My sworn enemy and I were forced by our families to register our marriage. On our wedding night, he showed off his eight-pack abs and sharply defined V-line, looking unbearably smug. He challenged me, “You’re dying to see it, aren’t you? Call me Honey, and I’ll let you touch it.” I calmly changed into a skimpy set of pajamas, lifted my chin, and shot back, “Think I look good? Call me Daddy, and I’ll let you see more.”
I had dreamed about my wedding countless times. The man I married would wear a designer Italian suit and drive a Ferrari to pick up the bride. But no matter how hard I racked my brain, I never could have guessed that man would be Giang Chỉ—the sworn enemy I’d had for more than twenty years.
On the day we went to register our marriage, Dad Giang shoved him out of the car by the head. He looked less like he was going to get married and more like he was being hauled off to the execution ground. I couldn’t hold it in. I snorted, then burst out laughing.
Giang Chỉ glared at me, and Mom, standing beside me, smacked me on the head. “Take this seriously. Stop fooling around!”
But the very next second, a smile appeared on Giang Chỉ’s face. Meanwhile, Mom Giang was busily fixing my evening gown. She laughed the loudest and said, “I told you! Those two are a match made by heaven.”
I was starting to suspect that blindness could be contagious. If my mom hadn’t suddenly said, “It would be wonderful if Giang Chỉ became my son-in-law someday,” the two families wouldn’t have instantly found each other more pleasing to the eye and quickly reached an agreement to force two over-the-hill eligible aristocratic bachelors—Giang Chỉ and me—to register their marriage.
Calling it tying the knot for life would be impossible. But if you called it becoming sworn enemies, we’d done that ages ago.
Giang Chỉ had never liked me, even as a child. He pulled the white hair ribbon from my head, made fun of my ugly dresses, mocked my grades, called me stupid, and even compared me to someone dumb as a sack of rocks. He cruelly said I was the round, fat dog from the neighbor’s house.
I wasn’t about to take that lying down. I smashed the building set he’d just finished, hid his summer homework, and secretly poured sand into his lunchbox. In short, neither of us was allowed to live in peace.
We fought and kicked our way through childhood, somehow managing to grow up. Once we became adults, he started sabotaging my love life. Whenever I liked a guy, he’d dig up his dirty history.
About my first boyfriend, he said the guy didn’t bathe for a week. About the second, he claimed the guy had three girlfriends. Even the most recent one passed his background check with a squeaky-clean record. Yet during my very first date with him, Giang Chỉ suddenly showed up pretending to be my mentally disabled little brother, drooling all over himself. He flat-out split up the happy couple and scared the other guy into running for his life.
I wasn’t about to lose, either. Whenever a girl confessed to him, I immediately spread the rumor that he was such a cheapskate he never bought gifts costing more than nine ninety. I claimed he’d worn the same patched-up underwear for three years and had socks so filthy they could stand on their own.
In the midst of that fierce rivalry, we impressively managed to remain single all the way to the age of twenty-eight.
Our parents grew so anxious they couldn’t stand it. They started matching us up at random, hurriedly shoving these two ducks into the civil registry office and making us register our marriage once and for all.
On this matter, Giang Chỉ and I were once again completely united in opposition. It was the twenty-first century. We absolutely refused to accept a family-arranged marriage.
But three days later, we both showed up at the civil registry office. It was all because his parents had offered far too much.
Two luxurious apartments under Giang Chỉ’s name were transferred to me. The three supercars in his garage became mine, too. Thirty billion in savings from his account was transferred to me as well. Not to mention the betrothal gifts from his parents.
Overnight, I became rich. Giang Chỉ, on the other hand, plummeted to the bottom of society.
I patted Giang Chỉ on the shoulder and comforted him. “It’s an order from our parents. Just accept it.”
Giang Chỉ threw a fit.
It was the first time we’d ever agreed on something, yet the result was completely opposite of what we wanted.