Bringing along a ball and hiding from foreign devils
Chapter 27 - Expectations
During the summer vacation, An An didn"t need to attend kindergarten. And in the past few days, Leonid was on business trip also. Ren Zhouyuan decided to take two days off to get acquainted with the new environment with An An together.
Leonid would call every night to ask about them. Although they didn"t talk much, and sometimes it was dead silent, there has been an improvement, and when they mentioned about An An, it wasn"t as embarra.s.sing as before.
They suddenly became like a newly married couple, or even new parents, but there was no sweetness usually experienced by newlyweds. They took the time to slowly discover everything, and they were working hard on their new family.
After staying at home for two days, during the weekend, Ren Zhouyuan decided to send An An to Vichy. He thought, since Leonid had already taken them home, there"s no more need to hide, and he didn"t need to worry anymore about being seen.
He refused to be picked by the driver. He brought An An to take the bus, just like the other times. It"s also a good opportunity to know about the nearby environment. Knowing that his father was bringing him to school, An An couldn"t stop smiling on the way. He"s also much more talkative than usual. And he"s so excited when he told Ren Zhouyuan about what they would learn that day.
Strictly speaking, this was the first time that Ren Zhouyuan appeared in Vichy with An An. When Anan was injured in the game last time, Ren Zhouyuan had no mood to look at other stuff. This time, he could check out the place more thoroughly.
An An was in the pre-kids group, and Vichy accepted minors aged from 5 to 18. An An was turning 5, and he"s the youngest kid in Vichy. When Ren Zhouyuan submitted his application, An An had not yet reached the minimum age requirement. When he thought of that, he realized that An An might have revealed his ident.i.ty when he visited Vichy the first time. Even if no one knew that he"s the son of Leonid, it"s possible that he"s admitted exceptionally just because of his unique appearance.
Never had Ren Zhouyuan thought that, no matter how hard he"s trying to prevent this from happening. In the end, it did and it"s because he was trying his luck. And he wasn"t sure whether it"s a bad or good thing.
After a few days of rest, although Leonid still had not returned, Ren Zhouyuan had to go back to work anyway. When thinking that An An had to stay at home alone, and although knowing that nothing dangerous would happen, Ren Zhouyuan was still worried. Rowan happened to have returned from Russia, after asking his advice, Ren Zhouyuan decided to bring An An with him to the office.
After knowing that he could go to office with his father, An An was beyond excited. Obviously, he still remembered Ren Zhouyuan saying that companies nowadays forbid their employees from bringing their children along, but An An definitely wasn"t going to remind his father. He followed Ren Zhouyuan happily. Even though the pa.s.sengers were staring at them, he couldn"t care less. He was just so happy that he could spend the whole day with daddy.
When Ren Zhouyuan returned to the company, Rowan was already sitting in front of his desk, dealing with some doc.u.ments. When he saw An An, he wasn"t paying too much attention. Judging from his reaction, he might have known the whole thing already.
An An has always been obedient. Only in the presence of Ren Zhouyuan would he jump or run around a little. Whenever there were strangers, he would greet them childishly "uncle" before sitting next to Ren Zhouyuan again. And he"d start playing with his robot toy.
The sound of keyboard echoed in the empty hall. Ren Zhouyuan was already used to such an atmosphere. An An also adapted well, but Rowan couldn"t help but keep moving around impatiently.
It"s too quiet, it"s too horribly quiet!
He looked at the father and son sitting on the opposite side. Ren Zhouyuan frowned and he was thinking, sometimes knocking on the keyboard, and the serious look on his face made people wonder what important events he was dealing with. An An, who was sitting next to him, dismantled and a.s.sembled the robot toy over and over again. Then, after putting it back to his little schoolbag, he took it out again and repeated the action.
Rowan had stared at him for half an hour, and he frowned even more. Haven"t they all said that kids at this age all act horribly? How can this little guy be so obedient? He couldn"t tell whether An An looked more like the gentle, elegant Ren Zhouyuan, or Leonid who always looked extremely serious. However, when seeing An An playing with the little parts without any facial expression, he still thought that he looked more like the boring boss.
He simply threw his pen away, touched his chin and asked, "An An, your name is An An right? Come to uncle, let me talk to you."
When Rowan asked this, the two people sitting opposite him were stunned. They all looked at Rowan, making him a little embarra.s.sed. He rubbed his nose and laughed.
An An looked at Ren Zhouyuan, and Ren Zhouyuan nodded to him. Then, An An packed his own things and walked over to Rowan.
Ren Zhouyuan was observing them silently. Rowan held An An on his lap. An An put his hands on his lap. The two were whispering about something, Ren Zhouyuan didn"t see any discomfort on An An"s face, so he let them be.
Rowan couldn"t stop talking, he raised all kinds of questions to An An, and was just talking about everything. Sometimes, he"d also ask An An about Ren Zhouyuan. Since An An didn"t know a lot of people, for him, Rowan seemed to be an interesting uncle. He was slowly attracted to Rowan"s style.
After only a while, Rowan got more familiar with An An, and he even started holding An An"s hand. He suggested to Ren Zhouyuan, "I am going to bring him downstairs for his cla.s.s. It"s too boring here. I"m going to show him around."
Ren Zhouyuan answered briefly with an "ah", and he looked at An An with a hint of uncertainty. Then, he said to Rowan, "will it be too troublesome for you? Or you could just let him sit here and wait."
"It"s fine." Rowan waved his hand, and his other hand was holding An An"s. He tried to comfort An An, "An An is going to be a good boy in cla.s.s, yes?"
"Yes!" Out of Ren Zhouyuan"s expectation, An An accepted it without hesitation. Seeing the two taking the elevator happily, Ren Zhouyuan was completely confused.
After just a short while, Rowan returned to the office. He told Ren Zhoyuan that An An was having his lesson downstairs. He rea.s.sured Ren Zhouyuan by saying that with the teacher in the cla.s.s, nothing would go wrong. Afterwards, he moved a chair and sat next to Ren Zhouyuan, and it"s obvious that he wanted to gossip a bit.
Ren Zhouyuan looked at him and he didn"t really want to talk with him.
Apparently, Rowan wouldn"t give up because of the way Ren Zhouyuan looked. He asked shyly, "so, how is it going after living together? Any juicy stuff?"
"With whom? With An An? What stuff could there be?" Ren Zhouyuan rolled his eyes.
Rowan was shocked, then suddenly realized what he meant. He hit his thigh and said, "oh yes! I almost forgot that our boss is on business trip. What an incompetent a.s.sistant I am."
Rowan almost took Ren Zhouyuan as his boss" wife. And he finally said what he had tried not to. The reason why he sent An An away was because he wanted to know more from Ren Zhouyuan.
He told Ren Zhouyuan about the situation of Leonid"s family, including the number of members at their home and what they do for a living. He was basically trying to tell Ren Zhouyuan everything about Leonid. Ren Zhouyuan pretended to be working, but he was actually listening carefully. He also didn"t realize that he had already stopped typing, as he thought that he was still pretending it well.
"He has always envied his big brother"s family. Seeing that they have a big, fat boy, he"s really jealous. Although he never says so, every time he returns home, he always buys a lot of presents for the boy. But he always does so according to his preference, and he always gives him some gadgets. To be honest, Anthony doesn"t really like them." When Rowan thought of An An who loved playing with his little components, he smiled and patted on Ren Zhouyuan"s shoulder, "you and An An have rescued him!"
When Ren Zhouyuan was listening to it, he was feeling a bit complicated. For him, it"s like someone else had given his son a gift, only because he didn"t like it at the first place. Although he"s aware that he shouldn"t be thinking that way, he couldn"t control it.
Rowan went on talking about Leonid, and he made it sound like Ren Zhouyuan was exactly the savior of Leonid. He was speechless, but after listening to Rowan, he learnt quite a lot about how to control Leonid.
Also, he now knew that Leonid really liked children. When he was talking about An An, he always sounded careful. Even for other children, he"s willing to give the best stuff. It"s normal to a.s.sume that he might be acting a hundred times nicer to An An.
But then he thought, since An An hated foreigners so much, what would happen if the two were left alone…
Out of some reasons, Ren Zhouyuan started to look forward to the day when Leonid would return home.