Li Minghua squatted outside his sister's room, his ear pressed against the door panel, and his red nose, which was frozen, left an unknown mark on the peeling paint door panel.

The bed creaked in the room, and he rubbed his hands together anxiously, like a cat waiting to catch a mouse. He rubbed his hands together so anxiously that the black mud between his fingernails was rubbed out for two miles.

"Li, Mom made you a bowl of malted milk." Li Guifang held up an enamel pot with the words "Advanced Producer" printed on it, smiling so brightly that the wrinkles at the corners of her eyes could kill mosquitoes. "Drink something hot, you'll sleep better!"

Li Mingli looked up and saw Li Guifang holding a bowl of malted milk and coming towards her with a smile like an old chrysanthemum. The hairs on the back of her neck stood up.

"Mom, it's the middle of the night..." She shrank back, "Why aren't you asleep yet?"

Li Guifang's smile froze for a moment, then brightened even more: "Oh, you kid, I'm worried about you staying up late to review!"

She handed the bowl forward and said, "Drink it while it's hot. Mom specially added two tablespoons of it. It's very sweet!"

"What's so special?" Li Mingli stared at the bowl warily. "Wouldn't it be cloying to add so much sugar?"

Li Guifang's mouth twitched: "You girl, others want to eat something sweet, but they don't have it yet, and you are disgusted with it?"

Li Mingli was impressed by her mother's imagination, but looking at Li Guifang's eager eyes, she had to pinch her nose and gulp it down. The sweetness made her throat choke.

Seeing Li Guifang still standing there, she said, "Thank you, Mom. I'm done drinking. Can you go to bed early?"

Li Guifang rubbed her hands and put on a smile, "Li, how are your studies going recently? You've been taking math tutoring for so long, is it effective? Mom heard that the math test for the college entrance examination this year was hellish, so don't put too much pressure on yourself..." As she spoke, her eyes were still glancing around!

Li Mingli (watching Li Guifang beating around the bush, she asked herself, "Mom, just tell me what you want to ask. Don't beat around the bush. Your eyes are spinning around like a spinning top, it's making me shudder!")

Li Guifang was choked and stared blankly. Why didn't this girl play by the rules? "Mom is just concerned about your studies..."

Then, she suddenly lowered her voice and said, "Well... Mom knows that at your age, it's normal to have someone you like..."

Hearing this, Li Mingli looked up suddenly, her face flushed, "Mom! What are you talking about!"

"Don't be impatient! I'm not criticizing you. When I was young, I was also..."

Li Mingli quickly interrupted Li Guifang's rambling, "Stop, stop, stop! I've heard everything you and Dad have said eight hundred times! You're just saying that studying is the most important thing in the third year of high school! I know!"

Li Guifang was choked. If she ignored the red tip of Li Mingli's ear, she really couldn't see her signs! But now that she had said this, she had to ask again. Not knowing who the other person was, she couldn't help but feel itchy! Before Li Guifang could ask, Li Mingli opened her mouth and started talking!

"He was my junior high class monitor! He was Xu Minxing, the one who got into a key high school in Shanghai through the city's special recruitment! He just got back yesterday! We were just in the bookstore discussing a big electromagnetics problem! We really just went to the bookstore! We didn't even dare to share the marshmallows he brought!!"

"Specially recruited student?" Li Guifang suddenly remembered something. "Wait, isn't that the one who won the National Physics Competition two years ago and was specially recruited to Shanghai? He even had several tables set up at his house."

As she spoke, Li Guifang's eyes suddenly lit up - isn't this a ready-made rich son-in-law!

Li Mingli was surprised. It had been several years. "Mom, do you still remember? It was him. He came to school last year for the exchange..."

"Are you guys dating?" Li Guifang was delighted but pretended to be calm on the surface.

"Don't worry! I promise it won't affect my studies! We will definitely not have any casual relationships!"

Li Guifang wiped the saliva from her face and thought that this girl spoke faster than a machine gun, like a string of cannonballs, and her old bones almost couldn't catch it.

She cleared her throat and asked, "So...how do you usually keep in touch?"

Just one letter a month..." As he said this, he was about to turn over the letter to show Li Guifang!

Li Guifang quickly waved her hand, "Alright, alright, I'm just asking." She stood up and straightened her clothes. "Go to bed early and don't stay up too late."

As soon as I walked out of the room, I saw **Li Minghua** squatting at the door, shivering like a quail from the cold.

He grabbed Li Guifang's sleeve and said, "Mom! What did you say? What did you say?"

He had just eavesdropped, but unfortunately the two of them were talking so slowly and quietly that he couldn't hear anything!

Li Guifang glared at him and said, "Are you dazzled? Your sister went to a classmate's house with Liu Xiaohua today. How could they go to a bookstore?"

Li Minghua was so anxious that he was jumping up and down: "Impossible! I saw it with my own eyes..."

"Shh!" Li Guifang covered his mouth with her hand and lowered her voice: "Stop talking nonsense here! Who knows whose girl you saw! The girl's reputation is important. If you dare to talk nonsense everywhere..." As she spoke, she twisted her ear!

Li Minghua was yelling, "Ah, Ah, Yaya," and kept saying, "But I clearly saw..."

"You saw shit!" Li Guifang said, increasing her intensity. "If you keep talking nonsense, I'll break your legs! Go to bed!"

Li Minghua covered his ears and limped towards his room, muttering to himself, "This is weird, I clearly saw it..."

Li Guifang stood in the corridor, looking at her son's back as he walked into the house, a smile quietly rising from the corner of her mouth.

She turned around, glanced at Mingli's closed door, and tiptoed into her room.

Li Guifang quietly closed the door, the smile on her lips no longer concealed. She sat on the edge of the bed, her fingers unconsciously stroking the red peony on the quilt, her thoughts drifting back to her past life.

This chapter is not over yet, please click on the next page to continue reading!