steamed stuffed bun

The iron door was finally closed by Shao Linyin.

He is not a saint or a great bodhisattva. If he is a bodhisattva, he is just a clay bodhisattva.

He was only eighteen years old, an age that knew nothing, and he had saved so little money after several years. He also wanted to improve his academic qualifications. Even if he was just waiting to die in a daze, he had to find something to do.

Studying is fine, but taking care of children? Isn't that a waste of time?

What's more, this child's identity and background are unclear, and he might get himself into trouble.

He is a person who fears trouble, otherwise he would not be hiding in this urban village like he is now.

I comforted myself in this way, but I still tossed and turned in bed until three in the morning before I fell asleep.

When I was woken up by the alarm clock, I was completely dazed. I washed up, put on my clothes, and went downstairs in a daze.

There are a lot of things to do on the construction site today. The master took over the elevator installation project five days ago. The agreed delivery date was fifteen days, but now it is almost over. The company notified the owner that they need to use the elevator urgently, so the delivery date was suddenly brought forward by ten days. The contract has already been signed.

The master got very angry at the company, but in the end he could only take him to the construction site cursing at him.

He is still an apprentice now and can only help out and serve as his master's punching bag part-time.

Because of the deadline, he was almost drowned in his master's scolding every day.

He cursed the company in the morning and the owner in the afternoon, and in between he cursed the manufacturer for making the elevator parts too difficult to install.

As he walked downstairs, he went over the words that had been spoken so that he could prepare himself mentally.

I casually rubbed my frizzy hair and opened the iron door. Suddenly, I felt like I was being stared at, like a thorn in my back...

A little child was squatting by the door, hugging his knees. He didn't say anything, but just stared at him with a pair of pitiful big eyes.

He steadied himself and let go of the iron gate he was still holding.

The iron door locked with a "click". He pretended not to see anything and walked away.

I walked while listening carefully. There was no movement behind me and the child didn't catch up with me. Fortunately, that's good!

When he arrived at the bun stall he frequented most, the owner smiled and said, "Xiao Shao, how about the old three?"

Shao Liyin smiled and took out his phone to scan the code. His finger paused as he was entering the amount. After thinking for a moment, he sighed softly in his heart and said to the boss, "Boss, can you please pack another portion for me?" After a pause, he added, "Please add one more bun to this order."

The boss smiled and took another bag and started packing: "Is this for a colleague?"

Shao Linyin didn't say anything. He smiled, paid the money, picked up the things and walked back.

When they reached the iron gate, the child saw him from afar. There was disbelief in his eyes at first, then full of surprise, and he stood up suddenly.

Shao Liyin handed him a bag with a blank expression: "Take it and eat. Once you're full, we'll leave quickly. I told you that you can go to an orphanage in your situation. You've seen my situation. I can barely support myself. I really can't take you in."

The child took the bag, opened it and took a look. There was a cup of soy milk, a tea egg and two buns.

Without saying anything, he took out a bun.

Shao Linyin was just about to turn around and leave when the child took out a bun and put the rest back into his hand.

Shao Linyin couldn't help but raise her eyebrows. This kid didn't even know how to say thank you, and he started to be picky: "Why, you don't like it?"

The child shook his head and ignored him, squatting by the door again with the bun in his hands.

Shao Liyin also lost her temper and threw the bag back to him: "Eat it or not, if you don't want to eat it, just throw it away!"

He walked away, feeling inexplicably irritated.

He had been dragging his feet getting up in the morning, and because he was delayed by delivering breakfast, he arrived at the construction site late. He was afraid that the master would greet him first instead of the company today.

"You're already thinking about coming to work when the sun is shining! Why don't you wait until after lunch?"

Shao Linyin had just arrived at the construction site and had not yet seen his master when he heard a sound. He looked in the direction of the sound and saw his master sitting shirtless at the bottom of the shaft, filling a large kettle with water.

Smiling, he walked over and handed over the breakfast in his hand: "How could that be! I just remembered that Master always missed the buns from the bun shop next to mine, so I went to buy some for Master. Master, you haven't had breakfast yet, right? Try some."

Master’s breakfast always consists of tea and steamed buns, which are placed in a bag next to him. If he can save some, he will usually save the steamed buns until noon to soak in soup or drink with water.

He thought that his master would not refuse the buns, and would not make things difficult for him if he took the buns.

Sure enough, the master's expression relaxed a little, and he took the bun and started eating.

He also had the foresight to sort out the accessories to be installed today and prepare the tools needed. He just had to wait for the master to finish eating so that he could start working.

Maybe it was because of the buns he ate, the master was in a good mood today and he cursed less throughout the morning.

In just one morning, Shao Linyin felt hungry and a little dizzy from time to time.

He didn't have anything to eat last night, and all the buns were given to his master. Fortunately, his master didn't ask him to do any heavy work, just handing him tools, taking accessories, and helping to carry things.

It was finally noon, and when they got to the noodle shop, they ordered a bowl of oil-splashed noodles. However, no matter how hungry Shao Linyin was, she could only eat half of it as usual.

The master looked at the remaining half bowl and poured it directly into his own bowl as usual: "Why do you eat like a kitten every day? You are not being lazy because you eat so little."

As he spoke, he took out the steamed bun from his plastic bag, broke it into pieces, put it in a bowl, and fed it to his mouth with the sauce.

Shao Linyin looked at his master and somehow thought of the way the child ate last night. He had an astonishingly large appetite, but ate very slowly. It was unclear whether he ate the buns from the morning or threw them away.

The master waved the greasy chopsticks in front of him and asked, "What are you thinking about? Are you really thinking about being lazy?"

Shao Liyin unscrewed a bottle of water and drank slowly: "How could that be possible? When has Master ever seen me slacking off? I was thinking, we only have five days left to finish installing this ladder. Can we really finish it?"

The master picked up the last chopstick of noodles and stuffed it into his mouth. His cheeks were bulging with stuff, and his lips moved greasyly. He chewed it three times and swallowed it. "Even if I can't, I have to do it. I asked for leave yesterday, so I can't leave early today! Work overtime, or you'll have to pay the compensation!"

He wiped the oil off his lips, stood up, paid the bill and headed towards the construction site.

Because they were on a tight deadline, they started working without taking a break at noon and continued until nine o'clock in the evening. They stopped because they knew that further construction would affect the rest of the surrounding residents.

After taking a break, the master drank water from a large teapot. He watched Shao Liyin put away his tools one by one and asked, "Why did you come to the construction site?"

Shao Liyin raised his head and looked at his master in confusion: "Master, I have followed you for two years, why do you think of asking this question?" After thinking for a while, he worried that his master didn't want him anymore. "Master, if there is anything you are not satisfied with, you can tell me, I can learn from it. I may not eat much, but I am really not lazy."

The master rolled his eyes and closed the teapot. "I'm not saying you're bad, it's just that looking at you always reminds me of that kid from my family. He just finished the college entrance exam and is determined to go to Beijing. You're about the same age as him, and you look just like him, weak and effeminate. You don't look like someone who would just hang out at a construction site."

Shao Linyin didn't say much, just gathered up the tools and put the scattered parts back in place. Seeing that nothing was wrong, he stood up and said, "Nothing, I'll go back first."

The master raised his hand, telling him to get out.

The bus wasn't crowded at this time, but there was no one to sit on. As the bus swayed, he almost dozed off while holding onto the handrail.

The bus stopped at the bus stop at the entrance of the village. He dragged his legs, which felt as if they were filled with lead, and walked slowly inside step by step. He passed by the noisy vendors and bought another bowl of fried rice.

When he got to the door and took out the key, he felt a tearing pain in his shoulder. Then he remembered that in the afternoon, he had to move two steel plates weighing nearly 500 kilograms. It would take a lot of time to call a forklift, so the master gritted his teeth and pulled him over to carry them together.

Although most of the damage fell on the master's side, his shoulder was probably also rubbed raw. During the tearing, he didn't notice that the wound was bleeding and it stuck to the clothes on his shoulder.

I didn't feel anything while I was working. I took the bus for nearly an hour and took a break. When I reached out again, the clothes and the wound were torn apart at once, and the fabric rubbed against my shoulder, causing a burning pain.

He took a breath, changed his hand and was about to take out the key again, when he saw a shadow in front of him.

Thinking that it was someone from the same building who had returned, he stepped aside, letting the other person go in first.

After waiting for a long time without any movement, I raised my eyelids and saw a child standing next to me, dragging a big bulging bag behind him.

The child looked at him with a gleam in his eyes and happily opened the bag, which was full of plastic bottles.

"I can make money, I just need a place to live. Without a place to live, the bottles I pick up will always be taken away by others."

Shao Linyin leaned lazily against the wall, perhaps because he was too tired, or perhaps because his shoulder was too painful. He didn't want to talk and just looked at the child in front of him for a long time.

The child seemed determined to go in and looked at him.

Between them, people walked in and out of the building, each one looking at them suspiciously. But their eyes were only on each other.

Finally, he moved, looked in the direction of his trouser pocket, and said, "Why are you standing there? Take the key and open the door. Are you waiting for me to serve you?"