Chapter 004

Mother and daughter ultimately had no overnight grudges.

The next day, Guagua went to apologize to her, and they reconciled as before.

However, Xu Xiangjuan had thought a lot that night, and her temper had softened considerably.

The child had grown up, her wings had become stronger, and she no longer controlled everything. If she did, it would only add to her own troubles.

Before the her Ah Ning left, her focus had been on her child.

After he left, she had completely shifted all of her attention to the child.

However, now that the child has grown up, was no longer under her control and has become unreliable. The mother had taken care of both children, providing for their education, food, and clothing, but in the end, she was the one to blame.

—

Zhou Chengning hadn’t expected to get a quilt. Today, his wife was made him a soup and even gave him a quilt. What was going on?

The kerosene lamp was still burning in the bedroom.

Niuniu had eaten and was asleep. Usually, he woke up every two or three hours. Xu Xiangjuan saw that Guagua had already gotten into bed and was lying down, ready to sleep. She lifted Zhou Chengning’s quilt and patted the man who was still dazed, not knowing how to get into bed.

Zhou Chengning was completely at a loss now. He didn’t know where to put his hands and feet, he was stiff like a wooden puppet; he followed Xu Xiangjuan’s instructions and got into bed.

The couple hadn’t slept together for nearly ten months. Was this what his wife meant?

Xu Xiangjuan only had something to say, not intending to do anything else. “I’ll buy you a bicycle, so you can ride it to work in the future.”

“No… don’t, it’s not far,” he said. She was going to buy him a bicycle!

Bicycles are so expensive!

“How can it not be necessary? You walk for over half an hour, but with a bicycle, it would only take ten to twenty minutes. If I buy you a bicycle, you could even carry our family.”

Her husband had started getting sick two years later, and now she had to take precautions. She wanted him to keep warm and stay healthy.

As for other matters, like transportation, if she had to walk one or two hours every day, she certainly couldn’t endure it. Within her means, she still wanted to give her husband better conditions.

Now it was 1985. In the 60s and 70s, if a family had a bicycle, it might have seemed rare and special, but in this day and age, what was so strange about buying a bicycle?

Her older sister got married in 1975 and still had a dowry of three turns and one bell with 32 legs, and they already had bicycles. Her sister even left the bicycle at home. The Natal Home had everything. If she herself were to get married, she would think that the man’s dowry could just be money—money was practical.

Money was practical, but not having a bicycle was inconvenient. She couldn’t ask her parents for a bicycle. Their family’s bicycles were all rusted. How could they ride them?

“Will buying a bicycle mean we won’t have enough to eat at home?”

Zhou Chengning had grown up hungry. When he lived alone before, the conditions of the dormitory he rented at school was poor.

The bathroom and shower were shared, and his parents didn’t care about him.

He had saved the scholarship money he received from Tsinghua University, and after he started working, his diet consisted mostly of rice, steamed buns, and vegetables like cabbage.

Occasionally, when he craved it, he would have some meat. He understood that money didn’t last long. He spent about 10 yuan a month.

Now, with a whole family, his wife didn’t want him to worry about finances, but he wasn’t sure if he could afford to buy a bicycle that cost over a hundred yuan.

When Aunt Qian had introduced him to his future wife, she had explained all the conditions. The bride price was 800 yuan and he had saved up 1,200 yuan, enough to get married.

The living conditions in the local school dormitories were terrible, and he wanted a warm bed with his wife and children. He agreed to meet his wife as Aunt Qian had suggested.

The first time they met, his wife, with her bright eyes and charming demeanor, had leaned over and smelled him, making him wonder if he smelled bad. He had taken a shower before leaving the house and even washed with soap twice. He felt his face turn red as she smelled him, but then he heard his wife telling Aunt Qian, “Alright, he’s the one.”

At that first meeting, he felt he could hand over the 1,200 yuan he had saved up.

But to be honest, even with 1,200 yuan, after three or four years of marriage, it wouldn’t be much. Even with 2,200 yuan, it would be gone quickly.

Xu Xiangjuan said, “You don’t need to worry about food. We won’t go hungry. There’s enough. I’ll also get a bed for Niuniu. I’ll draw a design tomorrow, and the day after tomorrow, you can take it with you and ask Carpenter Chen in the village how much he’d charge for a small bed like that.”

“I understand,” Zhou Chengning replied, wanting to ask what day it was and why everything felt different.

But then his wife got out of bed, tucked in his quilt, blew out the kerosene lamp, and carefully made her way to lie down with Guagua and Niuniu in the same bed.

Guagua, still awake, was pulling the blanket, making it hard for everyone to sleep comfortably. But once she settled in, she slept soundly, and the adults could sleep peacefully too.

As his wife left the bed, Zhou Chengning felt an indescribable sense of loss. He told himself that today was already comfortable enough. He couldn’t be like Guagua, who was always unsatisfied.

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Xu Xiangjuan got up early in the morning to prepare batter for egg pancakes. Since the house didn’t have a TV or mobile phones, they went to bed early, and waking up at four or five in the morning didn’t make her feel overly tired.

She took a few eggs from the jar where she kept them and added them to the flour and water to make the batter. The family had a flat cast-iron pan, though it wasn’t used much for making pancakes before, and it was so dirty now. She decided to use it anyway.

The pancakes didn’t look great, but they were edible. She set the batter aside and went to the courtyard to cut some wild onions, washed them, and chopped them into small pieces, setting them aside.

Zhou Chengning, with nothing else to do, listened to his wife’s instructions and peeled two potatoes, then grated them into shreds. After finishing the potatoes, he went to boil some water.

Xu Xiangjuan first stir-fried the shredded potatoes until they were cooked just enough to eat, then sprinkled some chopped onions on top and put them into a bowl.

Zhou Chengning, who was boiling water, could already smell the fragrance of the potatoes and wondered what was going on with his wife. She was cooking so much delicious food today.

In the past, their meals mainly consisted of coarse grains and vegetables from the garden. They had some seasonings at home, but his wife said they were expensive, so they only used a little.

Even with just a little, the food didn’t have much flavor—it was bland. The other option was the hand-pulled noodles, which were just clear broth with no taste.

It turned out that when enough seasoning was added, the food smelled so fragrant. She must have used a lot of oil, too. When he had seen her cook before, even when she added oil, it was just a little, and the food was cooked mainly by stirring and adding water to finish the cooking.

Xu Xiangjuan began to fry the pancakes. The egg pancakes cooked quickly. Once they were almost done, she added some shredded potatoes inside, sprinkled more onions on top, and folded the pancake over. Soon, she served it.

Cooking with a big iron pan wasn’t as convenient as using a gas stove. She had to ask Zhou Chengning to lower the fire; otherwise, the pancakes would burn easily with too much heat. Even if they didn’t burn, they would become too tough.

“Ah Ning, you eat the first pancake. I’ll make a few more,” she said, giving him the first pancake to eat.

The egg pancake was golden, soft, and fragrant, still steaming. Zhou Chengning took a bite, and it smelled delicious. Once he tasted it, it was even better.

The pancake seemed to contain some juice and was tender when bitten into… How many eggs did this pancake take?

How could his wife bear to let him eat it? If she gave this to Guagua, how many meals would it last?

Guagua woke up on her own and, finding that her parents weren’t in bed, climbed out to look for them.

When Xu Xiangjuan saw the little glutton from her family coming to the kitchen, she handed her the small egg pancake she had made just for her, holding it with some straw paper.

“Mom, it’s fragrant, it’s delicious,” Guagua said as she took a bite. The pancake wasn’t very hot anymore and was ready to eat. She couldn’t stop praising her mother as she chewed.

Xu Xiangjuan made three pancakes for Zhou Chengning, and he ate them all. Now he was drinking porridge, which was egg porridge. She had added two eggs into it without any salt, so it was very light—just right for herself. “This is made with eggs. If Oh-Oh keeps wanting to eat chicken, we won’t have this anymore.”

Guagua, who was still thinking about it, realized that the house only had three chickens. Once they ate them, there wouldn’t be any left. The eggs from Oh-Oh were collected daily by Mom. After a little while, Guagua said, “I won’t eat Oh-Oh, Oh-Oh has eggs every day. I’ll eat this.”

“Alright, just don’t argue with Mom about wanting chicken. This afternoon, I’ll steam some buns for you to eat.”

With more food to look forward to, Guagua cheerfully said, “Okay, Mom.”