“It’s fine.” Hu Ruixue frowned a little and said, “I’ll bring this up to Uncle Wang. Well, anyways, I have something that needed taking care of at home. I’m going to take off.”
“Ms. Hu, there is nothing that I can give you so let me kowtow to you. You are the savior of me and my daughter.” Aunty suddenly got down on her knees to kowtow to Hu Ruixue.
“What are you doing? You don’t need to do that. I came today for Shu Yan. You can thank her.” Hu Ruixue had someone helped Aunty up. She gave Li Shuyu, who kept her head lowered, a look and left with her men.
Shu Yan took a look at the time and said, “You can thank me later. It’s getting late. Spend the night home and get your ticket tomorrow morning?”
Aunty nodded. It was getting late and they probably wouldn’t even be able to get train ticket at this hour.
Nobody had eaten anything with all the running around. Feng Zeyu brought back food from a restaurant. Aunty and her daughter had a little bit to eat and returned to their room.
Shu Yan listened in for a little and didn’t hear anything. She turned toward Feng Zeyu and asked, “You think they will be fine?”
“Don’t worry. They are mother and daughter.” Feng Zeyu put some food into Shu Yan’s bowl and said, “Have some more.”
Inside the room, Aunty looked at her daughter who had her head lowered. She didn’t hit her or yell at her. Mostly she felt guilty.
“You have always been a mature one and would do laundry and go into the field with me since you were a child. When you got into college, we had to pull your tuition from all of the place. Mom thought you have enough to live on but later on found out that you could barely have enough food for what I have given you. You never complained once but looked to make money yourself and work over summer and winter vacation to save up for tuition. Mom feels so bad about that so I thought I would get a job and help you out. We were lucky to run into a good employer. I have a good place to stay and good food to eat. And the pay is great. We have enough for your tuition and living expenses and my boss will give you clothes from time to time. Any way you look at it, our days are becoming better and better. So why? Xiao Yu! You can’t be tempted just because you saw others making quick money. Pies don’t fall from the sky. What would have happened to you had my boss didn’t help us? What could Mom have done?”
“Mom…… I was wrong…… I couldn’t resist the temptation. I just… I saw my roommate bringing back hundreds of yuan at a time so I thought I could just work over the winter holidays and will have enough for tuition for the next semester. That way you can spend your money on changing out the roof at home. I didn’t think this would happen.”
Tears were streaming down the daughter’s face and the mother didn’t fare much better. Aunty had no heart to scold her because she knew that her daughter was very mature.
The next day, the eyes of both the mother and daughter were reddened when they said goodbye to Shu Yan.
Shu Yan didn’t say anything about that but packed a lot of New Year goods for them to bring with.
“I brought a lot with me last time already and we still have a lot left! I can’t take more.” Aunty quickly declined Shu Yan.
“We won’t be able to finish these here anyway. Just take them and have a good New Year with you daughter.” Shu Yan even had someone took them to the train station.
Aunty returned just a few days later on the 7th and looked to be in much better spirit.
“Xiao Yu returned to school already?” asked Shu Yan.
“Yes,” said Aunty appreciatively. “Xiao Yu would be done for this time if it wasn’t for your help.”
It was fine for a student to work a part-time job. Others would even think that they were very mature but working at a club was different. It sounded bad and she might even be expelled if the school found out. Most importantly, had Xiao Yu fallen deeper and deeper and really gone all the way…….
Back to school, Li Shuyu saw her roommate who referred her to the job and her body shook.
“We have been roommates for two years. How could you lie to me like that? How you do sleep at night?”
“Sleep at night? Li Shuyu, use your brain, alright? We are talking about 100+ yuan a day. What kind of job pays that much? Besides, did I ask you to go with? No, you were the one who begged me to bring you with.” The roommate looked at Li Shuyu and there was jealousy in her eyes. “What a waste that you have decided to quit. At 100 ~ 200 yuan a day, that’s at least 3,000 a month, 40,000 a year, 120,000 for three years. How many years do you think will take you to make 120,000 otherwise?”
“Shut up. You are right. I can’t blame it entirely on you. I am partly to blame for that as well. I would not have gone with you had I had better self-control. Chen Mei, I will not mention what you do to others and from now on…… Let’s not hang out with each other anymore.”
Chen Mei, who remained in the room by herself after Li Shuyu had slammed the door behind her, looked out of the window, dazed.
