Your Distance

“Cough, cough…” Weng Yunyi choked.

Ting Shuang seemed to be unable to hear any of Weng Yunyi’s coughing, “Zhu Wenjia said that his first time was in the UK. It was during his high school prom, he especially liked those that looked mature and had big breasts, saying that he could think of them as mothers…”

Think of them as mothers…

Weng Yunyi couldn’t bear it any longer, so she left.

“Dad, don’t get agitated, don’t get agitated…” As soon as Weng Yunyi left, Ting Shuang quickly comforted Zhu Ao, “Zhu Wenjia likes young girls.” And young boys, “Don’t worry.”

Zhu Ao’s beard trembled as he cursed incoherently.

Ting Shuang could probably guess what he was saying, since the old man only scolded his son using those few words.

“Dad, I asked Dr. Cheng. She said that your condition’s better than it was yesterday. You should be able to transfer to the general ward in a few days.” Ting Shuang put away the scornful tone he’d adopted just now for one that was calm and reliable, “There are some things I wanted to wait until your health improved to bring up, but I still have some questions that I don’t understand, so I have to ask you now. You should be mentally prepared, don’t get agitated over anything trivial.”

Zhu Ao made a sound in reply, barely managing to stay awake.

Ting Shuang said, “Three things. Firstly, the company is holding an impromptu shareholders meeting tomorrow. As of now I still don’t know which shareholder initiated the meeting, nor the purpose of the meeting. Secondly, someone has requested for the R&D department to finish developing the FND before the impromptu meeting. Thirdly, Yan Liqian, even though he isn’t in charge of the European-side of business, met with representatives from HAAS today.”

After saying all that, he thought Zhu Ao would react strongly, but unexpectedly Zhu Ao just closed his eyes and let out an “Mm”.

“Dad, you’d thought of all these things?” Ting Shuang said, “Do you know what they want to do?”

Zhu Ao nodded, wanting to say something, but he couldn’t speak clearly.

Ting Shuang paced back and forth beside the hospital bed for a while. After thinking about it, he took out his phone from his pocket, pulled up the handwriting keyboard, and held it to Zhu Ao’s left hand.

With much difficulty, Zhu Ao moved his fingers, making frequent mistakes. It took a long time for him to type out one word: acquisition.

Acquisition…

The word was like a thunderstorm, piercing through the mist that had been blocking Ting Shuang’s vision.

No wonder Bai Changyi said in the morning that he was signing a non-disclosure agreement…

So it was an acquisition.

Then… the FND and Bai Changyi’s projects were meant to raise the price of their technology capital, and HAAS was likely to be the buyer selected by Yan Liqian.

Ting Shuang continued speculating, “So, Dad, you ate with Yan Liqian last time. During the meal, he proposed selling RoboRun?”

Zhu Ao nodded, then shook his head wearily.

“That’s right, he can’t sell the company with just 30% of the shares. At most, he’d transfer his own part of the shares.” Ting Shuang was mainly talking to himself, but then he saw Zhu Ao nod his head, “He wants to transfer his shares? I remember shareholders could transfer shares to each other. Who did he want to transfer his shares to? Was it that you didn’t agree to him transferring it to a certain person, so you quarreled at the table?”

Zhu Ao nodded.

Ting Shuang immediately went over the notes he’d made before. Zhu Ao was undoubtedly the shareholder who held the most of Roborun’s shares, but not more than half, only 36%. If Yan Liqian transferred the 30% of his shares to a shareholder of his choice who owned more than 6% of the shares, then Zhu Ao would lose the rights of control over RoboRun.

“If you don’t agree with Yan Liqian transferring the shares to another person, you’d have to buy 30% of the shares he owns yourself.” Ting Shuang did a little estimation, “That’s a lot of money… Is he anxious for such a huge sum of money? In cash? No one can fork out that much cash at once, right?”

At that moment, the nurse entered the room to remind him that visiting hours were over.

Ting Shuang glanced at his watch, “It’s not time yet, there’s still two minutes left, I’ll leave as soon as two minutes are up.”

The nurse left. Facing the wall, Ting Shuang’s thoughts churned quickly.

Before his parents divorced, both of their shares added up to 51%, so they had absolute control over the company. Now, with the power of attorney for the 15% shares that Ting Yun had, he just had to obtain another 36% of Zhu Ao’s shares. But he didn’t bring a copy of the power of attorney with him right now. If he waited until tomorrow to come back again, who knows how the situation would have changed.

“Dad.” Ting Shuang turned around, “Where’s your personal seal?”

“Did Auntie leave?” Ting Shuang exited the ward, to see just Zhu Wenjia listening to songs in the corridor.

Zhu Wenjia took off his earphones, “Mm, my mother said that she had something else to do.”

“Oh, she has things to do, but I don’t.” Ting Shuang hooked an arm around Zhu Wenjia’s shoulders, and said very softly and affectionately, “Lil’ Jia, I’ll keep you company.”

“Ge, you should call me my full name.” Zhu Wenjia got goosebumps, “This is too cheesy, I can’t stand it.”

“Fine, I’ll call you whatever you want me to call you.” Ting Shuang spoke to him very nicely, “It’s even fine if you want me to call you Ge.”

“Ge… Don’t do this.” Zhu Wenjia tried to lift the corners of his mouth for a long time, but he couldn’t lift them into a smile. “Ever since Dad’s accident this time, I think both of us are a little different from before.”

“The two of us weren’t very good before.” Ting Shuang laughed.

Zhu Wenjia said, “Come on, you just have a sharp tongue, everyone’s subjected to it.”

Ting Shuang’s smile disappeared, and he stopped talking.

The brothers were silent as they walked out of the hospital.

The tree in the hospital’s courtyard stood upright in the middle of the sidewalk, separating Ting Shuang and Zhu Wenjia.

“Ge, do you know what song I was listening to just now?” Zhu Wenjia said.

Ting Shuang said, “I don’t know, ‘Wei Feng Tang Tang’?”

Zhu Wenjia left one side of his Bluetooth earpieces in his ear, and gave the other one to Ting Shuang.

A song that Ting Shuang hadn’t heard in a long time played from the earpiece, but the moment he heard the prelude, he remembered it. It was the Russian version of “Brothers”.

The first time he’d heard this song was when he watched the anime “FMA”. After watching it, he started to treat Zhu Wenjia better. He thought that it was especially nice to have a brother, and asked Zhu Wenjia to watch it with him a second time. The two of them also grappled with the Russian pronunciation for a long time while learning how to sing “Brothers”.

Hearing the sentence “My brother, the fault is mine. So, where do we go from here?”, Ting Shuang looked at Zhu Wenjia and felt like he was a completely different person from before. He didn’t know if it was because he had dyed his head of white hair back to black.

“Where are you going?” Ting Shuang asked when they walked to the hospital door.

Zhu Wenjia pointed to the right, “The driver parked the car over there.”

Ting Shuang pointed to the left, “I’m going this way.” As he said so, he held the earpiece out to Zhu Wenjia.

Zhu Wenjia didn’t reach out for it, but instead followed Ting Shuang as he turned left.

“What are you doing?” Ting Shuang put on the earpiece again, “Brothers” playing in his ear once again.

Zhu Wenjia said, “I want to stay with you for a while.”

After walking for a while, Ting Shuang said, “What do you think of it all.”

Zhu Wenjia said, “What do you mean what do I think?”

Ting Shuang said, “Did Auntie not tell you?”

“She just told me about those kinds of things.” Zhu Wenjia smiled, then imitated Weng Yunyi’s tone as he spoke, “‘Your brother took the opportunity to steal the company while your dad’s sick in hospital.’ Even I’m tired of hearing it, so much so that I wish you’d actually come back to fight for the company. You’re so nice to me, you send me money every month, and don’t even let me work.”

Ting Shuang snorted, laughing, “If you were under my care, I’d send you a cap of 2,000 euros every month, and all you’d have to do is quietly and earnestly stay in school for me.”

Zhu Wenjia laughed for a while before saying, “Should we find a nice bar for a drink or two?”

“Drink, your ass.(1) We just exited the hospital and you still want to drink.” Ting Shuang found a shop selling milk tea, “Let’s drink this. You pay.”

Zhu Wenjia bought two cups of pearl milk tea, and the two of them walked aimlessly around the city as they drank, and were so bored they even competed to see who could blow the pearls the furthest with a straw.

“Brother, you treated me so affectionately in the hospital just now, is there something you need me to do?” Zhu Wenjia said.

“Yeah.” Ting Shuang said, “It’s not anything good.”

Zhu Wenjia asked, “What is it?”

Ting Shuang said, “I already said it’s not a good thing, yet you still ask.”

“Just say it, why not.” Zhu Wenjia said, “I won’t guarantee that I’ll do it anyway.”

Ting Shuang stopped walking, the straw in his mouth, “I want you to get something out from the safe in our dad’s study.”

“What thing? Gold bars? Heirlooms?” Zhu Wenjia said, “I don’t know the passcode of the safe.”

“I know the password.” Ting Shuang said, “It’s not anything valuable, it’s just a wooden box.”

Zhu Wenjia asked, “What’s in the box?”

Ting Shuang said nothing.

“Dad asked you to take it?” Zhu Wenjia asked again.

“How else would I know the safe’s passcode?” Ting Shuang said.

“If Dad asked you to take it, then just come with me to grab it. It’s not something you have to  sneak around to do.” Zhu Wenjia said, suddenly realizing something, “You’re afraid that if you go home with me, the nanny and the driver would know and tell my mum? You don’t want my mum to know?”

After a long while, Ting Shuang let out an “Mm”.

“… Ge.” Zhu Wenjia lowered his head, “You don’t believe my mom. And Dad? He doesn’t either?”

Ting Shuang just drank his milk tea, not saying a word.

“Then…” Zhu Wenjia looked up into Ting Shuang’s eyes, “Will you do anything that’d have a bad impact on my mum?”

He wouldn’t.

Ting Shuang was about to answer when he felt the phone in his pocket vibrate.

He took it out. Displayed on the screen was a message from Bai Changyi: Ms. Weng also arrived, five minutes ago.

Ting Shuang put away the phone and looked at Zhu Wenjia.

The brothers looked at each other.

“… I don’t know.” Ting Shuang said.