“So, they reunited?”
That evening, after coming back from the drinking gathering, Zhou Haoting didn’t go straight home. Instead, he made a detour to see Tian Tian. After all, they hadn’t seen each other all day.
The moment they met, Tian Tian told him about Xiao Ming coming to see Granny Cui today.
“I didn’t expect him to move so fast!”
Tian Tian mixed Zhou Haoting a glass of honey water. “Yeah, I thought he wouldn’t care. Honey water, help with the alcohol.”
“I didn’t drink much.” Zhou Haoting smiled and took it, downing it in one gulp. He smacked his lips at the taste, thinking it was really sweet.
Tian Tian said, “So how did things go today?”
Zhou Haoting pulled her over to sit beside him, then said, “Everything went smoothly. But in a couple days I have to go to a business banquet. The host is said to be a rich man who came back from America.”
Tian Tian nodded. She’d never been to a business banquet. Mainly because her business was at a relatively low level. That kind of lavish dinner from Hong Kong movies—she’d really never been to one. But if she actually went, she probably wouldn’t be used to it either.
Zhou Haoting didn’t notice what Tian Tian was thinking. Business was smooth, and having had a couple of drinks, he relaxed and became talkative.
“By the way, when the invitation to the banquet arrives, want to come along?”
“Hm?” Tian Tian tilted her head and looked at Zhou Haoting. “You can bring people?”
Zhou Haoting said, “Probably. It’s not a serious business negotiation. Just a rich outsider wanting to show his face in front of us locals.”
Tian Tian heard the dismissiveness in Zhou Haoting’s tone and burst out laughing.
Just now, the banquet in her mind should have been clinking glasses, bright lights, and revelry. But from Zhou Haoting’s mouth, it sounded about the same as going to a food stall at the village entrance.
But then again, Zhou Haoting had his own connections and capital. He probably didn’t have much of a filter for that kind of occasion.
Thinking of this, Tian Tian smiled sweetly. “Alright. If you can bring people, count me in. Let me broaden my horizons.”
Zhou Haoting tapped her. “Haha, this isn’t much to broaden your horizons with. Let me tell you…”
Zhou Haoting then talked about the various banquets his uncle had taken him to after he turned eighteen. Some high-end, some ordinary—all pretty much the same in the end.
Tian Tian leaned against him, listening to his boyhood stories, and felt the moon tonight was really beautiful.
—
The next day, Tian Tian woke up to the sound of a man’s voice downstairs.
She looked down—good heavens. It was Xiao Ming again. Yesterday he’d come to see Granny Cui and stayed a whole day before leaving. She hadn’t expected him to come so early again today. This time he was carrying a big plastic bag.
Seeing Tian Tian, he called out loudly, “Bought breakfast. Want some?”
Tian Tian thought, yesterday I let you mooch a breakfast off me. Now’s the perfect time to eat it back.
“Coming right down.”
So when Zhou Haoting arrived with the breakfast he’d bought, he saw Tian Tian already eating. He glanced at Xiao Ming sitting at the table eating breakfast, who, under Granny Cui’s enthusiastic urging, kept stuffing meat buns into his mouth.
“You’re here, come sit. This place’s dim sum is really good.”
Tian Tian enthusiastically invited Zhou Haoting to sit and eat together. After all, the breakfast Xiao Ming had packed really was delicious.
Zhou Haoting smiled and sat down, casually picking up a shrimp dumpling from Tian Tian’s plate and eating it.
“Hey, that hungry? This one’s good too.” Seeing Zhou Haoting so eager, Tian Tian quickly used her chopsticks to pick him a shumai. While picking, she said, “If you’re hungry, eat first. Must be from drinking too much last night, that’s why you’re so hungry today. What breakfast did you buy? Oh, wet-fried beef ho fun! How did you know I wanted this?”
As she spoke, Tian Tian cheerfully pushed her chopsticks and the dim sum she’d picked into Zhou Haoting’s hands. She herself opened the takeout box and started eating the wet-fried beef ho fun.
Seeing her like this, the little bit of jealousy in Zhou Haoting’s heart instantly dissipated. Out of the corner of his eye, he caught Xiao Ming’s teasing look and shrugged unconcernedly. He lowered his head and seriously watched Tian Tian eat, her satisfied expression making Zhou Haoting’s appetite surge. He alone ate nearly half the dim sum Xiao Ming had brought. It made Xiao Ming’s mouth twitch. He secretly gave Zhou Haoting a thumbs-up.
Tian Tian didn’t know the two men were playing charades. She just happily finished what she loved, then waved and headed off to Ye Lifeng’s garment factory.
Left behind, Zhou Haoting wanted to see her off. But Tian Tian told him to go to the factory early for work.
Seeing this, Xiao Ming finally laughed out loud.
Zhou Haoting shot him a glance. Xiao Ming finally said, “I didn’t expect you to be this kind of Zhou Haoting.”
“What kind I am has nothing to do with you.”
Xiao Ming said, “Oh my, how can it have nothing to do with me? We’re business partners, after all.”
Zhou Haoting always felt there was a hidden meaning in his words. But he really was in a hurry to get to work. The factory had a lot of orders lately. If not for needing to work the Canton Fair connections, he wouldn’t have gone to the dinner and drinking gatherings yesterday at all.
Xiao Ming watched Zhou Haoting’s departing back and shrugged, thinking, kid, you’ll know soon enough. Then he turned and urged, “Granny, when are you moving in with me?”
Granny Cui had wanted to sell the house before to get money to go to Hong Kong to find her son. But now that she knew her son was gone, and she had a grandson, she suddenly didn’t want to sell the house anymore.
Seeing Granny Cui stay silent, Xiao Ming knew it would probably be very hard to get her to move in with him.
Fortunately, this place wasn’t far from where he worked. Worst case, he’d move here later and live together, so he could be a filial grandson. He just didn’t know if that vinegar keg Zhou Haoting would mind! The little moves the guy had made earlier were exactly like someone who’d drunk aged vinegar.
Heh, he, Xiao Ming, did admire women like Tian Tian. But he wasn’t so lacking in class as to poach someone’s girlfriend. Especially when the other party was his godfather’s son.
Zhou Haoting still didn’t know he had this kind of connection with Xiao Ming.
Anyway, he’d been busy all day. The next day was the same. But the day after, he received the formal invitation to the banquet. It was for Saturday evening two days later, at the Overseas Chinese Hotel downtown.
For this banquet, Tian Tian urgently dragged Zhou Haoting to buy an outfit together. Mainly because she wanted to experience what a banquet felt like. Making clothes herself was too late, but Tian Tian noted this down. She figured in the future she’d make herself some nice little dresses to fill her wardrobe.
Soon it was the day of the banquet. Tian Tian and Zhou Haoting arrived half an hour early. There were many attendees—people from the mainland, Hong Kong, Macau, Taiwan, and some overseas countries.
All in all, it really looked a bit like the scenes in Hong Kong movies.
Tian Tian was dazzled and felt she’d broadened her horizons. There were quite a few women at the banquet. Some were clearly boss-level, and some were clearly family members. Tian Tian got to know quite a few people following Zhou Haoting.
Until the host took the stage, Tian Tian’s satisfaction with attending this banquet was very high.
But when she saw the banquet host that the emcee introduced appear on stage, Tian Tian felt she might be seeing things.
She rubbed her eyes, looked at Zhou Haoting, then looked at the stage. She thought, it can’t be that melodramatic, right!
Turned out Zhou Haoting’s expression was equally serious.
And two people had appeared on stage.
One was Xiao Ming, who had been showing up at Granny Cui’s house on time every day for the past few days.
The other was a middle-aged man in his forties leaning on a cane. His hair was a bit white, but he looked refined. But none of that was the point. The point was that this person looked exactly like a headshot Zhou Haoting had shown her.
And the person in that photo was Zhou Haoting’s biological father, Zhou Wentang.
“This…”
The two appearing on stage at the same time, especially with Xiao Ming’s current position and background, immediately gave Tian Tian a rough idea of what Zhou Haoting’s father had been through all these years.
But this result was just too dramatic. Even TV dramas wouldn’t dare write it this way!
And the two on stage were now staring at Tian Tian and Zhou Haoting below the stage. After looking for several moments, the middle-aged man with the cane, Zhou Wentang, finally walked to the microphone and began his speech.
It was this movement that let Tian Tian see that one of his legs was a prosthetic.
Just from this, Tian Tian could estimate how dangerous the man’s situation had been back then.
After all, she’d learned from Zhou Haoting’s mother that Zhou Haoting’s father had been a handsome man with sound limbs.
And now the person on stage was missing a leg. Needless to say, it had to be related to the grudges from back then.
What Tian Tian could figure out, Zhou Haoting naturally could too.
She looked at him worriedly. But Zhou Haoting’s expression was very serious now, completely unreadable. But Tian Tian, who knew him well, could still see the confusion, surprise, anger, and other complex emotions in the depths of his eyes.
Until a round of applause sounded in her ears, Zhou Haoting hadn’t moved.
Leave a Reply