Under Manager Yang’s adamant convincing, Yan Shuyu finally agreed to give the boss a heads up first before she went to cash the check. Just like how she had reassured the rich woman, she’s one with very intact work ethics.

That being said, she still has a bit of a guilty conscience when it comes to reaching out to the boss out of the blue and telling him to stop seeing her. That wasn’t breaking up amicably, that was straight up looking for trouble. So Yan Shuyu’s plan was to do nothing until the boss came looking for her. Then, she would be able to tell him that she was a person of her words. Now that she has accepted the check, he would need to stay away from her.

After her limited contacts with the boss, Yan Shuyu already had some stuff figured out. She felt that if only the boss really wanted to flirt around, they were not talking about the scale of a pond, they were talking about an entire ocean of fish for him to choose from. He was the master of keeping just the curious distance.

She has a better idea now. The boss might really be busy, or that he simply enjoyed cooking frogs in a pot of warm water. They have just seen each other for a week. If the pattern held, the boss would show up again this weekend. She could just wait patiently – as long as the check didn’t expire, she could just wait around for the time being.

Without cashing the check, that meant her agreement with the rich woman was not yet in effect. Yan Shuyu continued to go to work at the coffee shop.

Even though she has a 2 million yuan check in hand and that she could become an instant millionaire any minute, her painful experience from the transmigration taught her to never get too comfortable. Nevermind that she hasn’t cashed the check yet, even if the money was already in her bank account, she would still be going to work. Not having income at all was a bad idea. At most she’d do was to slack off a little during work in the future.

And just like that, Yan Shuyu acted like nothing had changed and carried on with her low-key and busy life.

Yan Shuyu did nothing in the next few days that followed. The rich woman, unexpectedly, never reached out to her again. That was very out of character of her considering her high and mighty attitude the other day. That made Yan Shuyu worried. She couldn't help but pull the check out again from her drawer at home and went to confirm it with Manager Yang. “You sure this check is real, right?”

Yang Zifeng, “……”

As speechless as he was, he still took the check and verified it for her. “Yes, don’t worry. It’s a real check. Plus, anyone that has anything to do with Boss Zhou are rich people. If words got out that they have given you a fake check, it’d make them look very bad.”

Yan Shuyu thought about it and agreed with him. Status was very important with those from a prestigious family. The rich woman even thought that writing a 500,000 yuan check for her was an insult and voluntarily increased the amount four folds. By that logic, that’s no reason why this check would be fake.

Once again, she cautiously put the check back into her purse.

Looking at her pious look, Manager Yang couldn’t help but make fun of her. “If you have time to worry about the authenticity of the check, have you thought about what you are going to say to Boss Zhou?”

“……” Now it was Yan Shuyu’s turn to be speechless.

She had been very torn lately. On one hand, she looked forward to the boss coming, that way she could resolve the issue and go cash the check; on the other hand, she wished he’d come later in time as she wanted to procrastinate the conversation as much as possible.

Nevertheless, when it rains it pours. Yan Shuyu, once again, “ran” into Boss Zhou on her way home from work that day.

Once again, she ran into Boss Zhou right outside of Sunshine House. This time Yan Shuyu was certain that the boss had just arrived as she saw his car pulling to a stop as she walked down the stairs.

His timing was so incredibly perfect. She stopped docilely and watched as the car window rolled down. The boss leaned over and greeted her, “Just getting off work?”

“Yeah. What a coincidence again?” said Yan Shuyu with a polite smile.

Zhou Qinhe didn’t chitchat with her but directly asked her, “Come eat with me?”

Yan Shuyu didn’t even give it much thought before she turned him down. “I already had dinner at work.”

“That seafood restaurant that we went to last time is known for their seafood porridge. Limited supply. I had already made a reservation. Now is the perfect time to head over.”

Hearing that, Yan Shuyu reflexively rubbed her belly. Porridge huh? She might be able to stomach two more bowls or so.

As she was hesitating, Zhou Qinhe smiled at her and said, “It might be a little bit on the late side, but porridge should be fine, right?”

Yan Shuyu mulled over it for a few seconds and finally patted where her purse was and hopped into the boss’s car. She told herself that her main purpose was to talk to the boss openly about the check; having porridges was only on the side.

With serious business as an excuse, Yan Shuyu had a much more righteous look on her. Once she had gotten inside of the car, she immediately buckled up herself before she pulled out her cellphone and called her son.

The place that they were renting did not have a phone. Yan Shuyu did not buy a cellphone for her instant son. An inexpensive cellphone cost only a few hundred yuan and she wasn’t frugal to this extent. She was more worried that her son would be addicted to cellphone at his age. She was still counting on him to for better times in her future, so that became a very important issue.

Yet, without a cellphone also meant that she had no way of reaching her instant son. Luckily, she has Manager Yan. Manager Yang’s niece has a high-technology smart watch that allows her to call her mother even from school. Once Manager Yan had learned about it, he bought the same one for Yan Shuyu as a gift. Which was why Yan Shuyu was able to communicate with her son who was waiting home for her right now. “Yuanbao, Mommy has something else to take care of and will be home late. Can you go to bed by yourself?”

Zhong Yuhuan was a very mature little boy, but he was still a very clingy child. That was perhaps a character flaw of all children from a single-parent family. He wanted to get down to the bottom of it. “Who are you with, Mommy? And what are you going to do?”

“Something minor.” Yan Shuyu didn’t want to get into it, so she tried very hard to change the subject. “Mommy won’t be home to read you a story today. Will you be okay to go to bed by yourself?”

Unfortunately, Zhang Yuanjia wasn’t one to be easily dismissed. He continued to try to figure it out. “Are you with Uncle Yang, Mommy?”

Yan Shuyu could feel a look coming from the boss. She shook her head awkwardly, “No.”

“Then is it Instructor Liu?”

The boss casted her another glance. It was not her imagination after all.

Yan Shuyu’s voice lowered some more. “No, can you go to bed like a good little boy?”

Little kiddo Zhang Yuanbao finally gave up and said in resignation, “Yuanbao can’t think of anyone else.”

Yan Shuyu, “……”

She has way more female friends than male ones, but for some odd reason, the little kiddo just assumed that she was with a man.

She did, however, have an idea why her son would think of Instructor Liu but not the Uncle Zhou that he liked so much. She had been texting Liu Ci back and forth on WeChat lately. As her examination time was getting closer, Instructor Liu was getting closer, Instructor Liu was also providing her with free tutoring. They had been in touch a lot, so, from where Zhang Yuanjia was, he thought that his mother was close to Instructor Liu.

As for Boss Zhou, even though he had met him two additional times, after the event at the musical institution, he hasn’t seen Uncle Zhou for almost a month so he wouldn’t even speculate that it’d be him.

Zhang Yuanjia, who couldn’t figure out who his mom was with decided to give up. But then, he brought up a new request. “If Mommy can’t read me a story, can you sing me a song?”

The little kiddo surely knew how to barter. Yan Shuyu was amused and bartered with him. “Does that mean you will go to bed after I sing?”

Zhang Yuanbao agreed, and Yan Shuyu had him turn off his lamp on the night table, crawl into bed, and close his eyes. After the little kiddo did all those things, she started singing. She sang the same familiar song at Sunshine house -- “Little Leaping Frog”.

Before she started singing, she hadn’t forgotten about the man next to her and had given him a heads up when the little kiddo was distracted. “Em… let me sing him a song first.”

Zhou Qinhe was probably curious too and nodded agreeably. Then Yan Shuyu started singing.

Under her influence, Zhang Yuanjia now knew this song like the back of his hand, so as soon as she started singing it, he started singing along. But his volume lowered gradually by the end of the first round. It wasn’t a difficult job to put a little kiddo to sleep. Yan Shuyu sang it a couple more times and only hung up on the phone after she heard rhythmic breathing coming from the other end. She smiled and said boastfully to the boss, “Mission accomplished.”

Zhou Qinhe, his hands still on the steering wheel, turned and smiled at her. As a parent, he could relate to Yan Shuyu’s emotion at that moment.

Seeing that she had gotten off the phone, Boss Zhou started chitchatting with her, “Yuanbao has his own cellphone now?”

“It’s a smartwatch. The kind that you can only make calls on.” Yan Shuyu explained simply. “I don’t want to get him a cellphone just yet.”

“He can only talk to you on his phone?” The boss grasped it quickly.

Yan Shuyu nodded and Zhou Qinhe smiled and said, “That’s disappointing. I thought we would be able to talk to Yuanbao as well.”

“Yeah,” said Yan Shuyu while she secretly praised Manager Yang on his great idea. Her son was already unreasonably fond of the boss when they couldn’t get hold of each other. She could only imagine what it’d be like if they have means to contact each other.

But that’s alright. The boss and her would go their own ways after today. Yan Shuyu felt very optimistic after she touched her purse where the check was. She was very patient today and didn’t blurb everything out on their way. She was determined to wait until they reached the restaurant and after she had a chance to try the legendary seafood porridge – if she was to tell him now, she might not be able to try the seafood porridge if the boss was in a bad mood.

They arrived at the restaurant as Yan Shuyu was having all sorts of ideas.

For some unknown reason, the boss booked a private room even though there were only the two of them this time. Yan Shuyu had been here once before so as the server took them toward the inner part of the restaurant, Yan Shuyu knew they wouldn’t be dining in the open area this time.

Yan Shuyu felt a bit awkward about that, but on second thought, she decided against saying anything about it. A private room is just as good. It would make it easy to have the conversation that they would be having.

She followed behind the server docilely without making a sound. Even Zhou Qinhe couldn't help but look over at her.

Yan Shuyu was still thinking about how to broach the subject and didn’t notice the look he gave her.

After showing them to the private room, the server said enthusiastically, “Please have a seat. Our chef had started your porridge an hour ago. I will bring it right up.”

The server wasn’t lying about it. She came back with two others in a couple of minutes with their dishes. In addition to the steaming porridge, there were a few more dishes. After placing them in front of them, the server said the chef was preparing the remaining dishes and to enjoy their meal.