Chapter 18

Tang Jianjun stormed into the house angrily, startling Zhao Dahua who was sewing pants in the house.

"What's going on? Aren't you at work? Why are you back?"

Tang Jianjun sat down on the kang and slammed the table so hard that the needle and thread basket on the table was knocked over.

"It's all your fault!"

Zhao Dahua glared: "What's wrong with me? I'm just staying at home. It's none of my business. You have to explain it to me clearly. You can't put all the blame on me."

"Why are you betting with that one-eyed old man? Well, now let's become the laughing stock of the team."

Tang Jianjun is a man who cares about his reputation. He is usually the object of envy, but now he has become a complete laughing stock in the whole village, which makes him feel particularly ashamed.

When Zhao Dahua heard this, his face turned very ugly.

She never thought that the damn girl had such a capability. Yesterday, no one believed that she could find the arsonist. They were all just watching the joke.

Today, they turned around and said mean things about her. They are all a bunch of fence-sitters. They haven't even wiped the shit off their butts, but they dare to say that they stink.

"Can I be blamed for this? If that old man hadn't kicked me, would I have said that? He was clearly trying to provoke me on purpose and make our whole family lose face."

The more Zhao Dahua thought about it, the more she felt that this was the truth. "This must have all been the idea of ​​that damn girl. I saw it a long time ago. She is an ungrateful person. If she hadn't instigated it, why would that damn old man cheat us like this for no reason?"

Tang Jianjun frowned but said nothing.

"His father, think about it, this damn girl has a bad temper, she can't hide anything. But she managed to keep this secret from us for such a long time. We raised her up, so even if she has no merits, she must have worked hard, right? Look how she is guarding against us?"

People outside say we treat her badly, but they don’t even look at how she treats us. She is so cunning at such a young age, just like her parents.”

Tang Jianjun was already furious, and his face became even uglier after hearing this.

When his family first decided to adopt a child, they were planning to adopt this young child out.

After all, children are older and it is easier to get used to them.

Moreover, the eldest brother is disabled and it is not easy for him to take care of himself. The old lady cannot rely on him for support in the future, so she must look for someone younger. In other words, it is time for Tang Jianguo to support the family instead of the eldest brother.

As a result, his third elder brother went to his uncle to curry favor with him and recited his own books to him whenever he had nothing to do. Seeing that he was smart and motivated, his uncle thought it was a pity to keep him in the countryside.

So he changed his mind temporarily and adopted Tang Jianguo, who was nine years old at that time.

That cousin was an old revolutionary and a high-ranking official. He ate only white flour and could eat meat a few times a month.

Tang Jianguo went to the city and lived a very good life there.

I sent back photos the first year I went there. I used to be dressed in rags, but in the photos I was neatly dressed and was attending school.

The fate of the two brothers changed from then on. Tang Jianjun, who was supposed to be a city dweller eating commercial grain, was forced to stay in the countryside, facing the loess and back to the sky, with no food to eat and leading a miserable life.

If he had known at the beginning that Tang Jianguo was so cunning, he would never have been so stupid as to let himself be chased away and covered in mud, and let his cousin dislike him.

Although he was only six years old at the time, he could recite several poems and was not much worse than Tang Jianguo.

If Tang Jianguo hadn't interfered, he would definitely have been adopted by his cousin.

This is a thorn in Tang Jianguo's heart. Ever since he learned the truth, he has felt remorseful whenever he thought about it. He wanted to slap himself in the face and scold himself for being a fool!

He was very happy when he received the old clothes and candies sent by Tang Jianguo, and thought that this brother was really a great person.

Haha, those things obviously belong to him! But he still needs others to give them to him.

"What about that girl?"

"I don't know. A grown-up girl who doesn't know how to stay out at night, I don't know what she will become in the future."

Tang Jianjun's expression became even gloomier. "When she comes back, you, as her mother, will have to take care of her."

"Why don't I care? But she has to listen to me. I used to wonder why she became more and more irritable when she was a child. Now I understand that she found someone to support her."

Zhao Dahua had always found it strange that before the age of eight, Tang Qingqing was relatively soft and coquettish. She would do whatever she was told to do and would accept being beaten or punished.

But his temper grew worse as he grew older, and he was beaten and starved. By the next day at the latest, everyone in the team knew about it.

It turns out that there was someone teaching me behind the scenes!

If before, Zhao Dahua could directly kill the one-eyed old man at his home, wouldn't she be able to deal with this childless widower?

But now she doesn't dare to do that. They are the family members of martyrs. What can she do if she dares? She can't bear the accusation of humiliating the family members of martyrs.

"You better watch your mouth from now on and don't say anything out loud."

Zhao Dahua was not convinced, but seeing the look on her husband's face, she didn't dare to say anything.

"As for the gambling matter, no matter how powerful that old man is, he can't really let us do anything. You can go and apologize later, and this matter will be over."

Zhao Dahua jumped up from the kang and said, "You want me to apologize to that old man? Are you crazy?"

"What else do you want to do? If we can't get over this, we will never be able to hold our heads up again in this village."

"Why should I care what others say? He even hit me with a stick and he didn't even apologize to me, so why should I apologize to him?"

"Are you going or not? If anyone else in the team uses this to slander me, I'll show you how I'll punish you!"

Tang Jianjun took off his shoes and lay down on the kang.

"Dad, you're not going to work?"

"Fuck you, I'm not a jerk who'd put my face in front of someone else's slap."

Zhao Dahua was so angry that she threw the clothes in her hand onto the kang, but she was thinking about how to get away with it.

While cooking in the afternoon, Zhao Dahua went to ask Old Lady Wu for eggs.

"Mom, Qingqing has done such a big thing, we should do something good to celebrate."

Old Mrs. Wu frowned: "This year, all our food has been burned. We won't even have rice to eat. How can we eat eggs?"

Zhao Dahua looked down on her mother-in-law's stinginess, but said in a flattering manner:

"It doesn't matter if there's just one egg. We'll just make it for Qingqing. It won't cost much."

Old Mrs. Wu squinted her eyes and looked at her: "Are you so nice to that girl?"

"Mom, look at what you said. Am I that kind of stingy?"

Old Mrs. Wu sneered, but still took out the smallest egg.

Zhao Dahua looked at the egg which was much smaller than ordinary eggs and was speechless.

Although the egg was very small, Zhao Dahua still took out a small piece after breaking the egg.

The rest is steamed into egg custard, and garnished with two chopped green onions when it’s out of the pot, and even sesame oil is not used.

But the sky gradually darkened and Tang Qingqing didn't come home.

"Mom, I'm starving. Why haven't you eaten yet?" Tang Xingwang rubbed his stomach in dissatisfaction.

Zhao Dahua glared at him angrily: "Eat, eat, eat, what are you eating? What else do you know besides eating?"

Tang Xingwang ran to Old Lady Wu and cried, "Grandma, my mom scolded me!"

"You too, why are you scolding your child when he's hungry? It's so late, let's eat quickly."

As soon as Tang Xingwang started crying, his two younger brothers also started to cry.

Zhao Dahua had no choice but to announce the start of dinner.

"Where is that damn girl? She didn't even come back for dinner."

Mrs. Wu didn't think it was a big deal. This wasn't the first time this had happened.

"She is smart. She must have found a place to eat and saved food for our family."

"I think she is unlucky. She can't even eat the delicious food."

Zhao Dahua did not leave any rice for Tang Qingqing, and even shared the egg custard with his three sons.

The egg custard was divided in front of everyone. Tang Qiaoqiao couldn't help swallowing when she saw them eating the egg custard, but she didn't say a word.

The unlucky Tang Qingqing was at Old Liu's house at this time. They brought back a piece of bacon from the Hongqiao Brigade today, and Tang Qingqing was preparing to cook it.

Tang Qingqing was used to cooking on the stove. Although it was not her turn to cook usually, she would learn it after watching it many times.

And in another memory, she was a good cook.

With this skill, she won over her two stepsons.

Thinking of this, Tang Qingqing felt that she was different from herself in the book. If she were in other people's shoes, she would definitely not marry a divorced man with children.

Especially in the book, her conditions are so good that she could find anyone else, but she insists on being someone's stepmother.

It is difficult to be a stepmother. Since the child is not your own, it is hard to be sure whether the matter is too light or too heavy.

Retracting her thoughts, Tang Qingqing used another memory to process the bacon.

This piece of bacon still weighs more than one kilogram after being air-dried. The Hongqiao Brigade can be said to be very sincere.

According to Tang Qingqing's idea, she only needed to cut a small section and eat it slowly later.

Old Liu disagreed. "We finally get to eat meat, so we have to enjoy it. If we share it, we won't be able to taste the meat each time, and it will be the same as not having eaten the meat at all."

Tang Qingqing couldn't argue with the old man, so she took a step back and did half of it today.

This piece of bacon is very tender and has a lot of fat.

Tang Qingqing cut the meat into thin slices that were light-transparent when held up.

Old Liu was extremely disgusted: "You don't need to improve your cooking skills here. Cut it so thinly that it will melt in your mouth."

Tang Qingqing ignored him and cut the meat into thinner slices so that it tasted better.

She put the thin bacon into the pot, slowly stir-fried it to release the oil, and then scooped out some of the oil.

Push the bacon to the side of the pot, add dried chilies, garlic slices and ginger slices into the pot and sauté until fragrant, then stir-fry a piece of washed garlic sprouts. Sprinkle some salt before serving, and a plate of fried bacon with garlic sprouts is ready.

The food here at Lao Liu is very simple, with only a little oil and salt as seasoning, not even soy sauce.

Without the addition of seasoning, if you want to make the dish delicious, you must control the heat accurately.

Next, Tang Qingqing cooked a dish of stir-fried sour beans with peppers.

The peppers in Old Liu's private plot grew particularly well this year. Both Tang Qingqing and Old Liu can eat spicy food, so when cooking this dish, Tang Qingqing added chopped chili peppers.

Stir-fry the chili pepper and minced garlic, then add the sour beans and stir-fry. It tastes so delicious.

Old Liu, who was weaving wicker baskets nearby, had glanced over here several times.

Finally, Tang Qingqing also made a dish of loofah and egg soup. First, she fried the eggs and served them out. Then, she used the remaining oil at the bottom of the pot to stir-fry the sliced ​​loofah until cooked, and then added boiling water.

Having two dishes and a soup like this is a luxury in the countryside. Many families just stew everything in one pot. It was also the first time that Tang Qingqing had eaten like this with Old Liu.

The usually choking mixed flour steamed buns become delicious when paired with these dishes.

Old Liu and Tang Qingqing were both very satisfied with the meal. After eating, they were not in a hurry to clear the bowls, but sat at the table to pick their teeth.

Old Liu: "With your current cooking skills, you could have opened a restaurant in the past."

Tang Qingqing thought about it and decided that according to what was written in the book, it would be possible for individuals to open restaurants in a few years.

She has no interest in being a cook. She wants to be a police officer like her master's son and use her tracking skills to catch the bad guys.

But if there is really no other way, she can consider setting up a stall to do business.

After finishing the meal and clearing away the dishes, Tang Qingqing was not in a hurry to go back, but followed Old Liu to weave rattan baskets under the moonlight and firelight.

Ever since Tang Qingqing knew Old Liu, she has brought here all the rattan she cut while herding sheep.

The master and his apprentice worked together to weave rattan baskets, and then asked the people in the brigade to help them deliver them to the commune or town to exchange for money.

After saving for several years, Tang Qingqing already had fifty-three yuan and seventy cents in her pocket.

With unreliable parents, Tang Qingqing started making plans for herself at a young age.

If anything happens, you won't panic if you have money in your hands.