These days, there aren't many parents who don't impose their own ideas on their children.
Zhou Chenyu smiled and wanted to help add firewood, but Li Xiuju shooed her out.
With no sign of Zhou Chenyu in the kitchen, and Baoyu and Zhou Wanqiu nowhere to be seen, she finally had some peace and quiet. Clutching the wild roses she had picked up in the valley, she returned to her room.
Originally, this room had nothing but a bed. After Zhou Chenyu moved in, he simply built some furniture, such as tables, chairs, and wardrobes. Although the workmanship was rough at the tip, it looked much better than before.
However, for girls who pursue a comfortable lifestyle, this is still far from enough; now, adding a bouquet of flowers is just right.
Zhou Chenyu found an old, worn-out jar, filled it with water, placed the roses inside, and then put it near the window. Sparse sunlight filtered in, illuminating the delicate petals, with a few strands of green vines outside the window providing a backdrop.
She lay on the table, watching this scene, and thought of the first apartment she rented after graduation.
Because she was short of money and wanted to save commuting time, she rented a small, cramped room in an urban village near her company. The room was barely big enough to fit a bed, and the soundproofing was so bad that she could hear the toilet flushing next door. What she found most unacceptable was that sunlight had become a luxury.
To escape that place as soon as possible, she worked desperately and was finally able to rent an apartment in a residential complex. Later, in order to buy her own house and stop working for landlords, she continued to save money diligently.
As she wanted more and more, the pressure she faced also increased. Sometimes when she was tired, she would think about pressing the pause button, but she was always swept forward by the tide of society and dared not stop at all.
She broke off a petal, placed it on the tip of her nose, and smiled, "That's nice."
The cuckoo's call echoed through the woods. Zhou Chenyu, who was dozing off at the table, heard Li Xiuju's shout outside and quickly got up and went out.
There were still some mountain crabs left over from frying a few days ago, so Li Xiuju used them to cook a pot of porridge and stir-fry a plate of fresh and tender green water ferns.
Because there was an extra person, Li Xiuju was worried that there wouldn't be enough food. Luckily, the scallions in the vegetable garden had grown to maturity and would wilt if not picked soon, so she fried a scallion and egg pancake, and the aroma wafted outside.
Li Xiuju went outside to call Baoyu and Zhou Wanqiu back for dinner. Zhou Chenyu hurried into the kitchen to get bowls and chopsticks, and heard an old, weathered voice ask, "What are you cooking? It smells so good?"
She looked up at the sound and saw a gray-haired old man in his seventies standing outside the window. He was dressed in tattered clothes, thin as a bone, and had almost lost all his teeth.
Zhou Chenyu didn't know this person, but they all lived in the same village, and if you traced their ancestry back several generations, they might be related by blood. Besides, asking each other these questions among neighbors was just a way of exchanging pleasantries.
She looked at the old man's kind face, which showed no malice, and smiled as she replied, "Stir-fried water ferns, picked up from the stream. There are still many more."
The old man stood there, grinning foolishly, as if he couldn't hear what she was saying.
She repeated what she had just said twice. The old man smiled, waved, and walked away with a limp, leaning on his wooden cane.
“He’s deaf, he can’t hear what you’re saying.” Li Xiuju stood outside the kitchen, staring at his back.
"A deaf man?" Zhou Chenyu frowned, the old man's strange behavior suddenly making sense: "No wonder his answers were so strange, he can't hear. Where does he live?"
Li Xiuju shook her head. "I only heard about it. He is an elderly man living alone in Qingshui Town. A few years ago, his only son died in an accident. His daughter-in-law remarried with the child. Since then, he has been deaf. Sometimes he is also mentally unstable. He wanders around the town and villages, and if he meets a kind person, he will give them a meal. I think his surname is Zhang. Everyone calls him Zhang the Deaf."
The three greatest tragedies in life are losing one's father in childhood, losing one's wife in middle age, and losing one's son in old age.
"What a pitiful person," Zhou Chenyu couldn't help but sigh.
Li Xiuju gently patted Zhou Chenyu's back, took the bowl and chopsticks to the dining table, and first ladled a bowl full of fried crab porridge for Zhou Wanqiu, "I cooked a lot of dishes today, you can add more if it's not enough."
Baoyu laughed and said, "Yes, Sister Wanqiu, these fried crabs were picked up by my sister and me in the back mountain. They are delicious. You must try them."
Zhou Wanqiu obediently took the bowl, "Okay, I know."
The group sat down around the table. Zhou Chenyu sat next to Zhou Wanqiu and watched out of the corner of her eye as she picked up her chopsticks and carefully placed a small piece of egg pancake into her bowl. It was only the size of a peanut, but she chewed it dozens of times.
When Baoyu was about to finish eating the giant prawns, he asked her how they tasted, and she smiled and nodded, saying they were delicious.
Zhou Chenyu put a large egg pancake into her bowl, and Zhou Wanqiu looked up in alarm.
Zhou Chenyu took a big bite and whispered, "Someone like me needs to be full to have the strength to beat people up."
Zhou Wanqiu stared at her intently, a smile playing on her lips.
Li Xiuju looked at the children with satisfaction, noticing the dark clouds drifting in. "It hasn't rained for a long time this season. If it rains tonight, we can go into the mountains to pick some summer mushrooms tomorrow. If we're lucky enough to find a lot, we can keep them for ourselves or sell them."
"Mother, you mustn't go again!" Baoyu replied sullenly. "Last year you went to pick summer mushrooms and fell off the mountaintop. Your foot still hurts. I can go by myself."
What?
After listening, Zhou Chenyu realized that this was how Li Xiuju got her foot injury.
"You're such a silly boy, going all by yourself, you don't even know where to look for the Summer Solstice Fungus." Li Xiuju was both amused and worried.
That's true.
Zhou Chenyu raised her eyebrows. She could find bamboo shoots, and mushrooms were much lighter than bamboo shoots, so she was sure it wouldn't be a problem for her. "Grandma, what do termite mushrooms look like? Where are they usually found? Tell me, and I'll go pick some with Baoyu."
Just as Li Xiuju was about to reply, Zhou Wanqiu, who had been eating silently, spoke up, "Auntie, sister, I've been going into the mountains with my mother to pick summer mushrooms since I was seven years old. I know where they are. Tomorrow I'll go with my sister and Baoyu."
"Okay, okay, Mom, can you rest assured now?"
Having said that, Li Xiuju didn't say anything more, and added some more food to Zhou Wanqiu's bowl. Halfway through their meal, dark clouds gathered overhead, threatening a storm.
Sliced dried radishes were drying on the eaves. If they got wet in the rain, they would not only taste bad, but also easily mold and spoil. The radishes that we had worked so hard to grow shouldn't be wasted like this.
It's going to rain.
Li Xiuju quickly put down her bowl and chopsticks and ran to the yard to collect the winnowing basket. The others followed her out. Baoyu and Zhou Wanqiu helped with the dried radish, while Zhou Chenyu put away the clothes.
They hurriedly packed their things, and then a torrential downpour struck. The rain pounded on the tiles like marbles, accompanied by thunder and flashes of lightning. The ditch in front of the gate quickly overflowed onto the roadside.
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