“If you want your support to be worth something, first get those three thousand yuan a month back.”
His face flushed.
“I already told Mom. Starting next month, I won’t transfer it anymore. From now on, if our parents need financial support, the two of us will split it equally—fifteen hundred yuan each, clearly and openly.”
“Yeah. That works.”
I turned to look at him.
Over the past three years, this man had given me plenty of reasons to be angry.
Weak.
Timid.
Afraid to speak up.
Afraid to take action.
But the way he had slammed the table yesterday, and the things he had said…
I would remember them.
“Chen Beicheng.”
“Hm?”
“From now on, don’t hide anything from me.”
“I won’t anymore.”
“If you hide anything from me, I’ll break your legs.”
“…I won’t. Absolutely not.”
I took something out of my bag.
A sheet of paper folded in half.
It had been in my bag for several days.
He took it and unfolded it.
He stared at it for two seconds.
Then his entire body went rigid.
I watched the expression on his face change from confusion to shock, then disbelief, before finally settling into an expression I had never seen on him before.
“This… this is…”
“Yeah. We found out last week. Six weeks.”
Chen Beicheng’s hand trembled violently.
He held the ultrasound in front of his eyes and looked at it over and over.
“Su Tang…”
“Don’t cry.”
“I’m not crying.”
Tears were already about to fall, and he still insisted he wasn’t crying.
He pulled me into his arms so hard that I almost lost my balance.
“Easy. You’re crushing me…”
“Su Tang. Su Tang. Su Tang.”
He held me, calling my name over and over beside my ear.
My nose suddenly stung.
But I held it back.
I couldn’t cry today.
It was the first day of the Lunar New Year.
It was New Year’s, after all.
“All right, all right. Let me go.”
“No.”
“If you don’t let go, I’m throwing all the smoked meat away.”
He immediately let go.
Then he took my hand again.
“So… should we tell my mom?”
“No.”
“Huh?”
“She can find out when she learns how to respect me.”
Chen Beicheng thought about it.
“Okay.”
On the second day of the Lunar New Year, we went to my parents’ house.
Mom still had a stern expression when she saw Chen Beicheng.
Dad didn’t even bother paying him any attention.
Chen Beicheng obediently stood by the door.
“Dad, Mom, Happy New Year.”
My mother snorted.
“Mom, what happened before was my fault. From now on, I’ll treat Su Tang well.”
“How many times have you said that already?”
“This time, I mean it.”
Mom still ignored him.
I took the ultrasound out of my bag.
“Mom, look at this.”
She took it and looked.
She froze.
Then she cried out.
“Ah…!”
My father jumped in surprise, and his reading glasses nearly fell to the floor.
“Mr. Su! Mr. Su, come look! Tangtang is pregnant!”
Dad snatched the paper from her and looked at it for a long time.
He was genuinely trying to make out the writing and the image on it.
Then the corners of his mouth slowly curved upward.
He set the ultrasound down on the table and patted Chen Beicheng on the shoulder.
“Good. Good.”
Two words.
But Dad’s eyes had already turned red.
Mom was crying now too.
“My daughter has suffered so much, and finally…”
“Mom, don’t cry at the start of the new year. I haven’t even cried yet.”
“Mom’s happy! I’m happy!”
We had lunch at my parents’ house that day.
Mom did everything she could and filled the table with food.
She even brought out a treasured old bottle of liquor.
Dad forced Chen Beicheng to drink three cups, leaving his face as red as a monkey’s backside.
After the meal, while he was lying half-asleep on the sofa, I sat beside him and opened my phone.
I checked my bank balance.
Then I looked at the photo of Zhang Ying’s shop’s monthly sales.
198 yuan per kilogram.
637 orders in a month.
The smoked meat I made.
The craftsmanship my grandmother had passed down to me.
It was worth that much.
I opened the notes app on my phone and started making a list.
How to register a trademark.
How to obtain a food business license.
Where to source the initial ingredients.
Who to hire to design the packaging.
As I was writing, Chen Beicheng drowsily leaned over.
“What are you doing?”
“Starting a business.”
“Huh? What kind?”
“Selling smoked meat.”
He stared blankly for two seconds.
Then he smiled.
“Okay. Sell smoked meat. I’ll work for you.”
“You’re my free labor.”
“Okay. Free.”
“You’ll also have to help me taste-test it.”
“That’s what I’m best at.”
Firecrackers sounded outside the window again.
The New Year’s sunlight fell across the notes on my screen.
Looking at each line of the plan, I suddenly felt incredibly steady.
If my grandmother could see this from heaven, she must be smiling.
The craft she had been proudest of all her life was finally about to leave that little kitchen.
Not to be secretly taken away and sold by someone else.
But to be made and sold openly by me.
## Chapter 8
What happened afterward wasn’t complicated.
Before the Lantern Festival, Zhang Ying transferred forty percent of the shop’s net profit to me.
The amount was more than I had expected.
Two hundred and thirty thousand yuan.
I took that money, added the small amount of savings I had accumulated over the past few years, and officially began preparing.
I registered a trademark.
“Tang’s Kitchen · Grandma’s Kitchen.”
It took a month to obtain the food business license.
Chen Beicheng handled the procedures with me from beginning to end.
His legs nearly ran themselves off, yet he didn’t complain once.
For the packaging design, I asked a college classmate for help.
We used kraft paper combined with red string.
It was simple and clean, like something that belonged in my grandmother’s kitchen.
In March, the first batch of smoked meat officially went on sale.
Zhang Ying handed over her old customer base to me.
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