Chapter 160

Did she buy them?

Shen Li was stunned for a moment, but that was all; there was no fluctuating emotion beyond that.

She thought it was clothes Shen Zhaozhao had bought, didn't like, and shoved into her wardrobe.

"They're a bit small and don't fit well."

After saying this, she didn't look at her and continued to focus on the problems.

"Have you tried them on? And you're already saying they don't fit."

Yu Lizhen walked in with a somewhat sour expression, feeling that she was still being unreasonable and stubborn, deliberately not wearing them.

How could they be small?

She had bought them according to the size of her old high school uniform.

Yu Lizhen's face darkened slightly. She took the coat out of the wardrobe and compared it with the old coat Shen Li had worn. Without needing her to try it on, she could see that the cashmere coat she had bought was indeed a bit small.

Now the person with nothing to say was her.

Shen Li had long since outgrown her high school uniform. During the few months she was in Wuchuan, she had been fed a lot of good food by Xie Qin; he often bought her snacks and cakes, and she often went out for late-night snacks with Xu Zhouyuan and the others.

Over a long period, it was visible to the naked eye that she had grown quite a bit.

After a moment of silence, Yu Lizhen spoke up: "Tomorrow you come with me to the mall and see if we can exchange them for a larger size."

Shen Li said to her in a flat tone: "No need to trouble yourself. You can give them to Zhaozhao; she should be able to wear them. These clothes must be very expensive, and I'm afraid of getting them dirty if I wear them; they're not easy to clean."

Shen Zhaozhao wasn't very tall; she was only 1.6 meters tall with shoes on. These clothes should fit her perfectly.

These clothes had delicate fabrics and looked very expensive. If they got dirty, she would inevitably be scolded again.

A complex emotion flitted across Yu Lizhen's eyes: "Zhaozhao's have already been bought. Look at this down jacket; try it on over your clothes, it should fit."

Her tone was a bit softer than before.

Shen Li pressed her lips together, not quite understanding why she insisted on her wearing them.

She couldn't quite calm down to do her problems here.

"Thank you, I know. You can leave it here, I'll wear it tomorrow."

This "thank you" was said very flatly; it wasn't deliberate distance, just a casual remark.

Instantly, it pulled the distance between the two of them to a strange position.

It made Yu Lizhen feel uncomfortable in her chest. She took out the ill-fitting clothes, intending to go exchange them for fitting ones tomorrow. Turning around, she saw the few pieces of bread in a plastic bag by her hand: "Why are you eating this unhealthy bread again? Didn't I tell you? This bread has a lot of food additives, you need to eat less of it."

"Is this all you ate for lunch today?"

Shen Li: "Yeah."

Yu Lizhen frowned, her face dark, and she started lecturing again: "I gave you two hundred yuan, not for you to buy this junk food. You're not allowed to eat it again."

Shen Li stopped her pen and looked up at her: "I didn't spend that money. I still have the living expenses Grandma gave me."

Seeing her like this, Yu Lizhen felt an inexplicable anger in her chest: "Not planning to spend my money, and not planning to eat my food either? Are you trying to cut off our mother-daughter relationship!"

"I didn't mean that." Shen Li explained to her in a flat tone: "I still have money left; I'll tell you when I don't have enough."

"A lunch doesn't need that much money."

"You can just give me fifty a day like before."

After hearing the explanation, her expression finally looked a little less ugly.

Whoever heard this would think Shen Li was very sensible, knowing how to save money for the family.

But Yu Lizhen just felt angry hearing it, though she couldn't say why she was angry.

Her temperament was just like this, cold and clear, and she never said anything.

Even the communication between mother and daughter almost never happened.

It was as if there was a layer of thin ice that couldn't be touched or melted, separating them in the middle.

This made Yu Lizhen feel powerless, always feeling that she had neglected something, but she couldn't find the reason.

She had thought that because of the recommendation quota, Shen Li would come back and have a big fight with her, or be stubborn and compete with her.

None of these imagined situations happened.

Not throwing a tantrum and obediently repeating the year was what she wanted.

But it seemed like there was a thorn in her heart, gently pricking her, making her panic.

There was no point in arguing about this anymore.

Yu Lizhen softened her expression and asked her: "I bought pork ribs, do you want them braised or in a soup?"

Shen Li: "Anything is fine."

She had no requests.

Yu Lizhen took the two ill-fitting clothes and left the room.

Behind her came a calm voice: "Now that I'm back, can you unfreeze that card?"

Shen Li had also just suddenly remembered.

Yu Lizhen's footsteps stopped.

"The money in there is what I won from participating in the math competition. I want to save it in my own card."

She would have use for it later.

The money she won from the competition back then was all transferred to the card her mother had set up for her. She couldn't bind it to her own phone, and she could only go to the deposit machine to withdraw money.

She had frozen the card to make her come back, and it hadn't been unfrozen yet.

She looked at her quietly and left without responding.

With a "click," the door was opened and then closed.

In the evening, Yu Lizhen made four dishes and one soup. There was still too much food. Dad wasn't coming back today, and Shen Li couldn't eat much of this table of food, so she could only put it in the refrigerator and save it for tomorrow.

It was a bit quiet without Shen Zhaozhao in the house.

The mother and daughter sat quietly at the dining table, looking at each other without a word, only the sound of chopsticks hitting the bowls and plates.

Shen Li only ate half a bowl of rice. "I'm full."

Seeing that the dishes on the plate hadn't been touched much, Yu Lizhen frowned with dissatisfaction: "I bought groceries and cooked as soon as I got off work, and you only ate this little? Did I tell you to eat less snacks outside?"

"I didn't eat snacks." Facing the inexplicable scolding, Shen Li pressed her lips together and said to her helplessly: "I know you're busy, you don't have to go through the trouble of coming back to cook for me in the future. I can just make do with something outside."

"I went through the trouble of coming back to cook for you, and I'm still wrong? Putting on this face, are you planning to keep being stubborn with me like this!"

Meeting the angry gaze, Shen Li relented first: "I'm sorry, I didn't mean that."

"I just didn't want to trouble you too much."

Yu Lizhen was blocked by her daughter's faint, cautious appearance and couldn't say a word.

Both were silent.

A while later, Shen Li got up and walked into the kitchen, silently washed the dishes, and turned back to her room.

Only Yu Lizhen was left in the living room, holding the cold half-chopsticks in her hand, facing the empty dining table.

A sense of irritability filled her chest. She had no appetite either, put down her chopsticks, and supported her forehead with her hand.

Closing her eyes, she asked herself in her heart.

Back then, when I gave the recommendation quota to Zhaozhao, was I really wrong?