It happened to be windy today, and with the wind as a medium, the aroma of oden spread further. It attracted people to smell the aroma and pull the people around them to ask questions.

 “Which stall is it?”

“What’s that smell? It smells like chili peppers.”

“Let’s go and have a look.”

“That’s exactly what I said.”

Meng Yunshu stirred the soup with chopsticks, turned his head and asked Yu Jinyue, “Xiao Yue, have you had breakfast?”

Yu Jinyue, who was still busy looking around, was stunned for a moment. He soon reacted, and pulled his small stool closer to Meng Yunshu but kept a suitable distance. He looked at the slowly boiling pot, and said, “Not yet, brother-in-law, put something in for me.”

“Okay.” Meng Yunshu responded, and the bean curd and yuba at the bottom of the spicy pot were cooked. He took out a clean bamboo cup from the backpack next to him, and picked up the cooked vegetables with chopsticks in his other hand. Knowing that Yu Jinyue liked noodles, he also put a small handful of green vegetable noodles for him.

 Next to them was a stall selling sesame cakes and tofu pudding. The stall owners were both elderly people with wrinkled faces. Although their clothes were worn and patched, they looked very clean. Their sleeves were tied up with ropes.

As they were closest to the oden stall, they were the first to smell the smell. Whether it was spicy soup or bone soup, it always attracted them and made them look over unconsciously.

After cooking for Yu Jinyue, Meng Yunshu noticed the sight of the vendors next to him and turned his head to meet their eyes. Before he could react, the old man selling tofu pudding was the first to move his sight away in panic, leaving him with only a busy back.

 Yu Jinyue, who was eating with a bamboo cup, caught a glimpse of Meng Yunshu’s sidelong glance and asked, “Brother-in-law, what are you looking at?”

“Nothing.” Meng Yunshu turned around and inadvertently looked up to see a group of people coming towards their stall. He nervously moved aside in an instant, leaving a seat for Yu Jinyue, and took a seat away from the crowd. Not only that, he also asked Yu Jinyue to move forward.

Yu Jinyue glanced at him without knowing why, and sat down randomly. Seeing that the guests were about to arrive, he had not finished the breakfast in his hand. He picked it up, blew it, and then ate it whole.

The guests who came for the fragrance saw him picking up the bamboo cup he had used as soon as they arrived. There was some soup at the bottom, and he also picked it up and drank it all up. The guests couldn’t help but sigh, and wanted to take a look at the bamboo cup in the seller’s hand before making plans, but unfortunately they didn’t make it in time.

 Yu Jinyue met the customer’s resentful eyes. He wiped his mouth in confusion and asked: “Two skewers of vegetarian dishes are one wen, three skewers of non-vegetarian dishes are two wen, and three wen for jade noodles and ruby ​​noodles.”

“Jade noodles? Ruby noodles?” The old man beside him muttered. The names sounded interesting.

“Yes.” Yu Jinyue pointed to the red and green noodles on the small table and explained: “Green jade and orange-red ruby.”

The people around the stall looked in the direction he pointed. Unlike the colors of the noodles they usually eat, the two colors corresponded to the names of jade and ruby.

“Can this be eaten?” They had never seen red and green noodles before, so they doubted whether they could really eat them.

“The color looks good, but I don’t know how it tastes?”

Yu Jinyue listened to the murmurs of the crowd. Seeing that they were getting more and more biased, he regretted that he had eaten too fast just now. He should have eaten in front of everyone to prove their noodles’ taste.

Meng Yunshu, who was standing aside, thought that he had neglected it. After a pause, he put the two kinds of noodles into the pot respectively. Seeing is believing, and letting them taste it for themselves is much more useful than their dry mouths.

“Brother-in-law, what are you doing?”

Meng Yunshu stirred the noodles in the pot and said softly: “It will be more useful to let them taste it.”

The people gathered around understood his intention and waited.

After the noodles were cooked, Meng Yunshu asked Yu Jinhuai to bring two bamboo cups. He put the noodles in the cups on the table, and put two pairs of chopsticks in them for the guests to use.

No one wanted to be the first to eat. You looked at me, I looked at you, but no one moved. Finally, a middle-aged man took the lead in moving the chopsticks.

“How is it?” Seeing him eat, the others asked. Not only were they curious, but Yu Jinyue and Meng Yunshu also became nervous, fearing that he would say something bad.

After the middle-aged man tasted it carefully, his slightly wrinkled brows slowly relaxed and praised: “The taste is chewy, not bad.”

His evaluation obviously touched the hearts of the others. With him taking the lead, everyone rushed to taste it.

“Five wen for vegetarian dishes, ten wen for meat dishes, and one portion of noodles each.  “

Meng Yunshu and Yu Jinhuai obviously didn’t expect him to buy oden. After a moment of daze, the money was collected and the dishes were taken. Hearing that he could choose the dishes by himself, the middle-aged man became interested and looked at the dishes in the pot seriously to choose.

“Spicy or bone soup?”

“Spicy.”

“Okay.” Yu Jinyue responded and started excitedly. How could he not be happy about the first business of the day?

Yu Jinyue put the bamboo sticks of the dishes selected by the man in the bamboo cup and said with a smile: “The price is 23 wen, of which two wen are the deposit for the bamboo cup. After returning the bamboo cup, I will refund you two wen. Of course, you can also go home and get your own bowl.”

The middle-aged man handed over the money with one hand and took his oden with the other.

He couldn’t wait and started eating on the side.

Meng Yunshu packed up the bamboo sticks and put them in the basket he brought. He turned his head and noticed that the middle-aged man was eating heartily with a satisfied expression on his face. Meng Yunshu’s heart was relieved.

Later, everyone seemed to have opened the door to a new world. One after another came to buy oden. Among them, the fastest-selling were the jade and ruby noodles. The sound of copper coins thrown into the pottery jar was very pleasant to Meng Yunshu. Their good business also made the stalls next to them lively.

—

At the Yu family home, everyone sat around the table in the main hall. All the copper coins in the pottery jar were poured onto the table. The copper coins scattered and piled up in the middle of the table. Yu Zhining held down the copper coins that rolled to the edge of the table, looked at them in his hand, and reluctantly put them back after a long time.

The three adults counted the money. They stacked ten coins together, and soon counted them all.

The total was 361 wen.

Yu Jinyue counted again in disbelief when he heard the number. Even Yu Jinhuai didn’t expect to make so much money. Yu Jinlan was even more shocked and her eyes were like balls. Only Meng Yunshu sat quietly without any surprise. He was the one who collected the money, and sometimes he would deliberately remember it so he would have a number in his mind.

He thought about the noodles that sold the fastest in today’s business, and made a decision.

“I have to work part-time for several months to earn more than 300 wen. We make this much money in less than a day by making oden. This much money every day, then in a month…” Yu Jinyue said with shining eyes. He was already imagining himself lying on a pile of money in the future.

“Money, money.” Yu Zhining shouted. He was thinking about sugar men, cakes and maltose.

 Yu Jinhuai covered his eyes and couldn’t bear to look directly. He noticed that Meng Yunshu was hanging his head and asked, “Ah Yun, what’s wrong?”

Is he not happy to make so much money today?

Meng Yunshu looked up at him and hesitated for a while before saying, “I saw that noodles were selling well today, so I thought about selling noodles and oden separately in the future, and mainly doing a noodles business.”

“Why brother-in-law?” Yu Jinyue looked at the pile of money on the table and asked in confusion, “Oden was also selling well today.”

Meng Yunshu took a sip of water from the bowl and explained slowly, “There are few kinds of vegetables and meat in winter. Compared with them, flour can be bought at any time.”

“Of course, I don’t mean not to make oden, but to focus on noodles.”

What he said was indeed reasonable. There are only a few kinds of vegetables in winter. Tofu skin and yuba are also what Meng Yunshu thought of. Besides, many people today are rushing for noodles, so oden has become their backup choice.

 Although Yu Jinyue felt that he was right, he still couldn’t get around it. He lay on the table in a depressed mood, staring at the curtain with a fixed look.

Seeing him like this and Meng Yunshu’s worried expression, Yu Jinhuai thought for a moment and suggested: “Try it for five days first. If noodles are still the best seller, then we’ll follow Ah Yun’s idea.”

With Yu Jinhuai’s decision, Yu Jinyue didn’t hesitate anymore. He got up from the table quickly and ran straight to the yard.

“I’ll go wash the vegetables.”

Looking at his cheerful figure, Meng Yunshu couldn’t help laughing. He turned his head to see Yu Zhining’s eager eyes, took out the candied haws he bought and gave one to him and Yu Jinlan.

“I promised you. How could little uncle forget?” Meng Yunshu touched his head and watched him and Yu Jinlan leave.

The hall suddenly became quiet, leaving only him and Yu Jinhuai.

Meng Yunshu stood up and sat beside him. He took out two wrapped pastries from the basket and handed them to the person beside him. He didn’t dare to look at Yu Jinhuai’s eyes, and stared at his hands before saying word by word: “I met someone selling pastries on the road. They are salty and fragrant, so I thought you would like the taste, and bought two.”

Although it was not the first time he sent food to Yu Jinhuai, Meng Yunshu was still very nervous. He could clearly hear his heart beating rapidly in his chest because of uneasiness. He felt his palms slowly start to sweat, and for a while he felt like sitting on pins and needles.

Yu Jinhuai stared at the top of his head, then moved to the pastry in his hand. He thought about what Meng Yunshu said, and his heart trembled. It turned out that not only Ah Ning and Xiao Lan had a treat. This kind of feeling of being remembered was something he had not experienced for a long time.

 He didn’t move for a long time, which made Meng Yunshu almost unable to sit still. Thinking that he didn’t like it, he was about to take it back when the pastry in his hand was taken by the person in front of him.

“I like it very much.” Yu Jinhuai took a bite solemnly. The salty and fragrant taste seemed to bring him back to his childhood, when his parents and brother were still here. Every time his father came back from working in the town, he would always bring him a piece of pastry and let him and his brother share it. Since he joined the army and left home, he has never eaten pastry of this taste again.

Getting his affirmative answer, Meng Yunshu’s hanging heart was put down. He noticed the burning eyes falling on him, and replied without raising his head: “I’m glad you like it. I’ll bring it back for you next time.”

There was an ambiguous atmosphere in the air as if they were enjoying this short-lived beauty. Neither of them spoke until Yu Jinlan rushed in and they turned around hurriedly as if awakened.