that they were aunt and nephew.
“We-” Susan began.
“We’re not related by blood.”
Suddenly, a dry voice interrupted her by answering the question on her behalf.
Immediately after the voice fell, the minibus rang with the laughter of the villagers.
So they’re not directly related. Could that mean that the rumor of them being a couple is true after all?
Within seconds, the impression of the youngsters in the eyes of their fellow passengers changed. Although they were heavily ridiculed, the villagers’ jest was never cruel.
Susan’s face, however, turned a deep scarlet.
She stumbled out quickly as soon as the minibus rolled to a halt at the station outside the market, feeling on the verge of dying of utter embarrassment.
Ian, on the other hand, remained completely indifferent.
His aloofness did not last very long. As soon as he stepped out of the minibus, the massive crowd jostling each other in the cramped market and the rampant presence of live poultry wailing on both sides of the street rooted him in
terror.
“What’s wrong? You don’t like it here?” Susan became worried at how green his face became.
Without deigning to respond, the young man pursed his lips before following cautiously in her wake.
Susan was just about to suggest they leave quickly after buying what they needed when her phone suddenly rang.
Without even looking at the screen, she answered it at once. “Hello?”
“Ms. Jadeson, what do you think you’re doing frolicking around with Sebastian’s son? Even if you don’t take the Limmers seriously, it’s still no reason for you to do that.”
The angry voice fell upon her ears like a thunderclap out of the blue.
With her phone glued to the side of her face, Susan’s cheeks drained of color within several seconds.
“I didn’t-”
“You didn’t? Are you still trying to deny it despite photos of you in Yeringham are now all over the Internet? You can’t do this, Ms. Jadeson. I’ve never forced you to do anything you didn’t want to, have I? Besides, you’d once said that you wouldn’t do anything for the Limmer family. I’d even obliged you for not wanting to bear the Limmer name. However, Sebastian is the enemy of our patriarch. How could you fraternize with his son?”
The man’s voice rose in pitch as he spoke. On more than one occasion, he was so angry that he spluttered in search of the right words.
Susan’s face was as white as a sheet of paper. The only thing she could do was mutter, “That has nothing to do with me.”
“Is that so?” the man challenged. “I dare you to tell Sebastian that you wish to be his daughter-in-law then. Do you think he would agree to it?”
He added menacingly, “Don’t you forget that although the Limmer family is gone, the Heard family still remains. They will never let you or Sebastian off the hook if you do this. After all, you have conveniently given them a chance to ruin the Jadeson family!”
Susan’s eyes dimmed in despair at the man’s vicious words.
