The Silent Siren and Her Affectionate King

Chapter 5

A man in a butler suit came in just as the three left. Grandma Hua called for Vivian and let Mr. Zhou lead them to the butler.

"Vivian, Auntie Hua, this is Dave. He'll be the one who'll be leading you to the house since I need to leave for the office in a while," Richard said, then looked at Vivian. "Vivian, since you're going to be living in the dormitory as required by the school, I'll assign someone to take care of your grandma in your absence. I'll occasionally check up on her, too, so rest assured that she'd be able to live satisfactorily here," Richard assured Vivian, knowing that she might worry about her Grandma Hua.

Unlike Lina, Vivian felt that Mr. Zhou was a benevolent person and trusted him. She nodded. "Thank you," she said in a soft tone. Mr. Zhou smiled and was thanked by Grandma Hua again for his hospitality, patting his hand. He then instructed some other things to Dave before he left.

They returned to the main doors where Vivian's and Grandma Hua's bags were. Dave carried them to the buggy and drove slowly to give them a tour on the way to the house. The environment here was truly remarkable. There were trees and various flowers along with marbled statues and fountains littered here and there. They even had a rose maze near an Olympic-sized swimming pool.

By the end of the tour, Grandma Hua finally had an inkling of understanding why the unfaithful woman had left her son for another.

(Papa Hua somewhere in the skies, scratching his head: ...Didn't you say you didn't want to move out of the old house back then......)

Dave brought the bags inside the house. The movers already put the furniture in place earlier, leaving only some boxes containing personal belongings for the owners to unpack.

Grandma Hua thanked Dave before closing the door. The house wasn't as big as the mansion earlier, but it was bigger than their house in the province. The two-story house was equipped with a kitchen, a dining room, a living room, a laundry room, a theater, bedrooms, and bathrooms.

Located on the first floor were the kitchen, the living room, the laundry room, the master bedroom where Grandma Hua will be sleeping in, and the smaller bedroom beside it for the live-in caretaker. There was a bathroom inside the master room and another one outside for everyone. The second floor was similar, except the living, kitchen, and laundry rooms were replaced with the theater room and ample space that had a grand piano and some bookshelves in it.

Vivian opened the TV and told her grandma to sit down and rest while she unpacked the remaining boxes. She finished around five-thirty, occasionally checking on her grandma in between. After moving a lot, Vivian felt clammy and took a shower. It was a little past 6 in the evening when she finished, so she headed straight to the kitchen after she put on her pajamas.

She looked at the refrigerator and saw that somebody had already loaded it with fresh food. She decided to cook fish and some vegetables for their dinner. The kitchen had a rice cooker, so she prepared rice first. After a while, the fragrance of the fish started to waft into the living room.

Just as Vivian put the last dish on the dining table, she heard shuffling and saw her grandma approach the table. "Ay, such good food from my amazing granddaughter," Grandma Hua praised. Even though Vivian has taken chiefly over cooking for their meals these past few years, Grandma Hua still liked complimenting Vivian. They ate in comfortable silence, with sounds from the television playing in the background.

"Ah, Vivian, Grandma forgot to tell you. Richard said that the caretaker would arrive tomorrow morning, and you'll need to go to the school campus tomorrow afternoon to move into your dormitory. Pack more things since the school is somewhat far from here, and it'll be hard for you to come home. Richard said he chose a single room for you, so you don't have to worry about other people and that someone will drive you there tomorrow," Grandma Hua stated. Today was a Friday and her first day of class started the following Monday, which gave her only a little time to explore the campus.

Vivian paused for a second, thinking about how she just unpacked her things earlier, before slowly nodding in acknowledgment. It was almost seven-thirty in the evening when they finished eating. Vivian carried the dirty plates to the kitchen sink and washed them.

"Grandma, I'm going to pack my things," she said to the old lady, watching some popular modern drama on TV. Grandma Hua waved her hand in response before greeting her good night.

The room that Vivian occupied had a lot of space. Vivian filled it up with her stuff, her father's books and keepsakes such as pictures, plants, his flute, and other whatnots. Since her father was hospitalized, he stopped taking orders from his customers and passed the remaining pending ones to her. She was only 15, but with her intelligence and knowledge from her father, she was capable of finishing them.

By now, she had finished more than half of them, and the remaining ones were harder to accomplish. That was another reason she accepted the offer to move to the city. Before Vivian's father died, he told her to go to the city and attend H city's H No. 9 High School and study there. There was nothing wrong with her previous school, but No. 9 High School was known to have a different curriculum than other schools, teaching their students topics ranging from the arts to medicine to technology and more. The school also liked to give their students opportunities to go on excursions for their lessons.

In short, the curriculum was challenging and varied, which seemed like a fitting environment for someone like Vivian to continue to learn in after he was gone. After finding out that his ex-wife's step-daughter attended, he contacted her husband for a favor in exchange for his services.

She was never told what he did for him, but it must have been considerable enough for Richard to agree to host Vivian and her grandmother in his home with such luxury. Naturally, everything that Ashley said earlier was information her papa had already told her before.

Vivian started to pack her things up again, taking some essential items with her. Nobody had given her her uniform yet, so she packed her previous school uniform. After loading, Vivian left her luggage and backpack by the door. She then played a few games until 11 pm before she fell asleep from the fatigue.