Indulgence - Chapter 1
Chapter 1
Jiang Nian didn't know how long she'd been asleep, slumped over her desk. When she woke, her shoulders, neck, and arms were sore and numb. She lazily rubbed her shoulder, taking a moment to recover.
It was late. The dazzling nightscape outside the floor-to-ceiling windows cast a faint glow into the dark room.
She glanced at the design draft on the paper. A headache was brewing.
Still no inspiration.
Two short knocks sounded from outside, and then the office door was pushed open unceremoniously.
"Why are you sitting in the dark so late at night?"
As she spoke, the room was instantly flooded with light.
The sudden brightness made Jiang Nian instinctively raise a hand to shield her eyes.
"You haven't been sleeping this whole time, have you?" Qiu Lan leaned against the desk and casually picked up the sketch. "Is the design finished?"
"Not yet."
Qiu Lan took a look. "This looks pretty good, doesn't it?"
Jiang Nian took the sketch from Qiu Lan's hand. "It's still missing something."
"This one's due this weekend," Qiu Lan reminded her. "Let's show this draft to the client first. They might be perfectly happy with it."
"Let's push it back a bit." Jiang Nian stared thoughtfully at the paper, unwilling to compromise. She lowered her head and said lightly, "If the client's in a hurry, just refund the deposit."
"Just drop it like that? This is a big client," Qiu Lan said with a helpless laugh. "I'm telling you, missy, could you be a little more enthusiastic about making money?"
Jiang Nian didn't respond, just propped her chin on her hand and looked at her.
Qiu Lan knew that while Jiang Nian usually seemed carefree, she was one hundred percent professional when it came to work. She had her own standards for her art and would never do a half-hearted job. It was precisely because of this that their studio had an excellent reputation in the industry.
"Fine, I'll go talk to the client," Qiu Lan finally sighed in resignation.
Jiang Nian tilted her head and smiled. "Love you."
"Love you, my ass," Qiu Lan grumbled. "This studio would fall apart without me."
They had opened this studio two years ago, specializing in original tattoos. Although it wasn't large, business was good.
Jiang Nian wasn't a veteran tattoo artist. At first glance, clients often thought she was too young, too arrogant—could she really be reliable? But she always let her work speak for itself. Her aesthetic was unique and inspired, and she had a way of winning people over.
Qiu Lan, on the other hand, was responsible for the studio's daily operations and promotion. They had known each other for years and worked together in perfect harmony.
Qiu Lan had a knack for social media and knew how to create a buzz. Besides regularly posting the studio's work on their social accounts, she would occasionally post a few photos of Jiang Nian at work. A young, beautiful, and hot tattoo artist—it was the perfect gimmick. Over two years, she had managed to turn Jiang Nian into a minor internet celebrity with a few hundred thousand followers.
Every industry was competitive these days; even the best wine needs a good salesman. With their promotion on point, the studio never had to worry about bookings. They operated on an appointment-only basis, and their schedule was usually full for a month in advance.
Qiu Lan really admired Jiang Nian. A top student from the country's number one art academy who chose to become a tattoo artist after graduation—she certainly had character. It wasn't that there was anything wrong with the tattoo industry; in fact, it was full of talented people. But there was still a certain amount of social prejudice against it.
She hadn't been in a good state for the past few days, so Jiang Nian decided not to wrestle with the design anymore. She asked Qiu Lan, "Want to grab a drink?"
Qiu Lan checked the time. "Not tonight. I want to go home early and get some beauty sleep."
Jiang Nian sighed. "No one to go with me again."
"You, a little flirt, worried about having no one to go with? Send out one group message and you could fill a few mahjong tables in minutes," Qiu Lan retorted, then added, "Isn't Sister Qian pursuing you? You have a ready-made option right there."
Jiang Nian liked women. She'd realized it during puberty and had never hidden it, so everyone around her knew her sexual orientation.
"I haven't said yes to her."
"Why not? I thought you liked the mature type. Last time you even said you were a little tempted."
Jiang Nian thought for a moment. "My heart fluttered for a moment."
Qiu Lan couldn't help but roll her eyes. "You mean for a matter of seconds, right?" She knew Jiang Nian's personality all too well.
Jiang Nian rubbed her sore neck again. "Seriously, can you be attracted to someone forever? Don't you get tired of it?"
"If you really like someone, your heart will always flutter for them." Compared to Jiang Nian, Qiu Lan felt like a champion of pure love. "A heartless seductress like you would never understand."
"Say that again, you Qiu."
Qiu Lan didn't mince her words. "Heartless seductress. I really hope someone comes along and tames you."
The two were close, so they didn't have many reservations when they spoke. Bantering like this was fun and a good way to relieve the fatigue from work.
The corners of Jiang Nian's lips lifted. When she smiled, her eyes curved, making her look even more alluring, yet with a hint of playful mischief.
She stood up, lazily stretching her waist, and walked past Qiu Lan to the door.
"Hey, are you really going drinking alone?" Qiu Lan called after her. "Should I go with you?"
Jiang Nian didn't turn back. Facing away from her, she said as she walked, "Nah, just going out for some air."
As soon as she got downstairs, she smelled a faint floral scent.
The studio was located in Spring Breeze Lane, a prime spot. The small shops along the street were all quite stylish and very popular with young people.
Jiang Nian stood on the street corner, breathing in the fresh air. Whenever she lacked inspiration, she liked to come out for a breather. Being cooped up alone was suffocating; she preferred lively, bustling places and enjoyed being in a crowd.
Spring Breeze Lane was home to several bars, so it was even livelier at night than during the day, filled with all sorts of people.
Jiang Nian was wearing something light underneath a simple, thin cardigan. When the wind blew, the cardigan slipped from her shoulders, revealing her fair skin and arms, her fine figure subtly outlined.
She wrapped her cardigan tighter. Even though it was late spring, the nights were still cool. The design issue had left her particularly frustrated tonight, and she wandered the streets with no particular destination in mind.
The evening breeze blew through Spring Breeze Lane, and one by one, the flowers along the road had begun to bloom. The few Snowfall Begonia trees, in particular, had practically become a popular photo spot in Beilin.
Across the street, clusters of cool white blossoms caught her eye under the moonlight.
The Snowfall Begonias were in full bloom, excessively beautiful. Jiang Nian found herself stopping in her tracks.
Many people didn't know that white begonias were even more captivating late at night than during the day.
Jiang Nian casually took out her phone. It was a habit of hers to document her daily life; you never knew when something might become a source of inspiration. As she took the third picture, someone accidentally walked into the frame.
She had intended to move the camera, but when the other woman entered the frame, she froze for a second and captured the image.
A beautiful woman with an elegant figure passed through the night, her aura aloof, cool, and mature, a perfect match for the serene white begonias behind her.
As pleasing to the eye as a painting.
Jiang Nian zoomed in on the candid shot. It was too far to see the face clearly, but she could feel the woman's exceptional presence. She stared at the screen for a while, and when she looked up again, the woman under the flowering tree was gone...
Only green leaves embracing white blossoms remained, swaying gently together in the night breeze, an occasional petal drifting down.
Jiang Nian looked left and right, her eyes searching, and vaguely saw the woman enter a bar.
Moments, the most popular bar in all of Spring Breeze Lane.
Since she had no one to go with, Jiang Nian hadn't planned on drinking, but now, as if guided by some unseen force, she crossed the street and walked toward Moments.
Moments was very close to her studio. She was a regular at this bar, partly for convenience and partly because she knew people there. If she remembered correctly, Ji Xi should be working tonight.
Jiang Nian was a social person with many friends. Ji Xi was a good friend she'd met in university, currently a graduate intern who worked part-time as a bartender at Moments in the evenings.
She walked into the familiar bar, made her way through the crowd, and quickly spotted Ji Xi. "Hey, scholar."
The person mixing drinks behind the bar looked up and greeted her familiarly, "Not busy today?"
"Busy. Just sneaking out to relax a bit." Jiang Nian sized up the fiery, eye-catching tattoo on Ji Xi's shoulder. It was one of her most satisfying works. With Ji Xi standing behind the bar like this, she was practically a living advertisement for their studio.
Ji Xi asked her, "What can I get you?"
"The usual."
Jiang Nian knew Ji Xi would be too busy to chat, so after ordering her drink, she quietly found a seat to the side. She sipped her drink listlessly, picked up her phone, and couldn't resist opening the photo she had just taken to study it more closely.
She was a sucker for pretty faces, with a particular weakness for mature women with class.
After she'd had about half her drink, the music softened, and a conversation drifted to her ears:
"Xiao Ji, this is for you."
"Thanks."
"Don't mention it."
Jiang Nian turned her head at the sound and instantly froze. The person from the photo had suddenly appeared right before her eyes—the coincidence was so incredible it made her heart skip a few beats.
Under the dim, flickering lights, she saw the woman's profile. Her hair was tied back in a simple, neat style, and the line from her nose to her lips was exceptionally beautiful.
Jiang Nian stared for a long time.
Perhaps the woman sensed it, because she suddenly turned her head.
They weren't far apart. Their eyes met, and they looked at each other in silence.
Jiang Nian was gently swirling the drink in her hand, feeling her heart beat even faster at that glance. But in the next moment, the woman turned and quickly walked away.
Jiang Nian watched her retreating back for a while longer. Her posture was beautiful, too. As an art major, she couldn't help but admire a woman with good proportions.
"What are you looking at?" Ji Xi asked.
Jiang Nian snapped back to reality, curious. "Was that a friend of yours?"
Ji Xi glanced at Jiang Nian.
"She has such an aura. We should grab a drink together sometime, get to know each other." Besides tattooing, Jiang Nian's greatest pleasure was making friends.
"She's the owner here."
"The owner here?" Jiang Nian was incredulous. The woman didn't seem like the type to hang out in bars.
Ji Xi cut straight to the point: "Are you trying to start something again?"
Jiang Nian smiled. "What do you mean, 'start something again'?"
Ji Xi saw right through her but didn't say it aloud. She knew Jiang Nian well. Miss Jiang's so-called crushes and flutters of the heart were just three-minute fads; the novelty came and went quickly.
"She's much older than you," Ji Xi said, not explicitly warning her, but offering a friendly reminder.
Jiang Nian had guessed the woman was older than her. She leaned against the bar. "Don't you know I'm very popular with the older ladies?"
Ji Xi gave a faint smile and mentioned casually, "She's not like those other 'sisters' you know."
Jiang Nian was outgoing and knew how to have fun, and many of her acquaintances were the same. They were always joking around, flirting with each other, rarely taking it seriously.
Different...
Jiang Nian didn't argue with Ji Xi, because she felt it too. She had sensed a difference at first glance. She just couldn't say why.
Jiang Nian absently finished the rest of her drink, leaving only ice cubes in the glass. A layer of condensation had formed on the side. Her slender fingers traced the condensation, gradually dampening their tips.
A moment later.
She asked Ji Xi again, curiously, "How is she different?"
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