Lin Wan thought of something, and her heart could not help stirring. But amid the voices urging her upstairs, she held it back and fought several rounds with Fu Minghui.
In the end, Lin Wan narrowly defeated Fu Minghui by winning two out of three games, exciting Fu Minghui so much that she challenged her to another match during National Day.
Lin Wan shook her head regretfully: “During National Day I really don’t have time. I have to go back to my hometown.”
Fu Minghui was reluctant to part and waited for the next time she came back from school to spar again.
At past nine at night, Fu Xiuhuai returned from the company. Most of the Fu family had already gone to sleep. Lin Wan was lying in bed reading. Hearing the noise, she could not help thinking of Fu Minghui’s words that evening and looked at Fu Xiuhuai.
This big boss, for some unknown reason, had actually tricked her by saying he did not know how to play Minesweeper.
What was he after? What was his purpose?
Fu Xiuhuai keenly noticed that Lin Wan was somewhat different tonight from usual. In the past she basically would not stare at him, but tonight she had looked at him several times.
“What’s wrong?” Fu Xiuhuai suspected whether he had picked up someone else’s cigarette smell.
Lin Wan shook her head: “Nothing.”
She only silently noted it down in her heart.
At the end of September, Lin Wan had her prenatal checkup a few days early, preparing to use the National Day holiday for going home.
The original prenatal checkup slip said the Obstetrics and Gynecology Department of Jiangcheng People’s Hospital. Lin Wan had always been independent and planned to go alone.
But when she was packing things at night, the man saw through her.
“Next month at the beginning of the month is the prenatal checkup. I’ll go with you.” Fu Xiuhuai suddenly spoke, leaving Lin Wan able only to state her plan.
“I plan to go a few days early.”
“Which day?”
“Tomorrow.”
Fu Xiuhuai did not say much, only speaking concisely: “Tomorrow morning I’ll accompany you.”
Seeing him insist, Lin Wan did not refuse.
The next morning, when Lin Wan woke from sleep, there was already no sign of anyone beside her. She changed clothes and got up. Downstairs in the living room, she saw Fu Xiuhuai reading the newspaper.
Seeing Lin Wan come downstairs, Fu Xiuhuai put down the newspaper and rose, then sat down at the dining table with her.
“Madam, Mr. Fu has been waiting for you to eat breakfast together.” Auntie Wang brought two glasses of milk, fried eggs, and bread to the table, then winked and whispered to Lin Wan.
Lin Wan smiled at Auntie Wang and did not pick up the topic.
After breakfast, Fu Xiuhuai personally drove. Lin Wan sat in the passenger seat. The black Santana slowly drove out of Cuihu Villa District.
Lin Wan had taken taxis in Jiangcheng, but no one drove as steadily as Fu Xiuhuai. The speed was gentle and suitable, with no sudden turns, sudden stops, or hard braking. It was so smooth and stable that it was astonishing.
She could not help quietly turning her head to glance at the man’s fingers holding the steering wheel, and Lin Wan was immediately caught.
Fu Xiuhuai turned his head for a look, then in an instant pulled his gaze back: “Do you want to learn to drive? That way it will be convenient for you to go wherever you want.”
Lin Wan was startled inwardly. She had indeed once dreamed of getting a driver’s license. But she had heard that learning to drive was very expensive. Factory workers’ wages were only three or four hundred, while the registration fee for learning to drive was two or three thousand.
Therefore drivers were especially precious. Those who drove taxis or ran freight could all make money. As long as you said you could drive, it was face-giving and made people envious.
In university, Lin Wan had planned that after working and earning money, she would save some money and then learn.
But dreams were ultimately dreams. Even if she learned to drive, it would be useless. With a license and nowhere to use it, since even an ordinary car cost tens of thousands.
“I happen to be planning to change cars. How about giving you this Santana to drive?”
Fu Xiuhuai’s tone was so casual it seemed he was talking about replacing a water cup at home, with no awareness at all that this was a luxury car priced at 180,000.
Lin Wan’s small face scrunched up. Her pretty willow-leaf brows furrowed slightly, and she blurted out in a murmur: “You really are lavish with money.”
The corners of Fu Xiuhuai’s lips lifted into a bit of a smile: “Of course, it also needs your approval. If Mrs. Fu does not agree, then I won’t change it.”
Lin Wan: “…”
She turned her head away and shut her mouth tightly, saying no more.
Lin Wan’s prenatal checkup went very smoothly. In the Obstetrics and Gynecology Department of Jiangcheng People’s Hospital, Dr. Gao looked at the prenatal checkup report and simply gave a few reminders: “The fetus is quite healthy. It’s just that the pregnant woman is somewhat thin and a little malnourished. She needs more nourishment and must be careful.”
Lin Wan was indeed on the thin side. She had stayed in the countryside until graduating elementary school, then went to town for middle and high school. Her adoptive parents’ family was financially strained, but they still made sure Lin Wan had food. Lin Guofu and his wife had at first occasionally sent living expenses, but after the second child was born and the child gradually grew older, they did not give much money anymore, only giving a symbolic amount during New Year and festivals.
In the countryside there was little meat. No matter how much she grew, she could not grow much. Like her eldest brother and second sister, Lin Wan was thin in build.
Fu Xiuhuai was the first to respond: “Dr. Gao, we will pay attention. Also, is it all right to occasionally eat popsicles?”
Dr. Gao had not expected to hear such words from the mouth of the man before her in a suit and leather shoes, mature and steady. She could not help being startled: “Eating a little occasionally is nothing much.”
Before Dr. Gao replied, Lin Wan saw her quickly glance at her, and immediately understood the meaning in her words.
Was this not Fu Xiuhuai ruining her image?
When had she ever said she wanted to eat popsicles?
On the way back, Lin Wan could not help speaking: “I didn’t say I wanted to eat popsicles.”
Lin Wan did indeed like popsicles in summer, but she had clearly never mentioned it to Fu Xiuhuai.
In the past in her hometown during summer, her adoptive parents would give the three children one cent each to go to town and buy red bean popsicles. There were two such opportunities every week.
Popsicles were cooler and sweeter than plain boiled water. Entering the mouth, they were refreshing and cooling, able to drive away the scorching summer heat from inside to outside.
People always make up for their childhood selves. In Lin Wan’s eyes, the chance to eat popsicles was utterly precious. So much so that after university, when she came to the city and saved some money by working part-time during winter and summer vacations, Lin Wan still loved eating popsicles. She would even eat them in winter.
In the shivering cold wind and a world of ice and snow, Lin Wan would wrap a red scarf around herself, wear a woolen hat, step on snow that creaked underfoot, and take a bite of a popsicle.
Fu Xiuhuai’s thin lips curved slightly: “You don’t want to eat them? If you do, the doctor’s words can serve as endorsement.”
Lin Wan: QAQ
All right, she did somewhat want to. She had even passed by a street vendor pushing a popsicle cart after work the past two days and nearly failed to resist paying.
It was just that she was mindful of the little one in her belly and for the moment was not sure whether she could eat them, so she held back.
When they got home, Fu Xiuhuai parked the car and only reminded her: “Whenever you want to eat, it’s best if I’m around.”
Lin Wan did not quite understand the man’s meaning and only nodded perfunctorily.
The next day, before going to the garment factory, Lin Wan first found Director Feng to ask for three days off.
In a few days it would be National Day. The first and second were statutory holidays. Lin Wan asked for three more days, making five days in total to go back to her hometown and see her family.
Feng Tianjiao did not make things difficult for Lin Wan. After all, this person was now a favorite in front of the factory leaders. Asking for leave was naturally no problem.
“By the way, Comrade Lin Wan.” Feng Tianjiao approved the leave slip and did not forget to remind her, “Remember to handle matters quickly. The factory director and Party secretary attach great importance to the foreign investment matter.”
“Rest assured.” Lin Wan had a plan in mind. “These two days will be enough to settle all the contract terms.”
Over the next two days, Lin Wan busied herself in the gaps between work, organizing the contract terms provided by the foreign side, but gradually she noticed something was wrong.
“Deputy Director Wang, there are some problems with this contract. I feel the risk is quite high.” Lin Wan explained clearly the translated contract terms. “It says capital injection, but the foreign investor demands very broad rights, and may even propose producing the products they need and halting our own production situation.”
Deputy Director Wang sat up straight and carefully listened to Lin Wan’s words, then checked them one by one. His brows furrowed higher and higher: “This foreign investor demands so much.”
“There is no free lunch in the world. I’m just afraid there may be a trap.”
“What you say makes sense.” Although Deputy Director Wang urgently wanted to promote foreign investment, he did not want to leave hidden dangers and harm the factory. “We’ll hold another meeting to discuss and deliberate. This matter is temporarily on hold.”
Lin Wan did not know the result of the factory leaders’ meeting. In any case, she felt the hidden danger was not small. Moreover, too many factories were competing for foreign investment, causing her own bargaining power to be too low. She was afraid there really would be problems.
The Jiangcheng Garment Factory was liveliest when work ended. These past few days Lin Wan had also been riding her bicycle to and from work, quite at ease.
Pushing her bicycle out the gate, the broad street was extraordinarily lively. Small restaurants, barber shops, audio and video shops, video halls, clothing stores, small shops, billiard halls, newspaper stands… divided the street into little worlds. Signboards were crisscrossed, each sticking out its head to attract customers.
Lin Wan walked into the audio and video shop and picked a cassette. On it was written “Hong Kong City Hit Songs.” Inside the flat rectangular hard plastic shell, the plastic tape was neatly wound, rotating in the radio cassette player…
Back home, Lin Wan put the newly bought cassette into the recorder. Melodious singing slowly spilled out: [This time I face the past and the future from the beginning. How can a person abandon herself and no longer care whether this is right or wrong? How can a person be unwilling to let go yet release everything…]
Lin Wan softly hummed. Her gentle female voice echoed the ethereal, pure singing drifting from the recorder.
From years ago when she heard songs played by barber shops and audio-video shops on the street, Lin Wan had followed along and learned to sing Hong Kong City songs. Over time, she grasped more and more. She could understand seven or eight parts of the songs, and likewise could pronounce them seven or eight parts accurately.
In university, students all liked to hold cassette players and listen to tapes. Hong Kong City songs were especially popular. Those songs that spread from films and TV dramas into thousands of households were deeply fascinating.
In the notebook Lin Wan carried with her, she had even copied some lyrics, marked with homophonic pronunciations for Cantonese.
When one song ended, a knock timely sounded outside the door, and in an instant Fu Xiuhuai appeared at the doorway.
“Wanwan, help me with something.”
Lin Wan was surprised: “Help with what?”
“The owner of the department store our company won the bid for not long ago is a Hong Kong businessman. In a while, the other side will send people over to inspect the chain department store situation on the mainland. Naturally we have to receive them.” Fu Xiuhuai looked at Lin Wan seriously, his words earnest. “The visitor is a guest. We should at least learn a couple of lines of Cantonese. I saw that you speak it quite well.”
Lin Wan had not expected that humming a few lines of a Cantonese song just now had been heard by the man. For a moment she struggled: “Mine might not be standard.”
“Enough to cope.” Fu Xiuhuai tugged the corner of his mouth in self-mockery. “At least better than our whole company knowing nothing, unable to find a single person who can draw out a couple of lines of Cantonese.”
It was indeed a small favor. Since Fu Xiuhuai dared to learn, what did she not dare to teach? “All right.”
……
On the last day of September, Lin Wan went to the department store to shop, buying clothes, pants, and shoes for family members, as well as candy, pastries, and chocolate rarely seen in the countryside…
Bits and pieces, and in one go she spent eighty yuan, six jiao, and three fen.
Once the things were ready, Lin Wan carried them home, only waiting to set off early the next morning.
Tonight Fu Xiuhuai worked overtime and did not get home until after nine at night. Before he showered, Lin Wan informed him: “Tomorrow morning I’m going back to my hometown. I’ll return on the fifth.”
After saying this, Lin Wan lay down with peace of mind to conserve her energy.
The bathroom in the bedroom did not sound with water for a long time. Curious, Lin Wan half sat up to look, and saw Fu Xiuhuai standing before the bathroom without moving. His tie was half removed, loosely circling his neck. Three buttons of his black shirt were undone, and firm muscles could vaguely be glimpsed.
“What’s wrong?” Lin Wan spoke softly.
The man walked to the bedside, placed both hands on the edge of the bed, and leaned down to look Lin Wan level in the eye: “Wanwan, we are husband and wife. The matter of you going home, you only inform me the night before? You did not even consider whether I wanted to go back with you?”
Lin Wan was somewhat unused to being so close to Fu Xiuhuai, so close that his scent seemed to be all around her, so close that with a slight tilt of her head she could clearly see his sharp jawline. His cold, stern face was full of seriousness.
Moving back a little, Lin Wan understood in her heart that she indeed had not planned for Fu Xiuhuai to be involved. Now, facing the man’s questioning, she could only find an excuse: “I was worried your business was too busy and you definitely had no time…”
A bit of a smile rippled in the depths of Fu Xiuhuai’s eyes. He raised his hand and tucked the thin quilt around Lin Wan: “You are quite considerate.”
Seeing the matter settled, Lin Wan turned her head and lay down again: “I’m sleepy.”
The next morning, Lin Wan got up somewhat excitedly, preparing to pack and go home. She had not seen Fu Xiuhuai all morning and guessed he had gone to the company to work overtime. Lin Wan enjoyed the ease.
But when Lin Wan, carrying large and small bags, excitedly went out the door, she was stunned in the morning sunlight to see the Santana already parked at the villa entrance.
The back seat of the Santana was stuffed with many cigarettes, alcohol, and gifts. Driver Uncle Liu was talking with Fu Xiuhuai beside the car. Seeing Lin Wan arrive, he quickly greeted her: “Xiao Lin is here. You two set off. I can rest for a few days.”
Fu Xiuhuai nodded, opened the driver’s seat, and sat down. He looked at Lin Wan: “Let’s go. To your home.”