Leo felt extremely embarrassed at this moment. He never thought that Coral would bring him to a classmate gathering and make him pretend to be her fake boyfriend.
Looking at so many unfamiliar faces, Leo didn’t know what to do besides trying hard to keep a smile on his face.
“Don’t just stand there, you two. Take a seat,” the former class president Jerry greeted them warmly.
After everyone was seated, the dishes were served. Needless to say, they were all exotic delicacies with great color, aroma and taste. Then the glasses were filled with alcohol and Jerry stood up.
“Dear classmates, today is our triennial classmate gathering.”
“Three years may seem long or short but no matter how time flies by, our friendship will always remain.”
“Let’s raise our glasses for beautiful memories and everlasting friendship! Cheers!”
“For friendship! Cheers!” Everyone stood up and raised their glasses in agreement.
Leo noticed that there were about twenty people at this big table including himself and Coral. Apart from a few single men and women, most of them came with their partners. It seemed like nobody was single here with no family members around.
After drinking up their glasses of alcohol together, everyone sat down again before starting to eat.
Classmate gatherings are usually like this – eating food while chatting away about recent events in each other’s lives as well as showing off some achievements such as who bought a new car or house or got promoted etcetera. Anyway Leo had zero interest in these topics; he was just an accessory here so he ate quietly without saying much.
However it wasn’t easy being a quiet handsome man because soon someone shifted their attention towards him.
“Hey handsome guy! What’s your name? What do you do for work?” A short-haired beauty sitting diagonally across from Leo asked.
Leo put down his fork then smiled at her, “My name is Leo… and my job…”
He glanced over at Coral then decided to make his job sound more unique, “I’m actually a geomancy master.”
The short-haired beauty looked confused for a moment: “What? Geomancy master? What’s that?”
“It means he’s basically fortune-teller,” said the chubby woman sitting next to the short-haired beauty directly.
As soon as she spoke those words out loud, all men and women started chattering excitedly again.
“Mr. Geomancy, is this still a profession?”
“Isn’t this the kind of charlatan under the bridge? What kind of profession is this?”
“Geomancy masters are all frauds, dealing with superstition. Recently, a distant relative of mine was cheated out of tens of thousands by a fortune teller…”
Coral couldn’t bear to listen anymore and tapped her plate with her fork. “Stop it! Stop it! If you don’t talk, no one will think you’re mute. Today is a class reunion, not for discussing other people’s professions!”
As soon as Coral spoke up, everyone showed her respect and quieted down.
The short-haired beauty looked at Leo and then at Coral with suspicion on her face. “Coral, is he really your boyfriend? We’re all classmates here. Although we know that you’re very annoyed by some fly-like guys, don’t be careless about important things in life. We’re still waiting for your wedding banquet.”
“Ruby, I don’t want to say anything else except trust me and drink this glass.” Coral raised her glass towards Ruby.
As the CEO of a company, there were naturally many social occasions she had to attend and she had developed quite an alcohol tolerance from them over time; so Leo didn’t doubt Coral’s capacity for drinking.
In addition to that though Leo felt several different kinds of gazes coming from several men; some envious ones while others were jealous or even hostile.
It seemed that among the men present here today there were quite a few who liked Coral; these men all wore suits and ties looking like successful people who should have done well in their careers.
Class reunions were delicate things; those who didn’t do well usually wouldn’t show up while those who did would come show off their success to their old classmates.
Although classmate friendship was important, ultimately this was still society where reality ruled supreme.
As dinner progressed, everyone started chatting. Originally, a woman with an ordinary appearance sat to the left of Leo. However, at this moment, a man exchanged seats with her and quietly asked Leo, “Are you a geomancy master?”
Leo nodded with a pretended seriousness.
The man took out a business card from his pocket and handed it to Leo, smiling, “I came here with my wife today. You’re the youngest geomancy master I’ve ever seen.”
“I know those so-called fortune tellers who set up shop with a sign on the street are all frauds. A genuine geomancy master definitely wouldn’t solicit business on the street, right?”
Leo nodded agreeing with him wholeheartedly.
Taking the business card, Leo glanced at it and saw that the man’s name was Tony Becky, owner of Langstel Construction Company.
“Mr. Bloomer, my family is going through a difficult situation and I was wondering if you could help,” Tony said in a low voice.
“Oh really? What’s going on?” Leo was feeling bored and curious to hear what kind of trouble Tony’s family had encountered.
Tony looked up at the other people sitting at the table before continuing. “My mother… well, she’s sixty years old now but last week something strange happened.”
“She started dressing like a twenty-year-old woman with black stockings, high heels, denim skirts… oh and she even wears makeup now! My mom never wore makeup when she was young.”
“This sudden change has made her an outcast among our neighbors who think she’s gone crazy. But besides her eccentric clothing choices, everything else about her seems normal.”
“I could tolerate all of this if it weren’t for the fact that my mother has asked for a divorce from my father! He can’t handle it and things have gotten really tense between them. I feel like something unexplainable has happened to my mom.”
“I thought about consulting a fortune teller but I don’t trust those street vendors. Since you’re Miss Wilde’s boyfriend, I assume you have real skills in this area. Can you please help me?”
After hearing Tony’s story, Leo couldn’t help but think of the movie 17 Again.
“Tony, have you ever seen 17 Again? It sounds similar to your situation,” he suggested.
“Nope,” replied Tony shaking his head. “I don’t watch movies often but my mom thinks she is still twenty years old doing things only young women would do.”
Leo became interested in helping him out, “How about this? When I’m free, we can arrange to meet your mother together so that we can figure out what is happening?”
After receiving Leo’s promise, Tony thanked him before returning back to his wife who sat beside him earlier.