Chapter 25
Grandma Sun stood at the door, watching them trudge through the muddy water and slink away from her house. She wiped the rain from her face, her gaze calm. Such relatives were better off without.
Inside the room, Chen Qing and Zhou Yuan looked at each other in bewilderment. After a long while, Chen Qing finally managed to say, "Thank you."
Zhou Yuan smiled and said, "You're welcome."
His gaze fell upon the mess in the room, and he saw the piece of cloth lying on the floor.
Chen Qing quickly jumped over and picked up the cloth. During the fight, the cloth he had taken from his room had been thrown on the ground.
"Sorry, I didn't notice..." Chen Qing brushed off the dust. "I'll wash it clean for you after I finish making the clothes."
"Alright then." Zhou Yuan didn't actually mind, but seeing Chen Qing like this was quite amusing.
When Aunt Sun returned to the main room, she saw Chen Qing holding a bolt of cloth and talking to Zhou Yuan.
"Aqing, didn't you say yesterday that you didn't have Zhou Yuan's measurements? Why don't you ask him now?" Aunt Sun's eyes were a little red. Looking at the messy room, she bent down to tidy up, and after a while, she didn't hear their voices.
She looked up at Chen Qing: "Qing?"
Chen Qing then came to his senses and said in a low voice, "Oh, to make clothes, I need to know your measurements, height, arm span, and so on."
Zhou Yuan listened to his words in a soft voice, which sounded like a cat scratching at his ears. He whispered, "I don't know. I've never measured it before."
"Then Aqing, why don't you take his measurements?" After cleaning up the main room, Aunt Sun really had no mood to do anything else. Her mind was in turmoil, and all her emotions were piling up at once. She didn't care about Chen Qing and the others, and just said, "I'm going back to rest for a while."
Chen Qing: ...
Grandma Sun went back into the house. Chen Qing and Zhou Yuan looked at each other in bewilderment. Zhou Yuan knew that if he didn't speak up, Chen Qing could keep this silence going forever.
"Aren't you going to measure it?" Zhou Yuan asked.
Chen Qing slowly took out a measuring tape from his sewing kit and handed it to Zhou Yuan: "Measure it yourself."
"I don't know how," Zhou Yuan said, spreading his hands.
Chen Qing jumped over: "Just take this ruler and measure yourself."
Zhou Yuan simply held the measuring tape and stared at Chen Qing without moving.
Chen Qing curled his lip and snatched the measuring tape from his hand. His measuring tape was only three feet long, and he hadn't even finished measuring Zhou Yuan's height after two measurements.
After the final measurement, Chen Qingcai exclaimed in surprise, "You're actually six and a half feet tall?"
Zhou Yuan lowered his eyes to look at him: "You look no more than six feet tall, maybe five and a half?"
Chen Qing pouted, a little angry, but couldn't refute it.
He had a limp and couldn't stand for long. After measuring Zhou Yuan, he lost his balance. Zhou Yuan reacted quickly, putting his arm around his waist and pulling him firmly. Chen Qing's head hit Zhou Yuan's chest hard due to the force of the impact.
Chen Qing quickly pushed Zhou Yuan's chest away with both hands, but Zhou Yuan didn't budge. Chen Qing was pushed away by Zhou Yuan's strength and fell back a little. Zhou Yuan could only grab his hands and then pressed him down into the chair: "Behave yourself, or you'll lose your legs?"
Zhou Yuan lowered his head and saw that Chen Qing's entire face was red all the way down to her neck, and even her hands seemed to be pink. Was she that shy?
He realized he had gone a bit too far in teasing him, and Chen Qing was looking down at him. At this moment, Zhou Yuan took the measuring tape from his hand, measured other parts of himself, and then reported the results to Chen Qing.
Chen Qing kept his head down, uttered an "oh," and didn't even know when Zhou Yuan had left.
After the rain stopped and the sky cleared, all worries were put aside, and autumn planting began in full swing.
Before the autumn planting season even began, the village chief led his men to collect taxes from house to house. When they arrived at Zhou Yuan's house, because he had just moved to Luohe Village and had not yet started farming, and because of the preferential treatment he received from the imperial court, he only paid a small amount of money.
He went inside to get the money and felt a gaze following him from behind. He turned around and saw a married man who had come with the village chief staring at him.
Then they arrived at the Meng family's house. Chen Qing's foot was still not healed, and Aunt Sun couldn't lift him. Zhou Yuan came along and helped them pay the taxes.
Chen Qing watched Zhou Yuan move things. He was strong and his movements were clean and efficient. After the village chief finished collecting the items, since their family was the last one, Zhou Yuan helped carry Chen Qing's family's items to the village chief's yard.
Once they were a distance away, Chen Qing noticed that the village chief's husband had been intentionally or unintentionally getting closer to Zhou Yuan. Chen Qing remembered that his name was Zhang Ran? He had only recently married into the family, so why was he following the village chief from house to house?
However, Chen Qing quickly put the matter out of his mind because the busy farming season had begun.
Grandma Sun got up very early. Chen Qing got up when he heard the noise in the yard. When he went out, Grandma Sun had already prepared the things she needed to take. When she saw Chen Qing get up, she handed him a wooden stick.
"This is more convenient." After saying that, she left in a hurry, leaving Chen Qing alone in the yard, looking at the stick in his hand. It was very long and straight, and seemed to have been polished, with no sharp parts.
It rained yesterday, so the chickens and geese were kept inside the shed. Now they need to be let out. The ground was slippery from the rain, and Chen Qing almost slipped, but he managed to catch himself with a wooden stick.
After feeding the chickens and geese, Chen Qing swept the yard. After sweeping the yard, he sat down and began to prepare to make clothes for Zhou Yuan.
Making clothes from cloth is not a simple task. He learned all his skills from his uncle. Before his father passed away, their family was actually doing quite well. His father was good at farming, and his uncle was very skillful. Although his grandmother often came to ask for money, their family was not doing badly.
My uncle used to make clothes for the villagers. Buying ready-made clothes was much more expensive than buying fabric and making clothes himself. My uncle could earn money by making clothes for the villagers.
When Chen Qing was a child, he would sit by his uncle's sewing basket. He was the cleanest boy in the village. While other children's clothes were patched, Chen Qing's clothes always looked brand new. This was because his uncle would make clothes for others, and sometimes the scraps of cloth that others didn't want would be kept by his uncle. He would use the fabric that was closest to Chen Qing's tattered clothes to sew his clothes back on.
But after his father passed away, his stepfather seemed to have cried himself blind and could no longer make clothes.
There was a water stain on the black cloth in front of him, and Chen Qing quickly wiped it off with his hand.
Bending down to do needlework actually makes your neck and shoulders very sore. Before you know it, it's already past 9 AM. Chen Qing puts down his needlework and rushes off to cook.
The steamed cornbread was perfectly firm, the pickled vegetables were seasoned just right, a pot of stewed potatoes and eggplants was sticky and mushy, and there was also mixed grain rice that I don't usually steam. There was also a bowl of pork bone soup that had been stewing for a long time. The soup had turned snowy white and was sprinkled with chopped green onions. The aroma was irresistible.
Chen Qing put the cooked food in his basket, and he was thinking of carrying the basket to the field when Li Xin came to visit.
"Are you going out?" Li Xin saw that he was about to leave and quickly helped him up.
"Mom went to the fields, I'm going to bring her food."
Li Xin quickly helped him carry the basket on his back: "I'll go with you, you follow behind."
The main reason is that it rained yesterday, and people can easily slip and fall if they are not careful, especially since Chen Qing has a limp.
"Is your foot alright? I heard someone came to your house and caused trouble yesterday? Are you and your aunt alright?" Li Xin was a talkative person who never stopped for a moment.
"How did you know?" Chen Qing thought Li Xin was really amazing; he could know what was happening somewhere.
"Niu Niu runs around the village all day long, and he tells everyone everything he hears," Li Xin said with a smile. "So, what's the situation?"
"It's nothing, Zhou Yuan came to help," Chen Qing said softly.
Li Xin nodded in satisfaction: "He does have some manly qualities."
"Um?"
Li Xin chuckled, and soon they reached the edge of the field.
"Mom, take a rest, dinner's ready."
Zhou Yuan was engrossed in his work when he heard Chen Qing's voice coming from the edge of the field. He thought that if Chen Qing's shout had been followed by his name, then even the scorching sun high in the sky would feel gentle.
Farm work was more tedious than he had imagined. Repeating the same actions made Zhou Yuan feel like his brain was going numb.
Because of the tight schedule and heavy workload, he wouldn't be able to go home for meals. Looking around, he saw that many families had people bringing them food, and the whole family was sitting on the edge of the field eating.
Grandma Sun was a little tired and hungry. Chen Qing brought out the food, and when he saw Zhou Yuan coming over, he took out his portion as well: "Mom, you eat, I'm going to do some work."
Then he and Li Xin went to the field. Li Xin half-supported him. The field had been plowed with a sled. Luckily, Zhou Yuan had an ox, otherwise it would have taken a long time just to turn the soil.
At this moment, Chen Qing and Li Xin were sowing seeds. Chen Qing was hopping on one foot. Zhou Yuan looked at him and remembered a little dog they used to keep in the military camp, which was also hopping around.
His hands were still a bit stiff. It was his first time plowing with an ox, and he wasn't very skilled. He was either too tight or too loose, and he didn't know where to put his hands on the plow. He was stammering and intermittent, and even the ox turned around and looked at him several times.
"Practice makes perfect, you've done very well." Grandma Sun mixed the vegetables into her rice and ate heartily.
"Next year, I'll rent out the land again and find another way to make a living." Zhou Yuan withdrew his gaze.
Grandma Sun nodded and said, "A good man should have ambitions beyond his hometown. What do you want to do?"
Zhou Yuan took a bite of his cornbread: "Aren't there a few others in the village who came from the front lines like me? I'm planning to form a caravan."
This was far beyond what Granny Sun knew: "What is it for?"
"To put it simply, if someone wants to send something valuable but is worried about safety on the way, we'll accompany them."
Grandma Sun nodded: "Then I'd have to be away from home all the time, and there's danger on the road."
Zhou Yuan laughed: "Nothing is more dangerous than the battlefield, Auntie. While I'm still young, I'll work for a few years and earn more money."
"You're trying to earn money to get married, right?" Aunt Sun laughed at him.
"Yes." He thought for a moment and then felt it was inappropriate, "to marry a husband."
Grandma Sun immediately understood. No wonder he had been watching the field the whole time. Ah Qing had done a good job, even bringing Li Xin along.
The more she looked at them, the more she felt they were a perfect match, so she asked, "When are you going to propose marriage? That blacksmith Li looks tall and strong, but you're even taller than him, so he'll feel comfortable entrusting Li Xin to you."
Zhou Yuan choked for a moment, then said seriously, "Auntie, it's not Li Xin. I've never liked Li Xin."
Grandma Sun was truly stunned at this moment: "Not Li Xin?"
"No." Zhou Yuan finished the cornbread in his hand. "Auntie, I don't like Li Xin."
Grandma Sun was stunned, and finally realized that something was wrong.
He doesn't like Li Xin, but he takes excessive care of his family. He used to be able to see Li Xin wherever she was, and they had things to talk about. If he doesn't like him, what do he have to say?
It's not Li Xin...
Grandma Sun's pupils suddenly contracted: "Is it A-Qing?"
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