Delicate Beauty in the Palm : Chapter 78 - Parenting Variety Show (Part 1)
Chapter 78: Parenting Variety Show (Part 1)
These two little babies had inherited the best genes from both their parents. Once the redness from birth faded, their skin turned fair and clear. Two tiny bundles — absolutely adorable.
The boy was named Wen Zhijing, and the girl was named Wen Zhiling.
Wen Liang’s affection for the two babies didn’t last very long. Once Chen Die finished her postpartum confinement period, his patience for Wen Zhijing and Wen Zhiling had completely run out.
He had never imagined that babies could be so noisy.
They cried when they were hungry, cried when they were cold, cried when they were hot — and sometimes, even when they were just lying quietly in bed with nothing wrong, they cried anyway.
Having one like this would already be a headache, but they had two at once.
Whenever they started crying, the house basically turned into a noise chamber.
Wen Liang had always been a laid-back person. Once he got irritated, he didn’t want to bother coaxing them. So they hired two nannies, one for each baby — Wen Zhijing and Wen Zhiling.
One night, Wen Liang returned home from the office and was greeted by the sound of Wen Zhiling crying as soon as he stepped in.
By then, the first three months had passed. Wen Zhijing wasn’t as prone to crying as he had been at birth — most of the time, he was pretty well-behaved. The true noise-maker-in-chief in the household was definitely Wen Zhiling.
At the entryway, Wen Liang changed his shoes and saw Chen Die holding Wen Zhiling, trying to soothe her.
Wen Liang frowned. “Where’s the nanny?”
“She’s been crying all afternoon,” Chen Die replied. “The nanny just got a chance to go eat.” She nodded toward Wen Zhijing on the other side. “You feed the big brother. His milk should be at the right temperature by now.”
Wen Liang picked up the bottle, tested the temperature, then glanced over at Chen Die and said in a flat voice, “How many times have I told you? Stop calling him the big brother.”
Chen Die: “......”
He sat down on the sofa, pulled the stroller over, shook the milk bottle a few times, and then placed it next to Wen Zhijing’s mouth. “Hold it yourself.”
“......”
Truly a strict father — he’d been enforcing the ‘do it yourself’ policy since the baby was three months old, never mind that Wen Zhijing couldn’t even understand what he was saying yet.
But whether it was some father-son telepathy or something else, Wen Zhijing actually raised his tiny hand and gently grasped the bottle.
His hand was too small and weak to hold it steadily, though, so Wen Liang still had to support it from below.
He sat lazily on the sofa like that, one foot propped against the stroller, one hand holding the milk bottle. Even while feeding the baby, he looked effortlessly cool.
Chen Die tried to soothe Wen Zhiling for a while, but the baby girl just wouldn’t stop crying. So she simply carried her over and sat down on the sofa.
Wen Liang very noticeably and indifferently shifted backward, leaning against the sofa armrest, avoiding his own daughter like she was the plague.
Chen Die noticed and immediately shot him a cold glare. “Wen Liang.”
He lazily looked up. “Hm?”
Completely unaware of what he’d done wrong.
Chen Die took the bottle from his hand and placed Wen Zhiling into his arms. “Let’s switch.”
Wen Liang looked down at the wailing Wen Zhiling, his eyelid twitching hard.
At three months old, Wen Zhiling was already very pretty — baby-fat chubby cheeks, eyes that looked just like Chen Die’s, like two sparkling black grapes.
But she could cry like no one else.
Wen Liang frowned and patted her back twice in an attempt to comfort her.
No use.
“Wen Zhiling.” He started sternly calling her name again.
Chen Die glanced at him, curious to learn from his unorthodox methods — maybe he knew some magic way to stop her from crying.
Wen Liang reached up and pinched her cheek. “You’re already three months old. No more crying.”
“......”
Wen Zhiling did actually stop crying for a moment, blinking her big eyes at Wen Liang. Two seconds later — maybe because the pinch hurt — she burst into even more gut-wrenching sobs.
Chen Die couldn’t hold back her laughter. She’d just finished feeding Wen Zhijing and walked over to gently rub her daughter’s cheek, which had turned pink.
“You really pinched her that hard?” Chen Die said. “She’s just a three-month-old little baby, what do you expect her to do?”
Wen Liang frowned and commented, “Too delicate.”
Chen Die shot him another glare and muttered, “You think everyone’s too delicate.”
Wen Liang let out a low chuckle, holding Wen Zhiling in one arm while wrapping the other around Chen Die’s shoulder, leaning in to kiss her. “Isn’t it good to learn independence early?”
He brushed his lips against her earlobe. “Let’s go upstairs.”
“......”
Chen Die gave him a look. The words on his face might as well have read: I’ve given up on being human.
“What the hell is going on in your head?!” Chen Die blushed and scolded him. “Who says stuff like that in front of the kids?”
Wen Liang chuckled and asked, “What did I say?”
He brushed Chen Die’s ear again, leaned in to kiss the edge of it, and only when he saw it turn red with satisfaction did he casually say, “Even if I did say it, they don’t understand anyway.”
“But you were just talking to them.”
Soon, the two nannies responsible for taking care of Wen Zhijing and Wen Zhiling came downstairs after dinner. Wen Liang, clearly relieved, handed Wen Zhiling over to one of them.
Wen Zhiling had just been scolded by Wen Liang. Even though she didn’t understand what he said, his demeanor alone was scary enough. Sniffling and whimpering, she buried herself into the nanny’s neck and refused to look at her father again.
Fortunately, there was perfect understanding between father and daughter in this regard — Wen Liang didn’t want to look at her anymore either. After giving the nanny some instructions, he directly pulled Chen Die upstairs with him.
Full and satisfied, Wen Liang lay in bed, holding Chen Die in his arms.
Chen Die was so exhausted she didn’t even want to move a finger. She lay there with her eyes closed for a long while. Wen Liang thought she had already fallen asleep and was about to get up to turn off the light when she finally opened her eyes.
Her voice was soft: “Wen Liang.”
He had just sat up, turned to glance at her, switched off the light, and lay back down, pulling her into his arms again. “What is it?”
“I’m planning to return to work soon. I haven’t acted in such a long time. Recently, Fang Ruan sent me a few new scripts. Some of them seem pretty good,” Chen Die said.
Wen Liang had been idly toying with her fingers, but his hand paused at her words.
He didn’t object to her going back to work. Though deep down he hoped she’d just stay at home, he knew what she truly loved.
“Can your body handle it?”
“…I think taking care of these two is more tiring than filming.” Chen Die poked his palm. “So you take care of them. I’ll go out and earn money.”
Wen Liang let out a soft laugh.
Before her pregnancy, Chen Die had completed a movie that had just been released recently. There were interviews and magazine features still coming out. Though she hadn’t appeared publicly during the late stages of pregnancy and postpartum, she still maintained a certain level of exposure.
Wen Liang had kept her pregnancy very well hidden, so no fans knew that her temporary absence from acting was because she’d had children.
As a result, some bizarre rumors started circulating — like one claiming that she and her brother Chen Shao had fallen out over the Chen family inheritance, and that Chen Shao had now ‘frozen’ her career.
Chen Die found these rumors both ridiculous and hilarious, and treated them like jokes.
A month later, she confirmed her next script and joined the production team. Her personal studio started promoting it, and the company’s official account reposted the announcement, effectively and effortlessly shutting down the rumors.
In truth, Chen Shao was also a first-time father himself and barely had time to manage his own affairs. The company’s support for Chen Die wasn’t from his direct orders. But everyone in the company knew she was the chairman’s sister, so they naturally offered her the best resources and promotional efforts.
In the past, when Chen Die joined filming crews, Wen Liang could stay in the hotel with her without any issues.
But now that they had Wen Zhijing and Wen Zhiling, it was inconvenient to live in a hotel with them. With no one to care for them during the day, Wen Liang could only occasionally bring the kids to visit her on set.
No one in the crew knew she’d had children.
But when they saw Wen Liang pushing two strollers onto the set, everyone was stunned. Now that was what you called ‘quietly doing big things.’
By her twenties, she had become a top-tier actress, won a Best Actress award, had the powerful Chen family behind her, married Wen Liang, and now — surprise — already had a son and a daughter, and still maintained her figure perfectly.
It was the kind of thing that made others feel utterly defeated in comparison.
Once everyone got over their shock and finished playfully scolding her for hiding it, they were quickly melted by how adorable the babies were, all eager to hold them.
But Wen Liang was a different breed. While most parents found their children endlessly cute, Wen Liang seemed completely blind to it — like he didn’t find his own kids cute at all.
The family version of ‘They have their fun, I just find it noisy.’
While everyone else was gathered around Wen Zhijing and Wen Zhiling, squealing over their cuteness and snapping photos, Wen Liang just clung to Chen Die, feeling relieved to be away from the chaos.
At one point, Chen Die even began to question whether Wen Liang really had the potential to be a father.
After all, it was Chen Die who had initiated the idea of having kids. Wen Liang had never brought it up.
Fortunately, when the twins started speaking and stopped crying all the time, Wen Liang’s faint, flickering ‘fatherly love’ finally started to show.
The first to say ‘Mommy’ and ‘Daddy’ was Wen Zhijing. Suddenly, Wen Liang treated him like an interactive toy, fascinated by him and constantly coaxing him to say ‘Daddy’ again and again.
Not to be outdone, Wen Zhiling — who had been somewhat neglected as a result — learned to say ‘Daddy’ about a week later.
Her voice was soft and sweet, with a girlish delicacy. When Wen Liang heard her say it, he stared at her for a few seconds, then suddenly smiled.
Chen Die couldn’t help but feel like that smile had instantly healed all grudges between father and daughter.
Life went on peacefully and quickly. Before long, Wen Zhijing and Wen Zhiling were already three and a half years old.
Over the past three years, Chen Die had balanced family and work, starred in a few more projects, and now had an even more stable fan base and status. She could be considered the leading star among the new generation of young actresses.
She hadn’t gone out of her way to hide the fact that she’d had children — everyone on set knew — but thanks to the influence of the Chen and Wen families, no one dared to leak it.
In order to protect their two children, Wen Liang had already reached out to various media outlets before the babies were born, ensuring that there would be no related reports.
To this day, none of the fans knew that Chen Die had already had children.
But continuing to keep it a secret was becoming increasingly inconvenient. Chen Die couldn’t just casually take the two little ones out in public without worrying about causing a scene or being chased by fans.
So she started considering announcing it publicly at an appropriate time.
Fang Ruan gave her a suggestion and placed a collaboration proposal that had arrived a few days earlier from a TV station in front of her. “Take a look at this. I think it’s quite suitable.”
Chen Die opened the first page.
At the top was a bold title: “<Lovely Baby> Season 2 Collaboration Invitation.”
Season 1 of <Lovely Baby> had invited several popular celebrity parents and their children to participate. The program focused on observing how celebrity parents interacted with their children and how the children completed tasks set by the production team.
Thanks to the popularity of the celebrities involved, the first season had very high viewership.
“...” Chen Die flipped through the invitation casually. “You really think Wen Liang would agree to something like this?”
Fang Ruan said, “Why don’t you ask our two little ones first? If they want to go, then Mr. Wen’s veto vote would be outnumbered three to one.”
Chen Die had watched the first season of the show. Some of the tasks and games were indeed meaningful.
Also, due to her identity, she had never had the chance to travel with her son and daughter before. She didn’t actually mind this kind of variety show.
When she got home that day, she first asked Wen Liang for his opinion.
Unexpectedly, he agreed without much hesitation.
Chen Die was stunned and asked again to confirm: “You really want to do it?”
“Sure,” he said. “You’re going too, after all. Better than when you go off to a film set and don’t come home.”
“......”
He made her sound like a heartless deserter.
Then Chen Die asked their son and daughter. They didn’t quite understand what a variety show or filming meant yet — they only knew they’d get to appear on TV like Mommy and that it would be fun. So they happily agreed.
Two months later, <Lovely Baby> officially aired.
There were four celebrity couples and their children. However, in the teaser trailer, only three of the families were revealed. The fourth remained pixelated and anonymous.
In the teaser, the mystery family was only shown for about three seconds — a family of four getting out of a car with their faces blurred, making it impossible to tell who they were.
Naturally, this piqued the curiosity and attention of netizens, who started speculating wildly. But after listing every celebrity with two kids in the entertainment industry, none seemed to match the silhouettes in the teaser.
So when the first episode aired, everyone eagerly waited to find out who the mystery family was.
The episode started with footage of the families arriving at the airport. After introducing the first three families, the show built up suspense for the final family, even cruelly cutting to a commercial right before the reveal.
Just as viewers were cursing the interruption, the commercial ended — and the fourth family finally appeared.
The door of a business van slid open. The camera first captured a pair of long male legs stepping out of the car. By the time it panned up, the man had already turned his back to the camera. He was seen helping a little boy out of the car, then carrying a little girl in his arms.
The children were still very young. The girl clung tightly to Wen Liang’s pants leg, while the boy curiously looked at the camera.
As the camera zoomed in on the two children, the comment section on-screen exploded with live reactions:
[Who is this?? WHO WHO WHO WHO WHO?? They're too cute!!]
[Wait—are there even guys this handsome in showbiz?? Why don’t I recognize him?!]
[Ughhh another show trying to make me want kids again.]
[They look the same age — twins?! Boy and girl??]
……
Then the camera shifted again. A pair of slender, fair hands reached out from inside the car. The man tightly held her hand and helped her down the van steps.
Finally, their faces were shown.
Chen Die. Wen Liang.
Once the beloved onscreen tragic couple.
Now, a real-life family of four.
The comment section exploded. Trending topics crashed.
[HUH?????????????]
[!!!!!!!!!!!!!!]
[When did this happen?! Holy crap, how does my Die-die have two kids that are already three or four years old???]
----------
If you like my translation, please support me by buying me a coffee:
0 comments: