Chapter 17 Unexpected Call

Gu Yunsu's enthusiasm for cooking rose again.

As a local who is good at eating, she thinks she has a lot of talent. What she lacks the most in the skill of "home cooking" is the courage to practice and innovate. Look at the potato shreds she cut this week, aren't they much prettier than the ones she cut last week?

Wu Limei is a staunch supporter of Chinese food. Pizza and burgers are both delicious, but in the final analysis, we Chinese still have to eat stir-fried dishes, the kind that would make foreign fire alarms scrapped.

So Gu Yunsu occasionally looks up Western food recipes online to satisfy her own international tastes, but most of the time she asks Li Jianxiong for advice and learns a few tricks that can only be acquired through experience.

When Li Jianxiong was young, he lived alone and ate very poorly for a while. The nutrition was poor and most importantly, his mouth suffered. So he signed up for a cooking class, hoping to master the basics so that he could feed himself. He became obsessed with it and even got a chef's certificate.

Gu Yunsu came to him for advice, and he was of course very happy. He thought of the recipe last Saturday morning and asked Gu Yunsu to work with him in the kitchen.

Li Jianxiong is not a dull person, otherwise he would not be able to catch up with someone like Wu Limei who has particularly high emotional needs. In fact, Gu Yunsu feels that he is too...how to put it, it's not that he talks too much, nor that he has a sticky personality, it's just...Gu Yunsu, who is a relatively cold person, cares more about the sense of distance and boundaries, and what kind of friendship and behavior patterns cannot cross the line.

But ever since Wu Limei became pregnant, Li Jianxiong seemed to feel very familiar with Gu Yunsu. He would talk about her all the time and give her advice on her career from time to time.

Gu Yunsu: Who are you?

But this is not Li Jianxiong's fault, he is too "lonely". Li Yan lived with his grandmother in his hometown before high school, and he is in the same state after coming back in the past two years. Li Jianxiong wanted to cultivate the relationship between father and son, but he failed repeatedly. In the end, he accepted his fate and gave up. Mentally, he always feels a bit like a single man.

So this is why he was so happy when he found out Wu Limei was pregnant. He has never really been a father. It didn't matter when he was young, but he felt regret when he got older. Now it seems like God has given him a second chance, and he cherishes it very much.

Of course, he would not be able to see his biological child for another six or seven months, so at this stage, he could not help but focus his attention and love on Gu Yunsu. Susu was a girl, and although she was already 28 years old, and although he was only 20 years older than her, girls were always more lovable, especially in comparison with Li Yan. Gu Yunsu, who could talk, laugh and answer, was simply an angel in the eyes of her parents.

Gu Yunsu put on her apron and looked at the small note written by Li Jianxiong: "What dish do you want to cook?"

Li Jianxiong handed the menu over and repeated it, "Boiled fish, beef in sour soup, tofu with crab roe, pork with pineapple, and choy sum with garlic sauce. Is that enough?"

"That's enough." Gu Yunsu waved his hands quickly, "I'm just here to help, right?"

Li Jianxiong: "It's okay if you want to do it."

Gu Yunsu moved his hands even faster: "I can't do it. I can't do it."

Li Jianxiong also put on an apron, and the two of them processed the ingredients first. As long as they didn't open their mouths, they were quite harmonious.

But after a while, Li Jianxiong probably felt it was awkward not to talk, so he asked casually while cutting tofu, "I heard from Meimei that you have a boyfriend?"

Gu Yunsu: …

This is what women are like. Gu Yunsu is gender-biased, mainly against her mother. She hasn't even said it directly, but Wu Limei has already found a boyfriend for her out of thin air. If she tells him everything about her, she thinks Wu Limei can even arrange the name of her grandson.

name……

Speaking of which, Gu Yunsu replied "No", and couldn't help asking: "Have you thought of a name for the child?"

Li Jianxiong's attention was easily diverted. He shook his head and sighed, "I've thought of several, but your mother isn't satisfied with any of them." He looked back at the kitchen door like a guilty thief and complained in a low voice, "She also thinks my surname is too common and she can't think of a good one. Who do you think I have offended by having this surname? This was my surname before you married me. How can I change it?"

Gu Yunsu chuckled to express his sympathy.

Wu Limei was indeed very concerned about these details. When she had just divorced, she also thought about changing her daughter's surname to hers. However, "Wu Yunsu" was not as nice as "Gu Yunsu". The name Gu Yunsu sounded like a smart girl who walked out of the Jiangnan water town, gentle and soft with a classical temperament, like a lady from a noble family - although the real Gu Yunsu was completely different from what she expected to grow up to be.

She told her daughter several times: "It's a good thing that your father left you with this surname." No wonder she disliked Li Jianxiong's surname because it was ordinary.

Gu Yunsu comforted Li Jianxiong: "It depends on the overall situation. Think about it slowly and you will always find the right one."

"That's what I said." Li Jianxiong nodded, glanced at her, and said, "Blanch the tomatoes with hot water before peeling them, so they're easier to peel."

"Is that so?" Gu Yunsu followed suit, washed his hands, and went to boil some hot water.

During this time, Wu Limei walked towards the kitchen and said, "Susu, there's a phone call."

Gu Yunsu responded, put down the work in his hands and picked up the mobile phone on the coffee table.

The phone was facing downwards, and she turned it over to check the incoming call number, but it was blank. Three big characters appeared on the screen: Gu Kangqi - it was her father calling.

She glanced towards the kitchen reflexively and saw the couple laughing at the same time, talking about something.

It was a good Sunday, and the couple was loving and the father and son were filial. Gu Yunsu didn't want to ruin everyone's mood because of such an unexpected call. She wanted to run to the second floor to answer it, but it seemed a bit deliberate. Although she could also make up a story that it was the "boyfriend" who called Wu Limei, she didn't want to take the blame. After hesitating for two seconds, she rushed into the bathroom on the first floor.

"Hello?" She answered the phone.

Then she realized that she could have chosen to die.

This pig brain...

Gu Kangqi seemed to be in a good mood and asked with a smile: "Are you at home?"

Gu Yunsu: “Yeah.”

"fine?"

"Um."

"Where's your mother?"

"She's fine, too."

There was a brief silence on the other end of the phone for two seconds. It wasn't because of anything else. Apart from greetings, they had nothing to say to each other. It had been like this since they were young.

The last time the two contacted each other was when Wu Limei announced her marriage.

In fact, Gu Kangqi has never completely let go of his ex-wife, especially in recent years. He remarried once and divorced again. Now he is over 50, and he is too lazy to do anything else. Especially he is not the type of person who likes to have affairs. All he wants is to live a down-to-earth and honest life. So he thought of Wu Limei's goodness again. In the past two years, he has been unwilling to give it up and always wanted to try again. However, he was always discouraged by Gu Yunsu and dared not take any real action.

After learning that Wu Limei was married, Gu Yunsu met her biological father because he couldn't bear it and wanted him to stop having any hope and be disappointed.

As a result, Gu Kangqi misunderstood that she was helping Li Jianxiong to hide the truth from him. The two quarreled and never contacted each other again.

Now I don’t know what to do.

"What about the job? Have you found one?" Gu Kangqi brought up the topic again.

“No.”

"Still writing novels? Is that okay? If not, you should find a proper job. You are so old, and you still rely on——"

"Is there something wrong?" Gu Yunsu interrupted the other party, and his mood suddenly became irritable. He rolled his eyes in shock at the bathroom mirror.

"Why, I can't call you if nothing happens?" Gu Kangqi was also a little unhappy, "I'm your father."

"I am your father", these four proud and irrefutable words, like a spell or a comprehensive package, once used, make people lay down their weapons, stop their actions and obey your orders.

If "I'm your father" means more rights, does it also mean more responsibilities?

The lyrics say it well: "Big things become small/Small things become nothing/Don't get confused when things happen/It's good to have a dad."

You have to solve everything for me before you dare to use this title to pressure me, right?

"So what?" Gu Yunsu asked bluntly, "You are my father, so what?"

Gu Kangqi's voice suddenly rose eight octaves, and he was very emotional. He asked, "Do you want to piss me off to death? Oh, I understand. With your stepfather here, I don't think you'll even remember that I'm your biological father!"

So... Gu Yunsu has figured it out a little bit. Is it because Gu Kangqi is afraid that his position will be replaced that he comes to his daughter to seek a sense of existence?

Please, Gu Yunsu rolled her big KARS eyes deftly. She didn't feel happy, she just felt ridiculous.

"I still have things to do. If there's nothing else, I'll hang up." Gu Yunsu didn't want to say anything more.

"Hey you!" Gu Kangqi was angry but couldn't say anything. He probably wanted to say something to ease the atmosphere, but he couldn't say it because of his face. Finally, he snorted and said, "Hang up, it's okay."

Then he hung up the phone first.

Gu Yunsu ignored her father's childish behavior, put away her phone and went back to the kitchen.

Wu Limei was still talking to Li Jianxiong with a sweet smile, her hands on each other's shoulders, showing a very natural intimacy.

Gu Yunsu watched from behind, feeling mixed emotions.

Gu Kangqi is an ordinary worker who grew up in an ordinary family. He has no great ambitions in life and just wants to live a good life. To outsiders, he is honest and taciturn, and has no hobbies except drinking a little.

Is he a bad guy?

Of course not.

Although he has the loudest voice when quarreling and doesn't care much about his family, he doesn't cheat, deceive, or do pornography, gambling, or drugs. He is definitely not a bad person.

There was nothing wrong with his marriage to Wu Limei, except that they were not suitable.

The two people have different values ​​and personalities. Gu Kangqi is a male chauvinist and has never been able to sympathize with Wu Limei's emotions. In the more than ten years that the couple has been together, they have quarreled about all kinds of things, so much so that whenever Gu Yunsu recalls his childhood family life, he always feels a buzzing in his ears and a headache.

Gu Yunsu was young at that time and could not join in the conversation. She just felt annoyed and sulked when she heard the conversation. So when the two of them finally divorced, Gu Yunsu was not sad at all. She wanted to take two strings of firecrackers and put them on the street to celebrate and tell everyone that she had finally escaped from this sea of ​​suffering.

Yes, it wasn’t those two people, it was her, Gu Yunsu herself, who finally got rid of this kind of life.

She hated her father at that time, but as she grew up, the hatred faded away.

Sometimes she thought that if Gu Kangqi had found another suitable woman to marry, perhaps this situation that made everyone miserable would not have happened.

The key is suitability. Gu Yunsu later thought that in marriage, this seems to be much more important than love.

Because marriage is not just a relationship or some impulse, it is two people choosing each other to become comrades-in-arms to defeat the little villain called life. They have to live together day and night and fight side by side.

This requires fairness, understanding, tolerance and compromise.

Like Li Jianxiong and Wu Limei, they are a perfect match.

The phone rang, and there was another WeChat message.

She looked down and saw that it was from Gu Kangqi: "I don't mean to argue with you, I just want to ask about you and your mother's situation. How about I go visit you one day?"

Gu Yunsu’s eyes darkened: Don’t make trouble anymore.