The pinhole cameras on the ceiling diligently captured the scene.
The barrage of comments went wild upon seeing this.
[“Ah, what’s Bai Jinyan doing?! They’re already in such a situation and they’re still not making a move?!”]
[“I’m really feeling the vibes of a couple in the ambiguous phase!”]
[“Dmn! Bai Jinyan, quickly reach out and hug him, then kiss until he can’t breathe!”]
[“Bai Jinyan, are you okay? I’ve been pounding my keyboard non-stop behind the screen. Please, when can we get some action.”]
[“The wife is just too adorable, being teased instead of doing the teasing, blushing all over.”]
[“A good-looking blushing face is truly irresistible. If Qiao Qiao blushes and says something to me, I’d give him the whole world.”]
[“Wake up, Bai Jinyan is looking at you.”]
…
Qiao Huaiyao closed his eyes, forcing his heartbeat to calm down.
He picked two strawberries absentmindedly to shift his focus.
Then he felt someone touch his arm. All their other guests were outside; only the two of them were inside.
Qiao Huaiyao turned to look and saw Bai Jinyan’s hand extended, holding three large and red strawberries.
The strawberries bore traces of being rinsed with water.
A smile curled up the corners of Qiao Huaiyao’s mouth.
He pressed down his growing amusement, picked up one of the strawberries, and began to eat.
Busy for an hour, Qiao Huaiyao had eaten some strawberries while picking them, and they had filled two baskets by the end.
When it was time to weigh them, he asked, “Brother, how many should we keep?”
They certainly couldn’t sell all the strawberries.
Bai Jinyan replied, “Let’s sell half.”
In truth, Qiao Huaiyao liked the strawberries so much that he wouldn’t mind not selling any.
But they couldn’t preserve so many; the fridge space was limited, and leaving them outside…
Even with the cooler temperatures, it wasn’t enough to serve as a natural freezer for the day. Too many to finish eating.
Beside him, Zhao Jiamo had set up a scale. “Come on, put the strawberries on the scale in order. The scale will automatically deduct the weight of the container, like the basket or the cap. The weight it shows will be the weight of the pure strawberries. Completely accurate.”
Both Qiao Huaiyao’s and Nie Yihang’s households consisted of two people.
Most of their other guests had three or more.
More people meant more strawberries picked.
After the weighing and sorting, Zhao Jiamo announced, “First place goes to Su Yijia, second place to Bai Jinyan, third to Ji Zhengui, fourth and fifth respectively to Nie Yihang and Zuo Tai.”
Hearing they were in second place, Qiao Huaiyao felt a bit surprised.
They didn’t seem to have picked that many.
Zuo Tai’s group had the most people, four adults, so he thought they would secure first place, but they ended up last.
He couldn’t help but ask, “Why are we last?”
Zhao Jiamo explained, “Because your wastage was too high. Look at these strawberries; juice is already starting to seep out.”
He didn’t elaborate further, but the camera showed the scale, with quite a bit of strawberry juice on it.
Not to mention the area they had kept the strawberries on throughout.
Zuo Tai had focused on quantity rather than quality, with baskets piled on top of each other and strawberries getting scratched, but he hadn’t paid much attention to that.
However, when it was all piled up like this, problems emerged.
Knowing he was in the wrong, Zuo Tai’s expression wasn’t too great, but he didn’t refute.
Zhao Jiamo raised his voice, “If there’s no problem, come over here and register. Note down the quantity you’re selling and the quantity you’re keeping for yourself.”
“Once the registration is done, you’ll get paid. Then you can head back and rest. I’ll send a text message to inform you of the evening recording time.”
Some of the guests from his group were still hesitating.
Qiao Huaiyao handed a basket of strawberries to Zhao Jiamo, “This is from our group.”
“Alright.” Zhao Jiamo checked the weight and handed him three hundred yuan.
The market price for cream strawberries was not low, especially since they were of good quality and without much wastage, and the director didn’t deduct any.
The money was collected by Qiao Huaiyao.
This time, he simply combined it with the money from before.
With all the picking for an hour, it was hard not to get some soil on them.
After returning, Qiao Huaiyao put the strawberries into the fridge.
Fortunately, half of it was already empty in the morning, freeing up space for refrigeration.
Not in a rush to deal with them, he changed his clothes and then saw Bai Jinyan’s phone screen flashing constantly, even though he hadn’t answered any calls.
Thinking he might not have noticed, he reminded him, “Brother, your phone is ringing.”
“Mhm.” Bai Jinyan put down the script, took the phone, and hesitated over whether to answer or not, then got up and walked out.
Qiao Huaiyao wiped his damp hair.
Director Zhao Jiamo sent three messages in a row.
He thought it might be about some changes in the show’s recording, worried about missing the time, and quickly opened the messages.
Zhao Jiamo: [Are Bai Jinyan and you together? Why isn’t he answering the phone? Auntie Meng asked me about it.]
Qiao Huaiyao typed back: [I didn’t see it earlier; I’ve answered it now.]
Zhao Jiamo: [That’s good, I thought something had happened.]
He was the director, and if Bai Jinyan ran into trouble on his show, it would be hard to escape blame.
Mentioning this, Zhao Jiamo went on to say: [Auntie Meng was nagging at me just now. She said she called you, and no one answered; she called Bai Jinyan, and he didn’t answer. She’s overseas and had her soul frightened away.]
Qiao Huaiyao paused.
Call him…?
There was no missed call on his phone.
He typed: [Maybe it’s a coincidence; I might have been on a call with someone else, so he couldn’t get through.]
Qiao Huaiyao: [Auntie Meng is overseas, and she’s so well-informed? She even knows that I’m participating in this show’s recording.]
Zhao Jiamo: [I don’t know, the conversation just got to that point. Maybe she didn’t get through to me the other time she called, so when Bai Jinyan didn’t answer this time, she casually complained.]
Qiao Huaiyao didn’t get to say anything before more messages came in.
Zhao Jiamo: [Besides, I don’t know if Brother Bai is…cough, cough. For the sake of Brother Bai’s privacy, I haven’t let news spread too much. Auntie Meng is busy rock climbing and scuba diving overseas. She found herself an island to play on and managed to make a call when she had some time, but she isn’t paying much attention to variety shows.]
Normal procedure; Qiao Huaiyao didn’t find it surprising.
He hadn’t initially agreed to participate in the later stages of the variety show.
Being a nobody, it was only natural to keep his identity low-profile.
After chatting with the director for a while and noticing that Bai Jinyan hadn’t returned yet, Qiao Huaiyao curiously got up to look for him.
A phone call probably wouldn’t take him too far, but upon going outside, he didn’t find anyone.
“Why are you outside?” Qiao Huaiyao’s hand paused, suspiciously asking, “Brother, where did you go?”
Bai Jinyan lifted his hand, bringing Qiao Huaiyao into the room and shook a bottle of drink, “Fresh strawberry shaved ice, try it.”
It’s hard to make a hot beverage with fruit; the fresh flesh would easily lose its original taste when doused with hot water.
So, it’s usually consumed as a cold drink.
Luckily, the room was kept at a constant temperature, so it wasn’t a problem to drink a cold beverage.
Qiao Huaiyao blinked lightly, “Tastes good.”
The ice had a rough texture and could be bitten into. Drinking it, you could taste the strawberry flesh.
The texture was rich, and it seemed there was strawberry syrup added.
Qiao Huaiyao sat at the edge of the bed and asked, “Why did you suddenly think of making this?”
Bai Jinyan adjusted the room’s temperature a bit higher, “I thought you might like it.”
With so many strawberries, they should enjoy them as much as they can.
Anything consumed in excess might lead to a backlash; strawberries were no exception.