Chapter 18

Zhou Pingguo said to the crowd, “I believe everyone is reasonable. I am a young wife, and it is indeed against the rules for me to hit people with a fire stick. But our family is like this now. My children are my life. I am not afraid of wearing shoes even if I am barefoot. If anyone says this again and slanders my children, I’m sorry, let’s die together. I will set their whole family on fire, drink pesticides myself, and I will not let them go even in the underworld!”

Zhou Pingguo looked delicate and weak, but her words were chilling. There had been cases in the village where people had committed suicide by drinking pesticides after setting fires. If you push people too far, then both sides will perish!

Who is afraid of whom?!

After this battle, the villagers had a completely new understanding of Zhou Pingguo. This woman was not someone who could be easily provoked. She might be even more difficult to deal with than her cunning brother-in-law!

Those who had previously said bad things about Zhou Sen’s family were now worried, fearing that Zhou Pingguo would get crazy and take it out on them.

Zhou Pingguo returned home in high spirits. As soon as she got home, she drank water in big gulps. It had been a long time since she had such a big mood swing. To be honest, she felt a little tired.

After a while, a little guy sneaked into the yard. It was Goudan who came to ask for his candy.

Zhou Pingguo went straight back to the room and got a full pack for him. “Goudan, you did a good job this time. I’ll give you another task.”

“What’s the mission?” Gou Daner took the candies from Zhou Pingguo, unwrapped them immediately, counted them one by one, and after making sure there were 12, he returned them to Zhou Pingguo, “I’ll leave them with you first. I’ll come over to eat them every day.”

Goudan has more than one child in his family. If I take this bag of candy back, it will probably be gone today. It is safer to leave it with Zhou Pingguo.

“Okay, when the time comes, you can eat one and draw lines on the door frame. You can count them yourself.”

“What do you want me to do?”

“Catch loaches.” Zhou Pingguo gave Gou Dan’er a net. “The loaches can’t be too small. I’ll only catch them if they’re bigger than this net. I won’t give you candy this time. I’ll just give you money. 50 cents per pound, okay?”

“This net is so big. Loaches are not so fat nowadays.” Although Goudan is young, he is very familiar with every tree and plant in the village.

“Then you can wait for a while before catching them. I don’t want to catch anything too small, and you won’t be able to catch a big one, so if it’s too small, let it go and wait for it to grow bigger before catching it, understand?”

“I know.” Gou’er pouted, “Sister Apple, your money is not easy to earn!”

“Tsk, whose money is easy to earn?” Zhou Pingguo pouted, imitating him. “If others want to send it to me, I will also accept it. If you come with me, I will give you 1 cent per pound. Do you understand?”

“But there is one thing, I won’t accept anyone from Zhou Songguo’s family. It makes me angry when I see his mother like that.” Zhou Pingguo added.

“Sister Pingguo, in fact, it’s not just Zhou Songguo’s mother who gossips in the village.” During this period, Gou Dan’er had eavesdropped countless times in order to catch the culprit in the act. He finally seized this wonderful opportunity.

“Who are they?” Zhou Pingguo asked.

“Hey, I saw Zhou Lei eat a black one, he said it was chocolate, give me one and I’ll tell you.”

“Forget it if you don’t want to talk about it.” The chocolate that Zhou Lei ate was found by Zhou Pingguo when he followed Zhou Sen to clean up Zhou Xin’s room. There wasn’t much, just one plate. He looked at the time and it wasn’t expired yet. It would be a waste to leave it there, so he took it out and gave it to the two little ones.

Zhou Lei is a kid who can’t hide the leftover steamed buns in the doghouse. He has to go out to eat them, and people will see him.

“Then at least one candy.” Gou’er lowered his request instantly.

“I don’t really want to know. You can figure it out on your own.”

In fact, people in the village would more or less say something about their family. Maybe they felt sympathy at first, but later on, things started to change.

It turned into jealousy.

Jealous? What’s there to be jealous of when a family is almost falling apart?

Actually, it is true.

When Zhou’s father had the accident, the villagers thought Zhou’s mother would collapse, but she didn’t. She suppressed her inner grief and went to the mine leaders to ask for compensation. All the miners who had the accident received more compensation than before, and they also held a grand funeral for Zhou’s father. Zhou’s mother died of dystocia, and everyone thought the Zhou family was almost broken up. They didn’t expect that Zhou Xin would give up his bright future in the army, return to his hometown, bring Zhou Erni home, and find a little girl from their hometown to help take care of the child.

They were relatives, but everyone knew that Zhou Pingguo was a maid and a wet nurse. In their village, apart from the landlords before liberation, who else could have such treatment?

Later, Zhou Xin earned some money and bought a radio, a watch, a sewing machine, a bicycle, and later he also bought a TV. Although it was black and white, it was the only one of its kind in the village.

If Zhou Xin hadn’t gotten into trouble, they would have bought a refrigerator!

Zhou Xin was out doing transportation and disappeared. Although it is said that if he is alive, he must be found alive, and if he is dead, he must be found dead, Zhou Xin has not even found his body, so there is a possibility that he is still alive. But this possibility is very small, especially as time goes by. Now it has been more than two years, and he has not returned. The probability is that he died in a foreign land. Everyone thought that the Zhou family might not be able to survive this time, but Zhou Erni, who was sick, suddenly cheered up and arranged the family in an orderly manner. Several children were enrolled in school, which was much better than most of the villages that could only afford to send 1 to 2 children to school.

At the beginning of last year, Zhou Erni’s cancer cells spread, and Zhou Pingguo and Zhou Sen took her to the county hospital for treatment, which cost a lot of money. But there was still no way to cure her. Not long after they brought her back from the county, she died.

The three children of the Zhou family have truly become orphans without a father, a mother or a family. The villagers think that the Zhou family will eventually break up. As long as Zhou Pingguo gets married, what will these three children do?

It turned out that Zhou Pingguo was also very stubborn. She didn’t want to marry a strong man in the village while she was still young and beautiful, but insisted on staying with this precarious home.

I heard that she was tinkering with raising earthworms and often set out for the county town in the middle of the night. She actually made some money, so her three children had meat to eat and new clothes to wear during the New Year. Her living standard was considered upper-middle class in the village.

Many families have a lot of adults, but they don’t let their children live this kind of life. Isn’t it jealous?

In addition, all three children of the Zhou family can read. Zhou Sen has never been the first in the village primary school since the first grade. He represented the village to participate in the town competition and was the first in the town. The two younger ones, who were nearly a year younger than others, went to the first grade and always got 100 points. They were the only two in the class.

The teacher praises them in class every day, and when he meets other parents, he also tells them that they are studious and well-behaved.

Although the “study is useless” theory is becoming more and more popular nowadays, who doesn’t want their children to be able to study?

“Useless” and “useless” are sometimes just a form of self-consolation for people who can’t read.

Especially for those like them who were born and raised as farmers and have no background or connections, studying is still the best way to escape from farming.

As time goes by, the jealousy will only grow stronger.