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A Lunatic Says He Loves Me: Chapter 31
Chapter 31: Mother and Daughter 2
Ling Feng didn’t know when Bai Xinhuai left. He had fallen asleep halfway through his work, and when he woke up, he found a cashmere blanket draped over him. Glancing at the monitor, he saw a curvaceous figure leaving. His brain hadn’t yet processed it, but his body had already acted on its own.
Ling Feng intercepted Lu Xin at the staircase. Her expression remained as cold as ever, but her face was stunningly beautiful, and she seemed to have no awareness of being a public servant, strutting around in heavy makeup during work hours.
“You…” The 1.9-meter-tall bald man was suddenly at a loss for words. He wanted to ask why she was there or if she had put the blanket on him. After drafting a thousand different ways to start the conversation, he finally said, “Thanks for the help with Li Yueran.”
Yuan Fei was just an intern and couldn’t have had the clout to get the Anti-Pornography squad to check the records and staff files of the ‘A Little Green’ bar. Ling Feng knew right away it was Lu Xin’s doing.
Lu Xin coldly replied, “It just happened to be part of our sweep of that area. Don’t flatter yourself.”
“Your mouth…”
Lu Xin raised an eyebrow and sneered, “What? Does Officer Ling plan to shut me up with a sausage?”
“Don’t be so…” Ling Feng turned beet red at her bluntness and coughed, “Act your age, at least mind your image a bit.”
“What does that have to do with you?” Lu Xin retorted sharply and strutted away on her high heels.
The sound of her heels clicking down the hallway gradually faded. Ling Feng stood there for a while, then touched his bald head, smiling foolishly like a young man in love. “Sharp tongue but soft heart.”
After grinning like an idiot for a while, he snapped back to reality, wiped the smile off his face, and called Ding Ding. “Where are you guys?”
“We’re about to go find Lu Yan’s match, Li Lan.”
Li Lan was forty years old, the owner of a supermarket, and had been widowed for ten years with no children. According to the matchmaking agency, Li Lan and Lu Yan, a widower and a widow, were “a match made in heaven.” The agency staff said that Lai Fengxia didn’t have to put much effort into setting them up; Lu Yan and Li Lan hit it off on their first meeting and quickly confirmed their relationship.
“It’s a bit too casual,” Ling Feng said into his phone. “Lu Yan needed support the most right after her husband passed away. Why didn’t she look for a partner then? Now that her daughter is about to become a mother and get married, she starts dating? And after one meeting, they confirm the relationship? It doesn’t add up.”
Yuan Fei interjected, “Maybe she’s been lonely for a long time?”
Ling Feng asked, “Have you thought about why a woman would remain widowed for twenty years?”
Ding Ding analyzed, “It could be due to deep feelings for her late husband, reluctance to remarry, pressure from her in-laws, or perhaps the children couldn’t accept a new family.”
Yuan Fei said, “Given Lu Yan’s active participation in dating and quick decision to confirm a relationship with Li Lan and consider marriage, the first two reasons don’t seem valid. So, it must be the third. For twenty years, Lu Qi didn’t want to accept a stepfather.”
“If she didn’t want to accept it for twenty years, why the sudden change?”
“Could it be that Li Lan’s a good person and gained Lu Qi’s acceptance?”
“We’re here,” Yuan Fei said as he parked the police car by the roadside, turned off the engine, and got out. “We’ll soon find out what kind of person Li Lan is.”
Li Lan looked much like his photo: around 1.65 meters tall, with an honest and simple appearance, resembling a simple-minded big brother. However, as a businessman, he couldn’t be entirely naive, as Ling Feng often said, “Businessmen are quite shrewd.”
After Ding Ding and Yuan Fei identified themselves and stated their purpose, Li Lan cooperatively recalled his impressions of the Lu mother and daughter, holding nothing back.
“I haven’t had much interaction with Xiao Qi. We’ve only exchanged a few words.”
Ding Ding took notes while asking, “Do they have a good relationship?”
After saying “good,” Li Lan’s expression became somewhat peculiar. Ding Ding noticed and quickly asked, “Is there something unusual?”
“Not really. It’s just…” Li Lan hesitated and said, “Their relationship seems unusually good to outsiders.”
“How so?”
“Xiao Qi just turned twenty-five this year. Here, that’s considered a grown woman. But A-Yan still feeds her and bathes her.”
Yuan Fei asked, “So what?”
Li Lan sighed, “Substitute the daughter with a son?”
Ding Ding shuddered.
Li Lan continued, “A-Yan is beautiful and has an independent personality. We’ve had a very harmonious relationship over the past three months. But as soon as Xiao Qi comes home, A-Yan completely ignores me. Sometimes, I feel like I’m the third wheel between them. And just yesterday, A-Yan called me to end our relationship. You know, I had already ordered the wedding ring. Doesn’t this seem like a farce?” He gave a bitter laugh. “I even feel like A-Yan started dating me out of spite towards her daughter. She told me, ‘Let’s break up. My daughter doesn’t approve of us being together.’ I said, ‘But she’s going abroad. Who will take care of you then?’ A-Yan told me that Xiao Qi had decided not to go abroad anymore.”
Ding Ding closed his notebook and stood up, shaking Li Lan’s hand. “Thank you for your cooperation, Mr. Li.”
“You’re welcome.”
On the way back, Ding Ding carefully reviewed the clues they had collected and asked, “Do you think Lu Yan might have an Lear Complex?”
Yuan Fei, while driving, said, “It’s hard to say. Maybe the mother just loves her daughter too much. But even if she does have such feelings, why kill the matchmaker? If she didn’t want to get married, she could have just said so.”
At that moment, Ding Ding’s phone rang. “Hello? Okay, thank you, Shixiong!” He hung up and urgently said, “Quick! Tianbao Building! The command center just got word that the Lu mother and daughter are shopping there!”
“We’re going to follow them?”
“This is called surveillance!”
****
Yuan Fei developed photos of the Lu mother and daughter and spread them out on the conference table.
In the photos, Lu Yan had delicate makeup and was well-maintained, looking like she was in her early thirties. Lu Qi had a buzz cut, three earrings in her left ear, and colorful tattoos on her neck and arms. She was tall, about 1.78 meters, and dressed in men’s clothes with a neutral style. The two held hands, looking more like lovers than mother and daughter.
“Look at this photo!” Ding Ding picked one up. “They went to a dessert shop, and Lu Qi picked out a fruit cake for Lu Yan and even fed it to her. Lu Yan’s smile is so sweet, it’s almost…”
Yuan Fei said the words Ding Ding couldn’t bring himself to say, “A bit disgusting.” He picked up a photo, pointing at the two of them kissing passionately, and frowned, “Who kisses on the mouth like that? Look at how handsome Lu Qi is. Lu Yan definitely has an Lear Complex!”
Ling Feng said, “Based on the clues you gathered, let’s assume Lu Qi applied for a green card to immigrate because she couldn’t stand her mother’s twisted affection. Lu Yan, unable to accept her daughter leaving, chose to marry a man she met just once to force her daughter to stay. Don’t you find this contradictory? If Lu Qi couldn’t stand Lu Yan’s Lear Complex, then Lu Yan remarrying would be a relief for her.”
Ding Ding frowned, “So is Li Lan lying?”
Ling Feng shook his head, “You can’t think like that. Li Lan has no reason to lie. He didn’t have much contact with Lu Qi and didn’t know her well. He’s only known Lu Yan for three months, and what he said is just what he observed on the surface.”
Han Rong, who had been silent, picked up the photo of Lu Qi feeding Lu Yan cake and looked at Yuan Fei, asking, “You just said Lu Yan’s smile looked what?”
Yuan Fei was startled, “It looked a bit disgusting.”
“Why do you think it’s disgusting?”
Yuan Fei scratched his head, “Uh… it just gives a weird feeling, like… I can’t really say.”
Ding Ding observed for a while and said, “Lu Yan’s smile seems too bright, like she wants the whole world to know she’s happy. It feels deliberate.”
“Yes!” Yuan Fei slapped his forehead, “She’s fake smiling, pretending to be happy. It’s disgusting!”
“So, let’s think in reverse,” Han Rong circled the subtle details in the photos with a red pen. “Suppose it’s not Lu Yan who has an Lear Complex, but Lu Qi who has an Oedipus complex. Lu Yan senses her daughter’s special love for her and feels she can’t let her daughter continue down the wrong path. So she decides to date and start a new family to leave her daughter. But the daughter can’t accept it, threatens her mother, and even kills the matchmaker to warn her.”
Yuan Fei said, “Lu Qi loves her mother and doesn’t want to share her with anyone else, so she hates the matchmaker who successfully set her mother up. That’s why she chopped off Lai Fengxia’s fingers as punishment for matchmaking for the widow. Wow, everything connects!”
Ding Ding added, “Then how do you explain the green card? If Lu Qi loves her mother, why immigrate?”
Bai Xinhai said, “I checked the system. Lu Qi applied for the green card long before her mother started dating.”
Han Rong asked, “Which country did she apply to?”
Bai Xinhai replied, “Seville, the first country to pass the same-sex marriage law.”
Yuan Fei shouted as if enlightened, “I get it! Lu Qi wants to take Lu Yan and immigrate to a place where no one knows them. This way, no one and no social pressure can stop them from being together!”
“Not a bad deduction. But it seems to be Lu Qi’s unrequited love,” Han Rong said as he rearranged the photos.
On the first solo photo of Lu Qi, he circled the English tattoo on Lu Qi’s exposed neck skin—LY.
Ling Feng leaned in to look, “Lu Yan? Lu Qi tattooed her mother’s name on her neck.”
Han Rong explained, “This spot has a major artery, where blood pulses vigorously, symbolizing life. Tattooing her mother’s name here shows Lu Qi’s gratitude and respect for the life her mother gave her, as well as her willingness to give her life for her mother.”
In the second photo of Lu Qi and Lu Yan kissing, he circled the bulging muscle on Lu Qi’s arm.
Yuan Fei exclaimed, “Wow, she’s holding Lu Yan tightly, not letting her escape!”
In the third photo, where Lu Qi feeds Lu Yan cake, Han Rong circled Lu Yan’s foot placed under the table, with the toes pointing toward the door.
“No matter how happy she looks, her feet betray her true intention—she wants to leave, to get away from the person feeding her the cake.”
Ding Ding asked, “If Lu Yan is being forced by Lu Qi, why doesn’t she resist?”
“Because that’s her daughter, the person she loves with her life,” Han Rong said, his expression calm. “Knowing her daughter has killed for her and that her mind is completely twisted, what else can she do but comply and accommodate?”
TN:
Okay so here’s the thing, I’ve been translating using my work laptop during my free periods of time during the day, but they’re installing some sort of remote manager on the laptops that enables the management track all activities from the user. They are doing this because we work remotely and with sensitive data. It’s partly for security purposes and partly to make sure we spend our time as we should. So unfortunately I won’t be able to translate on weekdays and as such the schedule will change from Mon-Friday to Sat & Sun for the rest of this month and in August. I’m hoping to get a personal laptop in September and return to the previous schedule.
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