CHAPTER 19
Being slapped in the face in public, the hypocrite Fang Zhongcheng did not dare to fight back in public. He was so angry that he cursed in a low voice: “You, you bitch. Why was I so blind to marry you in the first place?”
“Same here.”
Li Xia had just learned some new words, and when she spoke them, she made him jump with anger. Fang Zhongcheng pointed at her angrily and was speechless for a while, so his new partner took the opportunity to speak.
”Leave the child to him to raise, and don’t be so nosy. If you still have complaints, then raise the child yourself.”
Li Xia ignored her and turned to look at Fang Zhongcheng. “What do you say as a father?”
”I… We both have to go to work and we really don’t have time to take care of the child. How about… I pay child support and you take care of the child?”
”Do I want your money?”
”No, then, then what do you say we should do?”
She had originally planned to take the child to her side, and was afraid that he would be unhappy. But now that he had brought it up, she was furious again. I can take the child back, but you can’t push it to me. My child, my baby, do you despise me so much?
In your previous life, the child you gave birth to later died in an accident, so you only have Huihua and Yiyi as your two children. In your previous life, you could still find excuses saying that you were not together and could not take care of them, but in this life, I want to see how you will explain it to Yiyi in the future.
The little guy held by his sister’s hand had a sad look in his eyes, and a hint of anger. In his previous life, only Li Xia had experienced the resentment of being abandoned by a man, and in this life, he also experienced this pain himself. You little bastard, only when you experience it yourself can you empathize with your mother’s sadness.
”Find a time to sign an agreement, and you give up your custody rights for Yi Yi. Pay child support and tuition fees, everything is subject to the law. Also, go back and tell your mother that I won’t rent the house anymore. Bring the agreement and I’ll return the money. Remember, if you let your mother, an old lady, argue with me about this again, I will report this matter to your unit.”
Li Xia turned around and asked the children to get in the car, and took the children home. Fang Zhongcheng’s girlfriend knew what she meant by that. This woman’s attitude made Li Xia feel uneasy even if she followed her.
She had inquired about it. This woman was getting married for the first time, so she must be planning to have a child. Family planning only allows one child per family. If Fang Zhongcheng takes Yi Yi with him, then having another child would be against the rules, and both of them would be fired from their jobs. Yi Yi was a stumbling block for them to have a child, and they had already pushed it out before they even got married.
After coming back to this world, she understood many things. Yiyi recognized Fang Zhongcheng in the previous life just because he didn’t want her to be too tired. Whether she had conflicts with her son or not, he was still her biological son. Seeing that the two of them regarded him as a thorn in their eyes, she, as a mother, could no longer insist on each of them fulfilling their responsibilities.
In her previous life, she was obsessed with drawing a line between herself and Fang Zhongcheng, and didn’t want the children to call him dad. If she is still obsessed with having one child with Fang Zhongcheng in this life, regardless of the children’s situation, then she really has not made any progress in two lives.
She had heard of murdering a child left by a previous wife in order to have her own child. As a mother, she would never let her own flesh and blood fall into such a situation.
After getting home and washing up, Li Xia quickly cooked and asked about her son’s life at the dinner table. “Are you used to it? Did you have any quarrels with other kids?”
The little guy took the bun from his mother and ate it while saying, “We share a small bed. Mom, you don’t know how badly Da Pang, who sleeps with me, sleeps. He tosses and turns and grinds his teeth. He snores even though he’s so young. At night, he even gnaws my feet and calls them pig’s trotters.”
”Can you sleep like this? Okay, next week mom will talk to the teacher and ask you to go back to the same daycare. Mom will pick you up in the evening.”
”Okay.” The little guy was usually very lively, but today he was very quiet. After answering her question, he whispered, “Mom, Dad doesn’t want me anymore, so can I always follow you in the future? Will you also not want me?”
He had heard what was his dad said before and knew what it meant. Li Xia hugged him in her arms distressedly and lowered her head to touch the child’s cold face with her cheek.
”Mom will always want you, and you will follow mom from now on.”
”Well, I have a mother. Hum, he doesn’t want me, so I don’t want him either.”
After dinner, they discussed where to live. Huihua was the first to raise her hand and said that she wanted her brother to live with her. Shen Haiyang thought it would be more appropriate for the two boys to live together. Moreover, if the children of a reconstituted family are separated deliberately, it is difficult to cultivate feelings. Three children cannot become one family.
During this period, housing was in short supply and many families lived together. She didn’t expect him to think of this. Li Xia smiled and turned to ask Shen Hui if he was willing. The little guy pouted and looked at his father, and nodded in response to his expectation.
Shen Hui lived in the east wing, a room with a width of three meters and a total area of about 40 square meters. At this time, the two of them were separated by a partition, one in the south and one in the north, and a small hall was arranged in the middle. There was a movable railing next to the little guy’s bed, so he would not be afraid of falling down when he pulled it up at night.
Let the children go wash up and go to bed. After washing their feet, they lifted the curtain of the main room and looked inside. Shen Haiyang turned back from the desk. The big and the small looked at each other, and the man waved at him.
After the little guy went in, he pointed to the inner bedroom and whispered, “Mom is asleep. Are you looking for her?”
Yi Yi shook his head and hesitated to speak. Shen Haiyang was not in a hurry and waited silently for him to speak: “Uncle, is it really okay for me to live here forever?”
Seeing the insecurity in the little guy’s heart, Shen Haiyang nodded carefully and replied: “It’s Okay. You can call me daddy like your sister. This will be your home from now on, and you can be with mom and sister forever.”
”Thank you, uncle.”
After receiving his affirmative answer, the little guy’s face relaxed. Dad always said that mom was not the head of the family and asked him not to cause trouble for mom. But now uncle agreed, and also said that he could call him dad like his sister. It was just a name, but for the child it was a sense of identity. Calling the two adults in this family dad and mom, then he is the child of this family, with a clear conscience.
Shen Haiyang reached out and rubbed his hair, “Can you sleep alone at night?”
”I can. My brother said that if I’m scared, I can call him and he will stay with me for a few days.”
”Well, go to sleep with your brother.” Seeing Shen Hui coming in, the man asked the two children to go to sleep.
”Dad, you should go to bed early too.” Shen Hui said good night to his father, then walked out with his younger brother. As a result, the little guy also imitated him and turned around to wave to the man.
”Dad, go to bed early.”
After the two children left, Shen Haiyang still seemed to hear the familiar name. Unexpectedly, the little guy did not reject it at all, but was quite happy.
Wouldn’t children always reject stepfathers and stepmothers at first? He was still thinking about this, not knowing that Yi Yi was so proud at the moment. He felt that if he called him dad, he could stay here peacefully and not cause trouble for his mother.
————
Li Xia got up quietly in the middle of the night and started a busy day. In the morning, the family brought breakfast from here to the dining room in the back, and Huihua asked Yiyi to eat quickly.
”Hurry up, you still have to go to school after your sister drops you off. If you don’t leave now, you will be too late.”
The nursery and the elementary school where the painting was done were in opposite directions, and the little girl calculated that she had to leave 20 minutes earlier. As soon as she finished her words and nodded to eat quickly, she was interrupted by Shen Haiyang.
”Be careful, don’t be in a hurry. I’ll take you there on my bike later.”
The little guy looked up at him and smiled at him, “Thank you, Dad.”
This child is much sweeter than Huihua, or is he trying to please him on purpose? Shen Haiyang smiled and touched his little head: “You don’t have to be so polite to your dad. But I didn’t prepare a seat for you today, can you sit on the beam?”
”What kind of seat? Is it the kind that’s stuck in the front for children to sit on?”
”Yes. Whatever color you like, you can ask mom to wrap it around so it won’t be cold when you sit on it.”
”I want blue, the kind of blue that’s like the sky.”
”good.”
When he followed his dad before, he always sat on the horizontal beam. He was small and unstable, so he always held the handlebars tightly for fear of falling off. At that time, he envied some children who had special seats, but he didn’t expect that he would soon have one too.
The child was so excited that he said goodbye to Shen Haiyang at the entrance of the nursery. Shen Haiyang pushed his bike away and heard the conversation between the teacher and the little guy behind him.
”Fang Ruyi, that doesn’t seem to be your father, right?”
”Teacher, I have changed my father. He is my father.”
”Dad can be changed too?”
”Yes. My new dad is very nice…”
The sound can no longer be heard, Shen Haiyang rode his bike away.
This little guy is so funny, and from his childish words, you can tell that he is very satisfied with his new father.
When he went to pick him up after get off work in the evening, he asked him what he had done all day. The two talked as they walked. The little one was not afraid of riding the bike slowly, and he was very happy because he could show off his achievements to adults.
When he got home and was picked up, he ran to the kitchen and said, “Mom, mom, I got a red flower today. The teacher praised me.”
”Really? What did she praise you for?”
”Praise me for my quick arithmetic skills.” He took out a piece of paper from his schoolbag. He got all the addition and subtraction within ten correct at once. There was a little red flower and a striking hundred on it.
”Yeah, Yi Yi is great.”
With a simple compliment, the child seemed to have won the world, jumping and dancing with joy. While they were talking, the two older children came back and chattered with the adults about what happened at school.
Li Xia was cooking, and Shen Haiyang washed his hands to help. While working, he talked to the children. The lively chatter was the atmosphere of the family’s daily life.
Yi Yi ran too fast and lost his shoes. Shen Hui bent down to help pick them up. Huihua didn’t see his movements, so she reached out and patted her brother to make fun of him.
”If you keep doing this and lose your shoes, and a fool picks them up and runs away, what will you wear?”
Shen Hui froze in his action of picking up the shoes, turned around and asked, “Should I pick up these shoes or not?”
”Hahaha……”
The three children accidentally performed a joke that made everyone laugh. The children laughed so hard that they fell backwards. Yi Yi stomped his bare feet on the ground, Huihua smashed the garlic out of the stone mortar with a garlic hammer, and the other two laughed even harder. After laughing, Yi Yi went to get a broom and dustpan to clean up, and Shen Hui peeled two more cloves of garlic.
”Take it easy. How about I do it?”
Li Xia laughed along, and Shen Haiyang took the knife from her hand and cut the vegetables himself. Looking at the two children, she was extremely glad that she stayed in the city and met him.
Life was full of hope, and working in a bun shop was not as hard as working in the wind and sun. He simply helped her pass things or cut vegetables, which made her feel relaxed and know that she was not struggling alone.
She was in a good mood and in a good state, so she could be good-tempered to the children. The three of them were obviously more cheerful than before, and children are most sensitive to the state of adults.
She got up early to change Shen Hui’s medicine, and the children went to school. At noon, when Huihua came back from school and said that Shen Hui was taken away by his mother and uncle. Shen Haiyang and Li Xia looked at each other, and the man comforted her that everything was fine.
”I’ll go check it out after dinner.”
”Okay.”
Li Xia put the chickens she bought in the yard and planned to wait for Shen Hui to come back before cooking. Both sons had a lot of injuries, so she bought this to nourish them.
She let Shen Haiyang go to find his son with a clear conscience. On the other side, Murong Danling saw Shen Haiyang coming alone and immediately came out to greet him with a smile.
”Come in quickly, my mom made chestnut chicken for lunch. You used to like this the most, so I saved it for you.”
There was an ambiguity in the enthusiasm of these words, as if they were still a couple. Shen Haiyang stopped at the door and politely said that he was looking for the child.
”Shen Hui is still injured and needs a new dressing. I’ll take him home first. If you miss him, pick him up on the weekend.”
This was a subtle condemnation of her for taking the child away without saying hello, and Murong Danling’s expression suddenly became a little uncomfortable. He used to be so nice to her, and he would definitely agree to anything she wanted to do as long as she acted coquettishly. But now he is so cold to her that he doesn’t even enter the house when she comes to invite, and doesn’t even respond to any extra words.
Taking a deep breath to suppress her dissatisfaction, she slowly spoke: “I just heard that the child was injured, and I went to pick him up because I felt sorry for him. Huihui is my son, and no one loves him more than me. He got hurt like this in a fight with someone for your stepson, and you, as a father, gave half of his room to that kid. Haiyang, you raised this child with your own hands, and you have to take care of your son even if you marry a new wife.”
”Did Huihui say that? He doesn’t want to live with his brother? Call the child out, and I’ll talk to him.”
”What are you talking about? He’s so young and he always considers you in everything he does. If he doesn’t want to, you don’t know what his stepmother will do. For your own good, he doesn’t dare to say no. He can only swallow his grievances.”
Did he let the child suffer? Shen Haiyang immediately reflected on himself. He just….This arrangement was made in order to allow the children to develop feelings for each other, and the two of them were separated well, so that each had their own space. Shen Hui didn’t say anything, could it be that as she said, the child was taking him, the father, into consideration?
”dad,”
As they were talking, Shen Hui came out, followed by several adults. They looked like they wanted to stop him, but they failed. They looked at Shen Haiyang awkwardly, and after a moment of embarrassment, they invited him into the house.
”Come in quickly, let’s talk inside. I’ll bring you some food, which I’ve left specially for you.”
”No need, I’ll take the child and go first.” He reached out to hold his son, then nodded to Murong Danling: “I will take good care of the child. You’d better tell me in advance when you pick up the child in the future.”
After he finished speaking, he picked up his son and put him in the back seat. Seeing him push the bike away, the people of the Murong family were anxious and could not stop him. The old lady reached out and pushed her daughter, and Murong Danling followed.
”Haiyang, don’t be so anxious, come in and sit for a while so we can talk.”
”We, don’t have anything to talk about. If it’s about Huihui, then I know, I will talk to the child.”
She was rejected again, and saw that he had already pushed the bike out of the yard. She anxiously reached out and grabbed the corner of his clothes. “Why? The three of us are a family, you…”
”That was in the past.” Shen Haiyang interrupted her before she could finish, “We divorced a long time ago, don’t say such things again. If you miss Huihui and pick up the child on the weekend, don’t affect his life.”
The man rode away after saying this. Murong Danling stood there, mad and angry, stamping her feet and shouting. Her mother reached out and pulled her back home, complaining as soon as she opened her mouth.
”I told you to try to save the relationship earlier. Now that they’ve both gotten married, things have become even more difficult.”
”How could I know that he would get married to that country girl so soon? Shen Haiyang, you are a big fool. Did you know that woman is after your money?”
”What’s the point of shouting these things at home? Go find him and make him understand.”
The woman took a deep breath and calmed herself down. “Don’t worry, I’ll find a way.”
That’s fifty thousand dollars. With it, I can live my whole life without any worries. I can have everything I want. I will never give it up.
She encouraged herself, while Shen Haiyang was pushing his bike on the road and talking to his son. “Why didn’t you tell daddy if you didn’t like living in the same room with your brother?”
”I don’t dislike living with my brother. I just…” Seeing his father’s gentle face and quietly listening to him, the little guy continued: “I’m just afraid that Dad likes me or not.”
Shen Haiyang rubbed his son’s head. “What are you thinking about all the time? You are my son, and you will always be the first in my heart.”
”Really?” The little guy was a little confused. “Is it true that with a stepmother, even dad won’t be close to me anymore, as they say?”
”Do you think she treats you badly?”
Shen Hui shook his head. No matter how much he was influenced by others, he couldn’t say anything against his will. “She was very good to me. She took care of us before you woke up. She would share any delicious food with me and Huihua.”
”In that case, can you still treat her as your stepmother? Don’t worry about what others say. You should have a good judgement in your heart. And you have to believe in daddy. He will never ignore you for any reason. No one can take away what is yours. Daddy is here for you.”
Was I too impatient? I wanted the children to spend more time together and develop feelings, but what if the children resisted? “If you don’t want to live with Yiyi, Dad will go back and move Yiyi’s things to the west wing.”
Shen Hui smiled happily this time, and could feel the care and love from his father’s attitude. “No need. I like Yi Yi very much, and it’s good to have him as a companion. Dad, it’s not me who wants to go with mom, it’s her and uncle who are holding me back, and I can’t break free.”
”Dad knows. If you have anything to say, tell him later.”
”Um.”
The little guy smiled, he still believed in his father. When he got home, he found that Li Xia had bought a chicken and waited for him to come back to cook it in the evening. He immediately smiled at everyone, and after dinner, he took everyone to play. The little guy called him brother sweetly, which made him smile.
Li Xia did not ask about the father and son in detail. The child of the reconstituted family was in a normal mood and could be relieved in time. Shen Haiyang was a gentle and talkative person. Shen Hui’s mood was quite stable since he was brought back.
A few days later, Fang Zhongcheng came to see her and they signed a new agreement. She got custody of Yiyi and he paid child support. The previous rental contract was also returned, and Old lady Fang didn’t dare to bother her again.
