Yes, it's sweet. Su Jinli spent two lifetimes transforming the grievances of the prime minister's daughter into honey. From a girl snatching sugar paintings on the street to the renowned Madam Jiang in the capital, she taught her descendants: destiny isn't determined by calculations within the deep house, but by the courage to overturn a teacup, the choices made at the street sugar painting stall.
At this moment, a young boy was still lingering in front of a sugar painting stall in the West Market. He stroked the bamboo strips in his arms, the setting sun stretching his shadow far out. Suddenly, a clear, childish voice echoed from behind him: "Hey! The dragon you drew looks just like an earthworm!"
The young man turned around suddenly and saw the little girl with twin buns standing there in the sunset, with her hands on her hips, holding a newly bought sugar dragon. It was the same little girl from earlier. The maid behind her was shaking her head helplessly, obviously being pulled back by her.
The young man looked into her sparkling eyes, which resembled the red-dressed girl in his dreams, and the brightly smiling grandmother in the portrait. He smiled, pulled out a newly painted phoenix by Master Zhang, and handed it to her. His voice trembled slightly, though he didn't realize it. "My dear girl, I'll give you this phoenix as compensation. I'll take you in, and I'll protect you from any trouble you might face. Okay?"
The little girl was stunned, then took the glittering phoenix and smiled like a blooming pomegranate: "Okay! Then you have to take me to eat the osmanthus cake at Li Ji on West Street. I want the biggest one!"
The setting sun cast their shadows together. The hem of the young man's blue shirt brushed the bluestone slabs, and the hem of the girl's floral skirt rippled in the evening breeze. In the distance, Master Zhang polished a copper pot and suddenly remembered what his grandfather had said: Some fates are like the threads of a sugar painting, breaking and reconnecting, sweet for a lifetime and lasting into the next.
Beneath the wisteria trellis at the Prime Minister's residence, Xiaoyue stroked her great-grandson's head and whispered, "Remember, the story of great-grandmother and great-grandfather is hidden in the syrup from the sugar painting stalls, in the sweet aftertaste of every 'I do.'"
The spring breeze carried the sweet fragrance of sugar painting, drifting through the streets and alleys of the capital, past the grape trellises of the prime minister's residence, and across the clasped fingertips of a young man and a young girl. In that sweet aroma, there were sixteen-year-old street arguments, the laughter of a golden wedding anniversary, a deathbed promise, and even the promise of a love that would be renewed in the next life. This story began on the streets, transcending life and death, and brewing over time into an eternal honey, sweetening life after life.
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