Chapter 453

Chapter 453

Travis came by once to discuss cooperation with the Jackson Group with Simon.

Simon refused. They couldn't rely on the Jackson Group every time they faced a crisis.

He said he didn't care, that there was nothing they could do about it, that they weren't the only company affected. But except for those two years when he relied on Chris selling burgers at the police station entrance, when he got tired he'd let Chris take over while he pulled up a chair nearby to soak up the sun. When he'd had enough sun, he'd go to the shade of a nearby tree to play chess and chat with people.

After a while, he knew everything about everyone on that street—which family's son didn't have a wife yet, which family's daughter was still unmarried, which family's wife had been back at her parents' house for half a month after fighting with her husband.

Things like that—Simon knew it all. Sometimes he'd even help mediate neighborhood disputes. Then when Sienna and Kelvin got off work, if he saw someone he knew, he'd catch a ride home with them.

The one who suffered most was Chris. In the mornings he could still work properly, but by afternoon he wanted to slack off. What made it worse was that he had to bike home himself—Simon wouldn't even buy him an electric bike.

Finally, Chris worked up the courage to go on strike for three days. On the last day, he even went on a half-day hunger strike, insisting that Simon change their work hours to selling burgers in the morning and having the afternoon off.

When the colleagues at the police station heard about this, they kept crowding around Simon, suggesting he just stop selling burgers altogether and do something else—anything else, just not burgers.

So Simon thought about it and had Chris withdraw all the money he'd saved over the years to open a small supermarket nearby.

Chris transformed into a supermarket owner. He even threatened Raven and the others to chip in to hire a cashier for him, while he just lay in a chair all day, constantly sending videos to Sienna asking, "Which one should I eat next?"

At first, Sienna would send voice messages back scolding him. After listening, Chris would gleefully send another message, "Help me figure this out—I think we need to change the inventory. I'm sick of everything in the store."

Later, Sienna couldn't be bothered to reply. She'd just storm into the supermarket after work, grab Chris, and go find Simon.

Simon would have his chess game disrupted by them, watching helplessly as Sienna handed him a stack of A4 papers with Chris's provocative messages to her. As for the videos...

She'd look at Kelvin, and Kelvin would obediently hand his tablet to Simon.

After this went on for a while, Simon finally couldn't take it anymore and made Chris start working properly and focusing on his career.

Then disaster struck unexpectedly. Several subsidiary companies were forced to close. Simon's health wasn't good, so unless absolutely necessary, Sienna wouldn't let him step foot outside the estate.

Even Amy became much more well-behaved, saying she wanted to study medicine when she grew up.

Margaret quietly poured Simon a glass of water and teased, "She can't even write her own name yet."

Hearing this, Simon laughed. But as he laughed, he became troubled.

Because he realized he'd have to help with homework in the future.

Helping kids with homework—few people make it through that unscathed.

But the busiest people in the household were still Sienna and Kelvin.

During the time they were confined at home, even Chris became much more obedient, diligently disinfecting every day and monitoring Simon's and the other elders' health conditions.

Especially Simon's.

His health had only recently recovered. Even a cold would scare Sienna and the others, let alone this aggressive virus. So for a long time, Sienna and Kelvin didn't dare return to the estate—they could only video call.

Simon could still hold it together, but Chris couldn't.

One day, Sienna and Kelvin didn't get back to their apartment until 3 AM. When they checked their phones, they were full of calls from Chris.

"I'll call him back." Sienna said, standing at the door watching Kelvin disinfect himself.

Kelvin also disinfected his phone and the doorknob, "What if he's asleep?"

"He won't be," Sienna pushed the door open, "Mom says he's been troubled lately, walking around with dark circles under his eyes every day."

Before Kelvin could respond, Sienna's video call went through.

Chris answered in one second.

Before anyone could speak, Sienna saw his eyes were red. Her heart skipped a beat, "Chris, is it...?"

Chris interrupted her pitifully, "Sienna, do I still have a chance to become a police officer? If not, even an auxiliary officer would work. Think of something—get me in there."

It wasn't about Simon. Sienna breathed a sigh of relief.

"Chris, what's wrong?" Sienna asked, "Have you become interested in a police career lately?"

Simon's voice came from the side, "He's worried about you."

After a pause, he added, "He's pretty worried about Kelvin too."

Kelvin raised his voice and shouted, "He's never thought about me!"

Simon laughed and continued, "He hasn't seen you in months. He's worried about you and misses you. He can't go out himself, and lately he hasn't even felt like eating."

"Soon," Sienna said, quickly changing clothes, "Let's just hang in there a bit longer."

They hung in there, and another four months passed. New Year's was just a month away, but no one was in the mood to celebrate.

First, everyone was still worried about the virus. Second, both Simon's and Russell's companies had taken quite a hit this time. Third, Sienna and Kelvin were exhausted and needed time to recover properly.

But Russell was easygoing—more money or less money didn't matter to him. He even called specifically to comfort Simon, "Simon, don't be too upset. How about this—try to distract yourself, you might feel better."

Simon asked, "How?"

"Spend time with Margaret and Amy," Russell said mysteriously, "You don't know this, but my son told me..."

Simon was startled, "You really haven't been idle—you already have a son?"

"Yeah!" Russell said disdainfully, "Can you believe you didn't know?"

Simon rubbed his forehead, "Sorry, I forgot."

Russell wasn't angry and continued with his topic, "My son told me that everyone took a hit this time, but people like us are doing okay compared to others. We should be content, right? Look, Chris takes such good care of you. Your good health—that's the greatest wealth, isn't it?"

It wasn't that Simon couldn't accept it—he just felt a bit regretful.

Everything else didn't matter much, but these past two years he'd focused on scientific research and development, collaborating with many universities. Several of the subsidiary companies hit this time were related to this work. Two of them even involved classified projects. The loss of personnel, the interruption of experiments—considering everything, restarting the work would be very difficult.

For him, it was just losing some money. But for those professors and students who spent day and night in the labs, this was a devastating blow. Several research projects had reached critical stages but were forced to stop. Simon felt he'd let them down.