It’s early May, the weather isn’t that hot yet, but new summer styles are already being produced.

In late May, new styles were launched. Plaid skirts are popular in the market recently. I ordered a batch of 60 pieces from the factory and they were sold out in one week!

Business was so busy that, apart from the morning and lunch, Qiao Lu could only see her man after five in the afternoon.

Although she had her son by her side, perhaps because of the pregnancy hormones, she, who had always been free-spirited, would often feel lonely. Sometimes, when she lay on the windowsill and looked at the beautiful scenery in the distance, she would think that it would be interesting to chat with Wu Guifang and the others if she were still in the big compound.

Although she was familiar with the neighbors here, people of her age were all at work during the day, so there was no one to accompany her.

well.

This kind of life lasted from after the Spring Festival until June, the seventh and a half month of pregnancy, and Qiao Lu gradually began to feel resentful.

When Xu Haizhou returned home that afternoon, he was cooking in the kitchen. Qiao Lu stood at the door of the kitchen, gesturing at her big belly and asked him sullenly, "Haizhou, look, have I gained a lot of weight recently?"

He took the time out of his busy schedule to glance at her and smiled, "Well, you're definitely fatter than before you got pregnant."

"Then I'm definitely not as pretty as before." Qiao Lu tilted her head and asked.

Xu Haizhou smiled, sprinkled salt skillfully, and scooped the sweet and sour spareribs out of the pot with a spatula in two or three strokes: "What are you talking about? You are beautiful. You used to be a beautiful thin girl, but now you are a beautiful fat girl."

As soon as he finished speaking, Qiao An ran in quickly and raised his little hand: "Dad, I'll take it!"

When Xu Haizhou passed the food over, he heard his young wife say gloomily, "I don't want to be a beautiful fat girl."

Xu Haizhou washed his hands, dried them, held her face, and kissed her unhappy red lips: "You can be anything, I like it anyway."

"Well, the girls who come to our store to buy clothes every day are prettier than the other. Don't you have any other thoughts in your mind?"

Well, Xu Haizhou understood it completely. This was the question his little wife really wanted to ask.

Qiaolu has gained weight for at least two months since she became pregnant. They have lost all their image and don't dress up or put on makeup. They can only wear loose and casual clothes.

Not to mention Xu Haizhou, sometimes when she looked at the simple woman in the mirror, she couldn't help but have wild thoughts.

But what Qiao Lu didn't know was that this kind of mentality was actually caused by hormones.

Even though she really gained more than ten pounds, she was still beautiful. The flesh grew in the right places, and only a hint of "pregnancy" could be seen on her face. The fattest part was her chest, which was growing wildly without any care. If Xu Haizhou accidentally stuck to her chest, he had no doubt that he would be "suffocated to death".

"You're daydreaming again." He turned around, mixed the last dish of smashed cucumber with other ingredients, brought it to the dining table, and then picked up Qiao Lu.

"Are you fat? Why can I pick you up so easily?" He put her on the sofa and massaged her feet skillfully.

"I'm busy all day long, how can I have the time to look at other girls?" He increased his strength in annoyance, and Qiao Lu hummed in comfort.

Glancing at him, Qiao Lu lazily leaned back on the sofa pillow and said, "Let's see what's going on. It won't take any time."

"Well, even if I see it sometimes, I can't do business with my eyes closed, right?"

It is impossible not to look at it. Sometimes, not only can you not look at it, but you have to look at it carefully, give the customer advice! Or help the customer choose clothes to match her. How can you not look at it! It's almost like taking a tape measure to measure someone's height!

She pinched his face unhappily, and found his skin so tight that she was jealous.

"Well, then you have to give me more reports or something. I stay at home all day long, and it seems like I'm out of touch with society." She complained in her tone, and Xu Haizhou understood what was going on as soon as she heard it.

"I haven't been to Baiyun Street for three months. I don't even know what it's like there. How is Li Hongjun and his girlfriend doing? Has Yu Fan gone to see Fang Youwei? How is Li Xiuxiu's family of five? I'm very curious, but I don't know anything."

Xu Haizhou suddenly realized.

After all, he was not careful enough, otherwise why didn't he consider this point.

But to be honest, you can't blame him. He is so busy every day that he always thinks about what delicious food to make for his wife after work. It is inevitable that he ignores her "psychological needs".

It cannot be said that it is unreasonable, it is indeed caused by the stress during pregnancy.

So Xu Haizhou hugged Qiao Lu and told her everything she wanted to know in detail.

From that day on, Xu Haizhou developed the habit of rushing home before five o'clock every day no matter how busy he was, and then reporting the day's schedule to her and sharing with her the interesting things that happened in his business.

Sometimes business was so good that he didn't have time to go home to cook in the evening, so he would take his wife and children out to eat, and invite Li Hongjun and the others along. It would be more lively with more people, so Qiao Lu wouldn't feel lonely.

Originally, Xu Haizhou said he wanted to invite his mother-in-law to the city to take care of her, but Qiao Lufei said it was unnecessary and she didn't want to listen to her sister-in-law's whining.

Even if something happens to her at home, doesn't she still have An An? If she falls down or something, let An An go find the neighbors. Although people of the same age are rarely at home during the day, there are many middle-aged and elderly people, and they can often be seen strolling in the community downstairs.

Sure enough, during the rest of her pregnancy, Qiao Lu never acted unreasonably again. Instead, she felt that every day was fulfilling.

She tried her best to control her unreasonable temper. Every day before Xu Haizhou got off work and went home, she would greet him at the door a few minutes in advance. Qiao An would enthusiastically ask her father for slippers and change his shoes. Qiao Lu would affectionately hold his arm. The four of them would be affectionate and let him share the fun things of the day, and then cook after chatting.

In fact, sometimes there is nothing much to say, because the things you encounter every day in business are basically the same. But looking at his wife's expectant eyes, Xu Haizhou racked his brains to find ways to tell her the story in an interesting way.

"Do you remember the translator you met last year? The one who took two foreign lesbians shopping?"

With almost no recollection, Qiao Lu suddenly remembered: "Yeah, I remember. What's the matter?"

Caressing her shoulders again and again, Xu Haizhou smiled and said, "The female translator is here again, but this time she didn't bring any foreign comrades with her. She came alone."

Qiao Lu: "Oh, why come alone?"

The female translator was quite pretty and had a good temperament. She looked confident and cultured.

Xu Haizhou looked down at her and said, "You're here to buy clothes, what else can you do?"

Qiao Lu frowned and pointed at his face unhappily: "You're mean to me?"

Xu Haizhou: “???”

He held his forehead with helplessness and amusement, pinching her earlobe and saying, "No offense, I'm just asking you, what else can you do if you don't come here to buy clothes?"

"Well...how should I know?" Qiao Lu curled her lips as a matter of course.

"She immediately fell in love with three sets of clothes in our store. Two of them were designed by you, and one was a ready-made plaid skirt from the factory. She also asked me if I could get a discount because I had foreign exchange coupons."

He smiled and then tapped his wife's round nose: "Of course I said yes, so guess how much foreign exchange I exchanged this time?"

"How much?" Qiao Lu became interested and nagging: "You know, I really want a refrigerator now? In the summer, I put some ice cream in it. Hiss - the temperature suddenly rose a few days ago, and it was so hot that I really wanted to eat ice cream! But it's not available in this season. Oh, it's so annoying."

"You are pregnant, can you eat ice cream?" Xu Haizhou laughed: "Refrigerator? That thing is expensive. You definitely can't afford it with just these few tickets."

"Then what else can we buy?" Qiao Lu asked excitedly, an idea flashing in her mind; "Is there air conditioning? The summer in Li'an is too hot!"

"Air conditioner?" Xu Haizhou laughed out loud: "That's impossible! Do you know how much an air conditioner costs?"

"How much?" Qiao Lu asked.

Xu Haizhou: "It's enough to buy half a house."

"hiss--"

"Forget it, forget it. I'd rather buy another house with this money. It will appreciate in value in the future."

Xu Haizhou had previously learned about the mature real estate business in Hong Kong. Although he felt that houses in the mainland might not necessarily appreciate in value in the future, it would not be a problem to buy two more houses if he had the money.

Now we have two children, one set for each of them, one set for him and one for Qiao Lu, so we’ll have three sets as a start.

Xu Haizhou: "Okay."

Qiao Lu: "So how many tickets did you exchange?"

"Hmm... maybe I can change to an oven."

"Oven?!" Qiao Lu was surprised and patted his chest: "You still know this thing."

Xu Haizhou shook his head in amusement: "Why, are you surprised? You think I shouldn't know?"

After all, you are a business owner, so you know what's wrong with the oven?

Isn't it because I saw that Qiao Lu liked making Chinese snacks recently, so I went to the cake shop to buy cakes for her several times, and occasionally I found the oven in the back kitchen of the cake shop, so I thought of buying an oven.

Mainly to give my wife something to do at home.

"Then there are many more things that can be made with the oven. When you are at home and have nothing to do, buy a book and study it."

"What are you researching? I'm not a dim sum chef. Besides, my belly is so big now, I haven't made dim sum for a long time! I rest all day long and dare not do anything." He didn't have the energy to do anything.

I get tired after just a few minutes of standing. What can you expect to do with a body like this?

"Okay, it's up to you. What do you want to change?"

After thinking for a long time, Qiao Lu remembered and said excitedly, "Oh, right! A washing machine! It's so practical, let's buy it quickly!"

Well, although...the prices of washing machines and refrigerators are actually about the same.

So... looking at his wife's excited expression, Xu Haizhou curled his lips:

"Okay, I'll try to find a solution."

…

In early August, the air outside became scalding hot, and the ground seemed to be covered with hot oil. Walking on the road, people became walking corpses.

Qiaolu's physical changes have completely stabilized. She no longer gains or loses weight or vomits, but she has also developed more other problems.

For example, I have to get up to go to the bathroom every night, and then I can’t fall asleep. Sometimes I can’t fall asleep until five or six o’clock.

I turned over and was gasping for breath. My bones hurt from lying down for a long time, and my abdomen hurt when I walked. I couldn't sit or lie down.

Under such difficult circumstances, Xu Haizhou chose to stop working one month before the expected date of delivery and stay at home to take care of his wife.

Twenty minutes after dinner that night, Qiao Lu said she was hungry and wanted to eat noodles.

After cooking the noodles, I didn’t know what was going on. I hugged the bowl and cried, saying, “I really want to eat burgers, fried chicken, French fries, ice cream, and Coke… Wuwu—Haizhou, when will the baby come out? I can’t stand it anymore…”

Alas - he also wanted to know when the baby would be born.

He wiped her tears with his hand, held her in his arms and comforted her: "It's okay, it's okay, it will be soon, didn't you say it would be this month? It will be soon, we can go to the hospital in two days, maybe..."

"ah……"

Before she could finish her sentence, Qiao Lu covered her stomach uncomfortably and curled up in his arms.

"What's wrong? Are you cramping somewhere again?" Xu Haizhou thought she was cramping.

"It hurts—hiss—it hurts so much—" However, Qiao Lu's reaction did not seem like a simple "cramp" at all.

Qiao An, who was watching TV at the same time, was startled and ran over like the wind, holding Qiao Lu's hand tightly: "Mom! Mom! Mom, are you in pain again? Mom, let me give you a massage."

I couldn't wait to massage her hands and feet, but this time seemed different from the past.

"Haizhou, I feel like I'm about to give birth..."

The author has something to say:

As usual, 21 points