Chapter 6: You are such a heartless person, and you still say that about my family...
As if he hadn't noticed the other person's rapidly flushing cheeks, Chen Pan looked up at her and continued, "Anyway, Auntie, please refrain from doing things like this in the future. We're just neighbors, and it makes me feel awkward and uncomfortable when you keep doing this. I don't want to owe someone a favor for no reason."
"How does this involve personal relationships? I, I, I——"
After a long time finding her voice, Wang Xiaohua immediately began to explain, stumbling over her words. She had a soft personality and had never been good at arguing or arguing. After being confronted by her own daughter, her eyes quickly turned red, and she became visibly anxious and upset.
In his previous life, he lived until he was almost 30 years old and had almost always lived at the bottom of society. After opening the store, he had seen all kinds of monsters and demons. Chen Pan completely ignored her tears and continued in a stiff tone: "The most important thing is that you gave us a few old shoes and old clothes that you couldn't wear and didn't want. But I don't know what's going on. Every time this matter comes to Sister Juanjuan and your Jiabao's mouth, it seems like my family has shamelessly forced your family to have new and good things.
Anyway, you should refrain from embarrassing others like this. These are just a few worn-out clothes and shoes you don't want, and we don't particularly need them. Just for these small things, our family is forced to owe you a big favor. Every time you come home for the holidays, my grandparents give you eggs and rapeseed oil to repay your kindness. I feel like this is really a loss for us and not worth it.
"I, I, I, no—"
"What's going on?"
As Chen Pan talked nonstop, Wang Xiaoya, with her hair permed, kept talking back. Just when she was anxious, annoyed, embarrassed, and angry and didn't know how to respond properly, Grandpa Chen, who turned out from the main road at the village entrance, suddenly rescued her.
"Uncle San, look at Panpan. I was just trying to be kind and give her two old coats that Juanjuan didn't wear, but she suddenly didn't want them anymore and said—"
If it were her husband, Wang Xiaoya would have burst into tears when she said this. But the person who came over was Chen Pan's grandfather, an old man over fifty years old. So when she spoke, Wang Xiaoya bit her lip and tried hard to suppress the urge to cry. She just said this with great anger and hurt.
“…”
Grandpa Chen, who had just come down the road, had heard everything. Although he didn't know why his granddaughter, who usually seemed to be so happy when she received clothes and shoes from the Wang family, suddenly changed her temper, he actually agreed with what she said later.
No matter what the Wang family gave them, they would return it double.
The Wang family gave them a plate of dumplings, and when they made pancakes and dough later, they would definitely bring over a plate.
The Wang family gave them a bowl of mutton offal, and they would definitely give her family a few skewers when they made bacon.
Even though they never returned the clothes and shoes they gave their granddaughter, they did give them chicken eggs, duck eggs, and bottles of rapeseed oil every year when they came back for Chinese New Year.
I used to think this was just a courtesy between neighbors, but after careful calculation, it is indeed not cost-effective.
The most important thing is that the child is older, and Grandpa Chen doesn't want to embarrass his child in front of others, nor does he want his family to continue to be forced to owe the neighbor such a favor. Since the matter has been brought up by his granddaughter, he might as well decline the neighbor's offer of old clothes and shoes.
"Juanjuan's mom, although my Panpan speaks a little bluntly, I actually understand what she means." Chen Aiguo smiled soothingly at his granddaughter, then looked at Wang Xiaohua who was holding clothes and shoes and said calmly as much as possible: "My Panpan, she just wants to save face when she grows up, and she really doesn't want to wear other people's old clothes anymore. Plus, our family conditions are really not that bad. The two of us plant so much land every year and raise so many livestock at home, just to make sure our only granddaughter has good food and drink, so our family really has no shortage of food and clothes.
Don't look at her poor clothes now, but we bought her several sets of nice clothes when she went to school. We also bought our Panpan a pair of these little leather shoes last summer. So, let's just forget about your kindness. Juanjuan's mother, we know your good intentions, but my Panpan has grown up after all. Why don't you give these clothes and shoes to other children who are more in need? We are neighbors, so we can just give each other some food in the future. As for the clothes and shoes, if the child doesn't like them, there is really no need to give them away."
"I--"
Wang Xiaohua, who has been collecting old clothes for the Chen family since she was a child and sending at least two or three pieces a year, finally couldn't hold back her tears.
She didn't know why the Chen family, who always smiled every time they received her clothes and food, suddenly changed their expressions and attitudes.
With tears in her eyes, she held the clothes and shoes tightly in her hands, and in an instant she was extremely sad and upset.
"Tsk, what an ungrateful family! Why didn't you say this when you were poor? Now that our conditions are a little better, you start to look down on our clothes. It's outrageous!"
Unable to bear seeing her mother being bullied like this, Wang Jiajuan, who had been hiding behind her front door, couldn't help but rush out of the house angrily.
"What are you talking about? We haven't even returned the things your family sent us? You're calling us ungrateful? Then I'd like to say your whole family is cunning and deceitful. Every year you send us two pieces of tattered clothes and worn-out shoes, yet you take at least 20 kilograms of chicken and duck eggs from us. And every year you pump out 10 kilograms of rapeseed oil. And every autumn harvest, who are the ones who come to my house to look for my grandparents and collect some for you? Just a few tattered things, a few bowls of mutton offal worth one or two yuan, and you make us work so hard. Who are you trying to trick? Who do you think is an idiot?"
Before she knew Wang Qingshan and Wang Xiaoya were her biological parents, Chen Panpan had always thought their relationship was the best and most normal one in the village. It was definitely not a relationship where you give me two sets of clothes and I give you a few kilograms of cooking oil.
It's the kind of relationship where if something happens at home, I can leave my child at your house for you to take care of for a day and a night. It's the kind of relationship where my family starts planting and harvesting wheat, and we all get together to help each other out. It's the kind of relationship where it's almost Chinese New Year, and my family has a way to get cheap cigarettes, alcohol, and New Year's goods, so we can all pool our money to save even more. It's the kind of relationship where I fill up some cooking oil for you, and when you go buy fertilizer and seeds, you can bring some for me too. It's the kind of relationship where I go to the fields to water them, and if no one comes over, I won't even bother to tell you. So I spend two or three hours watering your fields too, and then tell you afterward.
This is also the real reason why the relationship between the Chen and Wang families has lasted for decades.
They don't just take advantage of one side, but both sides can take advantage of each other, help each other, and benefit each other. It is because of this that their relationship can continue.
Normally, even if Chen Pan no longer needed the Wang family's hand-me-downs, even if she privately hated Wang Jiajuan and Wang Jiabao for always looking at her like a beggar, for the sake of harmony between the two families, she should have endured and continued to accept the clothes and shoes that Wang Mama sent her. Even if she truly no longer needed them, even if she accepted them, she would never wear them.
But at this moment, Chen Pan knew the true identities of the couple opposite him, and he wanted to completely destroy the relationship between the two families.
So when he saw Wang Jiajuan suddenly running out in anger, Chen Pan looked irritated and immediately listed in front of the mother and daughter all the times that their family had taken advantage of his own family.
"Bullshit, my dad even bought soybean seeds and fertilizers for your family!!"
"Well, our family even gave your dad cigarettes! Last time when the village was watering, it was my grandfather who helped your family!"
"That's your family's own wish. You're the ones begging us for it!!"
Seeing that Chen Pan, who always endured it silently, dared to refute, Wang Jiajuan, who was only one year older than her, jumped up immediately.
"Juanjuan, Panpan, stop it!" Seeing the two sisters getting closer and closer, looking like they were about to fight, Wang Xiaohua, who had just shed two tears, immediately hugged her eldest daughter and subconsciously stretched out a hand to block Chen Pan, who was talking more and more excitedly.
Although she didn't know how things suddenly turned out like this, she instinctively didn't want to see her two children actually fighting.
"Okay, let's leave it at that. Please don't bring these things to my house again, Wang family. As long as you don't send these things, we will naturally not rush to bring things to your family again."
He never expected a teenager to look at his family in this way. Thinking back to the time when this child looked at him and his granddaughter, even though he politely asked people, he kept his chin raised high, Chen Aiguo immediately understood his granddaughter's grievance and immediately spoke loudly.
Chen Aiguo was tall and had a rough voice. When he was usually kind, he looked quite honest and friendly. But when he got angry, his face became quite fierce.
Anyway, at this moment, after he suddenly shouted, Chen Pan and Wang Jiajuan, who had been cursing like a rooster more and more vigorously and getting closer to him, fell silent at the same time.
"Old man, Panpan, come back for dinner quickly, why are you staying outside all the time?"
There was such a loud noise outside that even Xu Chunhua, who was three doors away, could hear it.
She yelled at the gate of the inner courtyard at the top of her lungs, and then saw her old man and granddaughter, who had been outside, come in with red faces. Grandma Chen slammed the gate of the inner courtyard shut: "Hurry up and wash your hands and eat, so that you can be kind enough to help others harvest wheat and water it in the future. You think you are helping your neighbors, but in the eyes of others, you are just a lapdog who is always begging others. Bah, you are a teacher's child, and I don't know who was always forgotten by his parents at home when he was young, and always ran to me pitifully, calling me grandma, and eating the steamed buns and rice noodles I made."
Xu Chunhua, who had been listening in the inner courtyard for a long time, originally wanted to endure everything, after all, they would meet each other sooner or later.
But after calling her old man and granddaughter in, seeing their blushing faces and the mother and daughter still standing at her door, she took two steps back and finally couldn't help but turned around suddenly.
"You heartless people, you still say that my family needs you for help? We have fields, land, chickens and cows, do we need to beg you for help? You just gave us a few pieces of tattered clothes and shoes, and you think our family is precious? We gave away those eggs and rapeseed oil, and we can't buy enough of them.
You have no conscience and no gratitude at all! You've completely forgotten how you gave birth to a daughter, how your mother-in-law ignored you, your father-in-law disliked you, your husband was too busy, your parents' home was too far away, and how I, an old woman, took care of you through such a long confinement. Just think about it, you were lying pitifully on that broken plank bed. Who wiped you? Who cooked you three meals a day? Who cleaned your little one's poop and piss?! I even washed your dirty diapers back then, and now you think we're being ungrateful and begging you? Ugh!!"
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