Plans

The next morning, Wan Chao woke up to the sound of Bai Zhexi cooking breakfast. She looked at the familiar room and the calendar on the table. Her heart slowly settled down. She was still sixteen years old.

She lay in bed and enjoyed the warmth of home for a while before getting out of bed.

When she took a step forward, Wan Chao froze for a moment, as if the pain in her limbs were really gone. She raised her arm to look, and saw that the color of the purple had changed, but she didn't know how long Bai Zhexi had massaged her last night.

After washing her face and rinsing her mouth, Bai Zhexi had just finished cooking.

"Chao'er, let's eat."

"Alright."

Breakfast consisted of rice porridge, tortillas, and a cucumber sauce made by Bai Zhexi. It was crispy and sweet. It was very tasty.

It had been nearly twenty years since she had eaten such delicious pickles. In her previous life, she had gone through great efforts to find one, but she had never eaten one that's better than the one made by Bai Zhexi.

"Chao'er, don't just eat the pickled cucumber, drink some rice porridge to warm your stomach."

Bai Zhexi, who had been observing her daughter's every move, reminded her.

"Yes." Wan Chao smiled at Bai Zhexi and then picked up the bowl to drink the congee.

The millet porridge was simmered and very delicious. Wan Chao felt that everything Bai Zhexi cooked was delicious.

She raised her head and saw Bai Zhexi holding the chopsticks, frozen in place and unable to move for a long time.

"Mom, what's wrong?" Wan Chao asked curiously.

"Chao'er, you haven't smiled at me in a long time." The voice actually sounded like it was choked with sobs.

Wan Chao was stunned for a moment, and then her heart began to churn. It had started when she was ten years old. That year, her father had sacrificed himself, and from time to time, An Lian would come out and roam about.

"Mom, before, I was too willful, too selfish, and too stupid. In the future, I will definitely show you respect and filial piety. I'm sorry." Wan Chao put down her bowl and chopsticks and said sincerely.

Hearing what Wan Chao said, Bai Zhexi's eyes widened. She didn't dare to believe what she had just heard. After a while, she asked in a trembling voice, "Chao'er, is what you said true?"

"It's true, I'll do whatever you want me to from now on. I won't do what you don't want me to do, I'll change into whatever daughter you like."

Once again, she lived once more, and Wan Chao knew how important Bai Zhexi was to her. Without Bai Zhexi, she was like a rootless duckweed, unable to be at ease no matter where she went.

Bai Zhexi looked at Wan Chao in bewilderment for a moment. Seeing that she was serious, she tentatively said, "Mom hopes that you can study well and get into a good university."

"No problem."

"Mother wants us to open up and tell each other, not to run away from home, not to lose temper, no matter how unhappy we are," she said.

"Okay, I'll do my best."

Seeing her rebellious daughter suddenly change so much in a single day, although Bai Zhexi was happy to see her change, her heart still felt uneasy. She decided to observe it slowly.

After the meal, Wan Chao even took the initiative to wash the dishes.

"Chao'er, you're already in your second year of high school, so you should hurry up and study. Today, you should rest at home and read properly. Tomorrow, you have to go to school, okay?"

Seeing that Bai Zhexi's attitude was very resolute, Wan Chao decided to obediently follow her lead and returned to her room.

In the room, Wan Chao flipped through the textbooks on the desk, looking familiar and unfamiliar.

In fact, Wan Chao was very smart. In elementary school, she always got first place in every exam. She started her teens and her grades slightly fell, but she didn't fall out of the top five. In her first mock exam, she took the sixth place in her class.

In her second year of high school, she had listened to Zhuo Yao's advice and abandoned her studies. Her university entrance examination results had been a complete mess too.

After that, Wan Chao didn't learn much for more than a decade, and she had long forgotten all about her high school textbooks.

Although she was already in her second year of high school and less than two years away from the College Entrance Test, Wan Chao was very confident that she could take the College Entrance Test and give Bai Zhexi a beautiful College Entrance Examination result to make up for the shortcomings of her previous life.

After some thought, she found a blank piece of paper and carefully wrote down her work and rest plan for the day.

When she finished writing her plan, Bai Zhexi's voice came from the living room.

"Chao'er, mother will go out to set up a stall. You should study hard at home by yourself."

Wan Chao hurried out of the room. In the living room, Bai Zhexi carried a machine in one hand and a large bag in the other.

"Mom, let's not go to the south side of the city today, it's too far. Let's stay nearby from now on."

"Huh?" Bai Zhexi was momentarily at a loss for words.

"Don't go to the south of the city." After Wan Chao said it again, Bai Zhexi finally understood her daughter's meaning. She smiled and said:

"It's okay, it's not far. Mom will be arriving soon by bus." She was afraid of humiliating her daughter.

"I've changed, Mother. I won't be so vain in the future," she said.

In the end, under the insistence of Wan Chao, Bai Zhexi agreed to set up a stall in a nearby market.

They had only walked for twenty minutes when they arrived at the nearest market place to the glassworks. As it belonged to the center of the county and there were many people, Wan Chao helped Bai Zhexi to find a blank space. After paying a fee of three dollars, they set up the shoe repair stall.

"Chao'er, hurry up and go back. Eat lunch by yourself, don't worry about mother." Bai Zhexi stuffed 5 yuan into Wan Chao's pocket and told her to go back.

Wan Chao didn't say anything. She took the money and left the market after seeing that there were no problems with Bai Zhexi.

After leaving the market, she didn't go straight home, instead, she once again wandered around the streets.

Seeing Bai Zhexi sitting in the open air of the market, waiting for people to mend their shoes, she felt uncomfortable. She wanted to study the market in Wutong County and find a suitable job for her family.

Unfortunately, after a whole morning, she still hadn't found anything good. She wasn't discouraged and knew that life wasn't easy.

When she decided to eat out at noon, she chose a clean and formal restaurant with a slightly critical air.

She asked for a bowl of noodles and sat in a corner. There were two middle-aged men sitting on the table, one of them had a black briefcase on his lap with the words' Wutong County Government 'written on it. She guessed that these two were probably working for the government.

Wan Chao quietly waited.

"Old Wu's noodles are really delicious, but the pickled vegetables are really not that delicious. I might be able to eat an extra bowl of noodles if they make some delicious sauces or something like that." One of the men across from him said to the other.

"That's right, I want to bring some pickled vegetables myself. This Old Wu won't let me. Look at the pickled vegetables provided by them. They're so unpalatable. Can they even be called pickled vegetables?!" The other man also complained.

Wan Chao looked at the dish of free pickles in the middle of the table. The big dish had been chopped into pieces and was mixed with soy sauce. It really didn't look good.

When her noodles were served, Wan Chao picked up a pair of chopsticks and ate them. As expected, the noodles were strong and the flavor of the noodles was strong.

She picked up more pickles and put them in her mouth.

Heh!

She almost vomited, but seeing that there was no trash can or tissue around her, she felt unsanitary and quickly swallowed it down. She then ate two more chopsticks of noodles to quell the salty taste.

The two middle-aged men couldn't help but laugh when they saw her expression.

The salted vegetables had been filled with who knows how much salt. It was a dead man.

Was the salt seller beaten to death?!

Looking at the pickled vegetables, Wan Chao had an idea.