Zhang Fan had quite an awkward time in his last several days in the respiratory department. There wasn’t much he could say about who was in the right or wrong.

It was now the end of May. Zhang Fan’s younger sister would soon be taking her college entrance examination. Zhang Fan was preparing to take vacation time to visit home.

Zhang Fan had been eating dinner at Shao Hua’s home quite often now. The food was delicious, and the nutrition was balanced! The previously skinny Zhang Fan was gaining more weight now. Although he could also eat his fill at the hospital cafeteria previously, the food wasn’t nearly as delicious. It could only fill his stomach. But at Shao Hua’s home, he was able to eat dumplings, buns, noodles, rice, and so on. Shao Hua’s family definitely wouldn’t let him eat the same thing within a week. In addition, Shao Hua and her mother both remembered Zhang Fan’s favorite foods.

After dinner, Zhang Fan and Shao Hua took a walk outside together. “It’s the end of May, and I’m going to visit my hometown soon. Have you considered things?” Zhang Fan asked.

“Oh! I don’t know!” Shao Hua’s face was red as she looked down at her feet. “Do you want me to go with you?”

“Of course, I want you to come with me so much! I think that my parents would be overjoyed to meet you!”

“I think that it’s more you that would be overjoyed!” Shao Hua had actually already discussed this topic with her parents. Although her parents had agreed that she could go, her mother had privately lectured Shao Hua yet again about the importance of not having sex before marriage for the sake of remaining pure!

“Yeah! Of course I’d be overjoyed!” Zhang Fan wanted to embrace Shao Hua out on the street, but she escaped his clutches.

“Walk properly. I still have serious matters to discuss with you,” Shao Hua told him.

“Okay. Say it.”

“Will you always treat me this well in the future as well?” Shao Hua asked while directly looking at Zhang Fan.

“Yes, I will.”

“What about when I’m old and no longer so beautiful?”

“I didn’t pursue you because of how beautiful you were or not!” Well, Zhang Fan said the wrong thing here, so Shao Hua started hunting him down.

The two of them messed around for a bit. Then, Zhang Fan said, “My family’s financial situation isn’t so good, but since I was lucky enough to earn such a nice sum of money, I’m going to discuss things with them after my younger sister finishes taking her college entrance examination. I’m going to invite my parents to come live with me in Chasu City since this is an urban area rather than the poor part of town where they live back home.”

“Yes, you should do that. You need to hurry up and finish renovating your new home so that your parents can live in a new home, then,” Shao Hua told him.

“It might be difficult. It’s likely that they won’t want to come here.”

“Then what will you do?” Shao Hua asked worriedly.

“I was thinking that if my parents don’t want to come to Chasu City, then I’ll use the 300,000 yuan that I received to purchase a new home for them in our hometown. Is that alright with you?” Although Zhang Fan hadn’t gotten married to Shao Hua yet, he felt that such a major decision was something he should discuss with her.

“Will that be enough money? I heard that it’s not cheap to purchase a home in inland China. I’ve saved up approximately 50,000 yuan over the past two years of working. I’ll transfer that money to your account when you go visit your parents.”

“Rich girl!”

“You dare to make fun of me!” Shao Hua began to tickle Zhang Fan.

“Thank you for the offer! But, it shouldn’t be that expensive to purchase a home in my hometown!”

“Didn’t you just say that we shouldn’t separate our finances so clearly, and that money should be shared? Why suddenly act so polite with me?”

“Haha! Then I’ll happily accept your money. Also, I want to drive all the way back to my hometown, what do you think?”

“That’s fine with me, but I don’t think I can get as much vacation time as you. How about this? I’ll come back earlier by plane. But, I’m worried about you driving back by yourself,” Shao Hua said.

“Vacation time for you isn’t a problem at all. Just go talk to Sister Wang.”

“It isn’t good to trouble others!”

“Relax. It’s just as simple as issuing a command for her.”

Shao Hua returned home and discussed the matter of visiting Zhang Fan’s parents with her own parents in more detail. Her parents both agreed to let Shao Hua go, and told her to mind her etiquette so that she would give Zhang Fan’s parents a good first impression.

Since it was now decided that she would visit Zhang Fan’s hometown, and that they would travel there by car, Shao Hua began all the preparations for the food and drink on the road trip, where to stop at, and so on. Zhang Fan had no thoughts about any of this whatsoever. He figured that they could just stop wherever they wanted along the way. This was probably a difference between a man’s and woman’s way of thinking.

It would be considered good manners to go visit Wang Qian at her home to ask her to help out. Before visiting Wang Qian, Zhang Fan first went to the hospital administration department to request vacation time. Zhang Fan was requesting a long vacation of 15 days by using all of his previously unused vacation time combined, but such long vacation required the personal approval of the superintendent. So, the hospital administration director brought Zhang Fan over to Superintendent Ouyang’s office.

“Oh, you’re planning on going back to visit home?” Superintendent Ouyang asked.

“Yeah, it’s been two years since I last returned. My younger sister is taking her college entrance examination soon, so I want to visit her.”

“Okay, go ahead. 15 days doesn’t seem like enough. How about I approve you for a full month of vacation instead? Properly spend some time with your family,” Superintendent Ouyang said quite generously.

“Thank you, Superintendent.” Zhang Fan was really delighted by the outcome.

Actually, Superintendent Ouyang was so generous with giving him vacation time not only because of Zhang Fan’s recent accomplishment with the emergency military patient surgery, but also because she had coincidentally run into Li Xiao at the Chasu City Communist Party Committee government building yesterday. Li Xiao had even especially inquired how Zhang Fan was doing. This was why Superintendent Ouyang had given him so much vacation time.

After Shao Hua got off from work, Zhang Fan and Shao Hua prepared to go visit Wang Qian’s home together. They passed by a supermarket, where Shao Hua purchased some fruits. Zhang Fan told her not to buy anything else, because he felt that Wang Qian wouldn’t lack for anything, so fresh fruits would make the best gifts.

Wang Qian typically left her work post in the bank quite early. She had already finished making several dishes at her home as Zhang Fan had called her in the morning to let her know that they were coming over. “It’s fine to just visit. There was no need to bring me any gifts! Just take these fruits back with you as they’ll go bad if left here at my place. There’s only me and my husband, and he’s hardly home. It will take me three days to eat a single apple,” Wang Qian half complained as she invited Shao Hua and Zhang Fan inside.

“Sister Wang, what delicious food have you made today? Braised fish? I can smell it right from the doorway!” Zhang Fan glanced in the direction of the kitchen.

“Oh! You have such a great nose! Yesterday, someone gave me some Russian coldwater fish, so I braised it. Have a taste in a bit! Please have a seat first. Let me go check on the fish.”

Shao Hua followed Wang Qian into the kitchen to help out. Zhang Fan didn’t join them, and instead poured some tea for himself. Ever since Zhang Fan had met Wang Qian’s husband over New Year’s, Zhang Fan stopped coming here so often. Wang Qian also knew the reason why. There was no need for explanation. That was just how people were. It would take a while for Wang Qian’s husband, Old Jiang, to accept Zhang Fan. Forcing him wouldn’t be good, so things would have to be taken slowly.

Wang Qian was quite happy as she ate and chatted together with the young couple. Normally, she actually skipped dinner.

Zhang Fan had zero alcohol tolerance, so he didn’t drink. Wang Qian and Shao Hua had some red wine for themselves.

“Sister Wang, the hospital specially gave me an entire month of vacation time so that I can visit home. I’m planning on taking Shao Hua to visit my hometown together with me, but I’ll have to trouble you to help her get as much vacation time from the bank. Otherwise, Shao Hua won’t be able to request so many vacation days.”

“You’re preparing to go together?” Wang Qian chuckled.

“Yeah!” Shao Hua was so embarrassed that she lowered her face completely to her bowl as she ate!

“Okay, I’ll go talk to her boss about it tomorrow. How many months of vacation does she need?”

“Just one month!” Zhang Fan was quite stunned. Could it be that Wang Qian was easily capable of giving Shao Hua even several months of vacation?

“Alright. Wait before you leave, I have some gifts for you.”

After dinner, Wang Qian handed Zhang Fan two large bags filled with presents from her. “This isn’t much, it’s just some smokes and wine. Say hello to your parents from me.”

When Zhang Fan returned to his apartment and checked the gifts, wow! They were all top-class smokes and wine. Since Zhang Fan’s father didn’t drink alcohol, Zhang Fan only took two bottles of wine and half the smokes, and prepared to give the rest to Shao Hua’s father.

“These are gifts for your parents. This isn’t proper,” Shao Hua hurriedly tried to refuse.

“There’s nothing improper at all. They were given to me, so I can decide what to do with them. Hurry and take this bag of smokes, I can’t carry any more.” Zhang Fan forced Shao Hua to take her portion of the smokes and wine before leaving. Since he was leaving the border province soon for an entire month, he would need to greet and inform many people about this, which was why he couldn’t waste any time.

He needed to tell Li Xiao, Kang Hua, Chen Qifa, Director Gao Shijun, Li Hui, Li Liang, and Wang Yanan. He also needed to personally visit Li Xiao and Gao Shijun as just calling and informing them over the phone would be considered impolite since he was closer to them.

Li Xiao also gave Zhang Fan some presents of deer antlers and caterpillar fungi when she learned that he was returning to his hometown. Her back pain was now completely cured. When she went for a checkup, she was informed that her slipped spine disc had already returned to its proper location, which truly made her overjoyed.

Gao Shijun didn’t say too much. He just told Zhang Fan to be careful while driving.

Zhang Fan simply exchanged greetings and temporary goodbyes with Chen Qifa and Kang Hua over the phone.

When Li Hui learned that Zhang Fan was driving his girlfriend to visit his hometown together, Li Hui felt so much pain due to jealousy!

This was because back when Li Hui and Zhang Fan had arrived in the border province together, Li Hui had a girlfriend, and Zhang Fan had been single! But two years later, Zhang Fan was taking a girlfriend home with him, yet Li Hui was now single! Although Li Hui had tried to find a new girlfriend ever since his breakup, either he felt that the girl wasn’t good enough for him, or the girl would feel that he wasn’t good enough for her!

Li Hui was so lonely now!