Qiao Lian was amazed.
This person, Uncle Lu, simply used every trick in the book.
Now he was even trying to please the daughter-in-law.
Qiao Lian grimaced as she heard Xia Yehua nag,, “You went to the market again? Why are you wandering around in a market all dressed up? The next time you want to eat anything in particular, can’t you just get the housekeeper to buy it?”
Uncle Li replied, “I just thought it’s something you’d like. Anyway, it’s just buying a chicken, it’s nothing. Even if you asked me to buy napkins, I’d do it.”
“Is this handsome uncle,” Qiao Lian thought, “really in his fifties?”
The things he was saying would turn a young girl scarlet and make her heart pound.
Indeed, Xia Yehua jumped to her feet with exasperation and turned completely red again. “You shameless old man, what nonsense are you saying? Huh, what are you talking about? I’m already having my menopause!”
Li Mao immediately said, “Oh, right, see? Before we know it, it’s menopause. We are really getting old and if you still don’t agree to marry me—”
“Oh, shut up I said!”
Li Mao obediently fell silent.
Still exasperated with the man, she lowered her voice and warned him, “I’m telling you, you’re not to speak a word in front of the children later.”
“Why?”
“Let me discuss this with them, immunise them so to speak. We have to ease them into it slowly.”
Li Mao nodded and said, “Ok, sure. I’ll take the chicken into the kitchen and prepare the soup.”
Xia Yehua nodded finally and craned her neck to glance outside. “Did you come here alone?”
“Uh huh.”
“Why don’t you tell Li Tianyu to come over? Why leave him to eat by himself at home?”
“Ok, anything you say.”
Hence half an hour later, Xia Yehua and Li Mao were helping the housekeeper with making dinner.
In the study upstairs.
Lu Tianyu was holding onto Shen Liangchuan’s arm and shaking it with both his hands saying, “Brother, Big Brother, Brother Chuan, can’t you consider my plea? Just agree to it! Look, my mother passed away for eight years and Dad hasn’t found someone else. How nice is it for them to be together?! And I’ve liked you since we were little, followed you around, treated you like my own brother. Look, if they got married now, we’d really be brothers.”
Shen Liangchuan was silent.
He frowned and was about to speak when Shen Zihao’s gloomy voice said, “I don’t seem to recall any of my parents having another child?”
Li Tianyu replied, “What do you mean?”
Shen Zihao sneered icily, “Exactly what I said. You and my brother will never be as close as real brothers.”
Li Tianyu: …
Shen Liangchuan: …
Qiao Lian: …!
Shen Zihao sprang onto his feet from the sofa and stuck his hands into his side pockets. Walking slowly towards the doorway, he said, “I won’t agree to this marriage.”
Li Tianyu asked anxiously, “Zihao, why not?”
Shen Zihao halted and turned around. He said like a spoiled and petulant child, “I don’t agree because I don’t feel like agreeing.”
Everyone thought, “How willful!”
Qiao Lian grimaced. Then Li Tianyu turned to Shen Liangchuan and asked, “Now what do we do?”
