Pan Qiaomu pushed the door open in annoyance: "Are you ready? I'll take you to work."
"But," he added, "in order to avoid being seen, I'm going to put you two streets away."
No one answered.
Pan Qiaomu walked through the living room and his eyes fell on the open study door.
The study room was neat and orderly, with not even a hair falling on the floor, and no sign that anyone had stayed there. Same goes for the second bedroom bathroom.
Pan Qiaomu took out his phone and saw a WeChat message from Chen Jiaxian.
She thanked him for his hospitality and then told him that she didn't want to trouble him anymore and had already taken the subway to work.
Subway?
Pan Qiaomu typed in the dialog box: "Have you already walked to the subway station? Let me take you. It takes an hour to take the subway to the company. You are not feeling well and need to rest."
After typing, he frowned and deleted each word one by one.
Finally, he sent a WeChat message: "Okay."
After sending a WeChat message, Pan Qiaomu looked at the ginger milk in his hand and became even more annoyed.
He placed the ginger milk on the dining room table in the living room and took a sip himself.
Pan Qiaomu was not from Yuecheng, and the taste of ginger milk was not what he imagined. The strong spicy ginger flavor exploded in his mouth and traveled up his throat to the top of his head. Pan Qiaomu's face twisted.
Go crazy.
He angrily pushed Jiang Bangnai away.
The phone vibrated, and the message from Chen Jiaxian came back.
Pan Qiaomu quickly clicked on it, and in the dialog box was an extremely perfunctory system-generated emoticon.
His early morning temper was ignited by this perfunctory "fist-holding".
Pan Qiaomu started the car, grabbed the steering wheel, and drove toward the company aggressively.
…
The typhoon is over. No matter how brutal last night's heavy rain was, Yuecheng is still hot during the morning rush hour, supporting the prosperity of first-tier cities.
The intersections were filled with colorful umbrellas, the subways roared under the ground to handle the crowds of people going to work, and the highways were congested with cars that were struggling to move.
Let him be exposed to wind, rain, cold and heat. When it comes to finding jobs and making money, Yuecheng people have always been low-key and pragmatic.
Changlefang also woke up from his dream.
Termites gnaw at the beams, and rainwater eats away at the roof. There was a violent storm last night, and a light rain fell in the house. When the rain subsided, the old people took out basins to collect rainwater from their houses and kept them to feed the plump and red bougainvillea on the balcony.
A hundred years ago, what woke up here were famous Cantonese opera actors and the sounds of Cantonese rhyme; a hundred years later, the past people are gone, the splendor is no longer there, the sound of water leakage, noise, the sound of cooking pots, the sound of morning exercises, and the click of the cane on the ground. The sound constitutes Changlefang this morning.
Guan Xi wore knee-length rain boots and stepped into the stagnant water under the corridor of the old arcade.
There were dozens of calls from Guan's mother on her phone, but she ignored them.
The road in front of me has been blocked by broken branches. There is a dim broken stone tablet engraved with the name of this short street:
Xunfengli.
She thought about the route. If you take a detour in the opposite direction, cross Youyu Lane and turn into Fengyang Lane, you can still get out.
The typhoon that raged all night soaked the advertising paper pasted on the brick wall. One is "Jinji Pure Dace Fish Welcome to Retail and Wholesale", and the other is very new, it looks like it was just posted: "Chenji Tang Shui Warehouse is for rent. The address is near Erzong Road, Changlefang."
There seems to be something wrong with the operation of Chen Kee Tang Shui.
The "Changlefang Erzong Road" in the advertisement is "Xunfengli". Only old people like Grandma Jin and Uncle Jiang still remember the names "Xunfengli" and "Fengyangli". Grandma Jin told Guan Xi that it was said that Wu Zetian once built an altar here to worship heaven and pray for blessings, so most of these short streets and alleys were named after "phoenix".
The legend is groundless and has faded away now. There are only a few winding short alleys on the left and right, all referred to by "number + vertical road/horizontal street". No one cares what their name is or what they are specifically, as long as it does not affect the work to make money.
Guan Xi held an umbrella and walked through the red incense seats "Blessed by Heavenly Officials" on the doors and windows of every house. There is a household that has a small blackboard hanging under the eaves. It undertakes zipper repair, custom-made quilts, processing of supplied materials, modification and repair, and finishing and ironing of clothes. Further forward, there is a wall painted white with red words: Phoenix Chess and Card Room, and a red paper attached below: 10 yuan for shaved head, 12 yuan for quick haircut, 48 yuan for dyeing black hair, every Monday and October. Five breaks.
Changlefang is old, and these neighborhood businesses are also open to the elderly.
Guan Xi took a few photos with his mobile phone before leaving.
…
When we arrived at the company, there was an amazing aroma filling the office.
Apparently other colleagues had also smelled it. They were surrounding Chen Jiaxian, watching her take out the swollen and hot pineapple buns from the microwave, take out the butter from the refrigerator, sandwich them together, wait a few seconds, and take a sip. Take small bites.
Everyone cooed, watching the butter in the sandwich melt slightly, and guessing how to combine the wonderful taste. Then look at your empty hands, from your mouth to your stomach.
"The owner who sells rice rolls and fish balls didn't come out today..."
"Uncle Jiang, Uncle Jiang, what will I do without you, Uncle Jiang!"
"Oh, there's no breakfast sold around here. There are potato chips in the pantry, would you like a pack?"
But potato chips are not as delicious as hot and fluffy ice-fired pineapple oil.
The more I chew oily, salty and spicy potato chips early in the morning, the more appealing the aroma of pineapple buns becomes. Colleagues finally couldn't stand it anymore, so they took out their mobile phones and collectively ordered takeout from the tea restaurant.
“The dim sum at Chen Kee Tang Shui is better than that at a tea restaurant. I’ve had it before!”
Colleagues placed orders in a flurry.
After Chen Jiaxian finished eating the hot pineapple buns and pressed her lower abdomen with her hands, she finally felt that her menstrual cramps were relieved a lot. Pan Qiaomu strode into the office, and the first thing he saw was her wearing her own white shirt, leaning on her seat with a dejected expression.
Pan Qiaomu stared at him calmly for a few seconds, and then looked away as if nothing had happened.
Not long after, the takeaway of Chenji Tang Shui was delivered, and my colleagues were disappointed:
"It's not delicious. The pineapple bun is soggy and soft."
"The butter is all melted in."
"No, this butter toast is not good either, the butter is melted too!"
"Xiaowei, you are really unreliable. You said it's delicious, but where is the best?"
"That's right, I can't trust Xiaowei anymore, hahaha."
Yu Xiaowei, who had just made the recommendation, immediately blushed and defended: "His previous pineapple buns were not like this! They used to be heated just right and would not collapse at all. The butter was not delivered with it sandwiched inside, but after being frozen. Wrap it individually and let me put it in myself! This way it tastes better!”
"Really?" The colleague said doubtfully, "You put it that way, it should be pretty good. But why did it get delivered here today? It's all gone. Bad review."
"Yes, that's what Chen Jiaxian did just now, what she made was so delicious!"
“The boss’s negative review is so perfunctory.”
Yu Xiaowei was very embarrassed and depressed and left a negative review on the takeaway shop: "It's not as delicious as before! I won't order from your place in the future!"
After exiting, he looked at other comments and almost said that it was not as delicious as before.
Chenji Tang Shui is a time-honored brand, so why do it have so many bad reviews?
Yu Xiaowei took a closer look and found that almost all the negative reviews appeared in recent times. If he hadn't been so angry about the poor product just now, he would have almost thought that Chen Ji had received a malicious negative review.
Yu Xiaowei was speechless.
He thought for a while and contacted Chen Ji Tang Shui: "Have you changed your boss?"
Chen Ji Tang Shui replied quickly: "No! The products are obviously the same."
Yu Xiaowei recalled it carefully. Indeed, the taste of the dim sum is still the same, but when it is delivered to the diners, it is either soggy, soft, or rough-cut.
Is it because the details are not done properly?
Although it was an inconspicuous failure of details, it was a death sentence for food.
Yu Xiaowei typed: "Boss, you have to keep working hard. It's not as refined as before. You should roll it up!"
This time, the merchant did not reply.
