1208 Poor But Generous
Qiao Nan could not understand what was on Qiao Dongliang’s mind. Ding Jiayi, who stayed under the same roof with Qiao Dongliang, had no idea what her ex-husband was thinking of either.
Even though it seemed that he understood and finally realized that Qiao Nan was not a good daughter and was willing to stay with Zijin and her, whenever she schemed against Qiao Nan, Qiao Dongliang would be angry with her. He would get into a quarrel with her and ordered her not to do whatever she had in mind.
But on the other hand, it did not seem that her ex-husband sided with Qiao Nan like before.
The wretched girl became emboldened after getting married into the Zhai family. She no longer cared about the Qiao family. She placed the interests of the Zhai family above them.
Now that Old Qiao stayed with her and provided for Qiao Zijin, she knew that the wretched girl must be very displeased with Old Qiao.
What he did was tantamount to driving a wedge between him and his daughter.
It could be a simple matter. Ding Jiayi could not understand why Qiao Dongliang made it so complicated. She felt confused. “You are indeed generous to give three golden bangles to them as presents. Did you see that? You spent all the money to prepare the presents for the triplets. Despite knowing that we are not well-to-do, the wretched girl never helps us in any way. She keeps quiet even though you spent such a huge sum of money on the presents. As a man, you need to have some money with you when you are outside. In my opinion, the wretched girl has no regard for you.”
She had never seen such a heartless child, although she was the person who gave birth to her.
“Alright, stop calling her as the wretched girl. Regardless of whether Nan Nan is heartless or not, I will support her no matter what her decision is. With a mother like you, if she is ‘with a conscience’, she will be making life difficult for herself. She has to be heartless to people like you. If she is nice to you, it will be a waste of her effort!”
Ding Jiayi thought that this was the right time to badmouth Qiao Nan. She felt that it was a good opportunity to get Qiao Dongliang to side with her.
What Ding Jiayi did not know was that Qiao Nan might be heartbroken that her father was muddleheaded and was disappointed with him, but she was not without a conscience. She knew that she had to take care of her father and she never really left her family in the lurch or severed all ties with them.
As soon as she received the three golden bangles, Qiao Nan contacted Qiao Dongliang to express her grat.i.tude. She gave him a sum of money, which included the amount of money that he spent on the bangles as well as another sum of money for his personal use.
It was in the early 2000s. One would usually be paid a few hundred yuan per month.
Qiao Nan gave Qiao Dongliang more than one thousand yuan. It was equivalent to Qiao Dongliang’s salary for three months. If this was considered as heartless, what about Qiao Zijin, who was two years older than Qiao Nan but still needed Qiao Dongliang to provide for her?
Qiao Dongliang felt guilty taking money from Qiao Nan.
Qiao Dongliang’s heart ached and he could not help but blame himself when he learned that Qiao Nan was willing to come to Ping Cheng so that she could visit him. However, she could only stay for a night and had to go back to the capital to take care of her triplets.
It was all because of him that the younger daughter made such a decision.
Qiao Dongliang was already heartbroken that Qiao Nan could not stay for a few more days to accompany him, yet Ding Jiayi kept nagging at Qiao Dongliang and badmouthed Qiao Nan.
Upon hearing Ding Jiayi’s words, Qiao Dongliang felt like giving her a tight slap on her cheeks. However, the Lunar New Year was coming. It was unlucky to get into a fight or quarrel. But if Ding Jiayi was not tactful and kept shooting her mouth off, Qiao Dongliang might not be able to stop himself from slapping her on the cheeks.
“What are you quarreling about?” Qiao Zijin stayed in the room, idling around. She could not stand the increasing noise outside and came out to check. “The Lunar New Year is coming. Don’t you find it shameful to keep quarreling? The neighbors will be laughing at us. We should have been the happiest family in the quad this Lunar New Year. Now that things have come to this, and the neighbors are waiting to watch a good show, do you intend on getting into a quarrel and becoming the joke of the quad?”
Nothing went well for Qiao Zijin in the past half a year. It was terrible.
During summer break, Chen Jun came back with Qiao Zijin from the capital and initiated a breakup.
Qiao Zijin sensed that Chen Jun might be serious, but she told herself that it was impossible for Chen Jun to break up with her.
Chen Jun was scheming and he had spent so much money on her. How could he bear to break up with her before he had any returns and give up on getting close to the Zhai family?
However, after they returned to the capital, she realized that Chen Jun was indeed serious. He did not contact her when they were back in Ping Cheng. Qiao Zijin, who felt insecure, disregarded the fact that she should be demure and took the initiative to call Chen Jun.
But Chen Jun would not answer her call. Whenever she called the Chen family, it would be the auntie who answered the phone.
In the past, the auntie at the Chen family would be very polite to her when she answered the phone. However, she was indifferent to her nowadays. She would say that Chen Jun was not at home or that he was outside and was busy.
In short, Qiao Zijin was not able to meet Chen Jun or go on a date with him. She could not even talk to him on the phone.
Half a year had pa.s.sed. Qiao Zijin might be foolish and innocent and wanted to keep deceiving herself, but she knew that Chen Jun was serious about breaking up with her. He was not doing so to keep her on tenterhooks or to give her a scare so that she would behave herself in the future.
Qiao Zijin was certain that Chen Jun wanted a breakup and wanted to seek another way to success. He no longer wanted to be with her.
All along, Qiao Zijin was not interested in her studies. Now that Chen Jun broke up with her, it had a drastic impact on her results. She failed in three of her subjects, and she had to retake the exams.
The problem was that Qiao Zijin had to revise for the subjects that she failed in the semester. The revision period would last for half a year.
She had to prepare for her exams in the coming semester as well as retake the exams for the subjects that she failed previously.
It was torture for Qiao Zijin who was not good in her studies.
When it rained, it poured.
Everyone was happy that the Lunar New Year was coming. The Qiao family was the only family that was without a moment of peace and quarreled all day long. Qiao Zijin, who had a bad temper, could not help but flare up.