“No, definitely not.” My dad quickly denied Chen YingRan’s guess, “It’s definitely not the mother of one of Ye Lin’s classmates.”
“Then who are you getting remarried to?” Chen YingRan pressed on.
“It’s still… not set yet… no talks yet…” my dad looked to me for help, hoping I could help him say something.
I saw that Xiao Qin, who was sitting to my right, was already very curious and was about to ask “who is Uncle Ye going to marry”, so I felt I could not remain silent any longer.
Even if we were going to tell Xiao Qin the truth, we would have to find a more appropriate setting and not do it in front of so many unrelated people.
I was quick-witted and suddenly thought of a person we could use to deal with the situation for the time being.
“Dad, it doesn’t matter if you tell them.” I tapped my desk and said with an indifferent look, “Isn’t it just Auntie Xiao Juan?”
Xiao Juan was once my father’s student. In my memories, she was a young girl with glasses and braids. After my father was shocked by his divorce, he resigned from the university and fell apart. Xiao Juan would still come every now and then as a student to ask my father advice on life problems, all the way until I was 7 or 8 years old.
Even my neighbor, Auntie Ren, could see that Xiao Juan wanted to have a teacher-student relationship with my dad. Every time Xiao Juan came to our house, she would desperately give me candy to up her reputation. I always regarded her as my biggest source of snacks and I still remember it to this day.
Unfortunately, my dad has always thought that Xiao Juan liked him because she was still immature. He neither supported a romance between teacher and student, nor was he able to struggle out of the predicament of losing Ai ShuQiao. He was afraid of wasting her time, so he deliberately put up an attitude with Xiao Juan. Finally, he went overboard once and she ran away crying and never came back.
Later, by chance, I heard my dad’s college classmate, Uncle He, talk about. It seems that Xiao Juan was sent to Canada by her family for graduate school and we don’t know where she finally decided to stay.
Anyway, there’s a high chance Auntie Xiao Juan is not even in the country. “Xiao Juan” is also just a nickname, not a full name, so I think it’s okay to temporarily use her as an excuse.
“Xiao Juan.” My dad did not react for a while and actually responded in a questioning tone.
“Of course it’s Auntie Xiao Juan.” I made some eye gestures at my dad, “Auntie Xiao Juan liked you when you were a university lecturer, but you chased her away because you were opposed to a student teacher relationship. After so many years, she’s actually been single and waiting for you, so it’s about time to give her a good ending.”
Damn, I’m really good at making things up. I’ve been spending too much time with Dr. Yu these days and I’m almost the king of lies.
Chen YingRan was still swirling the half cup of red wine in her hand, she looked over with suspicious eyes, so my dad could only follow through with my words and say:
“Right… Xiao Juan, she’s a good girl, but ended up single because of me, I couldn’t bear for her to continue to wait, so…”
Winnie finally took a breath after wolfing her food down, then said with a loud sigh: “Wow damn, that’s just robbing the cradle.”
Seeing that her statement drew the attention of everyone at the table, Winnie embarrassingly scratched the back of her head and shrugged it off, “No, I didn’t say anything. Freedom of love, freedom of marriage, age isn’t an issue, and even gender…”
“Does this person really exist?” Chen YingRan expressed doubt that a female student would have been so infatuated.
Auntie Xiao Juan was really infatuated with my dad. I remember that she refused to let me call her “Sis Xiao Juan”, but told me to call her “Auntie Xiao Juan”, which was a premeditated attempt to use me to make her seem like she was a part of my father’s generation, so she could develop a more intimate relationship with my dad.
Although my dad has always maintained the proper etiquette between a teacher and student, and has persuaded Xiao Juan several times to liberate herself and pursue her own happiness, but because of the deep impression left by her in my childhood, Xiao Juan still occupies my the number one spot among the candidates to be my step-mother.
Some people may wonder why I did not include Auntie Ren as one of the candidates to be my step-mother since she was so good to me when I was a child and the Little Tyrant also didn’t dare to bully me in front of Auntie Ren.
Do you even need to ask? After all, Auntie Ren was the Little Tyrant’s mother, if she gets married to my dad, the Little Tyrant would become my sibling. If I was almost bullied to death as neighbors, would I still be able to grow up if we were siblings?
“So, so it’s her…” Xiao Qin covered her mouth in surprise, “I also met sis Xiao Juan when I was a child…”
“It’s Auntie Xiao Juan.” I reminded Xiao Qin, “I call her aunt, but you call her sister, are you trying to pretend to be my senior?”
Xiao Qin naughtily stuck out her tongue at me to express that she was wrong. She then changed her words to Chen YingRan: “Auntie Xiao Juan does indeed exist, but I haven’t heard any news of her for many years, I didn’t expect her to come back… Sis Ying Ran, there’s no doubt, she does like Uncle Ye. I believe that if she and Uncle Ye were together, she will also treat Ye Lin classmate well.”
“Is that so…” Chen YingRan held her half a glass of red wine with a thoughtful look.
The two men present, my dad and Dr. Yu, were obviously more than ten years older than Xiao Qin and were like uncles to her, so they didn’t trigger her androphobia and allowed her to speak freely at the dinner table.
Referring to the lying skills taught by Dr. Yu, I thought I had perfectly created a scenario that was close to the truth. I even made Xiao Qin unconsciously provid me with supporting evidence, so I was feeling pleased with myself and thought I had a high IQ.
But I did not expect that soon Xiao Qin was going to tell her own mother: “Uncle Ye is going to get married to Auntie Xiao Juan, who has been waiting for him for many years.”
My dad would immediately get treated as trash by Auntie Ren. What do you mean “let’s have another child”, or “give the unfortunate baby a second change” and other warm and moving words, it was all a bunch of lies!
I didn’t really think it through and ended up screwing things up for my dad.
But at the dinner table, I hadn’t anticipated it that far and still foolishly thought I was very clever, unaware that in a couple of days my dad would end up out of luck.
“Wait.” Chen YingRan suddenly raised her voice, “I heard that you quit your university job the year Ye Lin was born. If Xiao Juan had been waiting until now, wouldn’t she have waited for a full 14 years.”
“You could say that.” My dad said awkwardly, “I quit when she was 18 years old. She was still in the first year of college, so now she would be 32 years old…”
“It’s true that she is older than me.” A hint of excitement flashed through Chen YingRan’s eyes, “A girl who can wait for you for so long, must be very infatuated, and have a very pure love. A pure love that would make anyone jealous was actually able to come to fruition…”
Like a beautiful snake looking for prey, Chen YingRan’s scarlet tongue swept past the corner of her lips.
What are you thinking about, do you want to NTR Auntie Xiao Juan? Are you jealous because you heard that Auntie Xiao Juan’s love for my dad is too pure, so you want to break them up? Why are you so evil?
I remember when you first assumed the position of school doctor, you laughed at the former school nurse (a clumsy big sister) for only having a diploma. You also cursed and hoped her newly wed husband would cheat on her… why can’t you let others just be happy?
Fortunately, Xiao Juan is not going to marry my dad. If Chen YingRan is not afraid of death and tries to NTR Auntie Ren, then she will have to wait to be beat to death.
“A 32-year-old mature woman.” Hearing that Xiao Juan should now be 32 years old, Dr. Yu, who had been left out for a long time, suddenly opened his mouth with a serious face and asked, “Are her breasts big?”
My dad laughed bitterly in embarrassment and did not answer.
Chen YingRan looked at Dr. Yu like he was a monster. She probably thought that he was sick in the head and should immediately give himself a brain surgery. I mean, he just said he would go to her house on the weekend to propose, but then became interested in another woman’s breasts. It would be strange if he was able to find a partner.
After the odd “brunch” ended, my dad went to ask Dr. Yu about my treatment. Chen YingRan was curious about Xiao Juan’s situation, so the three adults gathered together. Me, Xiao Qin, and Winnie, the three minors, naturally also gathered together.
“Are you guys doing your summer homework together? You’re almost done?”
Winnie was surprised at the efficiency with which Xiao Qin and I completed our summer homework.
I had asked my dad to bring my summer vacation homework that I had left at home if he had time, but I didn’t expect him to bring it today. I could now do it together with Xiao Qin (basically copy the parts that Xiao Qin had already written, what a common scene involving childhood friends).
“No, I have to go home and bring my summer homework.” Winnie was determined, “Last summer, I didn’t finish my homework and was caught by the teacher and scolded in front of the whole class… I must take this opportunity to copy all of the homework this time.”
Wihtout hiding her intent to only copy homework, Winnie ran out of the VIP building, leaving only me and Xiao Qin in the bedroom of room 103 to do our homework.
The reason I chose the bedroom over the more spacious living room was not because I had any malicious intentions for Xiao Qin (who had a cold), but because the bedroom had more sunlight and a wooden table big enough for Xiao Qin to sit on a chair while I sat on the edge of the bed, to do my homework.
I don’t know if it had anything to do with the rain yesterday, but today’s weather was not particularly hot. I slightly opened the window and didn’t turn on the air conditioning. The warm sun shone on both of our shoulders, and it also shone on our homework, coating everything with a layer of gold.
I suddenly noticed the Swiss army knife that was at the corner of the table, which Xiao Qin had returned to me after saving me from the nameless mountain.
When I saw Xiao Qin’s quiet appearance as she carefully wrote her homework, I thought she was even cuter, and at the same time I asked:
“Um, although I’m already 14 years old and don’t like playing with toy robots, but… Bro Optimus Prime, can you also….”