Grandma Jin, smoking a cigarette, said cheerfully, "It's been many years since anyone called me 'Auntie.' You, my grandson, didn't recognize me at first, but you treat a 'servant' like a human being, so you can't be too bad."
From "definitely not a bad person" to "cannot be too bad," why do I feel like I'm starting to backtrack a bit?
Grandma Jin, holding a cigarette, asked me, "You can't have a problem with me calling you grandson, can you?"
"...Uh, no, you can call me."
Grandma Jin continued, “Ever since you finished filming Little Jinzi, he hasn’t said anything, but I know he hates you. So I gave him a warning—” The old lady tapped her cigarette ash, “I said if he dares to make things difficult for you, I won’t let him off the hook.”
Now I understand why Jin Yi didn't cause me any trouble after he woke up. It turns out he had the Empress Dowager backing me up, "Little Qiangzi"!
I asked, "Was the plaque on the day my school opened also a gift from you?" Grandma Jin nodded.
Why are you willing to help me like this?
Grandma Jin stubbed out her cigarette on the corner of the table, and after thinking for a long time, she said, "There are some things I don't know whether I should tell you or not. I'm afraid that if I tell you, I'll scare you, or after you hear it, you'll start calling me an old lunatic."
I laughed and said, "You tell me, there's really nothing that can scare me right now."
Grandma Jin paused for a moment, then said leisurely, "You'd better listen to what I'm about to say and forget it. The reason I'm telling you this is because I don't want you to think that our Jin family is ungrateful and heartless, that we accept kindness from others and then act like ingrates."
My heart skipped a beat; those words sounded rather mysterious.
Grandma Jin continued in that drawn-out tone, "I've never done anything bad since I was a child, but my eyes aren't very clear. Occasionally, I can see things that I shouldn't see. The old folks call that spiritualism."
I couldn't help but stiffen; it really gave me the creeps.
Grandma Jin chuckled: "See, scared you, huh? Let me tell you, I'm not like those real psychics. I can only foresee things a few days from now in my dreams, and I'm usually pretty accurate. A few days before my 80th birthday, I kept dreaming that Little Jin was going to have an accident that day, like he was in a car accident, oh dear, his head—"
I quickly waved my hand and said, "You don't need to say anything, just like Sachima."
This time it was Grandma Jin's turn to be surprised. She asked in astonishment, "How did you know?"
Realizing I had misspoke, I quickly said, "I was just guessing."
Grandma Jin gave me a deep look and said, "You guessed right, it's just like Sachima. I even dreamed about holding his funeral. Everything was so real, as if it were right in front of me. I could even see who came and what exactly happened. And I couldn't wake up from the dream. I spent those days like that, as if I were living in two worlds."
The surprise I felt was beyond words, and I could only subconsciously try to comfort myself by saying, "That's because you love your grandson, you're overthinking it."
A sharp glint suddenly flashed in Grandma Jin's eyes: "Really? When I heard on the day of the wedding that you had taken the picture of Xiao Jinzi before he got on the bus, I suddenly felt a sense of relief." Grandma Jin stared intently at me and said, word by word, "I think you are a benefactor to our Jin family."
Having said that, I suddenly fell silent. In the end, I could only brush her off by saying, "Let me say something you won't like to hear: this is feudal superstition."
Grandma Jin asked abruptly, "Did you eat vegetarian dumplings for breakfast?"
I was shocked and asked, "How did you know?" I quickly realized that since there were immortals like Liu Laoliu in the mortal world, could this old lady be another spy from the Heavenly Court?
Unexpectedly, Empress Dowager Jin smiled and said slowly, "I've been looking at that leek leaf on your tooth all morning..."
Chapter Sixty-Six: Jin Shaoyan Reunited
Grandma Jin glared at me and said, "I know a little about what you've been up to. You and Little Jin gambled on horses, making him lose face at the company. But I'm curious, when you were at odds with him, why didn't you pat him on the back? Why didn't you knock him down when he was about to bring you to my birthday celebration?"
I rinsed my mouth vigorously with tea, trying hard to come up with an excuse.
Grandma Jin gave me a meaningful look: "There's something else you don't know. After the accident that day, I stayed by his side. Around midnight, I vaguely saw a figure walking over and trying to say something to me, but he couldn't say anything."
I spat out the tea and asked, "Aren't you scared?"
“What am I afraid of? It’s my grandson. Then Xiao Jinzi woke up, sat up and called out.”
"...What did he shout?"
Grandma Jin sat there upright for a long time before finally saying, "Brother Qiang."
I choked on my tea and coughed, but my eyes instantly welled up with tears. My good buddy Jin 2 didn't forget me at the last moment—I thought he was calling for Li Shishi.
Looking at me, who was constantly bending over and coughing, Grandma Jin slowly said, "I'm old, I don't have many years left to live, what can't you tell me?"
I patted my chest and glanced at the old lady, only to find her staring at me too. I chuckled dryly and asked, "Besides Xiao Jin, how many other grandsons do you have?"
"In our Jin family, only one seedling grows on thousands of acres of land."
"Congratulations! Between June 12th and June 17th, you had two grandsons. I call them Jin 1 and Jin 2..." Since I couldn't hide it anymore, I decided to tell the old lady everything. It wasn't anything shameful, and besides, this old lady wasn't an ordinary person. It was just this one last thing; I might as well let it all out.
This time, it was Old Madam Jin's turn to be dumbfounded. She certainly hadn't expected the story to be so bizarre and convoluted. However, being someone with a strong foundation from childhood, after a moment of stunned silence, the old lady sighed, "You rascal, you're a benefactor to our Jin family—"
My face flushed red—if I weren't thick-skinned, I would have noticed—and I said, "Don't say that, your second grandson gave the money." I clicked my tongue and said, "Although the second son spent the money, it was the eldest son who was saved. I really feel sorry for him."
Grandma Jin said, "They were originally one person." She understood perfectly.
We sat quietly for a while, and I asked, "What else did Xiao Jin say after she woke up that day?"
"After he shouted that, he completely understood. Apart from a minor head injury, he was no different from before. And he had no idea what he had shouted. According to you, it's probably that my 'second grandson' is gone. But ever since that brick you hit, Xiao Jinzi has become much more composed, so in that respect, he should thank you. I hope you two brothers can become closer in the future. Can you do that?"
I smiled wryly and said, "I'm fine with it, but Xiao Jin hates me to no end. All he remembers now is me humiliating him in public and hitting him with a brick. Would you be close to someone like that?"
Grandma Jin nodded with difficulty: "...Take it slow. After all, not everyone can accept this kind of thing. I'll make sure he doesn't harm you. If you need any help, just ask. Your grandma may be old, but no matter where I am, I can still bend the scales."
I was sweating bullets. Judging from the Empress Dowager's domineering demeanor, there shouldn't be anything in the Jin family that could stump her.
I immediately thought of Li Shishi's plays and hurriedly told the old lady, "I have a cousin named Wang Yuannan..." I only said that my cousin Wang Yuannan wanted to film a play called "The Legend of Li Shishi" and didn't say anything more.
Grandma Jin squinted and said, "As for Little Jin's work, I don't understand it and I never ask. But since you brought it up, I have to do it for you, right? Otherwise, I'll let you, you good-for-nothing, say that I'm getting more and more useless as I get older, and that I only know how to talk nonsense."
I was afraid of putting the old lady in a difficult position. If it weren't for various special reasons, I wouldn't have wanted to go through this back door either. I knew that although the old lady looked like a country bumpkin, she was definitely the kind of sensible and considerate person who cared about the big picture; otherwise, how could she have raised a film tycoon like Jin Ting? I asked, "How do you plan to talk to Xiao Jin?"