June 6th, Tuesday. The weather was fair and sunny.
Today was Mangzhong on the lunar calendar. The capital's weather had clearly begun to heat up. In previous years, by this time, the clothing stores along the streets would have put away the outdated spring clothes and displayed all sorts of floral dresses, hoping to seize passersby's wallets and turn them inside out.
There were no credit cards these days, so if there was not enough cash in your wallet, then no matter how lovely the floral dress was, you could only stand outside the display window and sigh wistfully.
Since the Dragon Boat Festival was only two days away, Li Ye followed tradition that afternoon and took his wife and children to Teacher Ke's home.
But as he drove down the street, he found it unusually deserted. Forget floral dresses—many shops had not even opened, especially the privately owned ones. Their doors and windows were tightly shut, leaving them deathly still.
Little Pouch knelt on the back seat, pressed against the window, and looked outside for a long time. Then she suddenly asked Li Ye, "Dad, are the toy store and cake shop off work on Tuesday afternoons too?"
"Mm, they're off this Tuesday. They'll be open afterward."
"Oh, then that's fine."
Little Pouch was relieved. The television station did not broadcast on Tuesday afternoons. If the cake shop and toy store were closed too, it would throw her normal routine into complete disorder.
Since there was no TV signal on Tuesday afternoons, Little Pouch would pester Wu Juying to take her out for a stroll whenever Tuesday afternoon came around. She would spend some money on cakes and share them with Grandma Wu Juying and her brother, then visit the toy store.
In any case, she mostly just looked