“I hope so. I hope we live long enough to see your child grow up. I even want to see my grandson get married.”
“What is the background of that rival of yours?”
Father Lin asked.
“Is he even better than you?”
In Father Lin’s eyes, his son was the most outstanding.
In the past, villagers used to say that the family had poured everything into sending A Jian to school, and if he achieved nothing after graduating, it would all have been wasted.
Now the villagers said they were capable and blessed, that they had raised A Jian well, and A Jian himself was capable. With his own efforts he had cleared all the debts and built a new house for the family.
The Lin family’s living conditions kept improving. A Jian had bought a flat and a car in Dongguan City, and he had savings too. Whenever relatives or friends felt unwell, A Jian could always help.
Relatives and friends now treated the couple with great respect. Everyone praised A Jian for being capable, having a good heart, knowing gratitude. The lives of his siblings had all improved because of his support.
Who did not call A Jian outstanding?
“How could I compare with him, Dad? Do you know who the richest person in Dongguan City is?”
Father Lin said, “How would I know who the richest person in Dongguan is? I don’t even know who the richest in our brigade is. Truly wealthy people are very low-key. They never tell others how rich they are, for fear people will come borrowing money.”
“They say wealth should not be shown off. Now that our family is better off, people have come to borrow money. Your mum turned them away. She said we only look comfortable, but we’re just a little better than before, and that life in the city isn’t easy for you either.”
“If it were easy, you would have married long ago. Why would you still be single? Those borrowers left reluctantly.”
“A Jian, in future when you go back to the village, keep a low profile. Don’t say how much money you earn in the city. People may praise you to your face, but who knows how jealous they are inside.”
“People nowadays are not as honest as in the past. They look down on the poor and resent the rich.”
Father Lin had easily gone off topic.
Doctor Lin said, “Dad, why are you going so far afield? I know. In future when I go back to the village, I’ll keep a low profile. I’ll say the overall economy is bad now, everyone has medical insurance, if they’re ill they go to hospital, and our clinic isn’t doing so well either.”
When he had first started out, he liked to show off when he returned home, boasting that his clinic was making good money, that he had bought a flat and a car in the city.
In the last couple of years he had become more mature and steady. Also, those villagers would come to him whenever they felt slightly unwell and not pay, and he could not bring himself to ask for money. He had lost quite a bit and could not even complain.
He had realised the truth of what his father said. Wealth really should not be shown off.
Better to keep a low profile.
“The richest person in Dongguan is surnamed Zhan. It’s a thousand-billion-yuan family. A thousand-billion-yuan family. There aren’t many such families even across the whole country.”
Father Lin said, “Dongguan is so big, full of rich people. It’s no surprise the richest is a thousand-billion-yuan family. They say even the richest in our town has considerable wealth, and he’s changed wives so many times, buying one luxury car after another.”
“A thousand-billion-yuan family as the richest in Dongguan is perfectly normal. But what does this have to do with your rival?”
Father Lin finally caught on. “Don’t tell me your rival is the young master of that richest family?”
“Yes. I only found out after asking someone to look into it. Zhan Yue is actually the young master of the Zhan family. This generation of the Zhan family has nine young masters, and he ranks eighth, called the Eighth Young Master.”
“The young masters of the Zhan family are all outstanding. Any one of them taken at random could crush ordinary people like us. Knowing my rival is a young master of the Zhan family was a huge blow to me. That’s why I couldn’t sleep.”
Father Lin’s eyes widened. A young master from a thousand-billion-yuan family liked Doctor Zeng.
“Is Doctor Zeng really that wonderful? Even a young master from a thousand-billion-yuan family likes her.”
“A Jian, then try harder. If you can marry Doctor Zeng, we’ll all be proud. To beat even a young master from a thousand-billion-yuan family, how impressive that would be.”
