Two weeks flew by in a flash.
During this time, the World Cup was still in full swing, and the theme song that he loved the most, Shakira’s "Waka Waka," played on a loop through the streets and alleys.
Every time he heard the prelude of this song, Xu Qingfan felt as though he transformed into a wild man from an African tribal village, clad only in a simple grass skirt, dancing around a campfire with abandon.
The last match of the group stage ended on the 26th, and unsurprisingly, it matched the qualifiers Xu Qingfan had predicted on Weibo.
Actually, by the 24th, the outcome of many groups had already been sealed, and, as expected, he had become a sensation once more.
In just a little over two weeks, Xu Qingfan grew from a minor V-blogger with over four hundred thousand followers to a top internet celebrity with ten million followers.
There was no helping it—whoever followed Brother Fan’s bets was bound to strike it rich!
Many who took Xu Qingfan’s advice and bet on the group matches earned more than they would from a year of hard work;
Others, who hesitated and made only a small bet of two yuan, ended up beating their chests in regret when the results came in.
All these people posted their winning lottery tickets online and manually @ the number one passionate man of Hong Kong, fanning the flames of his already skyrocketing popularity. The summer of 2010 was destined to be a betting frenzy for the punters.
Xu Qingfan stopped browsing Weibo and, after drafting and sending his prediction for the match between Balagui and Little Sun Day on the 29th, he stretched lazily in his chair.
After idly reading a few marketing articles, he got up, planning to take a walk outside.
Xu Qingfan grabbed his wallet and keys and stepped out, noticing that next door, Xia Xiaoxiao’s door was locked. He did a stretch and muttered to himself, "Where did this Xia Xiaoxiao run off to now?"
This morning, she was out before he even got up, and now, approaching four in the afternoon, she still hadn’t returned.
Xu Qingfan took out his phone and dialed Xia Xiaoxiao’s number—not because he was lonely, but simply out of concern for her!
"Hey, where have you run off to? Not coming home yet?" As soon as the call connected, he preemptively demanded.
"Don’t shout. I’m busy. Cook dinner for me tonight, that’s it, bye!"
As expected, before Xu Qingfan could say anything more, his phone screen went back to the dialing page.
"This Xia Xiaoxiao..."
"This stinky, silly dog, has she forgotten her birthday is tomorrow?" Xia Xiaoxiao dried her hands on her apron before putting her phone, which had been resting on her ear, back into her pocket.
"But Brother Fan remembers everyone’s birthday though!" Lin Wanning placed the cut fruit on the countertop, waiting for the final step to decorate the cake.
"Brother Fan seems to really dislike celebrating his own birthday, not sure why," Xiao Ruawen spoke as she sneaked a piece of cake into her mouth.
"Brother Fan said it’s because the day he was born is also the day of his aunt’s suffering, and just thinking about that makes him not want to celebrate his birthday," Wu Lingyu stopped her beating of the egg whites and said.
That was the offhand answer Xu Qingfan had given when Wu Lingyu once asked him, and the girl took it as the truth, because that’s just the kind of person Brother Fan is!
"Brother is so nice!" Zhang Yiyi clearly believed that as well, nodding in agreement.
"Wow~ Hearing Brother Fan say that, I feel a bit guilty for having been so happy about my past birthdays," Xiao Ruawen said, sneakily eating another piece of cake while the others weren’t looking.
"It’s okay though; that’s why we should be even happier on our birthdays, yah. If mom sees us happy, she’ll be happy too!" The sweet Lin Wanning comforted them.
"Exactly, Xu Qingfan’s reasoning is twisted; of course, birthdays are meant to be joyful!"
"Brother is wrong, Wanning is right!"
While five girls were bustling in the kitchen of their secret base, Xu Qingfan had already ridden off on his beloved motorbike for a leisurely cruise.
This year, there wasn’t much rain around Qingming Festival, but the growth of the lychee trees was very pleasing.
He drove near a litchi forest, and looking out, the red was even more abundant than the green, but there weren’t many people picking lychees.
The market for lychees this year was not good, and even lowering the wholesale price to several dimes per jin couldn’t attract buyers, so he had just bought a big bag of Guiwei lychees by the roadside for less than three yuan.
The money made from selling lychees wasn’t enough to cover the costs of the pickers, so many fruit farmers simply let the lychees rot on the trees.
The first thing that came to Xu Qingfan’s mind was online fruit farmers, followed by the irritating "chop once" from his previous life.
If this project were to succeed, it could help numerous small and medium-sized fruit farmers open up sales channels, and it would also be a great political achievement for the local bigwigs.
However, the 4G era hadn’t arrived yet, so there was no need to rush; she thought it would be okay to start the next plan after Zhang Chunxue had completely taken over the national takeaway market.
Xu Qingfan took out his phone and saw it was already 4:58 p.m., and the displayed date was June 28th.
He got back on his electric bike, the seat warmed by the sun was a bit hot on the buttocks, "Going to buy vegetables."
The five girls were busy all afternoon and finally finished making the giant ten-inch cake.
After using jelly to draw caricatures of the six of them on top, everything was perfect!
"Brother Qingfan is definitely going to like it!" A satisfied smile appeared on Lin Wanning’s face as she raised the selfie stick to take a photo of the five of them with the cake-making background.
"If he dares not to like it, we’ll beat him up!" Xia Xiaoxiao clenched her small fists.
"Goose, goose, goose~ I think it’s you, Xiao Xiao, who will get spanked by Brother Fan!"
"Haha... stop... tickling... it’s so itchy, haha!"
Zhang Yiyi and Lin Wanning exchanged glances and nodded in tacit agreement.
"Ah~ Wanning and Yiyi, why are you...Yu, come help me quick!"
"Be careful not to knock over the cake." Wu Lingyu ignored the four playful girls and carefully packed the cake into a box before cautiously placing it back in the fridge.
"Why does it seem like it’s gotten bigger again?"
"Ah~ Xiao Xiao, you hooligan girl!"
Wu Lingyu smiled lightly with pursed lips, watched for a while, then rolled up her sleeves to start cleaning the kitchen.
The four girls soon joined the cleaning crew, blushing. Aside from splashing water getting everywhere on themselves and the floor, it was quite a harmonious and affectionate scene.
After cleaning the kitchen, the five of them entered the bathroom and soaked in the bathtub together.
Looking from left to right, it was like reading a haphazardly answered cloze test: BBCBD.
"Do you think Brother Fan will cry from being moved tomorrow?"
"For sure, duck, we put so much heart into this!"
"Brother will cry his eyes out!"
"But it seems like we’ve never seen Brother Fan cry."
"If he dares not to cry, we’ll beat him until he does!"