It was early evening.
"Do we have guests?"
Zhao Lanxiang was the first to return. Stopping her bicycle, she heard what sounded like strangers talking inside and hurriedly asked her younger son, Lian Lei, about it. Lian Lei, who was rolling an iron hoop in the lane, immediately ran over, stood on tiptoe, and whispered quite a lot into his mother's ear, grinning and waggling his eyebrows all the while.
"From Guangxi?"
That was the only part Zhao Lanxiang caught, and her eyes lit up. Rubbing her hands together, she pulled a few meal tickets and several yuan from her pocket. "Go wait for your dad at the intersection. Tell him to..."
"Oh, my brother already bought everything during the day," Lian Lei said. "Loads of food. We're just waiting for you two."
Sure enough, even as they spoke, hot oil was already sizzling in the kitchen, and a rich, spicy aroma quickly spread through the evening breeze.
Father Lian came home humming a tune just then. When he reached the courtyard gate and smelled the food inside, he asked in puzzlement, "What's all this? Has something good happened to our family?"
Zhao Lanxiang copied Lian Lei's earlier manner and whispered in his ear. Then, like a pair of thieves, the couple stealthily parked their bicycles, crept into the little courtyard, and peered through the window.
"Goodness, that girl's tall and slender. You don't see that often."
"Tall is good. With our son's height, a short girl wouldn't suit him. She'd need a stool just to kiss him. Mm, she really is from the south. Such well-defined features, rosy fair skin, fresh as a cabbage just sprouting out of the ground."
"Do you even know how to talk? What, is your son a pig?"
"I'm saying the girl's pretty! A