Chapter 119: Little Things About Dating ③
Nie Qiu smiled. The income from selling vegetables was much better than she had imagined. It made sense when she thought about it; with the city management cracking down on vendors selling things on the streets for the sake of cleanliness, most people in the city now bought their vegetables at the market. It wasn’t surprising that a stall could earn so much money.
After taking a bite of her meal, she asked, “Mom, did you record how much we took in total, and how much each of the two stalls took?”
Nie Aifang nodded. “Boss Zhang told me before that he needed me to record it so he could calculate my salary. So, yesterday, I took two notebooks from your room and wrote down all the goods the two stalls took in. Because I have a tricycle, we each transported our own goods. I told you before, I only studied up to the third grade of primary school, so I’m not good at calculations. You can help me calculate them tonight.”
Nie Qiu smiled and nodded. “Alright, I’ll calculate them for you tonight.”
After they finished eating, Nie Aifang handed the notebooks to Nie Qiu and went to the kitchen to wash the bowls and chopsticks. Nie Qiu sat in her room, intending to finish her homework before calculating the accounts. After Nie Aifang finished washing the dishes, she walked into Nie Qiu’s room with two apples. Seeing Nie Qiu doing homework, she was a little surprised. “Qiu Qiu, didn’t you do your homework when you got back this afternoon?” Perhaps because Nie Qiu’s class hadn’t assigned much homework before, and now that they had started studying, Nie Aifang saw that Nie Qiu did her homework relatively quickly each day. She assumed the teacher didn’t assign too much homework and that Nie Qiu should have finished it upon returning home.
But after Nie Qiu left the vegetable market, she went to the residential area warehouse. By the time she got home and cooked, Nie Aifang was almost back. She hadn’t had time to do her homework! Nie Qiu was stunned for a moment, then smiled and brushed it off, saying, “Today’s homework is a bit more.”
Nie Aifang nodded and looked at the ledger Nie Qiu had placed aside. She thought for a moment and said, “How about… Qiu Qiu, can you give me a pencil? Things written with a pencil can be erased. Although I can’t do complex multiplication and division, I can still do addition and subtraction! After I calculate it, you can check it for me.”
Nie Qiu smiled and nodded. She took out a mechanical pencil from her somewhat rusty pencil case and handed it to Nie Aifang. Nie Aifang brought a stool from outside the room, sat down opposite Nie Qiu, and began to calculate the accounts.
After Nie Qiu finished her homework, Nie Aifang was still calculating. The amounts for buying and selling vegetables weren’t large, but they were detailed. It was impossible to calculate each transaction one by one, but it was necessary to calculate them by category, as the price of each vegetable was different. The purchase price of long beans was one yuan fifty, and they were sold for two yuan. The purchase price of tomatoes was two yuan, and they were sold for three yuan. The purchase price of eggplants was three yuan, and they were sold for five yuan… The prices varied for different types of vegetables.
Watching Nie Aifang write item by item, diligently making corrections here and there, Nie Qiu couldn’t help but smile. Students in third grade now should have started learning to create tables, but in her time, third graders were still learning addition and subtraction. Forget about creating tables; they hadn’t even touched multiplication and division yet! It was no wonder Nie Aifang found the calculations so complex.
Nie Qiu took out a notebook that Huang Yan had given her from the cabinet. Then, using a ruler, she began to draw a table. After finishing it, she listed the types of vegetables, their purchase prices, and selling prices one by one on the table. Then, she began to explain to Nie Aifang how to create tables and how to use them for calculations.
Although the selling prices of the vegetables were fixed, there were good and bad quality vegetables, and some people would haggle, so not all vegetables were sold at the set price. Seeing that there was still time, Nie Qiu taught Nie Aifang how to create a profit margin table. It was somewhat difficult, and by ten o’clock, Nie Aifang still hadn’t grasped the application of the profit margin table. She had only learned a simpler method of calculating accounts using tables.
Using this method, Nie Aifang calculated the weight and price of the vegetables brought in by both vegetable stands, and also how much she had earned selling them.
Nie Qiu silently recorded how much vegetables Zhang Qitian and the others had taken and their value. She had agreed with Zhang Qitian that she would give him the wholesale price, and she wouldn’t go back on her word. She knew Nie Aifang gave all the money she earned each day to Zhang Qitian, and she had also arranged with Zhang Qitian to give her the money once a week.
Regardless, she was the one making the money.
“Ai Siyuan did it on purpose, he definitely did it on purpose!” Li Kai slammed the beer bottle onto the ground and kicked the corner of the table fiercely.
Wang Chao Lei poured the RIO from the bottle into a transparent high-footed cup. He picked up the cup and looked at the pink liquid inside, then at the mess on the floor. “I say… A Kai, you’re not actually falling for Nie Qiu, are you?” To be honest, he always thought Li Kai just wanted to mess with Nie Qiu. Although their impression of Nie Qiu had changed quite a bit due to their studies, and Nie Qiu wasn’t as dirty as before.
But there was one thing many people couldn’t stand! That was Nie Qiu’s haughty demeanor, acting like a superior teacher, as if they were from different worlds. Weren’t they all students? What was there to be so proud about? That kind of confidence felt like mockery to many people. He believed there were others who felt the same way. They didn’t want Nie Qiu to leave, and he knew that Nie Qiu’s words were sometimes surprisingly to his liking, but he just found it hard to tolerate that feeling of being from different worlds. In the end, they also wished that Nie Qiu could face them the way she faced Huang Yan and Peng Yu Yang. Not necessarily sharing everything she knew, or greeting them with a smile, but at least… at least being able to say a few words, and greet them when they met.
Instead of when they wanted to treat her to a meal, she would decline, saying she was busy. When they invited her for milk tea, she would rather drink a one-yuan drink than the one they offered. Not to mention whether he felt upset or not, but for Zhang Haiyang, who had offered to treat her, and Li Kai, who had said they would go together, wasn’t this a complete loss of face for them?
A Kai… could it be that he had actually fallen for Nie Qiu? Thinking about it, it was a bit hard to accept. To be honest, in the past, besides Chen Li, A Kai was one of the people who bullied Nie Qiu the most. He would either put glue on her stool to stick her pants so she couldn’t stand up and walk, or use a compass to draw a dividing line. He often saw a little bit of bloodstain seeping from the elbow of Nie Qiu’s arm.
Thinking about it this way, it seemed Nie Qiu wasn’t being haughty, but rather… rather just keeping her distance from them.
Like Nie Qiu? The room fell silent after he smashed several wine bottles and left. To be honest, he didn’t know himself, but now he couldn’t stand seeing Nie Qiu getting close to any boy. He couldn’t stand seeing Nie Qiu being nice to any boy. He really, really hoped that Nie Qiu would smile at him. If she were to smile at him, how wonderful would that be!
If Nie Qiu could smile at him, perhaps the whole world would become a better place!
