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“I’ll say it again—go home, wash up, and sleep. In dreams, anything is possible.”
Wang Man truly didn’t want to keep arguing with her. It was beneath her.
Seeing that Wang Man was about to leave, Yao Qiao’er reached out to block her, clearly prepared to fight to the end.
“You can’t go. Hand over the silver, now.”
Wang Man kicked at Wang San, who was still standing there watching the scene like it was a show.
“Are you dead or what? Can’t you see someone’s bullying your Wife?”
Wang San snapped out of it and immediately put on his usual scoundrel’s face.
“What’s going on here? What’s going on?
Madam Man is the Wife you people sold to me. She has nothing to do with your family anymore.
Now get lost—stop trying to claim ties you no longer have.
Or don’t blame me for being ruthless!”
Yao Qiao’er was still a little afraid of Wang San and his shameless nature, but letting Wang Man go just like that—she wasn’t quite willing.
She stiffened her neck and shouted,
“Wang San, how dare you!
Don’t forget, we are your Father- and Mother-in-law!”
“Pah! Shameless! Didn’t I just say—stop claiming kinship you don’t have?
You still want to cling to it? If you make me angry and something unfortunate happens to your precious daughter, don’t say I didn’t warn you.”
Wang San looked every bit the thug, radiating the full arrogance of a street rascal.
“You scoundrel!”
Yao Qiao’er didn’t dare tangle with him any further. She shot a vicious glare at Wang Man before turning and leaving.
She truly was afraid that Wang San might actually do something to her Jiaojiao. After all, a thug was a thug—completely unreasonable.
As she walked away, she kept cursing under her breath, clearly unwilling to accept the outcome.
Wang Man and the others heard it but didn’t bother to engage with her anymore.
Seeing Wang San still standing there, Wang Man urged him,
“What are you standing around for? Don’t want to go home?”
Wang San glanced at Wang Man’s swollen eye and asked,
“Your eye—was it from getting stung while collecting that beehive?”
Wang Man replied without looking back,
“Why bother asking when you already know? Let’s go.”
Wang San quickly caught up and asked,
“You really took down a big beehive and sold it for five taels of silver?”
Wang Man stopped and gave him a look that was somewhere between a smile and a smirk.
“What, are you planning to get your hands on my five taels?”
Wang San shook his head.
“Nope.”
“Nope, and yet you’re asking? Sounds like you’re up to something,”
Wang Man clearly didn’t buy it.
But Wang San continued to shake his head.
“No, really. I just thought… now that you’ve got some silver, maybe you could pay me back that one or so tael I lent you?”
Wang Man rolled her eyes at him.
“You should sleep early tonight too.”
Wang San blinked.
“What do you mean?”
“In your dreams, anything’s possible,”
Wang Man said, kindly explaining it to him.
When Auntie Ma Liu saw Wang San coming back, she quietly pulled Wang Man aside and whispered,
“Manya, you better hold onto that silver tight—don’t let that Ah San take it from you.”
Beside them, Wang San muttered,
“Mother, I heard everything.
Don’t worry, I won’t try to get my hands on that silver.”
What he really wanted was just to get back the silver he had lent out earlier.
But he knew Wang Man wasn’t going to give it to him.
Might as well forget about it and not get his hopes up.
Auntie Ma Liu, however, had no mercy as she snapped,
“Trust you? That’d be the day. You think I don’t know exactly what kind of person you are?”
Wang San sighed.
“Mother… am I really your son?”
Auntie Ma Liu looked at him, confused by the sudden question, but still replied truthfully,
“Of course. You don’t believe me? Go ask your eldest sister-in-law. She was there when I gave birth to you.”
Wang Man nearly burst out laughing. Not wanting to hear more of their off-track conversation,
she gave Wang San an order,
“Go cut a bamboo stalk and whittle some skewers.”
She, on the other hand, began rinsing the hawthorn berries clean and set them aside to drain.
Wang San was reluctant. He had been carrying several dozen jin of grain the entire way back, and now he was still exhausted.
Wang Man narrowed her eyes at him,
“What’s wrong? Don’t tell me I can’t even get you to move now?”
“You call yourself a man?
Might as well be a woman.
Lazy like this—what’s even the point of you being alive?
Honestly, if I don’t scold you twice a day, do you feel uncomfortable or what?”
Seeing that she was still ranting endlessly, Wang San hurriedly grabbed the machete from the house and slipped out the door.
He had a gut feeling that if he stayed any longer, Wang Man might actually lay hands on him.
To avoid getting smacked, it was better to obediently go cut the bamboo.
Although, he really had no idea what Man-niang wanted the bamboo for.
Was she planning to weave a basket? But… could she even do that?
Or worse—was she going to make him do it?
But he didn’t know how to weave anything!
sigh
If he’d known things would be like this…
he really shouldn’t have come back.
Sigh, if he’d known, he really wouldn’t have come back.
After chopping the bamboo and hauling it home, Wang San barely had time to catch his breath before Wang Man’s scolding came crashing down on him like thunder:
“You went to chop a single stalk of bamboo and took forever—what, did you hike all the way to Fucheng to cut it?
Tall as a bull, strong as an ox, but useless as hell. Lazy to the core, you could win first place in that!”
Wang San clenched his teeth, again and again… but in the end, he still swallowed down his temper.
He knew he’d been wandering outside for years, drifting and doing nothing good, completely unable to help out at home. It was understandable that Wang Man had pent-up frustration toward him.
So if he could endure, he would.
After all, what kind of man argues with a little girl?
And more importantly—this little girl was his wife now.
That meant he really had to give in a little.
If Wang Man had known what was going through his mind, she’d probably laugh loud enough to sound like a goose honking.
Let her off easy?
If it wasn’t for her holding back every second, she’d have beaten him into the next village already.
And here he was, still causing trouble to the point her eye was still throbbing in pain.
Auntie Ma Liu was also there, chiming in on Wang Man’s side, helping scold Wang San like it was a tag-team match.
At this point, Wang San was seriously starting to question reality:
Was his mother right in the head?
In other people’s households, mothers-in-law and daughters-in-law were natural enemies.
But in his house? His mother and Wang Man were clearly on the same team, and their sole mission was to take him down.
He thought back to the last two times he got beaten—his mother hadn’t even tried to help him.
What kind of brainwashing had Wang Man done to her?
His own mother had practically disowned him!
That said… despite all that, he was still a bit happy to see the two getting along so well.
At least there wouldn’t be any screaming matches between mother-in-law and daughter-in-law in his household.
Then he overheard them talking about selling those ridiculously sour red hawthorns.
Wang San honestly thought the two of them had gone mad.
No—more like they’d gone mad for silver.
That stuff was so sour it could make your teeth ache just looking at it.
Give it away and people might not even accept it.
And they thought someone would pay silver to eat that?
They had to be crazy.
Still, no matter what he thought, Wang San didn’t dare say any of it aloud—not unless he wanted to get smacked again.
Making tanghulu (candied hawthorn skewers) wasn’t exactly complicated—
The real challenge was caramelizing the sugar.
If you didn’t get the sugar to the right stage, it wouldn’t coat the hawthorns properly.
Even if it did stick, it could fall off too easily.
It turned out Wang Man really could make them—she got it right on the very first try.
Looking at the glistening, crystal-clear tanghulu skewers, Wang San swallowed hard.
He couldn’t hold back and asked,
“Man-niang, can I have a taste?”
Wang Man picked out the smallest one and handed it to him:
“Here. Try it. After you do, give me your opinion.”
Then she handed another one to Aunt Ma.
Aunt Ma hesitated—on one hand, she thought they should sell them for silver,
but on the other hand, she really wanted to know what it tasted like.
Could it really be good enough to sell?
After a moment of indecision, she accepted it.
Wang Man took a skewer too and bit off the hawthorn at the top.
Sour and sweet—it instantly whetted her appetite.
Her eyes narrowed slightly in delight.
That taste from childhood… how nostalgic.
Wang San, on the other hand, devoured his in just a few bites.
He smacked his lips, clearly wanting more.
What now? He still wanted another.
Wang Man rolled her eyes at him:
“If you want more, take it yourself—but not the ones that look good.”
Those were for selling—she had plans for those.
Wang Man and Aunt Ma Liu each had one and didn’t touch the rest.
Wang San, on the other hand, finished three whole skewers by himself.
When he reached for another, Wang Man stopped him:
“You’ve eaten that many—don’t your teeth feel sore?”
Wang San shook his head:
“Not at all. I think they’re really sweet. Tastes great.”
“Even if it’s tasty, no more. We need to save them to sell for silver tomorrow.”
With that, Wang Man didn’t bother with him anymore—she rinsed her mouth and went off to bed.