Chapter 42: Record of Moving to the City in the 90s 42

The three old brothers had lost their jobs, but life at home still had to go on.

Those three sisters-in-law had now thickened their skins and come knocking on the door.

This time they weren’t asking for anything specific; they just wanted to wander around the Siheyuan, intending to visit more often in the hopes that the family might throw a few scraps their way in the future.

Neither Zhou Jing nor Ms. Meng were the type to indulge such behavior, so they simply moved house.

Zhou Jing was in the real estate business himself; if there was one thing his family didn’t lack, it was houses.

Move, move, move—they moved quickly. Once they were gone, life became peaceful.

Back when the two elders were still alive, they hadn’t paid much attention to those relatives. Now that the elders were gone, why bother with them at all?

When the young brothers, Pengcheng and Wanli, were in the third grade of primary school, the family moved from the Siheyuan to a large villa that resembled a manor.

The school changed, and the number of domestic staff increased. Because the house and yard were so large, the cleaning couldn’t be managed without more help.

Su Huandan and her husband had essentially always lived with her parents-in-law. Previously, they lived across the hall; now, they were just a few steps away.

As the parents-in-law were getting older, they had no intention of living separately.

Less than a month after moving into the new home, Su Huandan found herself pregnant again.

The couple had been busy with their careers and had been using contraception; they really hadn’t planned on having a second child. But now that she was pregnant, she couldn’t exactly get an abortion, could she?

Initially, Su Huandan was a bit worried, fearing her superior would show up again and ask her to give birth to another “big shot.”

As it turned out, the superior never came.

It wasn’t until the little daughter was born and Su Huandan realized the child didn’t have any of the abnormalities her second brother, Yu Wanli, possessed that she finally breathed a sigh of relief.

One “big shot” son in a lifetime was more than enough; having more would truly be a source of constant anxiety.

For instance, right now, the second son was saying he wanted to skip grades again.

“The curriculum at school is so boring. I just want to skip ahead. I want to finish my studies early and do what I actually want to do.” Yu Wanli had wanted to skip grades since the first grade, but it had never been allowed.

Su Huandan didn’t agree. You’re such a small person, you’ve only been in primary school for half a semester, and you want to run off to middle school? The family doesn’t have a throne for you to inherit, nor are we so destitute that we need you to become a success early to support the household. Why are you in such a rush to finish school?

But year after year passed, and now that he was in the third grade, Yu Wanli truly didn’t want to linger in primary school anymore.

Yu Wanli was the best-looking child in the family, better-looking and more robust than his older brother. In the third grade, he was already 1.66 meters tall. He looked sturdy, but it was all muscle rather than baby fat.

He was more than a head taller than his brother.

Yu Wanli was very polite to his family and appeared very well-bred, but there was a sense of detachment between them.

It wasn’t that Yu Wanli didn’t like his family or was impatient with being close to them; it was simply his nature to be such a reserved person.

The family always spoke to him in a consultative tone. Only Su Huandan, as his biological mother, could occasionally lose her temper with him.

Just as she was about to get angry, Yu Zexiu quickly stopped his wife and tucked their infant daughter into her arms.

“Don’t worry about it, I’ll talk to him. It’s time for the little one to nurse.” Yu Zexiu sent Su Huandan aside to breastfeed.

Only then did he ask the second son, “Tell Dad first, what do you want to do in the future?”

Yu Wanli raised an eyebrow and smiled. “I want to get into aerospace and go see outer space.”

Su Huandan was stunned and blurted out, “You want to be an astronaut? You don’t need to skip grades for that right now, do you?”

Yu Wanli turned his face to look at his father helplessly, feeling as though he completely couldn’t communicate with his mother. “I don’t want to be an astronaut. I want to build spacecraft. Why would I put my life and safety in someone else’s hands? If I’m in a rocket or flight vehicle built by someone else and something goes wrong, wouldn’t I be the unlucky one?”

Su Huandan was speechless.

She felt like she was being looked down upon by her son.

Seeing the look of disbelief on his wife’s face, Yu Zexiu let out a muffled laugh. “Well, your grandfather is still counting on you to take over the business. Do you really not plan on taking the family assets?”

“What would I want those for? Leave them all for my big brother and little sister. As long as I research a few things and develop some civilian technology, is there any amount of money I couldn’t earn?” As Yu Wanli spoke, he wore a little expression that suggested he thought very little of the family’s wealth.

The matter wasn’t settled on the spot; they said they would discuss it with his grandparents later.

That evening, the family held a serious internal meeting.

Although the old couple was surprised that Yu Wanli wanted to pursue a path in scientific research, they supported it with both hands. Their generation held national sentiment more deeply than the youth. They knew all too well how smart their grandson was. With a brain like that going into research—regardless of whether he could actually build a ship and travel to outer space as he claimed—it certainly wouldn’t be a waste of talent.

“Go if you want to. Your grandfather and I are still capable; we’ll work a few more years to build up a nest egg for you. We might even be able to provide your research funding later. Your parents’ things can be left to your brother and sister.” Once Zhou Jing said this, the “big shot” Yu Wanli’s aerospace career was put on the fast track.

In three years, the boy skipped so many grades that he finished middle school, high school, and university. Now, he had been taken in as a disciple by a domestic aerospace giant, a true academician and expert.

Even though they lived in the same city of Beijing, it was normal not to see him for a year.

Su Huandan thought to herself that her superior had really deceived her. Was this boy even her son?

As the biological mother who had gone through labor for him, she was constantly worried, yet that boy didn’t seem to think about coming back for a single visit.

After giving birth to her daughter, Su Huandan didn’t go to the company often.

Her parents were getting up there in years. The purpose of her rebirth was her parents, and now she should spend more time with the elderly.

After letting go of the company’s affairs, Su Huandan lived a life where her sons were left to her parents-in-law’s care while she frequently took her young daughter back to her maternal home.

Su Dakui was now seventy-three, and Jiang Chunhua was seventy-one. Su Huandan’s youngest brother was fifteen, in his third year of middle school, the age to take the high school entrance exams.

This boy had a very active mind and was quite clever, but he just didn’t like to study.

“He’s exactly like you three sisters were back then. When you girls stopped going to school, you all stayed home honestly and didn’t run around. But this boy isn’t like that; he’s a customer at every internet cafe, large and small, in this neighborhood. If your father goes to an internet cafe to look for someone in the afternoon, he catches him every single time. Oh, heavens! Back when I didn’t have a son, I felt weak and couldn’t speak firmly. Now that I have a son, I still feel like I can’t speak firmly. Other people’s sons study like their lives depend on it, aiming for university. Ours… sigh!” Old Comrade Jiang Chunhua had quite a few demands; now that she had a son, she wanted him to make her proud.

Heh, Su Dakui just sneered right to her face.

“Give it a rest. You can tell what a person will be like at eighty by how they are at three, and this kid has never been cut out for studying since he was little. You’re the only one who won’t give up. You’ve pushed him to the point where he doesn’t even want to come home; he’d rather hang out at an internet cafe. You’ve got the internet and a computer all set up for him at home, yet the boy still won’t come back. Who’s to blame for that?” My goodness, this couple rarely argued, but now they were fighting every day over their youngest son.