"The second half is officially underway! AC Milan kicks off—Çalhanoğlu fakes right, and he's through!"
The commentator's excited voice echoed through the vast living room, competing with the hum of the television: "If Brescia dares to fight back, they still have a shot at turning this around!"
On the screen, the 2019 Serie A match burned with energy and tension. But Gan Qi, draped only in a sheer black lace thong that barely covered her, felt nothing but detachment. Her flawless, bare skin was pressed tightly against a firm, masculine body behind her—one that explored her passively, as though her form were his to toy with at whim.
It was well past 1 a.m. on a humid summer night. The house was silent, save for the commentator's fervent play-by-play. Fortunately, their son was asleep. That silence was her only reprieve—because when the boy wasn't around, Gan Qi ceased to exist in this house as anything more than a body. There was no warmth. No respect. No trace of love. She had nothing left but her flesh.
"Shoot—SHOOT! Ah, so close! Just a fraction off. If he had adjusted the angle..." The commentator's voice crescendoed as AC Milan clinched the match with a tight 1–0 win.
Lu Qingxiang's hand, resting lazily on Gan Qi's chest, suddenly clenched. Without a word, he placed the empty Bordeaux crystal wine glass on the side table and turned off the TV. Then, without emotion, without even glancing at her, he flipped over and took her—just like that.
No words. No foreplay. No intimacy.
Just silence, followed by the cold rustle of sheets as he stood up, headed to the shower, and went to sleep—mechanical, practiced, indifferent.
Gan Qi lay still for a moment. Then, quietly, she wiped herself off and turned to the other side of the bed—forty centimeters away from the man she called her husband. There, she curled into herself and began mentally preparing for tomorrow: what to cook for breakfast, what clothes to lay out for the two men in her life.
It was hard to believe she had lived like this for ten years.
Back then, she had arrived in the city full of dreams, a naive village girl with nothing but youth. He was a man who had already tasted the bitterness of failure. A few fleeting acts of kindness from him had felt like salvation—and in return, she had given him everything, believing it was love. But to him, it had always been a transaction: his needs met, nothing more.
To outsiders, she looked like a woman who had won the lottery—a peasant girl who had married into wealth.
But she knew the truth.
She had no friends.
No career.
No education.
No love.
In the house she worked so hard to hold together, she was… no one.