He stood at the door and listened for a while. Only after confirming that Fu Xiaoxiao hadn't woken up did he breathe a sigh of relief, turn around, and head downstairs.
He had just reached the bottom step when someone suddenly said, "You're too late!"
Su Huaiming jumped, his body trembling uncontrollably as his hand instinctively gripped the banister.
Sun Siyuan was even more nervous than he was. He rushed forward and caught Su Huaiming by the arm, afraid he might faint on the stairs.
Su Huaiming stood perfectly steady. He patted his chest in lingering fright, then frowned and glared at Sun Siyuan. "Speaking up so suddenly—are you trying to scare me to death?!"
Sun Siyuan stared at him in horror. "Don't tell me you have a heart problem too?"
Su Huaiming was baffled by the question. "No."
Only then did Sun Siyuan breathe a sigh of relief. In his mind, Su Huaiming seemed a little less like the frail Lin Daiyu.
"I..." Sun Siyuan had just started to speak when his stomach let out a rumble.
It was exceptionally loud, echoing through the empty house and lingering in the air.
Sun Siyuan: "..."
Su Huaiming: "..."
Seeing the look of mortification and anger in Sun Siyuan's eyes, Su Huaiming thought he was about to kill him to keep him quiet. He hurriedly coughed and changed the subject. "I've already ordered takeout. It'll be here in another ten minutes."
Sun Siyuan was starving. Looking at his late revolutionary comrade, he couldn't help complaining, "Why did you come down so late?"
"I had to wait until Xiao Xiao fell asleep before I could come out," Su Huaiming said in a lowered voice. "If the three kids caught us sneaking fried chicken, none of us would get to eat any!"
Sun Siyuan nodded, still shaken, and cautioned him, "Then let's be careful. We absolutely can't let them find out."
Su Huaiming and Sun Siyuan were both so hungry that they had no energy to talk. They sat quietly on the sofa, anxiously waiting for the fried chicken delivery.
Every second felt like a year.
After Sun Siyuan checked his phone for the 108th time, there was suddenly a noise outside.
Sun Siyuan frowned and complained mercilessly, "Is a stray cat in heat? Why does it sound so awful?"
The delivery driver outside the door: "..."
He looked at the note on the order: "Don't knock. Meow three times outside the door and I'll come open it. Please." A vein bulged on his temple in anger. If not for his professionalism, he might have dropped the order and walked away.
Su Huaiming immediately realized what was happening and glared at Sun Siyuan, signaling that the cat in heat was the delivery driver.
Sun Siyuan was so hungry he wanted to rush straight to the door, but he was too concerned with his image. He stuck his hands in his pockets and followed Su Huaiming at a leisurely pace, acting full of himself.
The door opened a crack.
The delivery driver saw a fluffy head poke through the opening. He stared for a few seconds, then was just about to speak when Su Huaiming cut him off.
Su Huaiming made a shushing gesture and lowered his voice. "Thank you for making the delivery so late."
Baffled by Su Huaiming's air of secrecy, the delivery driver instinctively lowered his voice too. "It's all right. It's my job."
With that, he handed the fried chicken to Su Huaiming.
After taking it, Su Huaiming recalled what Sun Siyuan had just said and apologized awkwardly. "Sorry, my friend didn't know about the note I left. He didn't mean to say that."
The delivery driver wasn't going to fuss over such a small matter. He was just about to say it was fine when Su Huaiming shushed him again, looking at him in alarm to let him know his voice had been too loud.
The driver could only lower his voice again and whisper, "It's all right, I don't mind!"
He instinctively drew the words out for so long that he nearly suffocated saying them.
The smell of fried chicken had Sun Siyuan practically drooling a river. He couldn't help urging them on. "Why are you two talking so much nonsense?"
The sound startled the delivery driver. Only then did he realize there was someone else inside.
He looked up, but could only make out Sun Siyuan's indistinct silhouette. He was a tall, broad man, watching him intently like a tiger eyeing its prey.
The delivery driver's heart skipped a beat, and he suddenly felt a little afraid.
After Sun Siyuan urged him on, Su Huaiming handed him the fried chicken and closed the door.
The delivery driver stood outside the closed door for a full half minute, panting in lingering fear and feeling utterly terrified.
The house was pitch-black and shrouded in secrecy. He couldn't speak loudly, and there was a burly man watching from behind...
Was this a gang hideout?!
The more the delivery driver thought about it, the more convinced he became. Afraid they would target him, he hurried away, his retreat so panicked it was as though a monster were chasing him.
The viewers in the livestream had seen the whole thing clearly and were laughing so hard they could barely breathe.
[Hahahahaha, Su Huaiming, what did you two do? You scared the delivery driver half to death!]
[You really can't blame the delivery driver for overthinking it. Those two were acting way too suspicious, pointing fingers.jpg]
[They went to all that trouble just to eat some fried chicken. I suddenly feel a little sorry for them.]
[If you feel sorry for anyone, it should be the three little ones. Those scheming adults actually ate fried chicken behind their backs and didn't save them a single bite! Tears in my eyes.jpg]
Su Huaiming had spent a long time browsing the delivery app before choosing this restaurant's fried chicken. It had excellent reviews, and the portion was big enough too.
He had deliberately ordered an extra-large portion and several additional sauces so they could eat to their hearts' content.
As soon as the box opened, Sun Siyuan caught the rich, oily aroma in the air, and every cell in his body trembled with excitement.
It had been a whole week. He hadn't eaten fried food for an entire week!
What an ordeal that had been for him!
Sun Siyuan couldn't wait to put on gloves. He grabbed a piece of fried chicken, opened his mouth wide, and stuffed the whole thing in.
The coating was neither too thick nor too thin, and it was exceptionally crisp. It was fried all the way through, crunching against his teeth with an appetite-whetting crackle.
The chicken, meanwhile, was tender and juicy, yet retained the texture of the meat and its distinctive aroma.
The restaurant hadn't mixed the fried chicken with the sauce, so the coating was still crisp. Paired with the sweet and spicy sauce, it stimulated the taste buds without the sauce completely overpowering the chicken's own flavor.
Su Huaiming and Sun Siyuan were perfectly in sync. They sat on opposite sides of the table without exchanging a word of idle chatter, thoroughly enjoying the fried chicken.
Whatever special method the restaurant had used, the chicken was wonderfully crisp but not greasy at all. They simply couldn't stop eating.
Su Huaiming and Sun Siyuan were enjoying it so much that the viewers in the livestream kept swallowing at the sight.
[Aaah, this is too much! How can you tempt us with food in the middle of the night!]
[I struggled with myself for a few seconds and already placed an order for fried chicken.]
[Help, the people upstairs and downstairs can hear me swallowing like crazy!]
[My great diet lasted three days, and just like that, these two easily ruined it. Waaaah.]
[Girls, diet in moderation. Your health is the most important thing!]
Su Huaiming ate three pieces in a row before he finally felt his hunger ease. He got up and headed for the refrigerator.
When he returned, he had two cans of chilled cola in his hands.
Sun Siyuan's eyes lit up, and he immediately reached out with a greasy hand to grab one.
Su Huaiming paused and couldn't help remarking, "Are you so hungry because you haven't eaten in three days?"
Sun Siyuan waved a hand. "Seven days, to be precise."
Su Huaiming exposed him mercilessly. "But you ate plenty every day."
"How can eating vegetables count as a meal?" Sun Siyuan said confidently. "Only meat and fried food count as real food!"
Su Huaiming chuckled. "If you say that, vegetables will be so sad they'll cry."
Sun Siyuan shrugged. "Can't help it. I'm a textbook carnivore."
With that, he took a sip of cola and felt so refreshed it was as though he had found the soul he was supposed to have.
Sun Siyuan took three sips in a row, then lamented with a miserable look, "We're eating fried chicken, and we don't even have beer."
Su Huaiming was slowly pouring his cola into a wineglass with a great sense of ceremony. "That's enough. The kids are here. How could there possibly be beer in the fridge?"
"But I'm not a child," Sun Siyuan couldn't help complaining. "Can't adults drink beer?"
Su Huaiming gave Sun Siyuan a long look but couldn't bring himself to tell the truth.
Sun Siyuan's role on this childcare variety show was that of an oversized brat, no different from Fu Xiaoxiao and the others.
Su Huaiming drank some cola from his wineglass before continuing to eat his fried chicken.
The atmosphere in the livestream was good, but Su Huaiming's haters were nursing grievances after being proven wrong again and again, and deliberately argued at every opportunity.
[Su Huaiming soaks his feet every day and tries to build a health-conscious persona, yet he's eating fried chicken and drinking cola late at night. Isn't that inconsistent?!]
[I'm dying, that persona fell apart way too fast.]
[Does Su Huaiming think there are no viewers at night? Is that why he's letting himself go?]
Unaware that his haters were still making a fuss, Su Huaiming took a bite of fried chicken, then pretentiously raised his wineglass and took a big swig of cola as though he were tasting red wine.
Both of them were eating in the dark, so the livestream image was quite blurry, but someone still spotted an unidentified object in the wineglass.
[What's floating on the cola?]
[I noticed it too. It looks like something brown and oval.]
[...They're goji berries.]
[??? Goji berries soaking in cola?!]
The discovery delighted the livestream viewers.
[Hahahahaha, Su Huaiming is serious about staying healthy.]
[Su Huaiming hasn't broken character. He even puts goji berries in his cola!]
[Seriously, I've never seen anyone work as hard as Su Huaiming to build a health-conscious persona. Touched.jpg]
[Hahahahaha, this is how young people look after their health these days.]
[True. I just ate a slice of chocolate cake, and to cut down on the calories, I deliberately drank a cup of iced milk tea too. I'm really working so hard to diet and stay healthy!]
[That reminds me of when I ate ice cream in winter. I was afraid it would hurt my stomach, so I stuck two heat packs on my belly. That way the hot and cold would cancel each other out! Doge.jpg]
Su Huaiming wasn't trying to build a health-conscious persona. His health had simply been so poor in his previous life that the memory still frightened him, so he paid a little more attention to it than most people.
The two ate happily, gradually making their way to the bottom of the entire large box of fried chicken. Just then, the door beside them opened.