Chapter 499: Chapter 473: Milk Kinship

Home is where the comfort is.

Xiao Qian sips the lovingly-made soup by her mom and enjoys watching her mom’s daily routine of disciplining her tardy younger brother. It makes her feel at ease.

“You little brat! Not coming home after school, where have you been roaming? You still know how to come back!” Jia Xiufang aimed a kick at her son’s buttocks, while Chen Zilong dodged and explained.

“Our teacher detained us. Sister, you’re back! Save me! Mom’s having menopausal issues and is beating your well-behaved brother again!”

“As the saying goes, a sapling needs to be straightened lest it grows crooked. Da Long, our mom is doing it for your own good.” Xiao Qian answered gently, only her eye behind the glasses seemed a bit cunning.

It’s been a long time since she has seen such a scene. It really feels like home.

The warm soup, the nagging mom, and the disobedient brother – it’s so good to be back home.

“Learn from your sister! When will you know better? Not returning home after school and wandering around aimlessly, did you go hang out with those unruly youngsters again outside the school?”

“No, Mom, I didn’t! I just went to the game hall for a bit after school. I went on my own, I didn’t go with anyone else – Ah!”

Chen Zilong screamed as Jia Xiufang took off her slippers and smacked him on the shoulder with them.

“I’ll show you not to study hard! I’ll show you to go to the game hall! Do you have money now? Are you arrogant now?!”

“I won’t go anymore, sister, please save me!” As Chen Zilong tried to seek refuge behind Xiao Qian, Jia Xiufang scolded angrily.

“Stand right there! I am only going to hit you a few times. If you dare to run, I’ll use a feather duster to flog you to death! ”

Not daring to run anymore, Chen Zilong obediently let his mom vent her anger.

After drinking half a bowl of soup, now feeling warmed, Xiao Qian put down the soup bowl and said earnestly:

“Da Long, don’t blame our mom. She just had a knife at her throat, and she was terrified. With you as the only man in our family, she got more scared when you didn’t come back.”

“Isn’t that true? That knife just now was aimed right at me. Oh, my goodness, I was scared to death!” Even now, Jia Xiufang was still trembling when she thinks about it, knowing that she had a brush with death.

“What happened, Mom? Tell me! Are you okay? Are you hurt?” Upon hearing this, the smiley expression on Chen Zilong’s face vanished, replaced with a look of tension and seriousness.

“At least you little brat has some filial piety, knowing to care about your mother. It’s alright, thanks to your sister, it was all like this…”

Jia Xiufang, unable to wait, recounted the whole story to Chen Zilong, who was scared to death. Chen Zilong touched his mom’s neck, and after seeing that it was only chubby and nothing else, he finally breathed a sigh of relief.

He sat there pale-faced and took a long time to regain his senses. “Mom, why would you be so bold? If you’d left when my sister told you to leave, wouldn’t everything be fine now? Sister, your skills at diffusing situations have improved! Effortlessly saving a lost middle-aged woman!”

“What can I expect from you!” Jia Xiufang complained about her son.

Pondering for a moment, Chen Zilong stood up and walked towards the door.

“Where are you going?” Jia Xiufang asked.

“I’m going to find our neighbor, that four-eyed nerd – ah, sister, I wasn’t talking about you!” Chen Zilong narrowly dodged the chopsticks thrown by Xiao Qian.

How could he forget that his family also has a “four-eyed” member?

“I was talking about Liao Yun Chang! Our mom usually gets along pretty well with him. How could he cause such big trouble for our mom!”

“You come back! Don’t make a fool of yourself! This matter can’t be blamed on him. What will our mom do to deal with the neighbors once you’ve stirred up trouble?” Xiao Qian scolded her delusional little brother.

Although she didn’t like Liao Fugui either, she couldn’t blame him for what happened. Indeed, this was not his fault.

As Xiao Qian lectured her brother on how to be a good person, the doorbell rang, and Jia Xiufang went to answer it.

Standing outside the door was a middle-aged man who looked similar to Liao Fugui, wearing glasses thicker than the bottom of a bottle. Although a bit older and with more wrinkles on his face, it was not difficult to see that he must have been a handsome guy when he was young. He extended his hand towards Jia Xiufang with an apologetic expression on his face and said,

“Sorry for causing you trouble, my dear younger sister. As soon as I got off work, I heard about this incident; were you scared?”

“It’s all right. What are you talking about? I wasn’t hurt.”

Liao Fugui stood next to his father, with two boxes of milk bought from the supermarket downstairs in his hands, as a consolation to Jia Xiufang’s frightful experience.

Jia Xiufang tried to invite him in to have a polite conversation, but Liao’s father declined. Taking a glance at the dining table in the living room, he realized that the family was in the middle of having dinner, and figured it would be impolite for him to disturb. So, he stood at the entrance and kept apologizing to Jia Xiufang.

Chen Zilong whispered into Xiao Qian’s ear, “Sister, do you think this old man has set his sights on our mom? I’ve seen him around all the time, trying to please her. Just yesterday, he brought a watermelon over, claiming he couldn’t finish it on his own. Watermelons are so expensive now, he didn’t just give her one without a reason. I think he has ulterior motives.”

“Could that be so?” Watching the interaction between the two middle-aged people, Xiao Qian thought, it sure seems animated. She accidentally glanced at Liao’s father and saw Liao Fugui standing beside him.

Her mouth twitched. She really didn’t want to have a brother like him.

She then whispered to her brother,

“Da Long, when you have the chance, you should…”

It would be better to keep Liao’s father at a distance. Her mom, as a charming old woman, wouldn’t have a shortage of men pursuing her. Although slightly overweight and indecisive, she stood out among the many older ladies. Otherwise, how could she give birth to a beauty like Xiao Qian herself?

Liao Fugui looked at Xiao Qian and Chen Zilong, a playful flicker in Xiao Qian’s eyes, as if she were scheming a prank. When her brother asked her a question, she secretly tapped his head.

She seemed like a mischievous elder sister, quite different from the professional psychologist she’d just been.

After chatting with Liao’s father, Jia Xiufang politely thanked him, and with lots of pushing and shoving, Liao’s father finally stuffed the shopping into Jia Xiufang’s hands. Soon after, he left with Liao Fugui, and the house quieted down.

“Look at how polite your Uncle Liao is! Seriously! Buying things for us when he didn’t have to. I wasn’t afraid at all – Why didn’t he buy the walnut milk?”

Xiao Qian couldn’t help but laugh at her mom, who just pretended to be polite for a while before wanting to accept Liao’s father’s kind offer.

Finally, the family had time to sit down and have dinner together. Jia Xiufang, as the head of the household, wanted to express her thoughts on today’s incident.

“Xiao Qian, Da Long, the matter today was a close call. What have you two learned from it?”

Chen Zilong thought for a moment while holding chopsticks in his mouth, “Mom, you like walnut milk. I’ll go to the store and exchange a box for you tomorrow.”

Jia Xiufang, annoyed, knocked on his head with her chopsticks, “All you care about all day is eating and eating! What I want to say is that today’s situation has made me realize the importance of the bond between siblings. The love between brothers and sisters is deeper than any other. You two should always try to support each other. If one of you is in trouble, the other must not stand idly by. Remember, you two are milk kinship. Look at that woman, how touching it is that she would travel far and wide for her brother.”

“Puff!” Xiao Qian almost spat out the soup she had in her mouth.

Ms. Jia Xiufang, you’ve gone off-topic, haven’t you?