No one understands rebirth better than me

Chapter 99 Happy Birthday
In the evening, when Guan Qiaoyun arrived at the place, she found that the restaurant Guan Ren chose today was different from what she expected.

It is a newly opened restaurant called [Shanyu] on Linjiang Road, which specializes in some fusion and innovative dishes.

Jiangzhou County is already considered a relatively upscale place these days.

"Sister Qiaoyun, let's go?"

"You... like this one?"

"Correct."

"..."

Guan Qiaoyun thought about her wallet and finally gritted her teeth:

"You've really made me bleed profusely now. If you dare to fail me during the midterm exam, I..."

"Oh, you really don't need to bleed, let's go..."

……

"Welcome~ How many people are there?"

"You two have reserved a table."

"What's your name, sir?"

"close."

"Okay, Mr. Guan, this way please..."

……

After entering the restaurant, Guan Ren was very satisfied with the interior decoration and lighting.

Even though it will close down in just one year...

However, Guan Ren now understood the reason for the bankruptcy.

That is the service, or attitude, problem of this store.

Others may not know this, but Guan Ren, who is very familiar with Jiangzhou County, knows that many of the employees of Shanyu are relatives of the boss.

Including the waiter who was following Guan Ren at this time.

……

"here."

When we arrived at the reserved table, the waiter pointed casually and turned away with a blank expression.

It was completely different from the smiling face at the beginning, like two different people.

The reason is actually simple.

That is, from the conversation between Guan Ren and Guan Qiaoyun after they entered the store, the waiter guessed that "it was a rare occasion for the young couple to come out and indulge themselves."

So Guan Ren immediately classified me as a "low-class consumer", and my attitude towards him changed.

Of course, Guan Ren didn't really care about this. He came to this place mainly for a quiet and leisurely environment. Service was not important, and not having too much service was exactly what he wanted.

And the meal is not the point.

The real focus, or the real focus of the entire day, was the exquisite paper bag that Guan Ren took out of his backpack and placed in front of Guan Qiaoyun.

"Sister Qiaoyun, this is a gift for you."

"A gift? You...gave it to me...?"

Guan Qiaoyun was stunned.

But today is clearly his birthday. He...this silly son, he had already bought that pair of shoes, why did he still want to give himself a gift?
In fact, in Guan Ren's view, this gift is not only his repentance and compensation for his regrets, but also a solemn gratitude to Guan Qiaoyun for her hard work in raising him in past and present lives.

But at the moment, his rhetoric is naturally "a son's birthday is a mother's suffering day."

When Guan Qiaoyun heard this, her eyes became misty.

But when she took a box out of the paper bag, Guan Qiaoyun was so shocked that she even forgot to be touched.

"This...this is..."

"Sister Qiaoyun, your phone is still a feature phone. I thought it was time to change it, so I bought you a white one. Is it okay?"

"But how much does this cost...?"

"4999."

"?!"

Guan Qiaoyun's hand on the box trembled:
"Guan Ren, you...where did you get all this money?"

"Well, actually, I'm currently writing regularly for the editor-in-chief of a magazine. This money is my first payment..."

Guan Ren had been planning to give Guan Qiaoyun a mobile phone since he started writing the book.

Therefore, a reasonable explanation has long been prepared.

Guan Qiaoyun stopped in amazement the whole time, looking at the new phone in front of her, and then at the smiling little man in front of her. No one knew what picture appeared in her mind at this moment. Anyway, the urge to cry came up again, and her eyes were obviously shining with stars under the light.

"Sister Qiaoyun...Mom."

Guan Ren pulled her hands over and squeezed them, then placed them on the box:

"Take it apart first and see if you like it. If you don't like it, throw it away."

"Pooh!"

Guan Qiaoyun knew he was joking, but she couldn't help but spit at him:

"You can't throw it away even if you throw me away!"

This was the first time that her son used his own money to give Guan Qiaoyun a gift. The moment Guan Qiaoyun touched it, she was destined to treat it as a treasure.

……

At the same time, two waiters at the front desk not far away began to whisper.

"Hey, hey, hey, look over there..."

"what?"

"Tsk, that table you were talking about, it looks like the men there gave the women gifts!"

"Just give it to me. I already said I'm not a rich man."

The person who said this was the waiter who had changed his expression at the beginning. He picked at his nails nonchalantly:

"That guy is just handsome. I guess the dishes he ordered were less than a hundred yuan. What good gifts can he give..."

"Oh, are you blind? That's an iPhone!"

"What?"

"Oh never mind, I'll go see if it's a 4 or 4s!"

……

Anyone who has experienced it knows the extent of the influence of a certain brand of mobile phone at this point in time.

The true story of selling a kidney to buy a mobile phone explains it all.

It can even be said that it was this brand that first popularized the inclusion of technological products in women's luxury goods list.

Moreover, at that time, Steve Jobs had just died, Apple was at its peak, and the iPhone was not yet known as a "phone for prostitutes". It was a serious fashion luxury item.

For a woman to own the latest iPhone is definitely no less than carrying LV or wearing Valentino, at least in the eyes of other women.

Although in Guan Ren's eyes, this is already a very old understanding.

But that's the way it is right now.

This is not an exaggeration at all, especially for a small county town.

When several waiters saw Guan Ren giving them an iPhone, they felt it was like giving them a big diamond ring.

……

"I checked the box! It's the latest 4s! 55,000!"

"Tsk...it's just one, it's actually not bad..."

A waiter curled his lips guiltily, but his attitude improved silently afterwards, whether he was serving food or doing anything else.

Until the last two people left, several store clerks continued to gossip.

"Do you think that woman can be thirty?"

"You can't tell from her looks...she looks like she's in her twenties, but she does have some style."

"Ah, being beautiful is good, being able to be with such a young rich second generation..."

------------

"Guan Ren, which way do I slide to unlock it?"

"Like this, and then you hear a click."

"Oh…"

“You can even talk to it.”

"Talk? What?"

"Hi, Siri."

……

Along the way, Guan Qiaoyun was like a child who had obtained a new and interesting toy.

After all, like many people, she had never touched a smartphone before, whether it was Android or Symbian.

Guan Ren just watched her shining eyes all the way, watched her fingertips slide curiously and carefully across the screen, and the smile on the corner of her mouth never stopped.

"Sister Qiaoyun, please check QQ."

"Can I still log in to QQ?"

"Yeah, any feature phone is fine, and this is definitely better."

The apps on smartphones are naturally different from the Java on feature phones. Guan Qiaoyun studied QQ alone from halfway through the community entrance.

"Hmm? Sister Qiaoyun, are you posting something?"

"Uh?"

Guan Qiaoyun was stunned for a moment, then locked her phone and stammered:

"Well... I just... posted a random message..."

Guan Ren is Guan Qiaoyun’s QQ friend, but after he blocked her in the first year of high school, he hasn’t communicated with her via QQ for a long time.

Seeing that she was acting mysteriously, he took out another brand new smartphone from his pocket and opened his space to take a look.

[A Little Cloud: Trying out the Clockwork Space on the new phone my son bought me, smirking.jpg]

"Hahaha…"

"You!...Hey, what are you laughing at? Are you annoying?"

Guan Qiaoyun, who was caught red-handed by her son, had a blush slowly spreading from her ears to her cheeks and then to her snow-white neck, like a rose under the moon.

And her little bastard was still laughing wildly:

"Well, I just think... a little cloud... hahaha, this online name is so cute hahaha..."

"Shut up!"

This brat is so annoying. How can a son laugh at his cute mother?

Guan Qiaoyun blushed as she pushed him and verbally warned him as a mother. Finally, she changed the subject to the new phone in his hand:
"Where did you get this phone?"

"Oh, this one was also bought with my royalties."

Guan Ren bought two mobile phones in total.

One is a white iPhone 4s for Guan Qiaoyun.

The other one is for himself, a white Samsung Galaxy S II, commonly known as the Galaxy Rabbit.

At that time, Samsung had not yet experienced the explosion scandal, and its market share in China was on par with Apple.

The two phones Guan Ren bought were the top flagship phones on the two platforms at the time.

"Guan Ren, how much is your phone?"

“It’s about the same as the 4S.”

"what…"

Although Guan Qiaoyun already knew that the money was earned by her capable son, it still hurt her heart to hear it.

"Then why don't you just buy a 4S?"

Wouldn't it be nice if the mother and son took out the same mobile phone?

Well…

What can it be called, a parent-child machine?

Guan Qiaoyun's idea is simple, but Guan Ren still prioritizes practicality: "I don't really like using that one, this one is fine."

……

Guan Ren has always felt that there is a certain reason why the iPhone is suitable for women.

For example, Guan Qiaoyun was not only using a smartphone for the first time, but she was also a novice when it came to electronic products in general, so she might have found it difficult to operate an iPhone.

After all, the current Android system generally requires cleaning up the background from time to time to ensure long-term smoothness.

But Guan Ren doesn't care much about these.

He understands it better and cares more about Android's freedom.

iOS requires jailbreaking to install even third-party input methods, which is not very convenient for people like Guan Ren who are used to typing in the nine-square grid.

There is also something called a control bar, which is not available in current iOS.

Not to mention the most outrageous and inhumane return logic.

In short, even though the current Android system is still very primitive, Guan Ren would still prefer to use Android.

What's more, today's Android phones have replaceable batteries, so you won't have to worry about battery life even if you play games for a long time.

……

But compared to these, there is actually another thing that is more important to Guan Ren right now.

"Oops!"

Guan Ren looked at the QQ app on his mobile phone that he had just logged into, and suddenly thought of something. He slapped his forehead and scared Guan Qiaoyun.

"What's wrong? Is your phone broken?"

"No, I... forgot something. Sister Qiaoyun, you should go back first."

What he forgot, of course, was the meeting he had made with Qingmei yesterday.

Today, I was outside all day while my computer was installing the system. In order to give Guan Qiaoyun a surprise, I didn't dare use my new phone early, so I didn't receive Luo Xiaobei's QQ message.

By the time Guan Ren discovered it, there were already countless lines on it.

The last few of them are all [wooooo].

Although Guan Ren knew that his childhood sweetheart would never cry.

But just looking at these words was enough to make him feel sorry for Luo Xiaobei, who had waited for a whole day without any response.

So I replied to her while rushing to her house.

Finally, I arrived at the gate of her community and happened to meet a girl who had just come downstairs carrying a bag.

"Xiaobei, I'm sorry, I..."

"Humph!"

"..."

Her expression was hard to see in the dark, but just from the "humph" she gave, one could tell she was aggrieved and unhappy.

At this time, Guan Ren knew that saying more was useless, so he just went straight to work.

While holding Qingmei in his arms, he skillfully dealt with her pretended struggles, muttering an explanation of what had happened today.

Slowly, Luo Xiaobei calmed down in his arms.

But I still have to criticize him:

"Guan, do you know how many times I knocked on your door?"

"I know, I know..."

"???"

"Oh no, I don't know..."

"Getting carried away..."

Can you completely forget your childhood sweetheart by dating another woman?
Although... although that woman is Sister Qiao Yun, she is indeed more important than me...

But it’s okay for Luo Xiaobei to complain secretly in his heart.

"Okay, let go, you smell so good..."

"Hey, it's okay. I washed my clothes with soap today."

"I'm talking about Sister Qiao Yun's taste!"

"cough…"

Guan Ren was a little embarrassed because of his self-conceit. Then, facing his childhood sweetheart whom he had stood up for the whole day, he wanted to say a few more words, but she had already moved on as if nothing had happened.

"Forget it, forget it. Today is your birthday. The most important thing is that you and Sister Qiaoyun are happy."

After saying that, she held out the bag she had been holding in her hand to Guan Ren:
"Here, a birthday present."

"what?"

Guan Ren was stunned. So the meeting she made yesterday was just to give him a gift?
"What? I give it to you every year, so this year can't be an exception..."

"Hey, Bei, hello again~"

Guan Ren gave Luo Xiaobei another bear hug, but Luo Xiaobei pushed him away with a smirk.

"Okay, let's take a look first."

"Ok!"

Guan Ren opened the bag and was stunned.

"Cellphone?"

"Yeah~"

Luo Xiaobei shook her twin ponytails proudly:

"It's a Samsung Galaxy S II. They say it's the ultimate phone online. You're always inconvenienced by not having a phone, and I heard you say you don't like Apple, so I bought this."

"You...your money is...?"

"I saved it up. Lucky money, pocket money, whatever. I saved it up for a year and it's just enough~ Hehe~ Isn't that great?"

"..."

Guan Rending stood there, looking at the birthday gift given to him by his childhood sweetheart, whose family was obviously not very wealthy, and he didn't know what to say for a moment.

So, after a moment of silence with his heart pounding, Guan Ren hugged her petite body tightly again.

Then, at the moment of separation, he gave her smooth forehead a gentle kiss, after a long absence.

"Xiaobei, thank you."

"whispering sound…"

Luo Xiaobei lowered his head slightly, casually brushed away his bangs that had been lifted up by him, then raised his chin and complained indignantly:
"You gold digger...!"

"?"

"How long has it been? If I don't buy you a phone, you're planning on never kissing me again, right?"

"..."

Guan Ren didn't know whether to laugh or cry when he heard this:
"After all, we're not in childhood anymore. Even if we're childhood sweethearts, we can't just kiss each other, right?"

What if someone saw them kissing, and it would be like what happened in junior high school, causing others to make a fuss and forcing her to hide at home for several days?
"Thank you, Luo Xiaobei, but I have to tell you something unfortunate."

After Guan Ren finished speaking, he took out his own S2.

Luo Xiaobei's eyes widened:
"You...why do you still have a white one?"

“I just bought it myself.”

"Ah?! Then...then what is this of mine!"

Luo Xiaobei was extremely frustrated, and her face immediately fell, but her childhood friend still had a solution. He grinned, tapped his white phone a few times to restore it to factory settings, and then handed it to Luo Xiaobei.

"I'll give you the white one, and you give me the black one. This way we both have new phones, and your gift will be unique."

"cunning…"

The childhood sweetheart was indeed a cunning person, but at least when Luo Xiaobei looked at the same mobile phones in the hands of the two people, one black and one white, the joy in his heart was indeed even greater than when he first gave him the gift.

----------

"Huh? Guan Ren, why did your phone turn black?"

"Oh, it's Luo Xiaobei."

After returning home, Guan Ren briefly explained the situation.

After Guan Qiaoyun heard this, her eyes were filled with tenderness and emotion.

Xiaobei, this kid... is really...

"Hey, Guan Ren, why are you taking off your clothes?"

"Take a shower."

Guan Ren glanced at the time. Although it wasn't too late, his eyelids were already drooping.

"Shopping is really not for me. I'm so sleepy. I'll go to bed right after I shower."

Guan Qiaoyun stared at him and asked:
"Where's your bath towel? Where's your change of underwear?"

"Uh…"

Guan Ren looked around and chuckled:
"Hey, I forgot~"

"..."

Seeing Guan Ren running out to the balcony in just his shorts, Guan Qiaoyun kept shaking her head.

This silly boy...

But then again, Guan Qiaoyun had been walking all day and was quite tired.

So after Guan Ren finished taking a shower, she took one for herself.

"Guan Ren, Guan Ren?"

After washing, Guan Qiaoyun wanted to ask Guan Ren a few questions about the use of mobile phones.

As a result, when I gently pushed open Guan Ren's bedroom door, I found that he was lying on the bed with his legs spread out, sleeping in an indecent manner.

"..."

Wow, that's really fast...

I had no time today and was planning to say happy birthday to him...

Guan Qiaoyun was helpless and could only help cover him with the quilt and support his tilted head.

"Eh?"

As a result, Guan Qiaoyun accidentally discovered that there was a photo under Guan Ren's pillow.

A very old photo.

On the yellowed photo paper, the location is a small scenic spot in Jiangzhou County.

There was a young woman, wearing a woolen coat and big wavy hair, her outfit was full of the strong Hong Kong style of the late last century and early this century.

In her arms, a little kid wearing a small hat and sleeves was also staring at the camera, but he just kept his big bright eyes open and sucked his fingers foolishly.

"Foolish..."

The young woman in the photo was holding the little one tightly, smiling at the camera of the photographer at the scenic spot with a very gentle and happy look.

Just like the woman outside the photo at this moment, she is holding the photo tightly with the same beautiful smile.

But when he turned to look at the sleeping face of someone on the bed, the red corners of the woman's eyes outside the photo began to gleam with a faint light again.

"No matter how stupid you are... Mom still raised you..."

She murmured softly, one delicate hand tightly gripping the new phone, while the other hand gently stroked the increasingly handsome and tough face on the pillow, and a warm tear finally fell silently.

The same silent tears that flow quietly.

At this moment, it has a completely different meaning from the time when I was angry at the little bastard in the first year of high school.

Guan Qiaoyun sat on the edge of the bed and looked at Guan Ren's sleeping face for a while. In her mind, the image of the little guy in the photo gradually overlapped with him.

Then, the corners of her mouth couldn't help but rise slightly, her willow-like waist bent slightly, and a few strands of black hair slowly drooped along with her delicate head.

A delicate lip line was faintly imprinted on Guan Ren's face.

……

"Happy birthday...my grown up little man..."

……

With a dreamy blessing, the bedroom door finally closed gently.

Guan Ren slept very soundly that night.

(End of this chapter)