Chapter 13

“Little Ye, your business these past few days has been pretty good. You’ve saved quite a bit of money, right?”

Sun Guixiang walked over with a smiling face, her eyes constantly glancing toward the wooden box where Ye Wanqing kept her money. She thought she was being subtle, but anyone could see through it at a glance.

“It’s all right.” Ye Wanqing curved her lips. “I haven’t been in business as long as Sister Sun. I definitely can’t compare to you.”

“How is that possible? I see that selling sour plum drink and oden has even brought quite a bit of benefit to Wang Fang. You yourself must have earned a lot—much better than me! Ai…… Little Ye, it’s not that I want to complain to you, but your Sister Sun’s family is really struggling.”

While packing up, Ye Wanqing listened to Sun Guixiang chatter on.

It was nothing more than the elderly in-laws needing care, medical treatment and medicine costing money, and them being unreasonable and making things difficult for her. The two children were both in school, and every semester the tuition and textbook fees were a big expense. Although her man worked as a repairman at the bus station, his monthly wages were only that little bit and simply could not support the family’s finances. She could only rely on doing business to earn some living expenses.

Sun Guixiang talked nonstop. Ye Wanqing did not interrupt and was not so kind-hearted as to play along.

“Little sister, your Sister Sun has said so much to you. You have to pull me up a bit.” Seeing that Ye Wanqing showed no intention of speaking, Sun Guixiang forced a smile and tugged at her sleeve.

“How can I pull you up? My ability is only this much.”

“If you teach me how to make sour plum drink and oden, that would be taking care of me. Sister Sun has treated you well usually. Just give me some face. You’re so pretty—I can’t steal your business. Look at my tea business; it’s not as good as yours, right?”

There was a sour flavor in these words.

During this period Sun Guixiang had also sold tea, but her stall was against the wall. Ordinary people rarely specifically walked over to that side and would not even notice that corner. She was reluctant to put enough tea leaves when brewing tea and reluctant to put beans and sesame when making ginger-salt tea, resulting in few returning customers.

Although Ye Wanqing’s stall was closest to the restroom, it was still several meters away with no odor at all, and it was the most eye-catching among the row of stalls. As long as someone entered or left the waiting hall and looked this way, the first thing they saw would definitely be her stall.

Added to that she was bright and pretty and dressed cleanly and neatly, ordinary people choosing by appearance would choose her stall. Sun Guixiang truly had not gained much advantage and had even been confronted by Liu Lizhen once.

Stealing someone’s business and then complaining about it?

Ye Wanqing raised her eyelids. “Sister Sun, you’re joking.”

“I’m serious.”

“Then it’s even more ridiculous.” Ye Wanqing said directly, “When you sold tea you still knew to ask whether I minded. Now you’re directly asking me to teach you how to make sour plum drink and oden. That’s not very good, is it?”

“Haha……” Sun Guixiang forced a dry laugh. “If you teach me these two things, how about I keep a secret for you?”

Ye Wanqing: “What do I have that needs keeping secret?”

Just as she spoke, Ge Yuan’s tall figure appeared at the entrance of the waiting hall. Seeing that someone was still talking with Ye Wanqing, his footsteps paused, as if hesitating whether to walk over.

Sun Guixiang glanced at Ge Yuan and lowered her voice. “Your boyfriend’s reputation in the county town isn’t good. If your family finds out you’re dating him, they’ll probably die of anger.”

Ye Wanqing’s eyes turned cold, a half-smile on her face. “There’s truly no need for you to worry about this. If you want to talk, go ahead and tell my family.”

She truly had not expected Sun Guixiang to be so thick-skinned and shameless.

Sorry, she ate neither soft nor hard!

Her face cooled. Ye Wanqing waved at Ge Yuan. The two of them familiarly carried away the things used for the stall, neither of them looking again at Sun Guixiang whose face had turned red then white.

Sun Guixiang was so angry she spat toward the ground and cursed in a low voice, “What’s there to be proud of? Isn’t it just relying on a face? With such a vicious heart, you won’t have a good end in the future. I’ll wait for the day you kneel and beg people.”

“What did that person say to you just now?” Ge Yuan asked.

“What else could she say? Just inquiring about how much I earned these past few days. Gossiping.”

“Nothing else?”

“No……” Ye Wanqing shook her head and changed the subject. “By the way, I asked you to find someone for me. Did you find them?”

She could let Ge Yuan boil the sour plum drink in the evenings—that only required preparing the ingredients and watching the fire for one or two hours. But oden required preparing many ingredients. She did not have that much time, and Ge Yuan could not handle these things either, so she had thought of having him find someone to do the work.

Ge Yuan nodded. “Found them.”

“Someone near your place?”

“Mm…… You also know her—Fatty Wang’s mother. Originally I wanted to find another family, but Fatty Wang’s mother said their courtyard gate fell apart and needs repairing. She insisted I give her a chance and planted herself at my house refusing to leave.”

Speaking of this, Ge Yuan rubbed his nose, looking a bit depressed.

Clearly this situation had not been within his expectations. He was perhaps still wondering why his fierce face was no longer useful.

People die for wealth ah!

Ye Wanqing could not help laughing. “We’ll go back and take a look first.”

When they returned to Ge Yuan’s small courtyard and looked, Fatty Wang’s mother had directly set up shop in the courtyard. One hand pressed a white radish while the other held a knife, chopping at high speed. Several basins were already placed on the ground, clear water soaking the cut potato slices, lettuce slices, and various other ingredients.

“Little sister, does this look okay?” The moment Fatty Wang’s mother saw Ye Wanqing enter the courtyard she came over holding the kitchen knife.

Ge Yuan hurriedly blocked in front of Ye Wanqing.

Fatty Wang’s mother: “……I’m not going to kill anyone. That’s against the law.” Yet she was waving the kitchen knife and had not the slightest bit of persuasiveness.

Ge Yuan did not move an inch.

Ye Wanqing circled around Ge Yuan’s tall body and, holding back laughter, went to look at the vegetables Fatty Wang’s mother had cut. Piece after piece was cut to even thickness, looking quite good—she had put in effort.

“Pretty good.” She smiled and nodded. “I’ll trouble you from now on.”

“No trouble. From now on leave it to me. The wages Little Yuan is giving are high!” Thinking that the family would have one more source of income from now on, Fatty Wang’s mother got excited and waved the kitchen knife again, looking even more terrifying.

Ge Yuan: “……”

He had become “Little Yuan”!

Human nature ah—truly complicated.

With Fatty Wang’s mother preparing the oden ingredients, Ye Wanqing saved quite a bit of trouble. After discussing with Fatty Wang’s mother the various ingredients needed every day from now on, she entered the kitchen to start making dinner.

Ge Yue came over hugging her small water bucket, tugged at the hem of Ye Wanqing’s clothes, and asked in a soft voice, “Beautiful Sister-in-law, is Fatty Wang’s mother going to come to our house every day from now on?”

“You don’t like her?” Ye Wanqing inquired.

Ge Yue shook her head, her gaze confused. “Today she told Fatty Wang to play with me.”

Ye Wanqing’s heart ached. She realized she had overlooked a very important issue and quickly squatted down to ask her, “Then do you like playing with Fatty Wang and them?”

“I don’t like……” Ge Yue blurted out, then a bit dejectedly lowered her head and spoke her true feelings. “None of them like me. They don’t want to play with me. Even when I give them marbles and building blocks to play with, they still don’t like me. After playing they push me and bully me.”

Most likely, Fatty Wang’s mother telling Fatty Wang to play with her was also the first time in history.

Ye Wanqing looked at Ge Yue’s small water bucket filled with her toys.

Her heart felt sour and astringent.

What other troubles could a child have? Nothing more than little companions not liking her, as if everyone hated her……

Ge Yuan was careless and could not consider so much—he only made sure Ge Yue had no worries about food and clothing. But Ge Yue was very lonely. She wanted friends, which was why she often wandered around hugging the small water bucket filled with “treasures.”

She had many toys. The surrounding children, even if only for the sake of playing with the toys, would play with her for a while. She could always obtain some rare closeness.

Ye Wanqing rubbed Ge Yue’s little head. “Does Little Moon like pastries? After I finish cooking later I’ll make some sour jujube cakes for you. You can take them to share with the little friends you like who don’t bully you. Those who bully you—you don’t give them any. Make them drool to death, okay?”

“Okay!” Ge Yue’s eyes suddenly lit up. She nodded hard, then asked a bit embarrassedly, “Is Little Moon me?”

“Mm. From now on I’ll call you that, okay? You’re so cute and pretty, and your name is Little Yue—just like the moon in the sky.”

“Okay!”

Ge Yue pressed her lips together and smiled shyly, then ran outward hugging her small water bucket. Very quickly Ye Wanqing heard her boasting to Ge Yuan: “I’m Little Moon, did you know? I’m beautiful!”

Ye Wanqing could not help laughing out loud.

She could not help thinking that Ge Yue, who in her previous life had been withdrawn, cold, and never married her whole life, should live a bit more easily and happily in this life, right? The little one was so cute and deserved better everything.

When she returned home it was Liu Lizhen who opened the door.

After Ye Wanqing washed up and returned to the room, she discovered Ye Mingzhu was not there again. She took out the small wooden box from her satchel and planned to sort out the accounts.

Every time she purchased materials or sold things she recorded it in the accounts. Even if sometimes there were too many customers and she did not have time, her memory was good and she would fill it in afterward. So matching against the account book, she could know the situation of these past few days.

The raw materials for sour plum drink were not too expensive. Several large packages of black dates, hawthorn, and other ingredients only cost five yuan, and it was still enough for her to boil several times, so she had not set the price too high either.

At this time the economy was just starting to prosper, and people’s purchasing power also had to be considered. Sour plum drink at two jiao per cup—one large wine bottle could pour out dozens to a hundred cups—and the profit was not small either.

In total five days, the sour plum drink had earned her 86 yuan. Subtracting the cost of 5 yuan, net profit 81.

Clear tea and ginger-salt tea moved in volume and together earned 180 yuan.

What surprised her most was that the low-cost and convenient-to-make oden earned even more than the sour plum drink. Although one skewer of vegetarian oden was only two fen and the meat one was one jiao, the cost…… well, the ingredients were all prepared by Ge Yuan. She took them pure for free.

Oden tasted good and could fill the stomach, so the volume moved was very large. In five days it earned 321. She just did not know how much the cost price was. Ye Wanqing decided she had to talk with Ge Yuan—she could not keep taking for free forever.

When she had not carefully calculated, she thought she had only earned a little over three hundred these past few days. After this calculation she realized it was far more. Adding the earlier earnings, she actually had over a thousand yuan in her hands in total!

Ye Wanqing’s mood was quite good. She thought about buying some things for Ge Yuan and Ge Yue. He would not accept money, but he could not refuse gifts, right? If he refused, just watch how she would punish him!

She was smilingly calculating what gifts to buy for the Ge siblings when the door was suddenly “dong dong dong” knocked on.

At this hour—was it Liu Lizhen?

After organizing the money and stuffing the wooden box under the pillow, Ye Wanqing walked over and opened the door.