Wen Fan had no idea that her simple act of deleting him had already left the male lead and his lackeys utterly bewildered. Fu Chuan’s face was as dark as the bottom of a pot, and the group dispersed in low spirits.
After finishing a simple lunch, Wen Tao and Xia Yingzhi both began to yawn, having woken up so early that morning.
Wen Fan pushed them toward the door. “I’ll stay in the shop and study. You two go back and rest for a while.”
Mother Wen’s eyes widened. “How could we do that?”
Although the lunch rush had passed, there would still be the occasional diner in the afternoon.
Wen Fan argued, “Isn’t it just boiling noodles? Dad already prepared the noodles, and the rice in the shop is ready. What are you worried about?”
Mother Wen hesitated.
Previously, she and her husband would take turns watching the shop so the other could go back and sleep for a bit; it was true that everything in the shop was ready-made. When she watched the shop alone, as long as a customer didn’t order a stir-fry dish, she could handle making a bowl of noodles.
But Wen Fan…
Father Wen said, “I should stay. You two go back and rest.”
Wen Fan said helplessly, “Dad… the shop has air conditioning.”
Father Wen was suddenly stumped, feeling a bit guilty. “Then… all right, I’ll go back with your mother.”
The family had rented a house here last year, and it had practically nothing in it. After opening the shop, money had been tight, so they had only installed a single second-hand vertical air conditioner in the shop.
Looking at her parents, whose guilt was almost tangible, Wen Fan felt a touch of helplessness.
Though they had only been together for a few days, Wen Fan had already intuitively learned how to communicate with them. Sometimes she didn’t intentionally trigger their guilt; rather, it was the only way they would follow her suggestions.
These were parents who wanted to give every good thing they had to their child. Perhaps the original “Wen Fan” would have found such love suffocating, but the current Wen Fan only felt that this “sticky” love was just right.
After her parents left, Wen Fan took out her English textbook. She first neatly copied the vocabulary words once, then read them aloud twice based on the original host’s hazy memories. The rest became much easier.
She placed the copied word list on the table, covering the Chinese meanings to test herself, memorizing the spellings over and over while her hands never stopped moving.
“Abandon, a-b-a-n-d-o-n… to give up…”
Sss—
Snow-white garlic cloves were peeled and tossed into a bowl of water, creating a ripple.
“Exchange, e-x-c-h-…”
She glanced at the vocabulary book: “a-n-g-e, exchange, trade!”
Dang, dang, dang—
Crisp thread chilies were chopped into chili rings the size of a fingernail.
“Lecture, l-e-c…”
She set a pot to boil Sichuan peppercorn water and fried ginger slices, onions, scallions, and cilantro in oil until fragrant…
Wen Fan found a pair of clean chopsticks and dipped them into the freshly mixed sauce to taste it.
After nodding in satisfaction, she soaked the chili rings in the sauce.
They had only been soaking for half an hour when she heard the front door open.
“Welcome!”
The young woman who walked in was covered from head to toe in sun-protective clothing, and her entire being exuded a sense of fatigue.
“Boss, what’s left?”
In the middle of the afternoon, if she didn’t have to go out for something, she would have much rather stayed home in the air conditioning and ordered delivery.
Wen Fan enthusiastically presented the menu. “We have rice bowls and noodle bowls ready. If you want anything else, you’ll have to wait.”
She wasn’t very familiar with the kitchen stove yet. Although modern cooking appliances were convenient, the counter with several faucets still left Wen Fan a bit flustered. Therefore, to be safe, she recommended the items her father had prepared.
Wu Na had lost her appetite due to the heat. As soon as she heard Wen Fan recite the menu, she frowned. “Is there anything else? Can you make Cold Skin Noodles?”
On such a hot day, she really didn’t want to eat a single bite of anything hot.
Wen Fan shook her head. “I’m sorry, we don’t have Cold Skin Noodles on the menu.”
Wu Na was a bit disappointed. If she had known this small shop didn’t even have Cold Skin Noodles, she wouldn’t have come in. But in the spirit of “since I’m already here,” she pointed randomly at the Beef with Cabbage over Rice.
“I’ll have this, then. To go… and an ice-cold Coke.”
“Coming right up!” Wen Fan found a takeout container under the counter, estimated the right amount to fill it, and grabbed a can of Coke from the freezer.
“That will be fifteen yuan in total.”
Wu Na took the bag, paid the money directly, then pulled her sun hat down and quickly rode off on her electric scooter.
The sun was scorching. Wu Na practically fled back to her home.
The first thing she did upon entering was not to take off her sun-protective clothing, but to quickly turn the air conditioner down to sixteen degrees.
“This hellish heat! When is it finally going to rain?”
The rain in the weather forecast was like a game of hide-and-seek; you never knew when it would arrive. The heat roasted people until they had no appetite.
Wu Na took a shower, changed into her pajamas, and opened her tablet to pick a “rice-accompanying drama”—it took her twenty minutes to choose.
In the end, she resigned herself to an iconic palace intrigue drama. Listening to the lines she could almost recite by heart, Wu Na opened her lunch box.
After being smothered in the takeout container for nearly an hour, the boundary between the vegetables and the rice had become blurred. Although it wasn’t cold, it was certainly not as good as when it was piping hot from the pan.
Wu Na took two bites and felt that she would have been better off just coming back and cooking instant noodles. At least instant noodles with Coke counted as a “happy home meal.”
Bored, Wu Na noticed a small white plastic bag of pickles in the takeout bag. She had originally intended to throw the pickles away, but just then, with a “mew,” the “master” of the house—her cat—approached from somewhere.
The round-faced Golden Shaded British Shorthair sniffed to the left and then to the right before jumping onto the table with a thud, making the canned Coke hiss.
The cat approached Wu Na’s food, and once it had sniffed its fill, it started to paw at it.
Wu Na cried out, “Hey, hey, hey! Stop sniffing; there’s nothing here for you to eat.”
Takeout was high in oil and salt. It was fine for Wu Na to eat it herself, but she didn’t dare give it to her “master.”
The cat was good-tempered. Being pushed away by Wu Na, it awkwardly licked its paw, then went “mew mew” looking for something else.
Without Wu Na noticing, the cat had somehow burrowed into the takeout bag.
With its nostrils twitching on its chubby face, the cat picked up the plastic bag tied with a dead knot and let out a muffled meow.
Out of the corner of her eye, Wu Na saw this and immediately grew anxious. Fearing that this “piggy cat” would swallow the plastic bag, she moved quickly to grab it by the scruff of its neck.
The cat seemed indignant and meowed even louder.
Wu Na snatched the pickles away and gave the cat a playful flick on the forehead. “Is there anything you don’t want to eat?”
It wanted to taste the seasoning of everything.
She picked up the plastic bag to check; fortunately, the cat hadn’t swallowed it, and the brown liquid inside hadn’t spilled out.
Wu Na still felt uneasy and prepared to toss the plastic bag into the lidded trash can in the kitchen. But suddenly, her nose twitched. Uncertain, she brought the bag to her nose and sniffed.
Wu Na was a bit confused. Why did she feel like…
These pickles smelled even better than the meal she just had?
To confirm whether it was actually the scent of the pickles, Wu Na bit her lip, found a bowl, and poured them out.
Once they were poured, her “master” became even more excited, rubbing against her pant legs and meowing.
Wu Na took two deep breaths.
She reached out with her chopsticks and cautiously picked up a chili ring.
Wu Na’s eyes widened.
This chili ring had a hint of sweetness within its spiciness. It was fresh and crisp. Upon entry, there was first a mellow, savory saltiness, followed by a heat that didn’t sting the nose at all. The sour, spicy, salty, and savory flavors blended together perfectly; no single flavor dominated, yet they felt exceptionally natural. That touch of sourness was particularly appetizing, as if the oppressive summer heat clumped in her chest had been completely incinerated by a fire ignited by the chili. All that remained was a craving for food.
Wu Na’s eyes lit up. Disregarding her previous distaste for the rice bowl, she heaped several chopsticks of chili rings onto the rice. The originally mediocre meal seemed to have found a second life. The sauce infused the rice, and Wu Na began to shovel large mouthfuls into her mouth.
The “piggy cat” grew exasperated, throwing a few “thump-thump” punches with its paws, but its owner was so engrossed in her meal that she ignored it entirely.
Wu Na finished the large container of rice in one go. Her stomach was stuffed, but her heart still wanted more.
This was the most satisfying meal she had eaten in quite a while.
But…
Wu Na felt a bit of regret. She had eaten too fast just now and finished the entire bag of pickles.
What was she going to do for dinner?
Wu Na bit her lip and thought: at worst… at worst, she would wait until the sun went down in the afternoon and go buy another meal!
No, wait!
She was going to go ask if the shop sold their pickles separately!
Wen Fan kept watch over the shop. In one afternoon, she had memorized dozens of vocabulary words and completed two English reading comprehensions (getting almost every question wrong). After seeing off two more customers who came in to eat, she finally saw her father arrive.
The black dust on her father’s shoulders was more prominent than it had been in the morning.
His forehead was covered in sweat. Upon entering, he told Wen Fan to go home and rest.
“Dad made dinner for you. Go home and eat early, then get some sleep. Don’t stay up too late playing on your phone.”
Wen Fan obediently packed her backpack. “Dad, I had nothing to do this afternoon, so I followed a tutorial online and made some pickles. I left them in the back.”
Father Wen was astonished. “You made pickles?”
Wen Fan slung her backpack over her shoulder. “What’s so hard about that? Dad, there are so many tutorials online now. As long as you follow the steps, anyone can do a good job.”
Wen Fan didn’t have the confidence that revealing her culinary skills directly would convince her parents. Therefore, she had to choose a gradual approach to make them believe she was a “talented” individual who had been trained, rather than someone who possessed innate knowledge from a past life.
Father Wen was very gratified by his daughter’s actions. Regardless of the outcome, Wen Fan being so proactive was undoubtedly her way of showing that she truly no longer looked down on her parents’ profession.
That alone was a wonderful thing.
“Good, good, good. Dad has to thank you for helping out.”
Father Wen patted Wen Fan’s shoulder kindly. “Your mom is at home. Hurry on back.”
After Wen Fan left, Father Wen walked into the kitchen and was first startled by how clean it was.
He considered himself a relatively clean chef, but he hadn’t expected his daughter to be even cleaner than him.
Not only was it clean, but Wen Fan also seemed to have a bit of obsessive-compulsive disorder. All the seasonings in the kitchen had been moved to new spots, the bottles were organized by height, and each one was wiped clean without a trace of grease.
As Father Wen looked around, his eyes suddenly turned red.
It was wonderful. His daughter had truly grown up.
Wen Fan pushed open the front door of their home, and a blast of cold air hit her in the face.
Mother Wen stood at the door, beaming. “Come in quick, Fanfan! Your dad and I went to buy a second-hand air conditioner this afternoon. Come in and see if it’s cool enough?”