Chapter 2.

The second we arrived at the dilapidated apartment complex I called home, Lu Gongming’s steps faltered. Standing beneath the mottled hallway, he stared at the peeling paint on the walls and then up at our tiny window draped with drying laundry, a look of unhidden heartache surfacing in his eyes.

“You and your father… live here?” his voice came softly.

Honestly, this place was miles better than the damp, dingy rental room I’d lived in before I transmigrated. I jiggled the key into the lock and popped the door open, shouting the second I stepped inside, “Dad! I’m back!”

A bedroom door flew open. My dad was stripped to the waist, hair still dripping wet, scolding me as he walked out: “You little troublemaker! Skiving off school again today, are you? Your teacher just called…”

He cut himself mid-rant the moment he registered the unfamiliar man standing in our doorway. My dad froze. “Huh? Who are you? Got the wrong apartment?”

Before I could even open my mouth to explain, Lu Gongming stepped forward and pulled my dad into a crushing embrace.

“Ah Shu… I finally found you,” his voice rasped with raw emotion. “Thank God… you’re still alive.”

My dad was held so tightly he turned completely rigid.

“Hey, hey! What do you think you’re doing? Two grown men hugging like this—let go!” My dad panicked, shoving at his chest.

Reluctantly, Lu Gongming let his arms fall, though his eyes remained pinned to my dad as if terrified he’d vanish into thin air. “Ah Shu, don’t you remember me? It’s Lu Gongming. We spent five years together in the orphanage.”

My dad blinked, blanking out for a few seconds, before suddenly bringing a hand down on his own forehead with a loud thwack.

“Holy crap! Are you really Lu Gongming?! That little crybaby from back then?!”

Lu Gongming stiffened, a rare flicker of embarrassment breaking through his stoic composure. “I… haven’t cried in a very long time.”

My dad burst into a bright laugh, warmly pulling him inside the apartment. “I thought I’d never see you again in this lifetime! Look at you now, you’re doing amazing!”

It was only then that I learned their history. The two of them had been inseparable back then, sharing a bed, splitting every piece of candy down the middle. After Lu Gongming was adopted back into his family, he had spent years looking for my dad, but it wasn’t until today that their paths finally crossed again.

From that day on, Lu Gongming officially unlocked “Future Wife Caretaker” mode.

He suddenly had so much free time that he found an excuse to come over every single day: one day he’d “forgotten something,” another day it was “raining too hard,” and on one occasion, he stood in our doorway and said with a deadpan face, “I watched a horror movie last night and got a little scared.”

A guy standing at six-foot-two, scared of ghosts? If a ghost saw him, it would be the one running for its life!

And that was just the beginning. Mr. Big Shot CEO started dropping absolute bombs:

Career: He offered my dad a position at his company with an annual salary of fifty thousand dollars. When my dad heard the figure, he genuinely thought he was talking about fifty bucks.

Education: He transferred me to an elite private school, with the astronomical tuition fees already settled down to the last cent.

Wheels: He handed over the keys to a brand-new Ferrari, nonchalantly claiming, “It’s just an old car a buddy left with me. It’s sitting idle anyway, so I’m letting you have it cheap.”

And finally… Housing:

“Uncle Lu gave you a house?” I asked, eyeing my dad, who was sitting on the sofa with a bright red face.

“Yeah… he said it’s company-provided housing for employees and told me to give him my ID for paperwork. Now he’s handed me the actual deed,” my dad groaned, clutching his head in utter despair. “Sweetheart, what am I supposed to do now?”

As someone with the soul of a college student, how could I not see right through Lu Gongming’s intentions? Who hands out houses and luxury cars out of “charity”? The man was so head-over-heels that his eyes lit up brighter than high beams every time he looked at my dad.

“Dad… do you like Uncle Lu?” I rested my chin in my hands and asked.

“Of course I like him. He’s my best friend,” my dad replied without a second thought.

I shook my head. “I mean… what if he wants to be your boyfriend?”

My dad froze completely. Within seconds, a deep flush crept up from his neck all the way to the tips of his ears. “What does a kid like you know?! We’re both men! How could we possibly date?!”

“But he likes you,” I analyzed calmly. “If he didn’t, who’d give you all these gifts with zero strings attached? You two aren’t blood brothers.”

My dad scrambled to counter, “He’s just taking care of me because I’m poor… plus we have our childhood bond…”

“Do you honestly believe that?” I looked at him, letting the silence hang with heavy implication.

The words choked right in his throat.

Sure enough, over the next few days, my dad spiraled into a state of absolute panic. He didn’t dare move into the new house, and his text replies grew painfully slow. Whenever Lu Gongming came over, my dad reacted like a cat dumped in hot water, all he wanted was to grab me and run for the hills.

Looks like the seed of suspicion I planted was already sprouting nicely!