CH 37

Guess.

Again with the guessing!

Cui Qingfeng was definitely possessed by a performer today, continuously saying “guess” with every sentence. As a big adult, he actually didn’t find doing this boring. Xu Zhao ignored him and reached out to gently pat Xu Fan’s small butt, telling Xu Fan to head inside the thatched hut by himself to find Grandma to help him wear his underpants.

Therefore, Xu Fan padded his short legs and ran butt naked into the thatched hut. Xu Zhao stood, and not being polite to the performing Cui Qingfeng, grabbed the two pieces of papers from Cui Qingfeng’s hands. When he saw the word “contract,” his heart immediately became nervous. And when he finally finished reading the two contracts, his nerves had turned into shock and excitement. He looked at Cui Qingfeng and asked, “Are these mooncake orders from the steel factory and cigarette factory?”

“Yes! They’re mooncake orders from the steel and cigarette factories!” Cui Qingfeng finally stopped acting mysterious, excitement clearly shown on his face. “Sister Yun asked me to give this to you. Haha, you’re really too amazing!”

“They all signed and stamped them?” Xu Zhao looked at the contracts again and quietly asked.

“Yep. It’s just waiting for your signature,” Cui Qingfeng replied.

Xu Zhao continued to read the contract out loud, “A total of 9,000 mooncakes…”

“That’s right!”

“With thirty percent of the total as a deposit.”

“Yep.”

After reading the key points, Xu Zhao looked at Cui Qingfeng again, his face full of excitement.

Cui Qingfeng was even more excited than Xu Zhao, and said, “Xu Zhao! It’s true, you don’t have to doubt it! You made a huge profit!”

Yes!

It was going to be a huge profit!

9,000 mooncakes! They would be able to make over a thousand Yuan all at once. Over a thousand Yuan would be enough to not only return the 200 to Cui Qingfeng, but also enough to buy thick clothes, thick quilts, and other things for his family. They’d be able to have a warm and rich winter. Xu Zhao became even more excited, and was very eager to rush to the steel factory to sign the contracts and obtain the deposit.

However, Cui Qingfeng said that Sister Yun had business in the afternoon and wasn’t at the steel factory. Therefore, he decided to head over there tomorrow morning. Seeing the signature and stamp on the contract, Xu Zhao was very excited. Even after Cui Qingfeng rode his bicycle away from South Bay Village, his heart was still beating very quickly. He stood in the courtyard for a full ten minutes before he calmed down. He then turned to head inside Mother and Father Xu’s thatched hut to tell them about the matter of the mooncake.

However, Xu Zhao didn’t tell the two elders about the income from the mooncake, since earning over a thousand dollars at once was quite shocking in this era. Especially to the very frugal Mother Xu, that was an astronomical number. Therefore, he only said that he would be busy with mooncakes in the near future and might not be able to care for the family as much, so he told the elders to take care of their health and whatnot.

Xu Zhao had originally wanted to leave Xu Fan at South Bay Village for Mother Xu to watch so that he boldly and decisively focus on the mooncake business, but sever since Xu Zuocheng and Xu Youcheng came to the county town looking for money, he got rid of that idea.

If the two of them came back to cause trouble with Mother and Father Xu without any reason, Mother and Father Xu might become overwhelmed and not have time to take care of Xu Fan, then what would happen? Regardless of how well Xu Fan spoke, he was still a three year old child. Ultimately, he still didn’t understand anything. Plus, he wasn’t as tall or fat as Xu Erwa. If Xu Erwa and Xu Dawa played a dirty trick and threw Xu Fan into the wilderness and he was kidnapped, then what would he do?

Thinking about it scared him, so Xu Zhao decided to bring Xu Fan with him.

After deciding with Mother and Father Xu, Xu Zhao rode the bicycle and took Xu Fan to the steel factory to find Sister Yun the next day. They didn’t need to run to the cigarette factory again since Sister Yun gave the 30% deposit for both contracts to Xu Zhao. Xu Zhao thanked Sister Yun nonstop, then took the 702 Yuan and without any hesitation, took Xu Fan directly to the county town’s bus station.

As soon as they arrived at the bus station, they saw numerous buses at the station.

Xu Fan’s eyes immediately lit up as he called, “Daddy! Look! It’s the even bigger car!”

“Yes, it’s the even bigger car,” Xu Zhao reluctantly repeated.

“Daddy, I want to ride the even bigger car.” Xu Fan hugged the toy car, his face full of longing.

Xu Zhao looked at Xu Fan with a slight smile and said, “Okay, we can.”

“Can our bicycle also ride it?” As long as it was a vehicle, Xu Fan would be concerned about it.

“Yes.”

“How?” Xu Fan asked.

And so, Xu Zhao paid two pennies and watched the bus driver hang the bicycle at the butt of the bus.

“Wow, the bicycle is sitting in the even bigger bus with us,” Xu Fan happily said.

Xu Zhao reached out to pet Xu Fan’s little head and said, “Yes, the bicycle is riding the even bigger car with us.”

Xu Fan tilted his head and thought for a moment before saying, “Then when it gets off, will we still be able to ride it home?”

Xu Zhao petted Xu Fan’s little meaty face and said, “That’s right. Wow, which family’s Baobao is this? He’s so smart that he even knows this.”

Xu Fan shyly tilted his head against Xu Zhao’s body. “I’m Daddy’s Baobao.”

“…” This kid had such a smooth mouth.

Xu Zhao hugged Xu Fan as they sat on the bus. He originally thought that since Xu Fan had already rode it once, he wouldn’t feel that it was novel anymore, however, once this kid saw any vehicle start driving, he would get super excited. He didn’t forget to drag Da Zhuang down either, saying that Da Zhuang had never ridden in a big car or the even bigger car before, but he’d ridden them a few times already.

Xu Zhao was speechless. As he was thinking about the matters of the mooncakes, the bus suddenly stopped. He wrapped arm around Xu Fan so that Xu Fan wouldn’t fall forward. He was still unsure of the situation when he heard the bus driver say the bus broke down and that they had to get off for a second. And so, everyone got off the bus and sat under the shade of the tree by the road to wait. They had to wait over an hour, and Xu Fan became listless from all the waiting.

After having a good meal in the city, Xu Fan instantly came alive again and followed Xu Zhao to the West Prefecture Food Factory. To be able to gain a 9,000 mooncake order in one shot and to obtain a huge 324 Yuan deposit, Xu Jianguo started to view Xu Zhao in a new light. He never thought that Xu Zhao would be so capable for being so young. Moreover, he obtained orders from the steel and cigarette factories. He was truly extraordinary.

Xu Jianguo immediately treated Xu Zhao more courteously than last time. His words and manners showed the admiration he held for Xu Zhao.

After the contract was complete, Xu Zhao brought up the request of having a trial sale for the mooncake.

“Trial sale? How many pieces do you want?” Xu Jianguo curiously asked.

Xu Zhao thought for a second, then said, “One thousand.”

“When?”

“Tomorrow.”

One thousand pieces—by tomorrow—

Xu Jianguo thought for a moment, then said with embarrassment, “We may not be able to make 1,000 pieces.”

“Why not?” Xu Zhao asked back.

“Mooncake is actually just one production line of our food factory. Under normal circumstances, we normally won’t start full production of mooncakes until next week. And when that happens, the employees of the other production lines would also come to help, so producing 9,000 mooncakes in a day wouldn’t even be a problem,” Xu Jianguo said honestly.

“However, the production of mooncakes only just started, so there’s only two workers for this production line. Moreover, these two workers aren’t very experienced, and one person can only produce 100 catties of mooncakes a day at most, which would be 500 pieces. However, it’s already late. There isn’t enough time to produce, much less mend any flaws the process may have. There’s definitely no way to make 1,000 pieces by tomorrow.”

Xu Zhao settled for the second best and asked, “500? what about 500?”

Xu Jianguo looked down and calculated, then said, “Yes, but you’ll have to wait until tomorrow afternoon. We will definitely have 500 pieces tomorrow afternoon.”

Xu Zhao breathed a sigh of relief and said, “Okay. I’ll come back tomorrow afternoon to pick up the 500 pieces.”

“Okay.”

After saying goodbye to Xu Jianguo, Xu Zhao took Xu Fan out of the West Prefecture Food Factory district and rode the bicycle to the bus station yet again. He stopped the bicycle to the side, and the father and sun sat under the shade of the tree. They waited for the bus while doodling on the ground with a branch.

“Daddy, what are you drawing?” Xu Fan crouched down beside Xu Zhao and asked.

Xu Fan casually said, “I’m drawing Xu Fan.” In fact, he wasn’t. It was just a stick figure of a baby’s face.

Unexpectedly, Xu Fan immediately cheered. “Wow, it looks so good.”

“…” How could he be so narcissistic!

They continued to wait as they drew, and after waiting for about 30 minutes, the bus still hadn’t arrived. Xu Zhao suspected that there weren’t any more buses, but it was clear that there was still another bus scheduled for the day. Xu Zhao couldn’t hold back anymore and went to find the bus driver to ask. After asking, he found out that there was a bus today, the one he had ridden this afternoon, that had broken down again. They had just sent it for maintenance, but they didn’t know when it would come back. Therefore, the last scheduled bus was canceled.

In other words, Xu Zhao and Xu Fan had no way of getting home.

Xu Zhao lowered his head to look at Xu Fan.

Xu Fan raised his small face to look at Xu Zhao and anxiously asked, “Daddy, why isn’t the even bigger car here yet?”

Xu Zhao squatted down and looked eye to eye with Xu Fan as he said, “The even bigger car isn’t coming today.”

“Why not?” Xu Fan asked.

“Because it’s broken.”

“Broken,” Xu Fan repeated, his small face endearingly silly looking. He thought for a moment, but couldn’t think of anything. His watery eyes landed on Xu Zhao’s body again as he asked, “Daddy, what should we do?”

Xu Zhao smiled and asked, “Yes, what should we do? We can’t return home now. Are you scared?”

Xu Fan immediately replied, “I’m not scared.”

“Why aren’t you scared?”

“Because Daddy is here.”

Because Daddy is here—

What a heartwarming sentence.

Xu Zhao’s heart instantly lightened. He patted Xu Fan’s small meaty face and said, “Daddy made money today, so I’ll take you to stay at a hotel and eat good food.”

Stay at a hotel! Get good food!” Xu Fan happily repeated Xu Zhao’s words. He clearly didn’t know the current situation, but he was happy as long as he was with Daddy.

In fact, Xu Zhao didn’t know if there were any available hotels now or if West Prefecture City even had any hotels.

However, there definitely will be a place to stay. Before finding a place, he needed to notify Mother and Father Xu first or else the two elders would worry about him and Xu Fan coming home late. However, the phone at Uncle Zhang’s home was only installed recently. After borrowing the phone, he only focused on helping Uncle Zhang read and write the letter and forgot to note down Uncle Zhang’s phone number. Therefore, he had no way of directly contacting Mother Xu. It appeared he could only look for Cui Qingfeng.

And so, he rode the bicycle and brought Xu Fan to leave the bus station. He found a shop nearby and spent ten cents to use the shop’s public telephone to call the Cui residence. After ringing four or five times, there still wasn’t an answer. Perhaps the Cui family wasn’t at home right now? When Xu Zhao thought that no one would answer and as he was just about to hang up to call again later, a man’s voice came from the other side. “Hello?”

“Youngest uncle,” Xu Zhao called out.

Cui Dingchen’s voice was as deep as ever as he asked the other side, “Xu Zhao?”