The elevator doors opened onto the floor, and the bustling sounds immediately flooded into the quiet car.
"Ah! Chen Chen is here!" The first to spot Liu Chen was her aunt, who was watering flowers in the hallway. After seeing Liu Chen, she then noticed Jiang Di emerging from behind her.
"Hey! Jiang Di! I asked you to take out the trash, and you ran into Chen Chen on your way back? What you're carrying is from Chen Chen, right? Don't tire her out, take her to your grandma's so she can see what Chen Chen bought for her."
Liu Chen looked at her aunt, Liu Fen, dressed in a red down jacket and beaming with joy, which was rather surprising. In her memory, her aunt always appeared with a teacher's seriousness and a touch of simplicity.
As she walked into her aunt's home with Jiang Di, Liu Chen quietly asked:
"What's up with my aunt? She's smiling so happily?"
Jiang Di shook his head. "It's because our apartment prices have gone up. My mom bought two units, right? At current market prices, those two apartments combined are worth almost three million. Mom heard the news and was so happy, she's been humming tunes while cooking these past few days."
Liu Chen finally understood. Her aunt was feeling the joy of asset appreciation brought about by the soaring housing prices.
She thought for a moment. She hadn't paid attention these past few months, but Beijing's housing market should also be starting to rise.
Liu Chen handed the gifts to her grandmother. "Grandpa Chen asked me to bring these. There are two bottles of Maotai. Let's open one today."
As she spoke, Liu Chen looked around but didn't see her mother at her aunt's house.
"Grandma, isn't Mom here yet?"
"She's here, she's here, she came early. But she slept in your place after lunch. She's probably not awake yet. Women are so troublesome when they're pregnant, there's nothing to be done. Don't resent her for having this child."
Hearing her grandmother start to counsel her, Liu Chen quickly raised her hands in surrender:
"Grandma, do you think I'm that unreasonable? Actually, I'm quite happy that Mom can have another sister or brother. That way, she won't worry about me all day long.
Grandma, you know I'm starting my own business now, striving and working hard. Sometimes, when I think about seeing Mom, it's only once every few months. Now that there's a little one, it'll give her something to focus her attention on."
Her grandmother listened to Liu Chen's words and said nothing more. She simply held Liu Chen's hands and stroked them, her face full of concern.
After sitting and peeling pistachios for her grandmother for a while, Liu Chen saw her aunt humming and busying herself in the kitchen. She then lowered her voice and leaned close to her grandmother, saying:
"Grandma, what do you think my brother should do after he graduates? He's already in his fourth year and will graduate next year."
Liu Chen's mention of this made her grandmother, Yang Shu, who was busy comforting her granddaughter, suddenly pause.
"That's right, Jiang Di is about to enter his fourth year and will graduate next year. His job hasn't been arranged yet?"
Liu Chen's words shifted her grandmother's focus to Jiang Di. It wasn't that her grandmother favored her grandson, but simply that Liu Fang's pregnancy had already happened, and she couldn't stop it.
However, Jiang Di's job search was not yet settled, and she could still put in some effort.
Seeing her grandmother Yang Shu head to the kitchen, Jiang Di quickly slipped out of the room and sat beside Liu Chen on the sofa.
"Are you trying to use Grandma to put pressure on Mom?"
Liu Chen hugged the cushion in her arms and kneaded it. Hearing Jiang Di's words, she looked up and smiled.
"Let's see first. Brother Jiang Di, think about it, Grandma definitely wants you to be a teacher. In Grandma's mind, being a teacher is such a good profession. When Aunt became a teacher back then, Grandma was so proud.
Never mind back then, even now, Grandma tells everyone that Aunt is a people's teacher and she's teaching.
Of course, I'm not trying to persuade you to be a teacher, but to let you know that your desire to be a teacher isn't that difficult."
Jiang Di nodded. Didn't he know these things?
"Alas, actually, my mom sees that Aunt Ren and Second Aunt are making money from their businesses. Although she doesn't say anything, she's envious in her heart, which is why she doesn't want me to be a teacher."
Liu Chen nodded. In her previous life, her aunt's lifelong wish was to save money to buy her son a marital home. Brother Jiang Di was also motivated to earn money because of the marital home issue, so their mother and son's goals were surprisingly consistent.
Now, Brother Jiang Di already had a marital home and wanted to be a teacher, working in a school. As for Aunt's goal, it was higher than in her previous life; she hoped Brother Jiang Di would make money, a lot of money.
Thinking of the Bitcoin she had bought for Brother Jiang Di, Liu Chen pursed her lips and looked at her still-youthful cousin.
Just as she was about to say something, she heard her mother and aunt arguing in the kitchen.
"Jiang Di is smart since he was a child, and being a teacher would be a waste!"
"A waste of what! Jiang Di is kind-hearted. If you make him do other things, he won't be able to handle it, and he won't feel good even if he can do it!"
Hearing her grandmother's words, Liu Chen sighed inwardly. Her grandmother understood Brother Jiang Di better. Indeed, in her previous life, Brother Jiang Di had been a good salesperson, but every time Liu Chen saw him leaning against a door frame, smoking silently, she could feel his fatigue.
The mother and daughter's argument attracted Liu Fang, who had just woken up from her nap. She had been sitting in her own dining room drinking milk. Her eldest sister's family was cooking, and there was the smell of cooking smoke in the living room, which she found nauseating. Now, hearing her mother and eldest sister arguing, she didn't care about the smoke anymore and walked over in her slippers.
"Chen Chen? When did you arrive? I texted you and you didn't reply, I thought you were still busy and wouldn't come."
Liu Chen waved her phone.
"Today is New Year's Day, so there were a lot of promotional messages. I didn't pay attention. I've been here for a while. Grandma and Aunt seem to have some disagreements about Brother Jiang Di's job search."
Hearing her well-behaved daughter's report of the situation, Liu Fang couldn't help but frown slightly.
"On New Year's Day, why are you talking about finding a job? If you're going to look, it will be after the New Year. These two are really something!"
Saying that, Liu Fang walked towards the kitchen, opened the door, and pulled both of them out.
Liu Fen and Yang Shu were in the heat of an argument, but seeing Liu Fang's pregnant belly, they could only suppress their anger and follow her out of the kitchen.
Out of the kitchen, the mother and daughter sat on either side of the dining chairs, neither willing to speak.
However, Liu Fang was not used to their behavior. She sat at the head of the dining table, peeling pistachios in her hand, and asked, "Tell me, what are you two thinking? You're arguing so fiercely, have you even asked Jiang Di, the person involved, what he thinks?"
At Liu Fang's words, both Grandma Yang Shu and Aunt Liu Fen froze.
Then they both turned to look at Jiang Di, who had been sitting beside Liu Chen.
Jiang Di thought of what Liu Chen had said earlier. Yes, was it difficult for him to want to be a teacher?
It wasn't difficult. If he wanted to be a teacher, he could try. It was just that he had always been accustomed to discussing everything with his mother, and his mother had also been accustomed to making decisions for him, which was why he felt hesitant to bring it up.
Looking at the expectant gazes of his grandmother and mother, Jiang Di steadied his resolve.
"I want to be a teacher. I've already obtained my teaching qualification certificate, and I've been preparing for the teacher recruitment exams during this time."
Aunt Liu Fen heard this and immediately refused without thinking: "Absolutely not!"
However, this time, Jiang Di didn't just give up when he heard her say no, as he would have done before. He swallowed and looked seriously at Liu Fen, saying:
"Mom, I really want to be a teacher. I'm an adult now, and I know what I'm choosing."
Seeing Jiang Di so serious, Liu Fen's heart, which had just calmed down, became anxious again.
"You're still young, you don't understand. What's so good about being a teacher? Look at me, the money I've saved over the years with so much effort. If I hadn't followed your Second Aunt and bought this house, when would our family have had so much money?
If you become a teacher, you'll be walking the same path as me. I'm a woman, it's okay to earn less money, but you can't. You have to support a wife and children in the future. If you earn as little as I do, how will you support them?!"
Liu Fang frowned at her eldest sister's words.
"Eldest Sister, then what do you want Jiang Di to do if he doesn't take the teacher's exam? Do business?"
Liu Fen pursed her lips. Yes, she had thought about letting Jiang Di join her second sister in business, but that was just a thought. If she actually said it, how would the boy maintain his dignity?
Even though she didn't say it, Grandma Yang Shu guessed it. Her eldest daughter was envious of her second daughter's good life. She could understand that, but how could a mother, out of envy, push her child to make money?
Wasn't she treating her child as a tool!
Grandma Yang Shu looked at her silent eldest daughter, Liu Fen, and said with annoyance:
"If you think being a teacher doesn't earn enough money and doesn't satisfy your desire to make money, fine, that's my fault. I shouldn't have let you become a teacher back then. Then think about it, if you force Jiang Di to go into business now, will he resent you like you resent me in the future!"
Grandma Yang Shu's words struck Aunt Liu Fen like lightning. She sat frozen on the chair, looking at her son Jiang Di, who had stood up and was looking at her, with a complicated expression.
Seeing her son's determined gaze, Liu Fen could only sigh in the end, saying with a look of disappointment:
"If you want to take the exam, then go ahead. Don't regret what you said today when you're short of money in the future. I originally prepared 100,000 yuan for you to start a business."
Hearing about this sum of money, Liu Chen thought of the land she was going to buy at the auction tomorrow. Of course, 100,000 yuan wouldn't be enough to buy land. Even the most remote and smallest plot of land would cost more than 100,000 yuan.
However, Liu Chen was still unsure. If her bidding for the land caused the future industrial zone planning in C City to deviate, for example, shifting a little to the left or a little to the right.
Her plot of land would then be outside the industrial park, and who would bear the losses then?
Thinking of this, Liu Chen couldn't help but grip her mobile phone. The auction was scheduled for tomorrow morning, and she needed Ren Yu's help to analyze the possibility of such a scenario.