Chapter 1

The next morning, I entered the office building and ignored the strange looks my colleagues shot at me. Then, I saw the present John York, Zenia’s assistant, gave me on the table.

It was a small slice of strawberry cake that could be bought for fifteen dollars off the street. The strawberry that was supposed to be on top was nowhere to be seen. There was even a message seemingly written on it at the last minute. In crooked letters, it read: Congratulations on the wedding!

“My god, is this the wedding gift John is giving to Felix?”

“Enough already, guys! Stop talking about it. He’s coming.”

I threw the cake into the trashcan and did not look at it again. The moment I returned to my chair to pack up, I received a message from the company group chat.

It was from Zenia.

[Are you still mad about me and John? Could you stop being so petty? You’re a man, you know? It’s not as if I’m not marrying you. I’m just helping John get a green card. Otherwise, he would have to leave our country, and it’d be a major loss for us to lose such a talented person!]

Even though I did not know how an idiot whose CGPA did not hit the minimum requirement for graduation and flunked ten compulsory courses could be considered a talented person, I did not say anything.

As for Zenia, she kept spamming me with messages once she saw that I was not replying.

[Getting the marriage certificate is just a process. The moment John gets his green card, I’ll divorce him. Are you saying you can’t even trust me that much? Besides, you know that John has been working with me for a long time. I can’t bear for him to leave. I have no other choice but to do this.]

I treated all her words like white noise. Nothing she said could be trusted.

It was not as if the company would stop functioning the moment an assistant left. Why would the company president need to enter a fake marriage with him? I clearly knew that this was just an excuse Zenia was using so that she could continue being biased to John.

Out of politeness’ sake, I replied with an “okay,” only for Zenia to take advantage of the situation.

[Since you’re okay with it, something has happened to the project you helped John manage. Go communicate with the client. Remember not to cause any problems. Don’t smear John’s reputation on purpose!]

I sneered. It was no wonder why she had said so many things to me. It was because she wanted me to clean up John’s mess.

As for smearing his reputation…

I was originally the one in charge of communicating with the client, but when John saw how much the project was earning, how much commission it would give to whoever was in charge, and how easygoing the client was, he snatched it out of my hands.

Two days after it was taken over, a problem rose.

I just could not understand how Zenia could ask me not to smear John’s reputation when calling him a piece of trash would be praise if coming from me. John was a Cathayean who had only joined the company for a year. From the moment he passed the interview and became Zenia’s assistant, Zenia was no longer herself.

The company was in its development stage, and everyone needed to put in more effort to make it grow, but she gave up on meetings and negotiations to do all sorts of things with John. If he liked a project, it didn’t matter how much effort I had put into it, how much alcohol I had to drink during social events, or how much suffering I had to go through; it would end up in John’s hands.

The moment something went wrong, I was then pushed to the forefront to help him clean up the mess.

During the company’s annual meeting, despite not having properly managed a project to completion before, John somehow managed to become the sales champion just by stealing projects from me.

I wooed Zenia for three years and dated her for five. I did my best to take care of her and catered to her every whim when it came to her life. I poured my blood, sweat, and tears for her. I proposed to her countless times before, but all I got was that she wanted to wait a little longer.

Forget whether it was embarrassing for me or not, the preparation I needed for every proposal was a lot of work.

But in the one year John was in the company, Zenia had threatened me with a breakup almost two hundred times and kept talking about her assistant at home. Every day, no matter what she did, John was on her mind. She left the house early and returned late. She acted like she had lost her soul to John.

During this year, Zenia forgot about my birthday, our anniversary as a couple, and my parents’ death anniversary. Even though I prepared everything and just expected her to be there, something would happen to John every single time, and Zenia would immediately put everything down to look for him, all in the name of needing to treasure foreign talents like him.

These were all excuses for her to show her bias toward John.

“Come, Zenia, let’s get our marriage certificate!”

John stood beside my workplace and shouted in the direction of Zenia’s office. He did not even look at me, but there was a smile on his face.

I knew that he was boasting to me.

Zenia walked out of the office in exquisite makeup and put a stack of documents on my desk.

“Felix, have someone get this special effects revision plan ready. I’m going to check it when I’m back.”

Then, she added a USB drive to the stack before turning around to hold John’s arm.

I heard him whisper to her, “Since we’re getting married today, can I have the honor of becoming your husband for the day?”

I did not hear Zenia’s reply, but I did not want to hear it.

Once they left the company, I submitted my resignation application to the system.

HR approved of it soon enough.

Sometimes, not saying anything could also be a show of attitude.