CH 24

“Why haven’t they arrived?” 

There was still 10 minutes before they had agreed to meet. However, Lin Jiabao was still worried, did he give them the wrong address?

Orange and Salad were playing in front of the store’s door. Salad was a male munchkin, whose short legs and claws couldn’t defeat Orange the fatty. Salad saw Lin Jiabao, who seemed to be waiting for someone outside, and stopped playing around to run to his side.

Orange saw that there wasn’t anyone to play with anymore and also ran to Lin Jiabao’s side.

‘Little boss, who are you waiting for?’

1028 was the big boss so Lin Jiabao was the little boss.

Looking down at the two cats who were sitting on the stairs staring at him, Lin Jiabao bent down and rubbed their fur. “I’m waiting for some friends.”

‘What friends?! Male or female cats?! Does the big boss know?’

“Don’t be noisy, Orange, they’re my classmates.” Lin Jiabao pinched Orange’s fat.

‘Never would’ve thought our little boss would also have this day, time really does fly for cats.’

“Salad, why are you also like this…”

“So there really are cats, not bad!”

Bai Youlian’s voice came from behind Lin Jiabao and she bent down as well, unable to resist squishing the two cats. The two cats appeared sweet and obedient, making her heart swell full of flowers.

However, in reality, the two cats were exchanging glances——

‘Female?’

‘Female!’

“I seem to be a little late, sorry about that.” Bai Youlian looked at the time. She was five minutes early.

Lin Jiabao waved his hand and smiled. “No, not at all, you’re actually early!” 

He hurriedly opened the door for her and looked over at the two cats by his feet. “Let’s get into the store first, what do you want to drink?”

“A cappuccino will be fine. I’ll get the materials out first. Little Bao, go do what you need to do.”

After a while, Lin Jiabao brought the cup of coffee to Bai Youlian and looked over at the time, feeling confused. “Could it be Chen Chen got lost, should I go out to wait?”

“Hmph, that guy must’ve overslept.”

Lin Jiabao smiled softly, passing Bai Youlian pastries along with her coffee before disappearing quietly.

Seeing that Lin Jiabao ran outside to wait again, the two cats who were observing Bai Youlian returned to the steps to sit down.

‘Little boss, are you still waiting for someone else?’

“That’s right, there’s still one more. He shouldn’t be lost, should I go look for him?”

“No need, I’m here.”

Ouyang Chen, with his arms crossed, looked at Lin Jiabao and the two cats sitting down. The corners of his mouth helplessly twitched upwards. “Do I look that unreliable?”

“You’re reliable, very reliable. Hurry, come in, hehe.”

The two of them went in, leaving the two cats staring wide-eyed at each other.

‘Why is there a male one?’

‘Male!’

Bai Youlian had just flipped over a page when she saw that someone had just arrived. She adjusted her glasses. “Wow, the young master actually came on time?”

“Hmph, this young master will give credit where it’s due. Accepting a request like this is dependent on my mood.” Ouyang Chen sat opposite Bai Youlian, taking the menu and ordering random items from Lin Jiabao.

“You’re giving little Bao extra trouble.”

“I’m looking after little Bao’s small business. =.= ”

They started quarreling again but maybe due to the fact that they were in a shop, the two did not argue loudly. It instead seemed as if they were having a typical couple’s dispute. But after yesterday’s fight, he was still worried, meow!

“Yi, isn’t this the Ouyangs’ little young master?” Lin Lan heard the ruckus in the front of the shop and came out, wanting to get to know Lin Jiabao’s new friends but instead saw someone familiar.

It turned out that the young miss of the Lin family opened this shop.

Seeing that it was someone from his brother’s generation, Ouyang Chen’s behaviour changed. “Long time no see, turns out that Lin’s second miss is little Bao’s shop manager.”

“Aiyo, so you turned out to be the schoolmate of my family’s Baobao. Your brother didn’t mention this.”

The two brothers seemed to have some kind of fate with Lin Jiabao. 

Lin Lan then turned to the lady sitting opposite of Ouyang Chen. “This pretty young lady must also be Baobao’s schoolmate, thank you for looking after our family’s child.”

“Hi, sister shop manager. I’m little Bao’s schoolmate, Bai Youlian. I’m grateful for little Bao’s care in school.”

Seeing Bai Youlian’s decent behaviour, Lin Lan developed a good opinion towards her and pointed at Ouyang Chen, “Order whatever you want, your brother is paying so have fun.”

Ouyang Chen’s expression turned puzzled, what did this have to do with his brother?

“That’s right.” Lin Lan turned to Lin Jiabao, “Bao, when you’re done with work, you can study in the shop.”

“Okay, manager.”

Lin Lan provided lunch by helping out in the cafe’s kitchen. As there was much to do for the summary, they didn’t finish writing until the afternoon.

Although the weather was getting cold, there was still a crowd during the weekends. It wasn’t considered extremely busy but it was difficult to consistently entertain guests. Seeing how proficient  Lin Jiabao was, it could also be determined that he had been working at the cafe for a long time, and he was also skilled in dealing with many customers. 

He finally cleaned the last table and fed the cats. Lin Jiabao took a short break before changing out of his apron and carrying his backpack to sit with Bai Youlian and Ouyang Chen.

But as soon as he arrived, he saw those two idiots scolding each other – ‘this should be written’ and ‘this shouldn’t be written’ – it was so intense that he purposefully leaned to the side and avoided the flames of war. 

So when it was Lin Jiabao’s turn to write his part of the report, he felt an incoming dilemma as he was forced to choose between one controversial opinion and another. What a painful decision.

No matter where he looked, he was attacked by glares. Lin Jiabao’s health bar was soon going to be empty.

However, looking at how busy Lin Jiabao was, Bai Youlian and Ouyang Chen didn’t argue much about Lin Jiabao’s decision. Lin Jiabao heaved a sigh of relief. 

Bai Youlian rubbed the cat in her embrace and asked, “Little Bao, how long have you been working here?”

Lin Jiabao counted the number of years as he wrote the summary, “Probably three years?”

Coming out to work so early, could it be that something happened in his family? Bai Youlian kept the question in her heart, there were some questions that shouldn’t be asked. She could see that Ouyang Chen was about to ask Lin Jiabao, so she stepped on his foot roughly. “I’m going to the toilet.

Hearing Ouyang Chen’s yelp of pain, Lin Jiabao looked up in shock, “What’s wrong, are you alright?”

“Hiss, it’s nothing.” Ouyang Chen’s eyebrows shot up. “This hag almost has the same amount of strength as my older brother.”

Lin Jiabao finished the summary before finally looking curiously at Ouyang Chen. The amount of curiosity in his eyes put Ouyang Chen in a tight spot. 

“What, what’s up?’

“So it turned out that Chen Chen has an older brother, I’m so envious.”

Ouyang Chen’s expression was one of dislike, “What’s there to be envious of? I have two brothers, one is still fine and he’s currently overseas. The other one is a demon, okay?”

It was rare to see Ouyang Chen’s expression this bad. Lin Jiabao’s curiosity peaked and he poked Ouyang Chen with the pen, asking for him to continue the story with an innocent face. 

Lin Jiabao really did envy Ouyang Chen who had siblings. He too had siblings at one point, but he lost one by one over the winters. Some starved to death and others turned into strays.

i did not expect to tear up translating this. why did you kill off the baby mew mews… bring them back please