Lin Xiaoyu rushed home in a panic but didn’t see her mother anywhere.

The people in Courtyard No. 23 saw her return and immediately started talking over each other:
“Lin Xiaoyu, you’re back! Your mom’s dumpling stall got smashed up!”

“Your mom was even beaten by some local thugs. The police took her to the hospital. It was terrible.”

Hearing that her mom was beaten by thugs and taken to the hospital by the police, Lin Xiaoyu was on the verge of tears. She turned around, ready to run straight to the hospital.

“Lin Xiaoyu.” Qin Ye came out from the house and stopped her.

“Qin Ye, my mom, she…”

Qin Ye said, “Don’t panic. Aunt Li’s not seriously hurt. The police just took her to the hospital for an injury assessment.”

The aunties in the courtyard were just eager to stir things up, deliberately scaring Lin Xiaoyu.

“I still want to go to the hospital to check on her.” Lin Xiaoyu couldn’t relax until she saw with her own eyes that her mom was okay.

Qin Ye said, “Aunt Li’s been gone for a while now. She might even be on her way back. If you go now and miss her on the road, wouldn’t it be a wasted trip? You might as well stay home and cook dinner, so there’s food ready when she gets back.”

Lin Xiaoyu thought about it and felt he made sense, so she decided to listen to Qin Ye and stay home, starting to cook dinner.

—

“Officer Xiao Zhao, I’ll head off first. You should get back soon too.”

The bus arrived, and Li Shuping squeezed on board, carrying a big bag of nutritional supplements prescribed by the doctor.

Officer Xiao Zhao waved at her, watching her force her way onto the bus, carrying that heavy bag, looking perfectly sturdy — and couldn’t help but twitch at the corner of his eye.

She sure hadn’t looked like this in front of the doctor earlier. Back at the hospital, she had been holding her forehead weakly, saying she was dizzy, had headaches, felt weak all over, had palpitations, cold sweats, and her legs hurt so much she couldn’t even walk.

The doctor checked her injuries — actually, just some soft tissue bruising on her leg and forehead, maybe a mild concussion, nothing serious.

But she kept describing herself as feeling awful and refused to stay for observation.

So, the doctor just prescribed her a bunch of nutritional products: fish oil, bone-strengthening powder, gelatin cake, glucose, royal jelly, and so on.

And, at her request, gave her a note recommending a month of rest.

Even though she paid for all of it herself, Officer Xiao Zhao knew she was definitely going to make those little punks cover it as medical expenses.

Those punks really kicked the iron plate messing with her.

“Officer Xiao Zhao!”

Pulled out of his thoughts, Xiao Zhao looked up and saw Li Shuping already seated by the bus window, waving at him.

“See you later!”

Xiao Zhao raised his hand and waved back, pulling his mouth into a half-smile, saying, “See you later.”

As the bus pulled away, Li Shuping hugged the bag of supplements tightly. With so many of them, she and Xiaoyu could eat well for quite a while.

Women of her age easily fell into deficiencies — lacking this, missing that. This was the perfect chance to properly nourish herself.

—

“Old Lin, Sister Li’s in trouble.”

As Lin Yongnian and his son and grandson walked into Courtyard No. 18, their neighbor Aunt Guo Xiaochun rushed over to tell them.

Li Shuping was in trouble?

“What’s it got to do with me if she’s in trouble? We’re divorced.” Lin Yongnian grumbled roughly.

“Auntie, what happened to my mom?” Lin Guodong still asked.

“Some little punks tried to extort her at her dumpling stall. She refused, so they smashed up her stall and even beat her up. She was taken to the hospital.”

Lin Yongnian said, “Serves her right. I told her not to run that stupid stall, but she insisted, acting like I was trying to harm her by stopping her. See what happened? A woman out there working alone — who do you think those punks would target?”

Lin Jianshe came in: “What punks? Who got messed with by punks?”

Lin Jianshe, along with Liu Qin and Zhang Jiao, had just come back, running into each other at the courtyard entrance.

“Who else? Your mom. Her stall got smashed, she got beaten, and she’s been taken to the hospital,” Lin Yongnian snapped.

Zhang Jiao: Mother-in-law’s dumpling stall was smashed!?

“Jianshe, that’s your own mother. Something like this happened — as her sons, you have to do something,” Aunt Guo looked at Lin Jianshe and Lin Guodong.

“You’re not doing anything!” Lin Yongnian barked at his two sons. “Neither of you will interfere. Didn’t she already tell you to treat her like she’s no longer your mother? So why are you meddling?”

“She claimed you two were useless, that raising you was worthless — let her handle things on her own now.”

It was Li Shuping who painted herself as the one wronged, abandoning her husband and sons, badmouthing him and their family. Now that she was in trouble, she wanted her sons to stand up for her?

Unless she came begging at their doorstep, he absolutely wouldn’t get involved, and he wouldn’t let his sons either.

“Lin Yongnian, are you even human? Shuping’s been hospitalized, and you still talk like that?” Aunt Wang couldn’t stand it and came out of her house, pointing at him and scolding.

Lin Yongnian shot back, “How am I not human? She’s the one who told the boys to pretend she was no longer their mother.”

If anyone was inhuman, it was her — abandoning her sons and family.

“A mother’s a mother! Even if she said that, Lin Guodong and Lin Jianshe are still her sons, still the children she carried for ten months and raised for over twenty years! How can they have no conscience, ignoring their own mother in trouble?” Aunt Wang demanded loudly.

“…” Lin Yongnian was momentarily speechless.

Lin Jianshe said, “Aunt Wang, you’re right. Even if my mom doesn’t acknowledge me as her son, I’ll never deny her as my mother. I’ll go to Courtyard No. 23 to find out what’s going on.”

Liu Qin tugged at Lin Jianshe’s sleeve, trying to stop him.

That wretched old woman — let her deal with her own mess. Why go sticking your nose in?

But Lin Jianshe felt his wife was just worried for him. He patted her hand and said, “I’ll be back soon.”

He left, and Lin Yongnian and the others went back into the house.

It was Liu Qin’s turn to cook today. Unhappy, she grabbed the groceries she had bought and went into the kitchen.

Zhang Jiao sat on the cool chair holding her son, Junjun, frowning as she thought about her mother-in-law’s dumpling stall. “Mom spent so much setting up that stall. She must’ve sunk a lot of money into it, and now it’s all wrecked. I wonder how much she lost.”

Thinking of all that money lost, Zhang Jiao’s heart ached — after all, that was their money too.

Lin Guodong also frowned. “At least a hundred or two yuan, I bet.”

Lin Yongnian growled, “That wasteful woman.”

A hundred or two yuan — such a huge amount — and she just wasted it like that.

Lin Guodong said, “Dad, after this, I bet Mom will want to come back and remarry you.”

Lin Yongnian snorted coldly. “If she wants to come back, that depends on whether I’m willing.”

Zhang Jiao felt that if her mother-in-law did come back, it wouldn’t be a bad thing — at least it’d make life easier for her, though she’d miss out on the extra grocery money.

But honestly, that grocery money was hard to earn anyway. After a few early mornings, she was already exhausted, and she kept dozing off at work. The team leader caught her twice, docking her pay.

“Dad, if Mom really wants to come back and remarry, you should agree. Just make sure she doesn’t handle the money anymore. Look at how much she’s blown through since she left — at least three hundred.”

Lin Yongnian frowned. If Li Shuping really came back, there was no way she’d be managing the money again.

She didn’t earn anything — why should she control the money? He’d just give her fifteen yuan a month for living expenses, and that’d be plenty.