Chinese New Year
There were few people in the family, originally only Jiang Zhizhi and Cheng Yuping, so the New Year celebrations were a bit lonely, but with Lu Xiye joining the family, it became a bit more lively.
The snow outside had stopped long ago, and the sound of firecrackers could be heard from time to time in the community. The laughter and joy outside easily penetrated the first-floor windows and reached Jiang Zhizhi's home.
She opened the door to the yard from the living room balcony, took a broom and started clearing the snow in the yard.
Lu Xiye was still wearing the same wet clothes from yesterday. Although Cheng Yuping helped dry them with the heater, he felt very uncomfortable and ran upstairs to change his clothes.
Cheng Yuping entered the kitchen and was about to make lunch when her cell phone suddenly rang.
Cheng Yuping thought of the call from Jiang Guozhong that Jiang Zhizhi had hung up yesterday, and she felt a little nervous. But when she saw the caller's note was Rongrong, she breathed a sigh of relief and quickly picked up the phone, "Hello."
"Godmother, Happy New Year! My parents and I are on our way to your place. Which unit is your house in?"
"Unit 12." Cheng Yuping replied.
"We're on the way and will be there in about twenty minutes." Li Rongrong said happily.
"Okay, okay, go slowly on the road."
After hanging up the phone, Cheng Yuping quickly asked Jiang Zhizhi to go to a restaurant outside to buy some dishes.
If it were just the three of them and Lu Xiye, it would be fine to just eat something casually, but now that there were official guests, they naturally had to prepare more carefully. Although Cheng Yuping could cook a few dishes herself, it was still too slow for her to prepare a large table of food by herself.
Jiang Zhizhi took the money and pushed the door open, just in time to meet Lu Xiye coming down from upstairs after changing his clothes.
"Where are you going?" Lu Xiye came over curiously.
"Go buy some food. Rongrong and her parents will be coming over at noon."
"Li Rongrong? Why are they coming to your house on New Year's Day?"
"Visiting relatives. My mother is Rongrong's godmother." Jiang Zhizhi explained lightly.
Lu Xiye seemed unhappy about this "uninvited guest". He followed Jiang Zhizhi out of the apartment door and asked hesitantly, "Can I still have lunch at your house?"
Jiang Zhizhi stopped and looked up at him and asked, "Is Aunt Zhou here?"
"Can't I have dinner at your house just because Aunt Zhou is here?"
Lu Xiye guessed the hidden meaning behind Jiang Zhizhi's words, and felt abandoned again, his tone a little angry.
"I didn't say that because I was afraid you would be embarrassed."
"Why am I embarrassed?"
"You are an outsider in our family. Rongrong will definitely ask you a lot of questions when she sees you. Not only will she know that you live upstairs from us, but she won't be able to hide the fact that I'm tutoring you." Jiang Zhizhi said lightly.
"What if she finds out?"
Lu Xiye is no longer the kid who was so concerned about his reputation in elementary school. Moreover, this time it was Jiang Zhizhi who was asked by his father to tutor him, so there was nothing wrong with others knowing about it.
Unless Jiang Zhizhi doesn't want anyone to know.
He looked at Jiang Zhizhi quietly, observing her expression.
But Jiang Zhizhi's expression was still very calm, and nothing could be seen.
"It's okay if you don't mind." Jiang Zhizhi walked to the carport downstairs, preparing to push the electric tricycle out. Seeing him still blocking the way, she couldn't help but say, "Why are you following me? Go back and rest."
"I'll go with you to choose the food. I want to eat too. I should pick a few dishes I like." He said confidently, "The tricycle is not convenient. Why don't you take my electric bike? I'll give you a ride."
As he said that, he quickly pushed out his electric car next to him.
Jiang Zhizhi looked at the tricycle that was almost as wide as two electric bikes, then looked at Lu Xiye's shiny electric bike that was pink, red and purple, and smacked her lips.
"What are you standing there for? Get in." Lu Xiye was very satisfied with his electric bike. He had specially modified the color and audio system of the electric bike based on its original cool style. It was the only one of its kind in the whole Nanshi City. He would be the coolest guy when riding it on the street.
Jiang Zhizhi hesitated for a moment, but still got on the back seat of Lu Xiye's car. After all, the tricycle was really not very convenient.
On the first day of the Lunar New Year, most of the restaurants on both sides of the street were closed, so Jiang Zhizhi simply went to Lujiang Village with Lu Xiye. The family restaurants in the village were still open.
Jiang Zhizhi took the menu and ordered a vermicelli noodle dish and a stir-fried pork dish. As she continued reading, Lu Xiye, who was standing next to her, started ordering frantically. "One serving of sauce-flavored spareribs, one serving of braised beef, four pig's trotters, one hot and sour grape fish, fried rice cake, and this shredded chicken roll..."
"That's enough. Why did you order so much? My mother has made several more dishes and we can't finish them all." Jiang Zhizhi was embarrassed and couldn't help but remind him.
"But I really want to eat all of these. Don't worry, I can pay for them even if I don't let you." Lu Xiye said as he took out a few red bills.
He bought more than a dozen dishes at once. On the way back, he passed by the fruit shop at the entrance of Lujiang Village. Lu Xiye felt greedy again and bought cherries, grapes and a big durian.
When they returned to the door of their house, the two men had their bags full. At first glance, it looked like they were visiting relatives.
"Mom, I'm back."
Jiang Zhizhi struggled to free a finger and knocked on the door.
It was Li Rongrong who opened the door. They had arrived.
"Zhizhi... Lu Xiye?" Li Rongrong was about to speak to Jiang Zhizhi when she saw Lu Xiye behind her and cried out in surprise, "Why are you here?"
"My home is upstairs. I didn't go home for the New Year, so Aunt Chen asked me to come over and celebrate the New Year with her," Lu Xiye explained.
Li Rongrong couldn't believe it. "Ah? Your home is here? How is that possible?"
The Lu family is the richest family in Dongxin District, so the place where Lu Xiye lives must be a villa, right?
This is just a shabby neighborhood.
Lu Xiye rolled his eyes at her and said, "Hey, can you please step back and let us go in first?"
Li Rongrong quickly retreated to the restaurant nearby, and Jiang Zhizhi temporarily put the things she bought on the table.
Fang Yi just came out of the kitchen and was surprised to see the dishes on the table: "Why did you buy so many? There are still five dishes being cooked in the kitchen."
Cheng Yuping poked her head out of the kitchen and took a look. She hadn't expected Jiang Zhizhi to actually buy so many vegetables, but she smiled and said, "How can you complain about having too much during the Chinese New Year? Of course, the more the better. Zhizhi, go and wish your uncle and aunt a happy new year."
"Happy New Year, uncle and aunt." Jiang Zhizhi said quickly.
"Happy New Year! This is the red envelope prepared for you by your uncle and aunt." Li Mingzhang handed Jiang Zhizhi a big red envelope. It was bulging and it was obvious that there were quite a few bills inside.
"Thank you, uncle and aunt." Jiang Zhizhi took the red envelope and said sensibly.
Li Mingzhang looked at Lu Xiye and said, "Your name is Lu Xiye, right?"
Lu Xiye nodded. In front of the strange adults, he looked very polite. "Hello, uncle and aunt."
Li Mingzhang remembered Lu Xiye. He was deeply impressed by their previous meeting in Jinhai City.
That time, the kid Lu Xiye only made one phone call and saved them thousands of dollars.
Li Mingzhang thought about it and gave Lu Xiye 500 yuan as a New Year's gift.
After receiving the red envelope, Jiang Zhizhi began to put the purchased dishes into plates, busying herself in the kitchen and the dining room.
Li Rongrong pulled Lu Xiye to the balcony outside the living room. "Lu Xiye, you haven't explained clearly yet. Why is your family here? Why didn't you go home for the New Year?"
Lu Xiye became impatient with her questioning and simply told her everything between him and Jiang Zhizhi.
Li Rongrong suddenly realized, "I was wondering why Zhizhi suddenly stopped going home with Xu Qingbo and me a while ago. So she was going to tutor you? No wonder your final grades suddenly went up so much."
She suddenly felt very jealous.
After entering junior high school, even Lu Xiye made progress, but her test scores kept declining.
"Zhizhi, next time you tutor Lu Xiye, please take me with you so I can learn from you." Li Rongrong also wanted to join this tutoring group.
Before Jiang Zhizhi could answer, Lu Xiye quickly refused, "That won't do. I spent money."
"What's the big deal? My grades are better than yours. It's like Zhizhi and I are tutoring you together. I don't want your money. I'll give it to you for free." Li Rongrong said jokingly.
Lu Xiye curled his lips and said, "Who cares? You only ranked 19th."
"How dare you, a person ranked over 300, look down on me?" Li Rongrong said angrily, glaring at him.
"Anyway, I don't want it. You're such a chatterbox, it affects me."
"Huh? How could I be chirping?"
"You just chirp."
"You're the one chirping."
“…”
Until dinner time, Li Rongrong and Lu Xiye were still staring at each other and were not getting along with each other.
"By the way, Zhizhi, there's a fireworks display at Changyin Lake tonight. Let's go watch the fireworks together. Today is New Year's Day, so it's bound to be lively there tonight!"
"Okay, let's go together." Jiang Zhizhi looked at her mother Cheng Yuping and said happily.
As far as she could remember, she had never been to such a place with her mother before.
When Cheng Yuping was alive in her previous life, she was basically taking care of the housework every day. She was even busier when she went home for the Chinese New Year and didn't even have time to rest.
In this life, she wants to go out with her mother and see more of the world.
After lunch, Cheng Yuping gave two big red envelopes to Li Rongrong and Lu Xiye respectively. Fang Yi and Li Mingzhang sat in the living room and talked with Cheng Yuping for a while, then went back, leaving Li Rongrong to play with Jiang Zhizhi and Lu Xiye, and they agreed to meet at Changyin Lake in the evening.
"Zhizhi, please take me with you to tutoring. My grades are getting worse and worse. If this continues, I'm afraid I won't be able to get into No. 1 High School."
Li Rongrong sat on the steps outside the balcony, looking pitiful.
Jiang Zhizhi said, "Don't talk nonsense. You will definitely be admitted to No. 1 High School. If you want to study with us, you can come to the library with us after school. But, didn't you sign up for a cram school? It shouldn't be over yet, right?"
"If cram school was useful, my grades wouldn't be falling so far behind," Li Rongrong sighed. "My math is way worse than yours and Xu Qingbo's. Junior high school physics and chemistry all require math as a foundation. If physics and chemistry become my weaknesses, I'll be truly finished."
On the side, Lu Xiye was shoveling the snow with a small shovel as if to vent his anger, glancing at Li Rongrong with resentment.
Every time they mentioned math scores, they always listed Jiang Zhizhi and Xu Qingbo's names together, as if the two were conjoined twins.
"By the way, have you and Xu Qingbo signed up for the junior high school math league?" Li Rongrong didn't notice Lu Xiye's little emotion at all, and mentioned Jiang Zhizhi and Xu Qingbo's participation in the math league.
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