Chapter 237: Different
Chuyi was quite well behaved. He cried for a while at noon, and then slept until sunset in the afternoon.
When she woke up, Hu Qingqing washed her face, closed the door and took her to play with Wen Wan next door.
As soon as the sun sets, the room is not very bright, so Wen Wan stops messing with the wool and goes to bed to play with the child.
Dandan grew fast during the confinement period, and her appearance changed every day. She no longer had the pink color she had when she was just born. The little hair on her face has basically grown out and is almost invisible. Her grape-like eyes are bright when she looks at people, and when she smiles, her eyes become a pair of crescents. She looks exactly like Wenwan.
Wen Wan particularly liked his smile when he was teased. There was nothing else to do during the confinement period, so as long as he was awake, entertaining the child was his main priority.
Zhang Hongying and the others went about their business while the sun was setting. Hu Qingqing came over with Chuyi in her arms and called out to the door, "Sister-in-law!"
Hearing her voice, Wen Wan got up, put on her shoes, and went to the outer room: "Come in, come in."
He invited her into the house and said, "Put Chuyi down quickly. It's so hot, aren't you feeling hot holding her?"
"Of course she's hot. Mom has been taking care of her all her life. Now that she's gone, her throat is hoarse from crying. She wakes up from a nap and starts looking for her everywhere. I really don't have any other options except holding her and comforting her."
Wen Wan asked her to sit down and took a teacup to pour her some water.
Hu Qingqing hurriedly stopped her: "Don't bother, I'm not thirsty. You're in confinement, take a good rest."
Wen Wan stopped being polite with her and turned to tease Chuyi: "Come, Chuyi, come to your aunt, come, let me hold you, and let me hold you to see your brother."
She carried Chuyi to the bed and saw Dandan wearing long johns and a diaper, with his two short legs kicking around.
Hu Qingqing asked her, "Sister-in-law, the child is so young, is this okay? Don't you tie his legs up?"
Wen Wan looked at her puzzledly: "Why do you want to tie your legs up?"
Hu Qingqing said, "It seems that they're worried that the child's legs won't grow straight in the future, so they need to be tied straight to prevent them from becoming bow-legged. That's how we do it, and my younger brothers and sisters do the same."
"I haven't heard of that, but aren't healthy legs meant to be moved? If they're tied up and can't move, wouldn't that be very uncomfortable?"
"I don't know." After so many years, she had long forgotten what that feeling was like. She leaned over to look at Dandan and couldn't help but exclaim: "It seems that he has grown so fast. Every time I come to see him, he looks different. He has grown a little bit more. Sister-in-law, he looks like you. He will definitely be very handsome when he grows up."
Wen Wan felt very happy to be praised.
Hu Qingqing brought Chuyi over and said, "She's quite heavy. Sit down and take a rest."
"It's okay. It's been more than ten days now. I'm much better now."
Hu Qingqing looked her over again and said, "Sister-in-law, you really don't look like someone who is in confinement."
Wen Wan smiled and asked her, "What's not similar?"
"After giving birth, women's bellies are huge, their faces are swollen, and they're all dirty and messy. They're told they can't see the wind or water and can't give birth for a month. But some women give birth within a few days, carrying their babies on their backs, their faces as yellow as if a weasel had sucked their blood."
Wen Wan reached out and touched her hair. "See? I haven't washed it in over ten days. You can even smell the grease. If it's completely dry, won't it just disappear? Be careful. Just keep it away from the wind and cold water. Avoid the foods you should avoid, but you still need to tidy up. You can't use confinement as an excuse to be sloppy. If you're tidy, it will be pleasing to others. Of course, the most important thing is that you feel comfortable too."
Hu Qingqing nodded in agreement.
Then he asked her, "Is Chun'e going to have summer vacation?"
Before Wen Wan could reply, Dandan started whining in dissatisfaction on the bed.
Wen Wan hurriedly picked him up and sat him on the small stool behind the door to help him urinate. After getting into position, she answered Hu Qingqing, "It should be in the next two days. Dongfu should be back by now. Without them, the house feels empty, just like without the elderly."
Hu Qingqing nodded in agreement: "When she comes back, we can go up the mountain and down the river together."
Wen Wan teased her: "Even without Chun'e, there is still Dongcai. He will accompany you whether you want to go up the mountain or down the river."
Hu Qingqing was a little embarrassed: "That's different." Can men be the same as young sisters?
Lu Dongcai is a nice guy, but he's always controlling. She feels like they don't act like a couple. In any case, she doesn't think other couples are like them.
Wen Wan asked her: "What's the difference?"
Hu Qingqing couldn't explain it, but she was always forbidden to do this or that. She couldn't even kick the covers when it got too hot at night, and occasionally, he'd spank her. She was already a grown-up, and yet she was spanked by someone, her own man, it was unbearable.
But she couldn't tell anyone about this, she felt so embarrassed.
In the evening, it was just the two of them, so Hu Qingqing cooked some porridge early and left it to dry, fried some salted vegetables, and made an egg for Chuyi.
After dinner, it was not too late, and she started asking to see her mother-in-law on the first day of the new year.
Hu Qingqing called Lu Dongcai, "Let's go to the river dam and take her for a walk. She slept for a long time during the day, and I don't think she can sleep now. She will cry at home."
Although Lu Dongcai often took care of Chuyi, he had no experience in coaxing children. When Gao Xiulan was home, he had always thought Chuyi was very well-behaved and obedient, but now that he was gone, he started to fuss, and it was the kind that couldn't be coaxed, which was really a headache. Especially at this moment, his mind was full of worries, wondering what had happened to Lu Dongcheng. Hearing the child's endless whining made him feel a little angry.
"Don't go to the dam. Just stay in the yard for a while. Don't spoil her. She can understand what you say now. She should be a little more aggressive. If you keep spoiling a child, adults should stop."
Hu Qingqing didn't say anything.
She had been in the Lu family for quite some time, and now she understood some of the things she hadn't understood before. She knew she was a stepmother, and people said stepmothers had the hardest time. She could scold and beat her own children if they didn't obey, but she couldn't do that with other people's children. She had to be nice to them, and if they didn't do anything wrong, they would be criticized.
After coming to the Lu family, she felt that she was really lucky and happy. The only thing she had not been able to grasp was the first day of the new year.
However, what Lu Dongcai said was not without reason. She had been coaxing it all afternoon but to no avail. Now the two of them were sitting on the stone steps ignoring the little thing. It hummed for a long time, and then stopped humming when no one paid attention to it, and then dived into Hu Qingqing's arms again.
"Is Chuyi sleepy?"
Chuyi started to pout again: "I want my mother-in-law."
Lu Dongcai got up and went into the kitchen, scooped some water out and washed her hands and face: "Be obedient and don't make a fuss. Grandpa and grandma have something to do. You should get some sleep, and they will be back tomorrow."
Hu Qingqing leaned over and whispered in his ear, "Can you come back tomorrow? You can't come back? Then aren't you just trying to coax her?"
Lu Dongcai glanced at her without saying anything.
Hu Qingqing found that he usually had no bad temper, but Chuyi was afraid of him. He washed his face and hands without saying a word, and after washing, he went to the toilet, and then was taken into the house and thrown on the bed.
It was a bit crowded for three people to sleep at one end, so Hu Qingqing turned over and poked Lu Dongcai: "Switch, I'll sleep on the edge of the bed." It was so hot being sandwiched in the middle that she didn't even have a chance to kick off the quilt.
Lu Dongcai was very easy to talk to. He reached out and pulled her to the bed, then flipped her over.
People can't stand nagging, and the next day before lunch, Lu Chun'e came home carrying her bedding roll.
She had finished her exams the day before and had originally planned to go back in the afternoon, but the county town was a bit far from the commune, and her classmates were not willing to go back that day. She was a little afraid to go alone, so she stayed overnight and set off at dawn the next day. She arrived home a little before ten o'clock.
Wen Wan's due date was in mid-June. She came back then but didn't give birth. She came back last week and found out she had given birth. Her little nephew was so adorable that she almost counted the days for the rest of the week, waiting for the exams to be over and she could go on vacation.
When she got home, no one in the family had returned yet. However, Wen Wan's door was not locked. She put her gift bag at the door of the main room and called out, "Sister-in-law, I'm back!"
A gentle voice came from the room: "Chun'e?"
As soon as the voice fell, the door opened, and Lu Chun'e rushed into the room and closed the door: "What are you doing out here? Don't you want to avoid the wind? Go lie down on the bed quickly."
Wen Wan said, "It's been more than ten days. Why do you still need to lie in bed? You're so annoying. Yesterday I told Qingqing that you should come back, and now you're here after just one night."
"I wanted to come back after I finished my exam yesterday afternoon, but it was a bit late and they didn't want to rush, so they ran back early this morning."
As he said this, he went into the bedroom to check on the child: "Hey, he's changed a lot since I came back last week! He's gained weight, and his little face is round and chubby, so cute." As he said this, he wanted to pinch him, but he didn't dare, for fear of waking him up and making him cry.
The cute Dandan is sleeping now and has no idea how much his aunt loves him.
After looking at the child, Lu Chun'e looked at the adults again, and then sized up Wen Wan and said, "Sister-in-law, your balls have grown a lot, but why haven't you grown? You seem to be even thinner than before you had the baby."
Wen Wan subconsciously took a look at herself: "No, I haven't lost weight. I feel that my waist is thicker than before. I have to eat three meals a day now, and I don't go out of the house. I feel like I can't digest it well."
Lu Chun'e asked her, "What do you want to eat for lunch? I'll go cook."
"Anything is fine. I eat normally." The weather was getting hotter, and it was not convenient to prepare a meal for her alone. At most, she would have a bowl of millet porridge or brown sugar eggs in the morning. In the afternoon, Lu Dongping would come back and make her some more. At noon, they always ate from the same pot.
Cook some meat and kill a chicken, but she can only eat that little in one meal. The family members are reluctant to eat it, so it smells bad the next day.
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