Ai Jiang and Mah Yi were still there because Ai Jiang was not quite ready yet but they didn’t take long. “Jiang Ge, how long does it take you to grab your jacket, seriously!” Mah Yi was obviously getting impatient as she waited for Jiang to walk out of his office with his jacket in hand so they could leave. “Dui bu qi, Mah Yi, I’m a little slow today…I have no clue where my mind is.” he shouted from his office before quickly grabbing his coat and rushing back to Mah Yi. Finally they left.

“So where do you want to go? A restaurant, somewhere quiet, a club, or just at your place?” Even though he was asking to be polite, Jiang really wished that they would go to her place but why he wished that was something he didn’t even know--it was strange. “My place is fine. It’s quiet and guaranteed to stay quiet if we ask not to be disturbed while conversing and eating. The maids and butler could be asked to not bother us either so as long as you want to, my place it is.” He smiled at her words obviously being words that he wanted to hear and stepped on the gas, driving faster so they didn’t waste time just on the road there. 

They didn’t take too long to arrive at her house. “Don’t disturb us, we’re coming in and we’ll serve ourselves, but do not even think of coming anywhere near us, okay Butler Lee?” Mah Yi spoke firmly into the phone, advising the butler to not disturb them while they were there, she also added for him to inform the maids and everyone else in the house of this. “Understood, Xiaojie.” And with that, she hung up the phone, stepped out of the car with Jiang once it was parked and proceeded towards the backyard of the grande mansion like house. 

Meanwhile, back at the company, La Na was at her desk, doodling randomly different pictures of clothes. She was not quite sure if she wanted to use the doodles to create them into actual clothes but she was bored, finished with her work, and waiting for her shift to end so she thought that while waiting it’d be a good idea to doodle out a few designs, even if they were just harmless doodles that wouldn’t turn to real clothes. 

She had a good twenty minutes left of her shift when she started and now she had only two minutes so she was pretty much unaware of what time it was until she looked up from her doodles to the clock and cursed low enough to not be heard by anyone to herself. “I got to go,” she said, before quickly finishing up the last doodle, closing her binder that was filled with documents and papers and grabbing her coat. La Na was out the door and headed home in no time--in fact, since she did not live too far from the company, she walked home and it took her a total of five minutes to get there so it could be said that she was home in no time as well.

At home, once she was safely inside her house, she sat her materials at the table, opened her binder and once again began doodling just to kill the time. She was so focused on the doodles that they didn’t look like doodles but like the professional designs she usually would draw to use when making clothes. Only difference was that those were doodles and were not going to be used like that--maybe.

Meanwhile, back at Mah Yi’s place, Ai Jiang and Mah Yi were out in the backyard seated by the pool. The weather was perfect for a swim but they decided to only sit there and converse. “Jiang, how weird is it that she looked so much like me?” She asked all of a sudden and the question caught him off guard because he just looked at her with a puzzled face. “I mean La Na. She looked so much like me…heh, what are the odds, right?” Obviously that time he understood her because he replied. “Oh! Yeah. You know, now that I think about it, I’ve never seen her around. I mean I’ve heard her name but never have personally met her.” And what he said was true because he honestly hadn’t. “Shiqual. I mean you work there and are the owner of the company but you’ve not met her before? Isn’t that kind of…bad for you?” Mah Yi’s curiosity brought upon quite a good point that he wasn’t quite sure how to answer to. “Perhaps, but I mean I’ve heard her name, shouldn’t that be all that matters--that I know her name?” 

“Perhaps it should be but in order to know her name you have to have met her because just by hearing her name doesn’t mean you know her name. It could mean that you know the ‘new employee’s name, but not her name. Knowing her name means that you know what she looks like and you know what to call her. Am I making any sense?” My god, sometimes Mah Yi could talk on and on until she infuriated people and it was not intentionally. Quite amusing to some, actually, because who would get bored listening to her ramble on and on about how she was right and he was wrong? Maybe not the person she was proving wrong, but everyone else around him, if anyone was there around them to begin with, would just die of amusement…maybe.

Soon enough that topic died and Jiang and Mah Yi got thirsty so Mah Yi got up to go get them some water. As she walked towards the table where there was usually always refreshments no matter if there were no guests or fancy parties, she stepped the wrong way on something which caused her heel to break and herself to trip and fall over into the water with a loud splash. “Agh” she complained once in the water before swimming anywhere that she could get herself out of the water from and pushing herself out of the water. She was soaking wet and a bit upset. “Stupid, stupid, stupid!” She scolded herself.

Jiang, on the other hand, was there in a flash and looking her over with a worried and concerned expression. “Ni hao ma?” He asked, wondering if she was alright and to confirm his hopes, she nodded. “Thank god, now go change before you catch a cold, I’ll wait out here.” 

Mah Yi made a face before she walked to the house and up to her room soon, changing out of her drenched clothes into clean new ones. 

While all this with Mah Yi and Jiang was going on, La Na was still at home but by this time she was asleep due to being tired, but she was not only asleep, however, but she was asleep on the desk that she was doodling on earlier with her head rested on an open sketchbook, pencil held in her hand and light switched on above her head. It was getting dark outside, as well as in her room, so the light could by now be slightly noticeable to her, had she been awake, but instead it wasn’t just quite yet. 

Just as every other person, La Na had dreams when she slept and today, right at this moment, she wasn’t having such a pleasant dream since her eyes were filled with tears. 

************************************ La Na’s Dream ***********************************

Fire was surrounding her house everywhere and she was trapped inside with no way out. La Na was about four years old at this time and all she could do and did, in fact, do was scream and cry for her mother whom never seemed to hear her. 

“Mama! Mama! Help!” She kept screaming, her fragile and seemingly worn out voice breaking from time to time as she kept crying desperately. Where was her mother? Was she alright? The answer was that her mother had actually been trapped under a heavy piece of furniture that had fallen on her and had died already. Poor La Na was all alone there, trapped in the fire, walking around any place that she could searching, crying, and screaming desperately for her mother still but to no avail. 

Soon enough, she saw her mother’s body and as she began running to it, while getting closer she realized something wasn’t right. She got a bit more closer only to realize this time that her mother was dead which caused her to scream louder and cry harder. “Mama! Mama! Mama!!!” She kept screaming, her voice breaking more and more with each sob before a noise was made, a crack was heard and her head tilted up only to see a big chunk of wood falling down in her direction. 

It got closer and closer before finally…


***************************************** End *****************************************

La Na nearly jumped out of her seat as she felt her eyes shoot open, the sweat leak down her face, and the tears slide down her cheeks. She was so freaked out by the dream that she couldn’t breathe right. “Thank god it was only a dream…” She muttered as she grasped her chest while walking towards the kitchen to get something to drink to calm herself. 

Once in the kitchen, she went to the fridge, opened it, pulled out the gallon of milk she had and poured herself a glass. After a nightmare, usually milk was the only thing that could calm her down completely.