Fu Yucheng's hands, which were twisting hemp rope, suddenly stopped, and his gaze fell on Yun Tangyin's voice.
A wisp of hair, gilded golden-red by the sunlight, clung to her temple, speckled with the pink wisps of embroidery thread.
He reached out and tucked it behind her ear, his fingertips brushing against her warm earlobe, like touching a ball of melting snow.
"The stitches are getting more and more even," he said, his Adam's apple bobbing, his voice slightly hoarse from the early morning.
When Yun Tangyin looked up, she met the smile in his eyes, like a flame leaping in a stove.
She slipped a needle into his hand, the end of which was tied with a ball of blue thread: "Then help me thread this needle. The eye of the needle is too small; I can't seem to get it through."
Fu Yucheng held the needle close to the windowsill. Sunlight filtered through the frost flowers, casting dappled shadows on his eyelashes. He tried three times before finally threading the needle, a thin layer of sweat beading on his nose.
“You’re really good at this,” he said, handing the needle back, his fingertips still damp with a bit of thread. “I’m good at shooting, but my hands always shake when I thread a needle.”
Suddenly a loud crash came from outside the courtyard, followed by Xiaolan's scream.
Yun Tangyin looked out the window and saw the little girl slip and fall by the woodpile in the snow. The cloth bag in her hand rolled far away, and the red cloth was particularly eye-catching in the snow.
When Fu Yucheng got up, he knocked over the wooden stool behind him. His military boots crunched on the snow. He reached Xiaolan's side in a few steps.
"Did you fall?" He helped the child up, brushed the snow off her cotton-padded coat, and seeing that her trouser legs were covered in ice, he simply bent down and picked her up. "Look how fast you ran, didn't you know the snow was slippery?"
Xiao Lan steadied herself by hugging Fu Yucheng's neck, blushing as she withdrew her hand: "Hehe, my mother asked me to deliver the newly made half-finger cotton gloves for my sister-in-law to wear when she embroiders a tiger-head hat."
She pointed to the cloth bag that had rolled away, "There were freshly steamed glutinous rice cakes inside, with red dates in them, which I broke when I dropped it."
When Yun Tangyin picked up the cloth bag, her fingertips touched the warmth of the glutinous rice cake, and she could smell its sweet fragrance even through the coarse cloth.
She placed a hand warmer into Xiaolan's hands, which were red from the cold. The copper surface was scorching hot from the charcoal fire. "Hurry up and warm your hands. They're so cold, they look like carrots."
Fu Yucheng placed Xiaolan on a small stool in front of the stove and added a piece of firewood to the firebox.
The flames licked the bottom of the pot, making the little girl's face glow red. She stared at the tiger-head hat embroidery hoop in Yun Tangyin's hand, and suddenly pointed to the brim and said, "A plum blossom should be embroidered here. My mother said that plum blossoms are cold-resistant and wearing them is auspicious."
Yun Tangyin picked out a red thread: "Then you help me hold the embroidery hoop, and we'll embroider together."
Xiao Lan immediately sat up straight, her little hands gripping the bandage without moving. The red ribbon in her braid swayed gently with her breath, like a red butterfly resting on her shoulder.
As she was embroidering, Zhou Desheng's wife lifted the curtain and came in, her head covered with a thin layer of snow. As soon as she entered, she stamped her feet and said, "This snow is so heavy, the chicken coop is about to collapse!"
She placed a bowl of pickled cabbage on the stove, saying, "It's freshly pickled; I'll stir-fry some pork ribs for you."
Seeing the hand warmer in Xiaolan's hand, he suddenly laughed out loud, "Your Brother Fu is so thoughtful. My wife doesn't even know to hand the child something warm when he's crying from the cold."
Fu Yucheng was hammering nails into the wall, planning to make a wooden frame for Yun Tangyin to hold her embroidery hoop. Hearing this, he turned around and smiled, "It's not that he's not careful, he just doesn't know how to do it. He'll learn."
Zhou Desheng's wife looked into the yard and saw that Fu Yucheng had neatly stacked the chopped firewood, and his military green cotton-padded coat was draped on the woodpile, looking particularly bright against the snow.
"Your Yucheng is such a good man," she said, stuffing a pair of insoles into Yun Tangyin's hand. "They were just made. Look at the stitches, aren't they better than last time?"
The insoles were embroidered with a pair of mandarin ducks. Yun Tangyin touched the fluffy fabric of the insoles: "They're thicker than those from the quartermaster's office. Desheng will definitely find them warm."
By the time the sun reached its zenith, Fu Yucheng's wooden frame was finished. The dark pine wood exuded a fresh fragrance and had been polished smooth by him with sandpaper.
He placed the embroidery hoop on it, at just the right height for Qi Yuntangyin's chest: "Now I don't have to keep my head down all the time, saving my neck from getting tired."
Yun Tangyin touched the carving marks on the wooden frame. He had actually carved a circle of small plum blossoms around the edge. Although the petals were crooked, they were enough to soften one's heart.
"When did you learn to carve?" She looked up at him, sunlight filtering through his shoulders and casting dappled patterns of light on her face.
“When we were repairing the stage last time, I saw the carpenter carving it,” Fu Yucheng said, his ears turning slightly red. “I secretly learned a couple of tricks, but I’m clumsy and didn’t carve it well.”
He walked towards the kitchen. "I'm going to stew pork ribs and add pickled cabbage. That way it won't be too greasy."
The water in the pot was bubbling and he chopped the ribs into pieces. The blade made a clanging sound as it hit the iron pot, mingling with the sound of snow falling outside the window.
Xiao Lan finished eating the glutinous rice cake and was about to leave when she slipped a frozen pear into Yun Tangyin's pocket, saying, "I kept it chilled by the well."
Yun Tangyin's hands were numb from the frozen pear shaved ice, but she couldn't bear to throw it away and kept it warm in her bosom.
When Fu Yucheng saw it, he reached out and took it out and put it in the bowl: "I'll melt it for you, you can eat it later."
He poured some hot water into the bowl, and the frozen pear slowly softened in the water, with a layer of sweet juice seeping out from its skin.
The snow stopped in the afternoon, and the sunlight made the snow-covered ground look white, so bright that it was hard to open one's eyes.
Yun Tangyin sat by the window basking in the sun, while Fu Yucheng squatted in the yard repairing the chicken coop. Zhou Desheng had just come to call him, saying that the chickens were squawking from the cold.
He bent the bamboo strips into an arch shape, tied them tightly with hemp rope, and his military boots left deep footprints on the snow.
Yun Tangyin slipped a pair of cotton gloves into his hand: "Wearing these will keep your hands warm."
Fu Yucheng put on the gloves and tried them on, then suddenly laughed: "This floral fabric is really flashy."
The rabbit in the bamboo cage had probably gotten used to the noise; it clung to the bars and peered out, its mouth trembling.
Yun Tangyin threw a cabbage leaf into the cage and suddenly noticed that the rabbit's fur was much longer and denser than when it first arrived, and it was round and plump like a snowball.
“Look how fat it has become,” she called to Fu Yucheng with a smile. “If it keeps eating, this cage won’t be able to hold it anymore.”
When Fu Yucheng turned around, he saw the rabbit holding a vegetable leaf in its front paws and nibbling on it. He suddenly said, "Let's build it a burrow in the spring, in the corner of the yard, and let it have a few baby rabbits for the kids to play with."
As evening fell, Fu Yucheng returned carrying an old hen, which Zhou Desheng had insisted on giving him. "He said it's to nourish your body," Zhou Desheng said.
He put the chicken on the stove, its feathers still covered in snow. "His chickens lay lots of eggs, so one more won't make a difference."
Yun Tangyin stroked the downy feathers on the chicken's wing and suddenly felt a little reluctant: "Why don't we keep it? It can still lay eggs."
Fu Yucheng pointed to the corner of the wall, where a small chicken coop had been built, with cotton cloth used to shield it from the wind and snow: "I prepared it for you a long time ago. I knew you wouldn't be willing to kill it."
The fire in the stove gradually grew stronger, making the New Year picture on the wall look particularly bright. The chubby baby was holding a carp, and the gold thread on the red bib shone brightly in the firelight.
Yun Tangyin leaned on Fu Yucheng's shoulder, listening to him recount the interesting things that happened during training.
Zhou Desheng kept missing the target when shooting and was punished by the company commander.
As she laughed, she suddenly yawned, her eyelids growing heavier and heavier.
Fu Yucheng pulled her closer and added a piece of coal to the stove: "If you're sleepy, take a nap. I'll call you when the ribs are done stewing."
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