The blind boss's nanny

Undeterred, she continued babbling on in Chinese:

"Oh, you should drink this soup while it's hot, it'll taste fishy when it cools down... By the way, those ginseng plants in the yard are growing really well, Aunt Mei said she'll dig them up and make soup when it gets a little colder, it's the most nourishing..."

She pronounced the two characters "Dang Shen" (党参) in clear and natural Chinese.

Baker's fingers twitched on the sofa.

It was very subtle, but Lin Xiaoman still managed to catch it.

Lin Xiaoman felt certain. A completely innocent smile spread across her face as she used even more broken English words mixed with hand gestures:

"You... eat... food..."

He looked anxious, trying hard to express his concern but unable to communicate due to the language barrier.

Bake finally looked up, glanced at her coldly, and replied in perfect English:

"Put it there. You can leave."

Lin Xiaoman immediately showed a relieved expression, nodding repeatedly, but still muttering in Chinese:

"Okay, okay, I'll be going now..."

She turned and walked out, her steps neither hurried nor slow.

As she reached the door, she suddenly stopped, turned around, and spoke in Chinese, as if to herself:

"Spending the holiday alone...it must be quite lonely, Codonopsis."

That long-forgotten Chinese name was so lightly uttered by her.

As soon as she finished speaking, she clearly saw the figure by the window, who had always stood as straight as a sculpture, tremble slightly.

The door closed gently.

In the corridor, Lin Xiaoman smiled at Leng Feng, gesturing for him to go back.

The moment she turned around, the smile on her face faded, but a hint of understanding appeared in her eyes.

He understands.

In the days that followed, Lin Xiaoman became even more outrageous.

She started delivering meals or snacks to him every day, each time speaking to herself in Chinese with a simple vocabulary and a slow tone.

"The sun is shining brightly today, it's time for Codonopsis pilosula."

"It's windy, close the windows, and bring some Codonopsis pilosula."

"Who gave you this name? Codonopsis pilosula."

Stubbornly, she gently tossed that name into his stagnant silence time and time again.

She observed that whenever he heard the words "Codonopsis pilosula," the cold lines of his profile would soften slightly, and his gaze, whether turning pages or looking out the window, would momentarily lose focus, as if he had been dragged back to some distant time and space.

He still never responded to her in Chinese, and continued to coldly drive her away in English.

Until one day, Lin Xiaoman asked him, seemingly casually:

Do you remember what happened in the Chinese orphanage when you were a child?

The figure by the window stiffened slightly.

Lin Xiaoman seemed not to notice, and continued in that calm, conversational tone:

"Did the person who took care of you back then give you the name 'Codonopsis pilosula'?"

The air suddenly froze.

After a long while, just when Lin Xiaoman thought that this test would once again go unanswered, a voice rang out.

It is written in Chinese.

His pronunciation was clear and accurate, without a trace of foreign accent, and even carried the tonal rhythms characteristic of the East.

"How did you know?"

He asked, his voice dry, like a long-unused string being suddenly plucked.

Lin Xiaoman's heart skipped a beat, and she almost cheered! She suppressed her excitement and turned around.

"I said... I guessed it myself after seeing your Chinese name, do you believe me?"

Dangshen glanced at her. His gaze was complex, containing scrutiny and suspicion, but lacking the stinging pain of having her past touched upon.

Then, a cold smile appeared on his lips as he picked up the book again, demonstrating his disbelief through his actions.

He's back to being the aloof Dr. Baker.

Lin Xiaoman was not discouraged. She shrugged and simply sat down on a small stool not far from him. Regardless of whether he was listening or not, she began to speak eloquently in Chinese.

She recounted her experiences at Sunshine Home.

Those small, fragmented moments that only those who experienced them firsthand would notice:

The smell of the quilts after they've been sun-dried on the communal sleeping platform; the steam rising from the shared basin of hot water when washing faces in winter; the few toys that the children treasured and passed around; and... many children didn't have their own names, their surnames often coming from the aunt who took care of them, or from the old dictionary in the courtyard.

"In our area, many children also have the surname 'Dang' (Party)."

At first, Dang Shen kept his eyes down, but didn't turn the pages of the book in his hand for a long time.

Gradually, as more and more details appeared in her words... college students would come to volunteer during holidays, all the children would line up to receive new shoes when companies donated, the aunt hummed off-key nursery rhymes... his fingers holding the book tightened little by little.

These words seem to gradually erase the blurred outlines of certain scenes that were deliberately forgotten in the depths of time.

Some details strangely overlapped with those faded fragments deep in his mind.

He raised his eyes and looked at Lin Xiaoman for the first time in a real and long way.

His eyes held shock, hesitation, and something extremely complex.

Lin Xiaoman met his gaze without flinching; her eyes were clear and calm.

"So, the name 'Codonopsis pilosula'..."

Her tone was firm.

"It must be very important to you."

This time, Codonopsis pilosula remained silent for an even longer period.

After a while, the sunlight in the room shifted a little distance.

Finally, he nodded very slightly.

Although this name hasn't been used for a long time.

So long that he almost thought the little boy named "Dang Shen" had died in some winter in a foreign land.

At this moment, this name was reawakened by a girl with a similar aura, speaking in the language of her hometown.

The frozen lake surface finally cracked open with a thin fissure, letting in a faint ray of light and the scent of homeland.

Codonopsis pilosula began to tell the story behind that name.

Before he was five years old, Dang Shen's household registration was with an orphanage in China. However, his memories of the orphanage itself are very vague.

"Most of the time, I was taken to live at my 'mother's' house."

He said.

Lin Xiaoman understood. She knew that some places had such pilot programs... allowing loving families to temporarily care for children in orphanages, with the state covering the children's basic expenses and providing some subsidies to the caring families.

This is a rare and warm time for the children, close to that of a normal family.

Codonopsis pilosula was one of those children.

The "mother" he spoke of was a woman with a warm smile. In her not-so-spacious but tidy home, besides Codonopsis pilosula, there was also a little girl of about the same age.

"We're like real siblings."

Dang Shen's voice lowered, and her gaze drifted to the window.

"We ate together, took naps together, and waited for Mom at the alley entrance together... She called me brother."

That was the earliest and brightest color in his memory.

One day, several blond-haired, blue-eyed foreigners came to the orphanage. They were there to adopt children. One couple in particular took a liking to the quiet and pretty Dang Shen at first sight.