Chapter 10

The cart was piled high with miscellaneous belongings, and with the addition of five bags of grain, it was particularly heavy to pull. Especially on the muddy road after yesterday’s rain, the cart wheels would occasionally sink in, making it extra hard. However, neither Shuiqing nor the five little ones showed any frustration or annoyance; they were all jubilant and excited. Shuiqing was so happy at the thought of not having to live with her mother-in-law, sister-in-law, and all their children that she wanted to spin around in circles. She was looking forward to living her own carefree little life.

“Hey, Mrs. Fan, what are you up to?” A villager asked as they saw them passing by.

Upon hearing that they were dividing the household, the villager took it in stride. It was common for a large family to split when the children grew up.

As the cart rumbled away, a woman waved and said, “Hey, you all don’t know yet, do you?”

“Know what?” Sensing gossip, several people gathered around.

“It’s about the Fan family. Can you believe it? Mrs. Fan tried to target Daya and Erya. Mrs. Fan always sided with the eldest, as you all know. But today at noon, Mrs. Fan was confronted, and it was nothing like her usual timid self.”

“If she was as timid as usual, she’d probably be dead by now. People shouldn’t be too weak!”

“Aunt Zhou is right! You see, after Fan’s second wife made a fuss, her days got better. They even managed to split the family.”

Older villagers worried that without a house or money, life would be tough if they split off. Younger women, however, were envious. What did a bit of temporary hardship matter? The feeling of being the head of their own household was the best! But they also worried about the hardships during busy farming times, like planting, plowing, and harvesting—all requiring labor.

The cart gradually veered away from the village, arriving at a slightly elevated flatland. This piece of land was vast, over ten acres, with hard soil. Even after yesterday’s rain, the village roads were muddy and difficult, but this flatland was firm. From up here, they could see most of the village, but it was at a suitable distance.

“This land is good!” Shuiqing genuinely praised it. It was away from the village’s hustle and bustle, allowing them to enjoy the tranquility of the mountains and forests.

Fan Jin stopped the cart and began unloading. Hearing Shuiqing’s praise, his dark eyes twinkled with a smile, and he replied, “This land is hard and not suitable for farming, so it’s been left unused. The three small hills behind it, along with this piece of land, are all ours.”

“Wow!” The five little ones cheered with delight. Even though the land was overgrown with weeds and their stomachs were empty, they were still excited and hopeful about living away from Grandma and Auntie.

“There’s a spring over there. We can build a straw hut near the spring for easy washing and drinking. Once we’ve earned some money, we can build a brick house.” Fan Jin outlined his plans one by one.

Shuiqing raised an eyebrow, “You had this all planned out?”

Fan Jin nodded obediently, his dark, shiny eyes and fair skin giving him a soft appearance that made Shuiqing want to pinch him to see if he was as soft as he looked.

Not knowing what Shuiqing was thinking, Fan Jin continued unloading and explained, “I’ve always wanted to move out, to have a home of our own, away from the village gossip and from Mother and Sister-in-law’s troubles.” He frowned slightly, thinking it wasn’t proper to speak ill behind people’s backs, and paused, giving Shuiqing an apologetic smile.

Shuiqing wasn’t bothered. She had clashed with Fan’s mother and sister-in-law because living together affected her directly, but now that they had moved out, she had no time or energy to care about their gossip.

Fan Jin pursed his red lips and quickly unloaded the cart. Then he said to Shuiqing, “The cart is unloaded. I’ll go return it to Uncle Li.”

Shuiqing nodded, “Alright, you go ahead. I’ll organize these things.” The cart was very useful, and since the owner’s family might need it back, it wasn’t good to borrow it for too long.

Fan Jin then instructed the five children, “Yanqiu, Xinghui, help your mother organize the stuff; Jianghe, Hu, you three go cut some thatch. Thatch can cut your hands and make your skin itch, so let your mother and sister do other work. I’ll join you in cutting it when I get back.”

The five children responded loudly and began their tasks.

Fan Jin pulled the cart to return it. Jianghe and Hu went to cut thatch, and Yanqiu and Xinghui ran over to help organize things. Although the stuff was heavy, there wasn’t much.

They placed the bamboo bed properly and put the clothes and bedding on it to avoid getting them dirty. Their clothes were pitifully few, with each child having only two sets of coarse linen clothes full of patches; Fan Jin had two sets of slightly better coarse cotton long gowns, likely because he needed to look presentable for work in town. Shuiqing’s clothes were also coarse linen, though not hand-me-downs from others. Besides two patched sets, there was one unpatched set.

They placed the farm tools on one side and the kitchen items on the other. They had five bags of grain: one of corn, one of millet, half a bag of rice, half a bag of flour, and one bag of bran. Bran is the husk of wheat ground into powder. Mixing it with some flour to increase stickiness would make black bread. Thinking of the taste of black bread made Shuiqing’s throat hurt.

Yanqiu and Xinghui looked at the five half-filled bags of grain, worried.

“Mom, I’ll build a chicken coop first and put the chickens in it. Then I’ll go to the village to get some seeds from my friends. It’s the end of August now; if we plant in early September, we’ll have vegetables to eat in winter.” Thinking of the vegetable garden, the dried peppers, eggplant slices, and dried cowpeas she had carefully tended, Xinghui felt a pang of heartache.

Yanqiu, surveying the barren surroundings, had an idea and said to Shuiqing, “Mom, I’ll go to the bamboo forest and pick some mushrooms for soup.”

With little grain, they had to supplement with wild vegetables. After the rain yesterday, there were plenty of mushrooms in the bamboo forest. Although they might be a bit old now, mushroom soup was one of the best wild vegetable dishes.

Seeing her two daughters organizing everything so orderly, Shuiqing was delighted. Hearing Yanqiu say she was going to pick mushrooms, she asked worriedly, “Yanqiu, some mushrooms are poisonous. Do you know how to identify them?”