Chi Qing returned to the village (3)
As she was thinking, Chi Yongliang came in on crutches. He deftly set them in the corner beside the kang and climbed onto it too.
"Dad, it's snowed a little again lately, so you really must watch your step. Don't go out if you don't have to," Chi Qing said, pulling over the large bag she had casually set beside her.
"It's fine. I'll walk slowly." Chi Yongliang smiled amiably, his eyes growing wider and wider as he watched Chi Qing pull out one finely packaged little box after another.
"What's this?" Yue Meifen's eyes widened in surprise too. She picked up one of the boxes Chi Qing had set on the kang, opened it, and froze. Against the black velvet lining, an exquisite, lavish gold bangle gleamed with a luster no woman could resist.
"What are you doing, child?" Looking at the seven or eight boxes lined up before them, Chi Yongliang and Yue Meifen's first reaction was not delight, but worry.
They knew how much their daughter earned and how much pressure she was under. Neither of them could work anymore, and they could only live on a monthly pension of just under 1,000 yuan. They could not help their daughter, but they tried their best not to burden her either, though she still had to send them a little extra here and there each month.
Seeing worry rather than happiness on her parents' faces at the sight of the gold jewelry, Chi Qing knew that only family would always have her interests at heart.
Not wanting the elderly couple to worry, Chi Qing had thought up an explanation on the way home. Now was the perfect time to use it. "Mom, Dad, I have something to tell you. Sit tight, and don't get too excited," she said, deliberately keeping them in suspense. "I won the lottery," she added, lowering her voice.
"Ah! What! The lot-" Yue Meifen could not help crying out, then immediately covered her mouth. Chi Yongliang was dumbstruck too. "Really? You're not fooling us, are you?" he asked with rare urgency.
"How could I lie to you about this?" Chi Qing said. "A little while ago, I happened to buy a ticket, and I won. This much." She held up one hand. "Fifty thousand?" Yue Meifen guessed, looking at the row of jewelry. This girl really spends with a free hand. She must have spent all fifty thousand... Still, at least gold can be sold. She won't lose much.
"Five million!" Chi Qing declared grandly. "Mom, that bangle you're holding cost almost sixty thousand! All this jewelry came to over a hundred and seventy thousand. How could fifty thousand cover it?" Ever since binding to the Lottery System, Chi Qing had carefully kept a low profile and concealed it. Now she finally had a chance to show off to her parents. Although her words were a mixture of truth and falsehood, that did nothing to stop her overflowing vanity from getting a tiny bit of satisfaction.
Chi Qing had thought about how much to say she had won. Although she did not have that much money on hand, she would have more and more in the future. To put her parents at ease, she might as well give a larger figure, but it could not be too large. Five million was a good number.
Seeing her parents' stunned expressions, Chi Qing's happiness went without saying. On hearing her words, Yue Meifen's first reaction was to jump off the kang. Yes, jump-without exaggeration. Yue Meifen, whose legs and feet were always aching, got off the kang in one fluid motion with unprecedented agility, then ran barefoot into the main room. "Ah!" Then she rushed back carrying a box of abalone and sea cucumbers.
Neither Chi Qing nor her father had managed to react. They stared blankly at Yue Meifen. "You silly girl, why didn't you tell me these things were so expensive? You just left them in the main room! What if a cat or dog had carried them off?"
"Ah, oh, okay." Chi Qing was still stunned by her mother's gazelle-like agility and had not recovered, answering on instinct.