“The kids are a bit picky when it comes to food. I will order from a different restaurant tomorrow.” No matter how disgruntled she was at heart, Zhang Xiying wasn’t going to let any of it show.
She even patted Meng Yan on the back of his hand in a comforting way. “The kids are still young. We can teach them gradually. You are not around them that often so it’s inevitable that they are a bit distant from you. It will get better.”
Meng Yan nodded mindlessly. He didn’t really believe what she said. This meeting had cooled his fatherly heart immediately once again.
He has no idea how other kids were like in front of their parents in other households, but for sure, it was nothing like how Meng Yuran and Meng Shanshan were in front of him.
Had he really been too absent in their lives?
Upstairs, Meng Yuran kept Meng Shanshan with him and did not let her return to the room that Zhang Xiying had prepared for her. He did not trust this couple at all. He’d feel much better with his sister where he could see her.
He went over to the other room and brought over the pillow and the blanket.
Luckily, the bed was 1.5 meter wide and more than enough to hold the two of them.
Meng Shanshan was the carefree type and had no awareness of being in a strange environment. When it was her bedtime, she showered, climbed into bed, rolled under the blanket, and fell asleep within a second.
Meng Yuran felt both relieved that she didn’t cry and fuzz but also worried that she has no sense of alert at all.
For some odd reasons, he suddenly felt a kind of helplessness like that a parent would feel…
At this time, Meng Yan, with milk in his hand, turned the doorknob.
It was locked from the inside.
Meng Yan was stunned.
When Zhang Xiying was heating up milk for her sister, she made two more glasses for Meng Yan.
She had his best interest in mind. She figured that allowing him more opportunities to spend time with his children would help them warm up to him slowly.
The children’s vigilance was unexpected.
The next morning, the two children were woken up by the maid’s knocking and telling them to go downstairs for breakfast.
Meng Yuran went downstairs holding Meng Shanshan’s hand.
Not being told in advance that they would be coming over, the two children did not have any of their personal items with them.
Meng Yuran was still wearing his clothes from the day before. That had put him in an even worse mood.
“We will be heading home after breakfast,” was the first thing that Meng Yuran said after he went downstairs.
Ever since yesterday, he couldn’t wait to go home.
It was though his father wasn’t his real father and that being at his father’s house wasn’t even as comfortable as being at some relatives’ place.
Meng Yan wasn’t too happy either. “What’s the rush? I've already told your mother that we want you to stay here for a few more days.”
Now that Meng Yan had brought that up, Meng Yuran felt even more ironic.
“My mother said it’s up to us whether to stay here or not. And I am telling you right now that we don’t want to stay.”
He sneered and couldn’t even hide the sarcastic look on him. “So now you want to mend our father-and-child relationships? Where have you been this entire time? Had you not lied to Shanshan that I am over here, do you really think we would have come?”
Nobody else dared to chime in but just looked at the two of them attacking each other.
Meng Yan had always known that his son had been disgruntled about him, but he had not expected that he'd speak so bluntly.
How’s that the proper attitude toward one’s father?
No! That's the attitude toward one’s enemy!
“You mean to tell me that had I asked nicely, you wouldn’t even have come?” asked Meng Yan in a deep voice.
“Yes.”
Meng Yuran’s answer was like a slap in the face to Meng Yan.
All he wanted to do was to squeeze out some time to spend with his family. What was so horrible about that? Did he really deserve to be treated that way just because he had been too busy to take care of them?
Meng Yan was infuriated by now. “Then leave!”