Chapter 128: Should I Push Him Away?
Translator: Fan Translation Studio
Despite Li Hongmei making this promise to Xiao Baoshan, still, Xiao Baoshan was her son and Ye Xiaoxian was her daughter-in-law. While talking to her son she could say anything and criticize him as much as she pleased, but she had to be polite when she spoke with her daughter-in-law.
Also, Li Hongmei did not find the chance to talk with Ye Xiaoxian until Xiao Baoshan left for the dock.
“Little Ye, you and Baoshan…are you getting along pretty well recently?” Li Hongmei asked tentatively.
Ye Xiaoxian suddenly paused and then said, “We’ve been alright, as usual.”
“As usual? But you already live together, don’t you?” asked Li Hongmei.
“We’re a couple and supposed to live together,” Li Hongmei replied while cutting vegetables.
“Ah, if you could have a son, it would be perfect,” Li Hongmei giggled again. “In that case, I can have a grandson to take care of, right? What do you think?”
Talking about having a grandson, Ye Xiaoxian was not sure if she could really get pregnant by the way they did it last time. That night in the hotel, Xiao Baoshan had really done her good.
If she really got pregnant and was going to give birth to a child, what would happen to the restaurant? Who would cook the food? A pregnant woman was supposed to keep away from grease and smoke, otherwise the fetus in her womb would be affected.
She heard that the most effective time span for using contraception was 72 hours, but now it was already too late for her. So…abortion? That would be too cruel to the baby, wouldn’t it?
“Little Ye, what happened?” asked Li Hongmei. “Why are you in a daze? You don’t want to have a child with Baoshan?”
“Ma, it takes time to have a child. Think about it, if I give birth to a child, who will be in charge of the restaurant? We haven’t saved enough money and the child will suffer when he is born.”
Li Hongmei smiled. “I never heard such an opinion. No matter how many children you give birth to, it’ll just be a matter of adding another pair of chopsticks. A child will grow up in the blink of an eye. In the future you’ll have one more hand helping you to work and to earn more rice, right?”
“…” For the first time, Ye Xiaoxian found the mindsets of ancient people were too different from modern ones.
On second thought, Li Hongmei was not completely wrong. In this era it was not that complicated to have a child. They don’t have to think about school districts, extracurricular classes or intensive courses which were such a pain.
However, she still did not want to give birth to a child too early. She thought that if she was not pregnant this time, that the next time she will have to take measures in advance.
Ye Xiaoxian then felt uneasy and worried for half a month and did not breathe a sigh of relief until her period came again.
…
Business at Ye Xiaoxian’s restaurant was booming. After the new year she hired more hands. Also, she had taught Little Five, Little Six and Xian to be chefs who could replace her temporarily.
However, Little Five, Little Six and Xian only copied her mechanically. They just did what Ye Xiaoxian told them to do. As for the principals of food and taste, they did not understand. That was to say, the dishes they cooked only had the form but not the soul. Still, it was sufficient to deal with the customers in the restaurant.
There were more customers and the restaurant could not accommodate all of them, so Li Hongmei suggested that they add more chairs and tables which, however, was turned down by Ye Xiaoxian.
“Don’t we need to add more tables and chairs?” asked Li Hongmei.
Ye Xiaoxian smiled. “Ma, we don’t need to add more tables. We can add chairs but instead of placing them inside, we can put them outside for customers to sit down while queuing up.”
“Queuing up?” Li Hongmei felt surprised. “We’re a restaurant, not those stalls or stands. If you ask customers to queue up, will they be happy?”
“We have no other choice. There are only so many tables. If they want to eat here they must queue up. Maybe they will have some opinions at he beginning so, Ma, I need you to take very good care of them. After a while, they’ll adapt to the restaurant’s queuing rule, so they’ll behave and queue up.”
After all, Ye Xiaoxian had been working in the modern food industry for many years and certainly knew the tricks of the trade.
As the number of people queuing up began increasing, it made more people find the food in the restaurant delicious. Due to the curiosity of the public, they would be more willing to try the food here.
Ye Xiaoxian made some cards for queuing also. As expected, when these people were asked to queue up at the beginning they would curse sulkily, but later on, when they saw that everyone who was queuing would be provided with free sweet and sour plum soup and popcorn made by Ye Xiaoxian herself, they stopped arguing.
Despite the free plum soup no one would be greedy about it. After all they were here for food. If they were too greedy drinking the plum soup and eating the popcorn, they would not have room in their stomachs for the food.
As time passed by, the diners adapted to the rules of the restaurant and stopped fussing. As for Ye Xiaoxian, she did not cook dishes on her own much. She mainly instructed Little Five, Little Six and Xian to cook and stand to one side to watch.
…
The better Ye Xiaoxian’s business got, the more jealousy it stirred among her peers. There were originally three big restaurants in this town; “Junlai Hotel” which provided both accommodation and an eatery, “Xianglin Hotel” which was almost the same as Junlai and lastly “Jufu Restaurant” whose main business was meals and wine.
The manager of “Junlai Hotel” was named Dai Yuanfei. The manager of “Xianglin Hotel” was a woman called Sister Xiang; Jufu Restaurant was a family business run by the elder manager of the family who was called Lord Lin.
Among the three of them, Sister Xiang felt mad about Ye Xiaoxian the most. Her hotel was on the same street as The Xiaos’ Cuisine. Since Ye Xiaoxian had won the award and put up the winner’s plaque, as well as started using the trick of queuing up for food, the business of “Xianglin” had dwindled.
Luckily The Xiaos’ Cuisine did not have a lodging business but if they did launch one, her hotel business would decline even worse.
Sister Xiang was about thirty years old, chubby and light skinned. Sometimes when she passed by The Xiaos’ Cuisine and saw it was packed with people inside and out, her anger would surge up.
Humph, a bunch of red-necks. They dared to win over her customers!
Sister Xiang knew that she could not let The Xiaos’ Cuisine grow and prosper like this. They must take measures, otherwise her restaurant would become more and more deserted.
Sister Xiang firstly went to find Dai Yuanfei of “Junlai Hotel”.
Dai Yuanfei was an infamous “ham shop” guy in Qinghe, which in the local dialect meant “lecherous”. He loved to fool around with others’ wives as he found married women more appetizing, so he was not interested in a woman unless she was married.
There used to be an accountant in his hotel. Dai Yuanfei thought the wife of the accountant looked rather pretty, so he began to flirt with her. The wife could not resist the seduction and ended up biting the hook.
Later, the accountant found this out and went to argue with Dai Yuanfei but got beaten up by him. Dai Yuanfei also falsely accused the accountant of stealing his money. The man ended up losing his wife and getting a broken leg.
So, the chubby and light-skinned Sister Xiang went to find Dai Yuanfei. Once they met, Dai Yuanfei began to stare at her in a lewd way. In this era they did not treat being fat as a flaw and only looks mattered. Sister Xiang was more or less a looker.
After Sister Xiang exposed her intention, Dai Yuanfei then crossed his legs, looked at Sister Xiang and said, “Oh, this is a piece of cake. No problem, no problem. But let’s have a meal together before we discuss it.”
While they were eating the meal Dai Yuanfei started molesting Sister Xiang and forced her to drink. Sister Xiang drank a couple of drinks and could tell that Dai Yuanfei was up no good.
Sister Xiang could open up a hotel in town which not only depended on her beauty but also her courage in order to make her business successful.
She felt a bit tipsy, then put the cup down on the table loudly and pointed at Dai Yuanfei saying, “I’ve seen enough of men like you! You want to grope me? No way. I’m not so desperate that I should throw myself at a man like you!”
Dai Yuanfei pretended not to understand. “What’s wrong? Aren’t we just drinking normally? Besides, don’t you want to discuss the issue of The Xiaos’ Cuisine? Where has throwing yourself at me come from?
Sister Xiang roared, “You know better than I do!”
After she shouted she left furiously.
Seeing the action of Sister Xiang, Dai Yunfei actually felt surprisingly happily. “This chick is spicy enough!”
…
Sister Xiang left Dai Yuanfei’s place and then went to Jufu Restaurant directly to find Lord Lin.
However, Jufu Restaurant was owned by a big family with great property who did not only have the restaurant but also other businesses. Even if the restaurant closed they could still manage to live well.
Lord Lin also said, “Besides, the business of The Xiaos’ Cuisine and ours do not overlap. Why not? Because we are professionals in dog meat. Diners here are drinking wine and eating dog meat. Does The Xiaos’ Cuisine do dog meat?”
They surely didn’t.
Sister Xiang returned in fury and felt really vexed. None of those men were reliable. Well, she could only rely on herself.
…
That day, Xiao Baoshan came back from the dock again.
Last time he went with a ship to a more remote town. In the ship he found some passengers and inquired about the famous produce of that town or of something delicious there. Others told him that the town produced pomelo. Although it was already after New Year there was still a lot of pomelo being sold.
Xiao Baoshan then went to buy a couple of them, put them in a hemp bag and carried them back for Ye Xiaoxian.
When Ye Xiaoxian saw the pomelo she beamed with happiness.
Xiao Baoshan thought that she loved eating pomelo but did not expect Ye Xiaoxian to peel the skin off the fruit and then ask Xiao Baoshan to take the flesh.
She said, “The skin of the pomelo is a great ingredient for cooking and can also be used to make honey and pomelo tea.”
Ye Xiaoxian did not even thank him before she went to fiddle with her honey and pomelo tea. Ye Xiaoxian had recently bought the honey from a beekeeper. As she found it too sweet she did not drink it.
When she made the tea, Ye Xiaoxian only took it to share it with Li Hongmei and said that they would leave another cup for Xiao Baofeng. As for Xiao Baoshan, he seemed to be forgotten by her.
Xiao Baoshan felt a bit wronged but as a man it would not be appropriate for him to just criticize Ye Xiaoxian.
Finally it was Li Hongmei who took another bowl to Xiao Baoshan and asked him to drink it quickly.
“Baoshan, you went away from home and got thinner again,” Li Hongmei said loudly in order to let Ye Xiaoxian hear it.
Ye Xiaoxian heard it but pretended that she did not.
As Xiao Baoshan was back she had to consider the way they slept at night. They did not see each other for a while and she seemed to be more unfamiliar with him. What was more, her anger towards him had not resolved yet, so she had no interest in him at all.
Xiao Baoshan did not take the bowl of pomelo tea but cracked open the flesh of the fruit considerately, turned them into a shape of a flower and then passed it to Ye Xiaoxian.
Ye Xiaoxian finally said, “Thank you.”
“You’re welcome,” said Xiao Baoshan.
Later, seeing that Ye Xiaoxian did not eat the pomelo, he sighed slightly and then turned around.
He could tell that Ye Xiaoxian really found him annoying now. He was also very stubborn: As you find me annoying I’ll stay away from you if it will make you less annoyed?
Ye Xiaoxian saw Xiao Baoshan go inside the room and not come out again and felt kind of upset.
Ah, actually the past is already the past so why should I sulk by myself? Should I feel happy by pushing him further away?
Seeing Xiao Baoshan go back to his room, Li Hongmei was unable to control herself and went over to Ye Xiaoxian to have a word with her. “Little Ye, listen to Ma, for us women, we really should know when to stop. Finally he has given his whole heart to you but you keep pushing him away again and again. If he doesn’t come back anymore or finds a sweetheart elsewhere, it will be too late for you to cry by then.”