“Dad, it smells amazing! Let’s eat!” Shen Ye couldn’t contain his excitement.
His chubby-cheeked, eager face was endearing.
Meng Guyu watched him with a soft smile. “I made the egg soup you wanted. Try it and tell me if you like it.”
Shen Ye was a well-behaved child with Shen Fengmian, but not nearly as obedient with Meng Guyu.
He just pulled a face and said nothing.
The food was ready, and it was time for lunch. Shen Fengmian nodded. “Comrade Meng, thank you for your hard work.”
Meng Guyu waved it off. “It’s nothing, Comrade Shen. Please, go ahead and eat. I’ll tidy up the kitchen and come back to clear the table later.”
With that, she hurried out of the room.
Once outside, she let out a long breath, patted her chest to calm her racing heart, and went to the kitchen to start cleaning up.
Inside, Shen Fengmian waited until she left before turning to Shen Ye. “Eat up.”
Shen Ye immediately grabbed a slice of pork from the cabbage and vermicelli stew.
He took a bite, let out a soft “Mmm,” and quickly stuffed another piece into his mouth.
His dark eyes sparkled with delight. “Dad, this is delicious!”
The cabbage and vermicelli had been stewed for a long time, and the thick, glossy sauce clung to the tender pork, making it incredibly savory and fragrant.
He tried the other dishes, finding each one just as delicious. The vermicelli was chewy, the cabbage soft and tender, and the potato shreds refreshingly crisp.
Holding a freshly steamed multigrain bun, he took a bite of the bun, then a bite of the vegetables, followed by a sip of the egg soup.
He squeezed his eyes shut in bliss. “Dad, this is amazing! It’s way better than the cafeteria. This is the best egg soup I’ve ever had.”
Shen Fengmian offered no comment, only taking his second bun in a deliberate, steady hand. “It’s not easy to satisfy a fussy eater like you.”
The previous candidates—all of whom had agreed to start the next day without fail—had not been able to please little Shen Ye with their cooking.
Shen Ye swayed side to side. “Her cooking is good, but everything else about her is wrong.”
“Oh?” Shen Fengmian acknowledged, signaling he was listening.
“She’s too young, and way too pretty. Who knows if she’s just like the one before the last one, trying to be my new mom.”
Shen Fengmian frowned. “Don’t talk nonsense.”
But it’s true!
Shen Ye started to argue, but seeing the look on his father’s face, he wisely shut his mouth. “Fine. Let’s just let her try. At least her cooking is good.”
Shen Fengmian agreed.
These past few days had been a nightmare. With his military duties so demanding and Shen Ye being such a handful—a little terror who would tear the house apart if left alone—he couldn’t put his mind at ease.
He turned to Meng Guyu, who looked quite uneasy. “When can you start?”
Meng Guyu had been so nervous that she’d been trying to think of things to say to impress him.
His sudden question caught her off guard, and she stammered, “Ah?” for a moment.
Though his expression was stern, Shen Fengmian wasn’t impatient.
He repeated, “You’ll be doing the laundry and cooking, and looking after the boy. If you’re okay with that, just tell me when you can start.”
Meng Guyu nodded vigorously. “I’m fine with it, really! I can start tomorrow.”
Shen Fengmian thought for a moment.
“Let me be clear about the job and the pay,” he said, setting the terms from the start. “If you take this job, I expect you to work hard, be punctual, and take your duties seriously.”
As soon as he finished, Shen Ye chimed in. “And don’t try to be my mom!”
Hearing this, Meng Guyu’s eyes widened slightly. She glanced at Shen Fengmian, then quickly lowered her head, her voice eager. “I-I won’t, I promise.”
Shen Fengmian glared at Shen Ye in annoyance.
“Ignore him,” he explained to Meng Guyu. “He’s just talking nonsense. If you have no other questions, I’ll see you tomorrow.”
…..
It wasn’t until she walked out the courtyard gate that Meng Guyu finally felt the job was truly hers.
On the way to see Qian Hongmei, she couldn’t help but pump her fist in the air.
I’m going to do this job right, she vowed.
Qian Hongmei was thrilled. “They hired you? That’s wonderful, Guyu! You have to do a great job now.”
Meng Guyu was far more excited than she let on. “Don’t worry, Auntie Qian. Thank you so much for recommending me. I’ll work hard and keep my head down. I won’t embarrass you.”
Hearing this, Qian Hongmei felt a warm glow of satisfaction. “Your mother is my dearest friend, and I don’t have a daughter of my own. Who else would I want to help? Besides, if you move in here, we can keep each other company. It’ll be wonderful.”
She looked at the certificate in Meng Guyu’s hand, then led her to the office to get her access permit and finally to her new living quarters to show her the way.
Meng Guyu finally let out a deep breath as she gripped the stiff card in her pocket and settled into the bus ride home. She had finally taken a different path from her past life.
Back at the Meng family home, Liu Sulian kept glancing at the gate as evening approached.
She couldn’t help but mutter to Meng Sanshi, who sat on the doorstep smoking his pipe. “It’s this late already. Why isn’t our daughter back yet?”
Meng Sanshi usually smoked in the courtyard, but today he had taken a spot by the gate, waiting for Guyu. With the sun sinking low, he couldn’t deny his worry.
He glanced at his son, Gucang, who was chopping wood at the south end of the yard. “Gucang, go to town and meet your sister.”
Gucang, always the dutiful one, immediately dropped his axe and prepared to leave, but Feng Juan stopped him as she emerged from the house.
“Go where?” she snapped. “You’ve worked all day. She’s just idling around—does she need a royal procession to fetch her?”
She dusted loose threads from the dress she’d been sewing inside, her tone dripping with sarcasm. “Mom, Dad, I’m not the one complaining, but you’ve spoiled Guyu too much. Most girls obey their parents, yet you let her have her way, insisting on becoming a nanny. It’s like she’s bored with a good life and just wants to make things difficult for herself.”
She had repeated these words several times over the last two days, but she still fumed every time she thought about it. “What was wrong with Jinlai? He has a secure government job. What does Guyu have to offer besides her looks? It’s a blessing that Jinlai even considered her, yet she went and ruined such a perfect match.”
Seeing no one in the family dare to speak, she scoffed. “She’s so clumsy. Who knows if she’ll even land a nanny job. I don’t know what she was thinking, but she’s completely blocked her own path forward by rejecting Jinlai.”
Meng Gucang was a simple, honest man. Before he got married, he obeyed his parents; now, he obeyed his wife.
But this time, he couldn’t hold back. “That Zhao fellow always had Guyu washing clothes and scrubbing shoes. He was just treating her like a servant. I think she’s better off not marrying him.”
After Meng Guyu broke off her engagement with Zhao Jinlai, she had explained the reason to her family once.
Zhao Jinlai had told her that once she married into the Old Zhao family, she was expected to serve them all, doing the laundry, cooking, and having a son.
He was treating her like a free nanny, and she figured it was better to be a paid one.
Feng Juan pointed a finger at Meng Gucang from across the room. “You’re so naive! Just because he says that, doesn’t mean it’s true. Once she marries into his family, she can get her hands on the money, eat and drink well—won’t that be better than being a nanny?”
She had always been the calculating one. After all, she was the one who had managed to secure a temporary job as a cafeteria server at Meng Gucang’s factory.
In her opinion, marrying Zhao Jinlai and flattering him was the way to go.
She could get the money and even send some back to her own family. That was much more reliable than being a nanny.
What was a nanny, anyway? It was just serving others, being exploited.
Such jobs were only special permissions in the army; outside, no such jobs existed. Besides, they’d already said it was a temporary position—she couldn’t keep it forever.
The more she thought about it, the more she felt Zhao Jinlai’s secure government job was the way to go.
She turned to Liu Sulian. “Mom, if you ask me, we should go to the Zhao family tomorrow to apologize. Let Guyu talk to Jinlai, and they can just get back together.”
“I won’t.”
The moment Feng Juan finished speaking, a voice rang out from a distance in opposition.
Meng Sanshi, who had been smoking his dry tobacco with his head down, finally looked up.
Seeing his daughter had returned, he quickly stood up. “Why are you back so late?”
Meng Guyu helped him into the courtyard and shut the gate behind them.
She turned to Feng Juan. “Sister-in-law, I will not marry Zhao Jinlai.”
In her past life, she had believed that marrying Zhao Jinlai was her ticket to happiness. She had agreed with her sister-in-law, convinced she was destined for a life of luxury—of eating and drinking well for the rest of her days.
But what actually happened? After seven or eight years of marriage, her entire existence revolved around the stove and the sink. The rest of the Zhao family constantly reminded her, subtly and not so subtly, that she was useless.
Despite her endless devotion to them, she never received a shred of gratitude. As for money, never mind the rest of the family—even Zhao Jinlai himself guarded it more fiercely than his own eyes.
Whenever she asked for a few yuan, he acted as if she were committing a crime.
Later, when she fell so ill she couldn’t even stand, his family accused her of faking it.
Worst of all, because she never conceived, Zhao Jinlai kept a mistress on the side.
She would never forget his words just before she lost consciousness.
“Stop pretending to have a headache! You’ve been married into this family for seven or eight years, eating and drinking well without earning a single cent. You can’t even give me a child. What’s wrong with me finding someone else to bear one? When they move in, you’d better serve her well while she’s recovering from childbirth. Otherwise, get out!”
When she opened her eyes again, she was back in the time before her wedding.
Since Heaven had given her a second chance, she wouldn’t be foolish enough to marry Zhao Jinlai again. This nanny job was an opportunity she had to seize.
She would forge a different path this time. She might not have much skill or talent, but she was determined to live with dignity and be the master of her own life.
When she declared she wouldn’t marry Zhao Jinlai, Feng Juan was speechless. “You’re being stubborn! You don’t know how expensive rice, oil, and salt are. You’re just too young, thinking dating is all romance and poetry. Let me tell you, money is what really matters. No matter what, he has a ‘iron rice bowl’—a job for life. The moment you break up with Jinlai, Xiao Fang from the front courtyard will be all over him. Go ahead, be stubborn. You’ll regret this!”
An iron rice bowl? Not necessarily, Meng Guyu thought.
In her past life, although she knew little about the outside world, she remembered that Zhao Jinlai’s factory had seen its performance decline year by year.
Rumors of layoffs had even started to spread. And that was only seven or eight years from now.
Her resolve hardened. “Sister-in-law, even if he had a golden rice bowl, I wouldn’t be jealous.”
Hearing this, Liu Sulian, who had been busy serving Meng Guyu a meal, finally remembered to ask, “Girl, what happened with that nanny job?”