The contract between Song Qingchun and Su Zhinian did not allocate any holiday; however, during breakfast on New Year's Eve, Su Zhinian still announced to Song Qingchun that she was going to have a three days' break.
Su Zhinian started to pack after breakfast. He was going to spend the holidays with his mother. Before returning to her place, he even sent Song Qingchun home to the Song family. It was not until Song Qingchun walked safely into the door and he heard the conservation starting between Song Qingchun and Song Menghwa that Su Zhinian drove away.
The helpers around the house had been given holiday, so only Song Menghwa, Song Qingchun, and Fang Rou remained at the house for the holiday.
Song Qingchun spent the whole afternoon at home, helping Fang Rou with the decorations and preparing the reunion dinner.
After the reunion dinner, CCTV's Reunion Gala began. Fang Rou was in the kitchen cleaning up while Song Qingchun accompanied her father to watch the television with a bowl of mandarins to snack on.
The atmosphere was just lively enough, but it still seemed rather lonely due to the absence of Song Cheng. Song Menghwa didn't laugh at any of the host's jokes, probably because he was missing his son. He stayed in the living room for only half a minute before taking his medicine and retiring to bed.
Song Qingchun had not been interested in the TV show to begin with, so after Song Menghwa left, she turned off the television and went to her own bedroom as well.
Song Qingchun had put her phone on charge in her bedroom before going down for the reunion dinner, so the first thing she did after going into her bedroom was to check her phone. It had five unanswered calls and many WhatsApp messages.
Most of the messages were spam greeting messages; Song Qingchun ignored most of them. She opened the first non-spam message and realized it was a message from Qin Yinan inviting her to join him at a new year party down at North Sea Garden.
Song Qingchun believed Tang Nuan would be at the party, so her first instinct was to reject. However, before she could do that, a call from TW Station's Manager came in. It was the same invitation as Qin Yinan's. According to her boss, Hwa Nuo's CEO had hired a cruise ship and was holding a giant party at North Sea Garden. He had invited many cooperating companies to attend. The Manager had called to ask Song Qingchun, who was celebrating New Year in Beijing, to come join in the fun.
Before Song Qingchun could settle on an answer, the door to her bedroom was pushed open. In walked Fang Rou with a plate of sliced fruits, which she placed on Song Qingchun's bedside table.
Song Qingchun was reminded of the fact that Fang Rou had practically not taken a step out of the house after Song Cheng's death to focus on taking care of Song Menghwa. Considering this was not an intimate party thrown by Qin Yinan and Tang Nuan but a large corporate event, Song Qingchun thought about it and asked, "Manager, can you get me two invitations?"
"Definitely, in a minute, I'll send you a QR Code; you just need to swipe it at the entrance to gain entry."
Her boss was probably in a hurry to contact other people, so he hung up after saying that.
Song Qingchun put her phone down and called after her sister-in-law who was leaving the room. "Big Sister."
Fang Rou turned around and replied with a gentle "Hmm?"
"There's a New Year party at North Sea Garden tonight. Since Father is already asleep and the night is still young, why don't you join me, and we'll go have some fun?"
Fang Rou shook her head slowly and replied in a gentle drawl, "Thanks, but I don't think so. I don't have any clothes for the occasion"
As if afraid that Song Qingchun might continue trying to persuade her, Fang Rou added after a pause, "Furthermore, Father might wake up while we're gone. Then, there'll be no one at home to help him."The CCTV New Year's Gala, also known as the Spring Festival Gala, and commonly abbreviated in Chinese as Chunwan, is a Chinese New Year special produced by China Central Television (CCTV). Shown on the eve of Chinese New Year on its flagship CCTV-1, cable channel CCTV-3, satellite channel CCTV-4, second flagship CCTV-7 and CCTV-14 and internationally through the China Global Television Network, the broadcast has a minimum yearly viewership of over 700 million viewers, making it one of the premier television events of China.