The Returning Ex

Cindy owed money to every single person on her contact list. Since they were already wary of her, they wouldn’t be answering
her calls if she wasn’t about to pay them back. Stopping in front of a traffic light, the driver turned around to check on Cindy.
“What’s the matter? You are frowning. Why do you look so troubled, young girl?”
Startled, Cindy smiled at the driver in return. “It’s nothing.”
There wasn’t a lot that she needed to do for the talk show, so she waited outside when Ian was filming. During the half an hour
when Ian was in the show, Cindy went through her contacts multiple times while sitting in the car until he was back again, after
which they went back to the hotel. Upon arriving, she helped carry Ian’s luggage to his room before saying, “I’ll be retiring to my
room if there’s nothing else you need.”
Ian cast her a glance while telling her, “You should have room service get you some medicine if you aren’t feeling well.”
Nodding, Cindy replied, “Sure, I will.” She entered her room after bidding him goodbye. Then, she went through her contacts
again before steeling her nerves to make two phone calls. In fact, she already knew the reply she would get, as she still owed
the other party money, so it was kind of unfair of her to try to borrow from them again.
Fortunately, one of the people Cindy called was her roommate during university. Instead of getting angry at her, her former
roommate gave her some much-needed advice. “Your family shouldn’t be relying on you like that. You have to think for yourself!
Just look at the life you’re living! You’ll be leading this sort of life forever if you don’t learn to put up any boundaries.”
Despite understanding every single word she heard, Cindy replied, “I have my own circumstances. With things as they are, I
can’t just quit.” Depressed, she collapsed onto the sofa. “If my family were even remotely close to a normal family, I would’ve let
go a long time ago, but I can’t let go now.”
Meanwhile, her former roommate also knew that Cindy had her own concerns, so she could only heave a sigh. “Cindy, I’m afraid
I can’t be of much help. I just started working, so I don’t have any savings, since I spend all of my salary every month.”
Murmuring an assent, Cindy said, “It’s okay. You’ll have to wait for some time before I can pay you back. I’ll try to save up next
month so that I can do so.”
After having told Cindy to not sweat about it, her friend hung up, but didn’t seem to believe in Cindy’s words at all. Cindy put her
phone away while curling up on the sofa, feeling groggy and out of sorts before eventually falling asleep on it.

Meanwhile, Ian watched some TV after showering and changing his clothes. It was already past dinner time, which, under
normal circumstances, Cindy would’ve already ordered or bought him some food. However, she did neither today, so Ian took it
upon himself to order both of them some food from the room service before calling Cindy.
However, nobody picked up despite him having made two calls, which was abnormal. After some hesitation, Ian left his room to
go check on Cindy, but neither did she answer the door after a few knocks. From what he gathered, Cindy was more of a
homebody, preferring to stick to familiar circumstances. With her personality, Ian knew she would inform him if she ever needed
to go out.
In the end, Ian gave the room service another call. They didn’t dally while dispatching someone to open the door to Cindy’s room
as they were also afraid that something might go wrong. Upon entering the room, Ian saw Cindy curled up on the sofa, while her
face was flushed, indicating that she was having a fever.
Frowning, Ian disliked situations like that as they were a bother, but seeing that they only had each other, nobody would take
care of Cindy if he didn’t, so he asked for some medicine from the staff before carrying Cindy into the room. On the other hand,
Cindy was in a semi-conscious state, but she could sense that someone was hanging around in her room.