687 Take the Rice Bucket Away

“If you have the time to tell me about those aristocratic families in the capital, why don’t you tell me what you did to Qiao Mei and whether the matter of Qiao Mei’s baby being harmed has anything to do with you.” Qiao Qiang snorted coldly and left the room.

He Ning smiled awkwardly in the room. What was done was done. If he had known from the start that Qiao Mei’s culinary skills were so good and that she was also very good at growing flowers, he would not have laid his hands on her at all.

Qiao Qiang did not walk far before turning back. He looked at He Ning coldly and said, “Is there anything else you need here now?”

“Nothing! Nothing at all!” He Ning said.

“If there’s nothing else, you should go back quickly. It’s not good for our family’s reputation if you stay here with that ‘rice bucket’ you brought with you. It won’t sound good if word gets out. If there’s nothing else, you shouldn’t come again,” Qiao Qiang said disdainfully.

Huo Gao was the “rice bucket” that Qiao Qiang was referring to. While he despised He Ning for shamelessly coming to Qiao Mei’s house to freeload, he ate more than He Ning. If not for the fact that there was not enough rice in the pot, Huo Gao would have eaten everything in their house.

It was not Huo Gao’s fault. The main thing was that although Wang Qin used a lot of ingredients in her cooking, it did not taste good and was worlds apart from what Qiao Mei made.

He Ning had no choice but to leave Qiao Mei’s house dejectedly with Huo Gao. Qiao Qiang also left on his bicycle.

The results of the previous chess competition were out. Qiao Qiang did not win. In the end, it was the old man from the neighboring village who won, so now he had to go to the neighboring village every week to continue playing chess.

Qiao Qiang even asked Qiao Mei to check with Xia Wen in the capital about getting him a book on chess. He wanted to learn chess well and defeat those old men so that they had to come to his house to play chess.

Qiao Mei had some free time and wanted to go to Li Gui’s house to take a look. She had not completely forgiven Li Gui, but because of what happened yesterday, she was worried that the children would be traumatized.

Zhang Miao had been lying on the brick bed all this while. Even if the sky collapsed outside, she could not react. After taking her medicine regularly, she could already move her limbs slowly. Qiao Mei believed that it would not be long before she could get down from the bed and start her rehabilitation exercises.

The other children were not too affected as Zhang Wei had protected them. Tomorrow was the official first school day for these children, so Qiao Mei fried some melon seeds for them.

Although this was not something rare and basically every family knew how to fry melon seeds, Qiao Mei’s melon seeds were just different from those from other families. She used her own secret ingredients and they were very fragrant.

Whoever ate Qiao Mei’s melon seeds would definitely not like other melon seeds anymore!

“Have you prepared everything you need for school?” Qiao Mei walked into the courtyard and said to the three naughty children.

Zhang Wei was the first to step forward and report to Qiao Mei, “Pencils, erasers, books and water glasses!”

They only had tea jars here. Those big tea jars were big enough to use as bowls and it was very troublesome to carry them to school. When Qiao Mei was in the capital, she had bought water glasses for the children, Li Gui and Qiao Qiang.

In a small county city like theirs, there was no such fashionable thing. It was almost guaranteed that these children would attract everyone’s attention as soon as they went to school.

Anyway, there was no need to worry about anyone coveting these things. Only the Zhang siblings had them. If anyone dared to steal it, Qiao Mei would break their legs.

“What did you eat this morning?” Qiao Mei asked.

Zhang Wei was stunned for a moment and did not say anything. Zhang Qin did not know what to say and hid behind Zhang Wei to look at Qiao Mei quietly.

Qiao Mei knew at a glance that they either had not eaten anything again or had only eaten a potato or a sweet potato. After Old Madam Li plundered everything edible at home, Qiao Mei had thrown a tantrum at Li Gui until now.

There was nothing left at home at the moment and Li Gui was too embarrassed to go and look for Qiao Mei. In addition, Li Gui was not in good health and was currently lying weakly on the brick bed, unable to move.

Qiao Mei patted Zhang Wei’s shoulder and said, “You’re the man of the household now. You have to learn to bear the heavy burden of the family. Elder sister can’t be by your side all the time. You have to learn to take good care of your younger siblings and mother. The most important thing is to take care of yourself too.”

Zhang Wei nodded solemnly. He was no longer the kid who only knew how to enjoy life. Since he had chosen to leave Zhang Qian to live with Li Gui, he must work hard.

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