Chapter 8 Thumbelina Jiahe (Revised)

Before the other side could…

Si Jiahe was still clinging to her body, almost half of his body leaning over, his entire face buried in Tang Man’s neck, his slightly warm breath hitting the back of her neck.

“Man Man, I miss you so much,” the boy said.

She shrank her neck, placing her hand on the back of the boy’s head, rubbing it.

“Are you acting spoiled?”

She said in a neutral tone, her gaze falling on the empty space in front of the car. She withdrew her other hand from Si Jiahe’s grasp, pulled out the car key and put it in her shoulder bag, then picked it up with her other hand and lightly patted the person in her arms.

“Stop acting spoiled, let’s go buy the groceries first and go home to cook.”

Being intimate in this situation was not very appropriate. Although this was an underground parking lot, infrared cameras were installed on both sides. She had no hobby of getting intimate under other people’s gazes.

Moreover, she hadn’t eaten lunch and was really a bit hungry now, even feeling a bit of a stomachache.

Si Jiahe hummed a few times before getting up from Tang Man’s embrace, but his eyes were bright, as if soaked with tears in the dark light.

“Man Man,” he called her name.

There were many questions in his heart.

Are you still with Du Henian?

Is he not good to you? Otherwise, how could you allow me to sit by your side? Why are you so intimate with me, as if we had never been apart?

Do you not like Du Henian anymore?

Leave him and be with me, okay?

But he didn’t dare to ask any of these questions, afraid that any one of them would receive a negative answer, and he would never get a chance again.

The jealousy and bitter hatred in his heart spread endlessly in the darkness, like the roots and vines of ivy, entangling the narrow space.

He lowered his head, unable to resist leaning into Tang Man’s arms again, burying his face in the woman’s chest, not wanting her to see the hideous and distorted expression on his face due to jealousy.

“Alright, alright, I know you’re in a bad mood.” Tang Man put down the bag in her hand and placed it on the steering wheel, slowly coaxing him.

She thought, it was unavoidable for the child to feel sad after his mother’s death.

She reluctantly spared a bit of attention to softly comfort the person in her arms. Her other hand had already pushed open the car door. After another moment, when she felt her arm going a bit numb, she finally pushed Si Jiahe away.

She touched the boy’s reddened eye corners, wiped them a bit, and kissed the corner of his mouth before saying, “I haven’t eaten lunch, and I’m very hungry now. Can our Jiahe have some consideration for me?”

Hearing Tang Man’s tone of coaxing a child, Si Jiahe’s face couldn’t help but redden a bit. After a few seconds, he shyly lowered his head and slowly nodded.

Only then did Tang Man let out a sigh of relief and hurriedly got out of the car.

She was afraid that if this continued, there would be no end to it.

This child Si Jiahe had always been very sensitive and liked to cry, whether in bed or out of bed. Sometimes she couldn’t handle it. But he cried even more miserably in bed, softly, with a layer of blush appearing on his skin. Especially his pair of eyes, as if they could speak. When looking at them, she would lose her mind, wishing she could give everything to him.

She looked at the boy who was still a bit shy with red ear tips after getting out of the car and smiled, extending a hand.

Si Jiahe immediately threw himself over, intertwining their fingers and tightly sticking together.

Tang Man had never bought groceries before. She followed beside him the entire time, watching Si Jiahe select from a pile of vegetables.

Most of the people here were women, young women, old women. But it was still quite eye-catching for such a young man to appear.

The key was that this young man was also very good-looking, exquisitely so, not much different from some celebrities. Otherwise, Tang Man wouldn’t be able to resist getting involved with him again now.

Because of this overly eye-catching appearance and his unusually skilled movements when selecting vegetables, the surrounding women couldn’t help but glance over a few times.

Tang Man didn’t like this kind of staring very much. She had walked ahead to the pricing area and stood there waiting for him to come over.

But when it was finally time to price the items, Tang Man took a look and seemed to remember something. “No bones?”

“Hm?”

Tang Man said, “My dad just sent a message saying he wants to drink pork knuckle soup. Let’s buy some bones back to stew. It can be put in the refrigerator, and I’ll heat it up and deliver it to him tomorrow.”

Hearing Tang Man’s words, Si Jiahe seemed to become a bit nervous and quickly nodded. “Then I’ll go over there to buy some pork knuckles and also get some soybeans. Soybeans are not bad for making soup.”

Tang Man nodded indifferently.

In any case, she wasn’t the one making the soup.

The meat section had a strong smell. Si Jiahe didn’t let her go over, perhaps afraid of making her wait long. He came back with a bag in just a few minutes.

This trip to the supermarket took them about an hour. When they came out, they couldn’t carry everything in their hands and had to push a cart to the parking garage, directly putting the things into the trunk.

By the time they returned to her home, it was already past four o’clock, almost five o’clock, the time for dinner.

Tang Man was so hungry that her chest was sticking to her back. But there was nothing in this house, and the fridge was probably empty. She could only drink several glasses of water to stave off hunger. Otherwise, if she became too hungry, her stomach would start to ache a bit.

As soon as they entered the door, Si Jiahe took a bunch of things into the kitchen to prepare dinner and put some easily perishable vegetables into the fridge in layers.

He had always known that Tang Man had a bit of a mild stomach condition. This was all because of her poor eating habits. In university, she would often go hungry for one meal and be full for another, skipping breakfast and basically relying on takeout for other times. To his surprise, after two years, there was still no change.

Thinking of this, Si Jiahe actually felt a bit happy.

This meant that she still needed him. What he had been terrified of before was that he was still stuck in the past while she had already changed, no longer needing him.

Now, he could no longer bear any changes.

Si Jiahe had come here many times before, back when they were still in university. Tang Man would live here during summer vacation. She didn’t know how to cook, so she could only order takeout every day. Later, when Si Jiahe found out, he would come over every day to cook for her, sometimes even cleaning and doing laundry for her, simply like a Thumbelina.

Standing outside the kitchen with one hand lightly resting on her stomach, Tang Man watched the busy boy and began to reminisce. How did she break up with this Thumbelina back then?

It shouldn’t have been like that, she thought.

But the two years had shrouded the past memories with a layer of white gauze, and she couldn’t remember many details.

She only remembered that during that time, something seemed to have happened in Si Jiahe’s family. He didn’t often appear at school, frequently taking leave, and the times he met with her also became fewer and fewer.

They also had a fight because of one of her ex-boyfriends. Specifically, it seemed she hadn’t deleted that boy’s phone number, and when he sent her a message, Si Jiahe saw it, although it was the only time.

But the boy saw it and made a big fuss, wanting her to apologize.

However, Tang Man was unusually angry because of Si Jiahe’s actions. She had a strong sense of privacy and didn’t like others touching her private things, especially objects like her phone.

That time, Si Jiahe had undoubtedly crossed her bottom line.

In the following cold war period, she often hung out with Du Henian. The freshness quickly replaced the weariness from her long-term relationship with Si Jiahe. She was immersed in the novel feelings brought by that man Du Henian, easily overlooking some things.

So now, thinking back, it seemed that all the memories had been shrouded in a layer of shadow, becoming mottled and disjointed.