Lu Yao went to the kitchen and saw two blue plastic boxes filled with eels, which were crowded together and still wriggling, fat and fresh.
Ji Feiming and Qingmei knew Lu Yao's habits. The seafood just caught from the sea would be kept separately for a while before being put into the fish tank.
Qingmei saw Lu Yao coming back and said happily: "Boss, we can eat eel rice now."
Lu Yao hadn't taken off his diving suit yet. He took a casual look and asked, "Where did this box come from?"
Ji Feiming leaned against the door: "I went to buy it."
Wearing a temporary worker badge, he can also enter and exit special spaces in the store.
"Oh." Lu Yao stood up and walked to the bathroom. "I'll take a shower first and deal with them when I come out."
In the bathroom, Lu Yao filled it with hot water, took a shower, and soaked in it, lost in thought.
She said yesterday that she wanted to eat eel rice. This morning she encountered a trapped killer whale and received two baskets of eels in the afternoon.
It doesn't seem like a coincidence no matter how I think about it. What exactly does he want to do
If he wanted to kill her, he would have countless chances in every world.
Hard to guess.
There was the sound of claws pulling at the door.
"Meow."
It sounds like he has two hearts. Lu Yao came back to his senses. He had been soaking in the water for a long time, so he got up and put on his clothes.
When Lu Yao came out, Qingmei had already left, and Ji Feiming was collecting cats all over the house.
Erxin just wanted to hide in the bathroom, so he pulled the door, but now he has been picked up by Ji Feiming.
Lu Yao went to the kitchen to clean the eels. He picked out twenty fresh fat eels, ready to send them to the snack bar to be grilled eels, and put the rest into the tank.
The deep-sea fish tank is filled with eels, octopuses, sea breams, sea urchins, lobsters, crabs... There are more and more species, and they are all separated by partitions, so there is no need to worry about them getting bad.
-
At 8:30 in the evening, the last table of guests left and Jiupintang Jianghu Restaurant closed.
Xie Minghua took off his chef's hat, wiped the sweat from his forehead, quickly cleaned the kitchen, changed his clothes and left.
He bought a two-yuan pancake from the pancake stall at the entrance of the alley behind the restaurant, and walked towards the bus stop while eating with the cup of water he brought from the store.
We stopped at the bus stop and just finished eating the cake when the bus arrived.
I spent two dollars on the bus and arrived downstairs at my house at about nine-ten.
He went to the underground garage to pick up the car, opened the order-taking app on his mobile phone, and started his second job.
Xie Minghua has two children. The eldest has just started elementary school and the younger daughter will soon be old enough to go to kindergarten.
My wife quit her job to take care of the children at home and is busy every day.
In order to ease the heavy financial pressure, he started working as an online taxi driver after get off work half a year ago.
When there is a large flow of people, such as during holidays or when it rains, I can earn two to three hundred yuan a night. More often, I work until midnight and earn tens or hundreds of yuan.
At 2:30 in the morning, Xie Minghua returned home by hand.
Today wasn't a good day. I spent several hours waiting for orders and finally earned about fifty yuan.
Passing by the barbecue stall downstairs, Xie Minghua touched his stomach and couldn't help swallowing. He was in a hurry to go to work at night, so he didn't wait for dinner in the store. He ate a small pancake in a hurry. Now he was really a little hungry.
An adult man would have to pay at least thirty yuan for a barbecue.
After a busy night, I earned a little over fifty dollars in total. I really couldn't bear to order this meal.
Xie Minghua shook his head, held back his saliva, and thought about going home to cook a bowl of noodles to fill his stomach.
In the kitchen, Xie Minghua was cooking noodles.
Maybe it was because he was too tired or distracted, or maybe both, but he didn't hold the bowl steadily when he was looking for the chili oil.
With a crisp "bang", the bowl fell to the ground and broke into pieces. Soy sauce, vinegar, soaked chicken essence... all kinds of seasonings splashed everywhere and exploded into a mess on the floor, just like his mood at the moment.
In the bedroom, Zhao Rou suddenly opened her eyes, guessing that it was her husband who had returned. With fatigue between her brows, she pulled back the thin quilt, and got up to go out.
"What are you doing?"
Zhao Rou rubbed her eyes and came out. She saw the light on in the kitchen and a familiar tall figure squatting on the ground. His shadow was projected on the semi-transparent frosted glass sliding door. Her brows furrowed slightly.
She takes care of her young daughter during the day, picks up and drops off her son in the morning and afternoon, takes care of housework and three meals a day, and helps her children with their homework in the evening.
The things are not big, just trivial. At the end of the day, my energy and temper are worn out.
When I walked to the kitchen door, I saw a mess on the floor and Xie Minghua was cleaning it in a panic.
The fire in her heart suddenly ignited, she pursed her lips tightly, turned back to the bathroom to find a rag to mop the floor, pushed Xie Minghua away with her knees, and said in a muffled voice, "I'll do it."
Xie Minghua stepped aside awkwardly, his face also looking tired.
The air was stuffy, but work and the trivialities of life had drained all their energy, and they didn't even have the strength to quarrel.
Zhao Rou cleaned the floor and saw the boiling water on the stove. She turned around and took out a large clean bowl from the cupboard to prepare the seasoning.
Xie Minghua walked over and turned off the open fire, and said in a deep voice: "Forget it, let's not do it. I'm not hungry anymore."
Zhao Rou looked back at him, put the bowl down heavily, and turned back to the bedroom.
After a few minutes, Xie Minghua went back to the bedroom to get his pajamas, went to the bathroom to take a shower, and when he came out it was almost 3:30 in the morning.
He lay down on the bed exhausted, sleeping with his wife facing away from him.
Zhao Rou was struggling beside them. Both of them were angry, but they were trying to endure it.
Arguing is so tiring.
They thought that they would be upset all night and would be worried until dawn.
As a result, the two closed their eyes and fell asleep unknowingly.
-
"Let's go to the store. I heard they have eel rice today."
"There's also takoyaki with half an octopus leg on it. Hurry up, or there won't be any room if you go too late."
"Am I the only one who goes to the store to pet cats? It's obviously a cat cafe, why do people go there just for the food?"
A fish nearby rolled its eyes and said, "Then you have to be able to beat those perverts. There are too few cats in the store, and you can't pet them at all."
"The only option is to settle for cheap and authentic seafood."
"Erxin is so cute, uncle will catch crabs to raise you!"
"Look! These people have no shame at all, tsk."
"Come out later, shall we go pick up sea urchins together?"
"Oh my gosh! Picking up sea urchins is so much fun, and you can even ask the owner to help you make sea urchin rice bowls!"
There was a lot of noise in his ears, and Xie Minghua opened his eyes in a daze, thinking he was dreaming.
Surrounded by talking fish, he turned into a seahorse.
It has gray-black skin, a bulging belly, a long tail, and swims very slowly.
Xie Minghua tried clumsily to swim in the water, but failed to master the technique several times. When he looked up, he found a seahorse with a turmeric body and light beige patterns on its back staring at him.
It’s hard to describe the feeling at that moment, he blurted out: “Zhao Rou?”
The ginger seahorse swam slowly to him, somewhat incredulously: "Husband?"
When the two recognized each other, they both thought they were dreaming.
The surrounding fishes were discussing about the shop and were swimming in one direction.
Xie Minghua and Zhao Rou followed them, holding each other's tails, and swam slowly towards the store.
The door of the furry shop was wide open, and the sea water was isolated by a transparent film.
The seahorse couple were amazed to see various fishes struggling to crash into the door and transforming into human forms.
They looked at each other, tucked their tails together, and struggled to squeeze through the door.
When I entered the store, everything returned to its original appearance, but I still didn't know where I was.
A familiar customer noticed that the two were reserved and took the initiative to greet them: "Is this your first time here? Are you here together?"
Xie Minghua held his wife's hand and nodded: "Yes, this is my wife. She came here for no apparent reason. Brother, where is this place?"
The familiar customer who approached me was also surprised, and immediately smiled and said to the people around me: "I've been here for so long, and this is the first time I've seen someone come here with me."
Xie Minghua and Zhao Rou were puzzled. Why couldn't they come together
They still doubted, was this really not a dream
Qingmei came out of the kitchen and saw the confused couple, and answered their questions.
The two of them sat against the wall, next to the cat climbing frame.
Zhao Rou's eyes widened as she observed the incredible scene around her.
This is a cat cafe opened on the bottom of the sea, and the customers are humans who have turned into deep-sea fish.
All you have to do is hand in some fresh seafood, and you can spend your time petting cats, eating, and just wasting time in the store.
"Why are we here?" Xie Minghua murmured to himself. Thinking about having to go to work in the morning, he became anxious.
Zhao Rou blinked and looked down at her hands. "Since we're here, why don't we try to relax? We can eat seafood without paying, and those cats are cute too."
Since having their first and second child, their lives have almost entirely revolved around the children. A large portion of their living expenses have tilted toward the children, and all their time and energy have been devoted to the family.
Every morning and night, fatigue accumulated little by little, bending his back and wearing away her vitality.
They do not regret the choice they made and they love their two children.
It was just that there was a sudden opportunity to relax and take a vacation, and Zhao Rou was a little eager to do it.
The familiar customer who greeted the two people at the beginning told them that there is no point in being anxious when you come to this sea. If the time comes, you can't go back.
It was useless for Xie Minghua to hesitate, and there was no point in worrying about the child. Just as the man said, they could not find a way to go back.
Having completely let go of their worries, both of them started laughing.
Xie Minghua said, "I saw someone ordered eel rice just now, do you want to eat it?"
Zhao Rou nodded, touched her pocket, and her expression changed slightly: "But I don't have any money on me, do you have any?"
Both of them were wearing pajamas, and Xie Minghua's pockets were also empty.
Silence spread.
Zhao Rou looked at the sea fish swimming outside the film, her brows furrowed.
Unfortunately, they are like seahorses in the ocean, and it is difficult for them to swim, let alone catch fish.
Without money and fish, all the fantasies just now were in vain.
Zhao Rou raised her hand and touched her neck.
She used to wear a thin gold chain.
No pendant, just a bare chain.
This was the third year that she and Xie Minghua had been dating, and he gave her a gift for her birthday.
I was still a student at that time and didn’t have much money.
He worked part-time, helping people play games and delivering takeout, and saved more than two thousand yuan in two months, and bought this chain for her.
To her, this chain is more precious than the jewelry she chose for her wedding.
Xie Minghua noticed her movements, held her hand, and shook his head, "Don't move. I'll find a way."
A few minutes later, Xie Minghua came back with a smile, holding a bunch of seafood, including crabs and sea urchins. "I made an appointment with some brothers over there to go pick up sea urchins with them in the afternoon. They lent me some seafood."
Different autistic fish species have different characteristics. Some are good at catching fish, while others can only watch the fish and sigh.
However, everything in the ocean is free for anyone to use. Autistic fish that are good at hunting often cooperate with fish that cannot hunt and go to the sea together to "catch fish".
Firstly, you can save up “money” to spend at the furry shop, and secondly, it will be much more fun with more fish.
Fish that are not good at hunting can collect seaweed, work together to weave simple containers, or help intercept escaped food.
The couple exchanged seafood for an eel rice, a sashimi platter, and an octopus dumplings.
There was no extra space in the store, so the two of them ate while leaning against the cat climbing frame.
When Lu Yao heard that a couple had come, he served the meal himself and asked casually, "You two are seahorses in the sea?"
Zhao Rou nodded: "What's wrong?"