NOVPUBXu Qingfan pretended not to understand, "Auntie, why are you thanking me? Surely you’re not thinking of sharing my red envelope, are you? Let me tell you, at most we can split it seventy-thirty... not twenty-eighty!"
"Hahaha~ Alright, Auntie knows you get it." Zhang Chunxue was amused to the point of shaking with laughter.
"Yiyi is my good friend, it’s only right that I do these things, and Auntie is such a nice person too!" Xu Qingfan’s gaze shifted to the car interior, where Zhang Yiyi was curled up on a seat, asleep.
"What a good kid, here’s a kiss as a reward." Zhang Chunxue bent down to give Xu Qingfan a peck on the cheek, patted his head, and then sat back in the driver’s seat.
Watching the wine-red Maserati Quattroporte drive away, Xu Qingfan couldn’t help swallowing his saliva.
[Who could withstand this!]
Xu Qingfan’s gaze shifted back, and he turned around, looking up to see if the lights in his family’s living room were on.
"Why are the lights on in Xiao Xiao’s house? Didn’t she say she would be back home on the eighth day of the new year?" Xu Qingfan rubbed his eyes, confused, making sure he wasn’t seeing things.
Excited, Xu Qingfan ran upstairs, "Xia Xiaoxiao, if you dare to come back early, then you’d better dare to open the door!" He shouted down the corridor, not yet at the door.
But when he reached Xia Xiaoxiao’s front door, there was unexpectedly no one in the living room.
"Xiao Xiao?" He tentatively called into the room, "Auntie?" Yet, no one responded.
Since the TV and DVD were still there, he ruled out the possibility of a burglary; Xu Qingfan took off his shoes and went in to investigate.
Both the kitchen and bathroom lights were off. He thought about it and then went over to pull on Xia Xiaoxiao’s bedroom door handle, "Xiao Xiao, are you in there?"
Xu Qingfan peeked inside. The bedroom was pitch-dark, and he faintly heard someone sobbing.
He reached for the light switch in the bedroom, and though the room was still empty, the blanket on the bed had a lump in it. Without asking, it was clear that Xia Xiaoxiao was hiding underneath.
"What’s wrong, Xiao Xiao?" Xu Qingfan tried to pull back the blanket, but it was clutched tightly from the inside.
Xia Xiaoxiao ignored him.
"If you don’t talk, I’m going to crawl in there!"
Xia Xiaoxiao still ignored him.
"I’m really crawling in now!" Xu Qingfan found a gap at the end of the bed and stuck his head in.
Xia Xiaoxiao seemed to have noticed, as she stretched her foot out to his face and kicked out Xu Qingfan.
"Ptooey, ptooey, ptooey! Disgusting!!" Xu Qingfan wiped his face disdainfully with his sleeve.
"Cough, cough...." The person inside seemed to be amused by Xu Qingfan, coughing with laughter for a good while.
Seizing the opportunity, Xu Qingfan yanked away the blanket wrapped around Xia Xiaoxiao, and this time he succeeded. Then he saw the little girl’s tear-stained face.
"What’s the matter? Where are Uncle and Auntie, did you eat?" Xu Qingfan pulled out a few tissues from the box beside the bed, trying to help her up and wipe her face clean.
"You don’t need to mind!" Xia Xiaoxiao sobbed as she pushed Xu Qingfan’s hand away.
"I didn’t even upset you, why are you taking your anger out on me? Wipe your own face!" Xu Qingfan tossed the tissues onto her.
"Xu Qingfan, I hate you so much! You’re a pig, a stinky pig, a dead pig, a big silly pig!" As if venting her emotions, Xia Xiaoxiao threw the tissues at his face, but the light tissues hardly flew to the foot of the bed before falling onto it.
"I’ve been waiting for you all day, why did you only come back now!" The little girl wept and complained, her voice filled with extreme grievance.
"I went to Hong Kong to celebrate New Year’s, you didn’t tell me you were coming back today... What happened, talk to me." Looking at Xia Xiaoxiao’s pitiable little face, Xu Qingfan’s tone couldn’t help but soften as he spoke.
Xia Xiaoxiao also knew she was being unreasonable, but she felt really aggrieved, really aggrieved. She had wanted to talk to Xu Qingfan at noon, but ended up waiting until past eight in the evening.
"My mom and dad had a fight..." she narrated the morning’s events to Xu Qingfan between sobs.
Xia Guofu had received a phone call and then announced that a friend had introduced him to a business deal he had to attend to right away.
Lin Jing tried to persuade him to wait until after the New Year, saying that money can’t be earned all at once.
Latter, somehow, the couple started arguing in front of all the relatives. Xia Guofu said how hard it was for him to earn money, and Lin Jing also said how much she had given to the family.
Seeing that she couldn’t persuade him to stay, Lin Jing got desperate and blurted out, "If you leave today, we’re going to the civil affairs bureau to get a divorce!"
Xia Guofu gave her a cold look and, without a word, turned around and left.
In the end, Lin Jing was left collapsed on the floor, in a state of breakdown.
When parents fight, it is always the child who is hurt the most. Xia Xiaoxiao felt helpless, sitting around at her grandparents’ house all morning, thinking she would go home and talk to Xu Qingfan at noon.
Who would have known she would wait and wait and just couldn’t catch him, and then it was nearly nine o’clock at night.
After hearing the whole story, Xu Qingfan cursed Xia Guofu a few times in his heart.
"Have you had dinner?"
Xia Xiaoxiao shook her head, only realizing she was hungry and her stomach was grumbling after venting her feelings.
"Go wash your face, I’ll make something for you to eat!" Xu Qingfan tapped her on the head not too lightly, not too heavily, and turned to leave.
"Okay."
Xu Qingfan simply boiled a poached egg in clear soup noodles, which Xia Xiaoxiao gobbled up greedily.
"Eat slowly, don’t choke." He handed her a glass of water.
"Mmm..." Whether it was because she was too hungry or Xu Qingfan’s cooking was exceptional, Xia Xiaoxiao felt this bowl of noodles was the tastiest she had ever had.
"Let the adults handle their matters, don’t worry about it. Just remember, as long as your Brother Fan has meat to eat, there will always be a bone for you!" Xu Qingfan patted Xia Xiaoxiao’s head and said with a smile.
"Cough cough cough... Xu Qingfan, get lost!" 𝓷ℴ𝓿𝓹𝓾𝓫.𝓬ℴ𝓶
"Alright, I was just playing with you. Take it easy, your mom and dad will definitely make up." From the perspective of an outsider, Xu Qingfan was indeed right.
"Yeah, thank you, Xu Stinky Pig." Xia Xiaoxiao held up her bowl and drained the soup in one go.
"Please, call me Handsome!"
"Silly boy!"
"You what?"
"You!"
"Bounce back!"
"Bounce back, bounce back!"
"Bounce back, bounce back, bounce back!"
"..."
