As the days passed and the weather warmed, Zhou Jiao began taking her child out. A baby carrier became an instant hit in the county. Father and daughter kept in touch, writing twice a week. The knowledge that they were both safe and secure finally brought them some comfort.
After Zhang Guoqing started working, he began to settle into a busy life. His only weekend was monopolized by Zhao Chuangguang and his wife, who frequently visited the county town. After several weekends in a row in the provincial capital, Zhou Jiao refused to go. She truly hated the boring life of shopping and socializing.
As Ping An grew up, she spent more time with her family and children. When the weather was nice, she would take the children for a stroll and listen to gossip.
She doesn't like going out anymore. She cooks some delicious food to save space, knits sweaters and does housework, plays chess with Zhang Guoqing, practices calligraphy, and reviews. Days like these allow her to leisurely forget all her worries.
Zhang's mother came over to tell her that her second uncle and his family had moved into her courtyard. Then she remembered that she hadn't been back home since returning from the capital. She wondered how everyone was doing.
On the weekend, she suddenly had the urge to take Zhang Guoqing and the three of them returned to Zhangjia Village.
After not being back home for a long time, everything started to feel different again. Family and friends gathered together, there was laughter and joy, everything seemed so harmonious again.
But Zhou Jiao knew that after the incident with the Huang family, her sister-in-law Huang Cuilan's status in the Zhang family had changed dramatically. After the family split, Lin Juhua's transformation was even more astonishing, and she had become a model daughter-in-law in the village.
However, all this no longer concerned her. Sometimes, a split was just the right thing to do, allowing each to live their own lives. If they got along well, they'd talk more; if they didn't, they'd avoid each other.
With Huang Yaozong's transfer to a lower-level village, the Huang family's affairs finally returned to normal. As for when Zhang Guofu would move in, he didn't ask, and Zhou Jiao and Zhang Guoqing never inquired.
The village had been meticulously planned by the old captain. The rows of thatched and adobe houses at the foot of the green hills had been demolished and cleared. A dirt road had been blasted through the small valley behind, and wild fruit trees had been transplanted along its sides. Besides the fertile fields in the valley, large tracts of wasteland awaited reclamation on both sides of the road.
I heard that the old captain now walks that dirt road seven or eight times a day. The villagers are extremely excited about having so much more land, their faces full of anticipation and satisfaction.
Old farmers always have a natural love for the land. They don't care that the increase in land ownership is undoubtedly a burden on them. They simply think that with more land, they can have enough to eat.
At the foot of the northern mountain, leading toward the village entrance, each household had marked out their homesteads with broken stones, wood, and other debris. Dozens of men began to clatter away at the blasted bluestone, busily preparing for future housebuilding.
Zhou Jiao knew there was a hint from Zhang Guoqing. The shrewd captain was now anxious for everyone to prepare to build the house, fearing that something unexpected would happen one day.
Before the Lunar New Year, the village welcomed new brides and also saw the wedding of many older women. Zhou Jiao remembered that her family's contributions to the gifts never stopped. While Zhang's mother was away, she had been helping with the expenses. Now, seeing the shy new brides, she realized that she, too, was a new bride, but she no longer had that shyness.
But seeing her sisters who had married into Zhangjia Village around the same time as her, she couldn't help but laugh. Those sleazy women teased the new brides, completely forgetting they'd only been married a year or two earlier. The elders were truly different; they spoke dirty talk without blushing or panting.
Mother Zhang had been holding her little grandson tightly. When she saw Ping'an hugging her tightly, babbling non-stop and pointing at Xizi and the others, insisting on joining the fun with his brothers, she was so happy that she was reluctant to let the child go.
She had long heard from her eldest son that her grandson was precocious and very strong, and had asked them to keep it a secret from outsiders. But how could she hide such obvious changes in a child from a woman who had given birth? In the face of the villagers' praise, she kept changing the subject, but she was secretly proud of herself.
Zhang Guoqing spent every day with his son after work. He knew the little one understood the words "walk," "drink," "poop," "go to work," and "mom and dad." He approached his son and told him he was going to work with his mom. Sure enough, he saw his son waving at him.
He was so happy that he pulled Zhou Jiao out. I secretly turned my head to look at him, only to see him tilting his head, looking at Zhou Jiao in confusion as she followed him, waving her little hands without crying or making a fuss. She looked so adorable.
Seeing this, Zhou Jiao pinched his palm and told him to hurry up and leave, otherwise he would be stuck. Her son was only four months old and already understood how to read her expression.
Many times he kicked her so hard on the kang that she fell flat on her face, and he would laugh foolishly. Then one time she deliberately cried, her brow furrowed, and lay there, refusing to get up. He was so anxious that he slapped the quilt with his hands, babbling "a, a, yi." After that, he stopped kicking her intentionally.
Now, if she frowned at him, he would stay still. He would not throw his toys around or cry loudly when he was unhappy.
Now that he's switched to the DHA-containing formula in the space, he's not picky about his food. Zhou Jiao plans to start adding solids after the beginning of the month. "Three lifts, four rolls, six sits, seven rolls, eight crawls, nine stands with support, and then walks"—he's recently started learning to roll over on his own, and he's constantly imitating adults to sit steadily, and he wants to stand up with support. This should be enough nutrition.
Zhang Guoqing walked to the corner, stopped, and listened quietly. After a while, he didn't hear the child crying, and he laughed happily. He pulled Zhou Jiao up the mountain.
A few days ago, Zhou Jiao saw someone picking fresh wild vegetables. She began to yearn for wild celery dumplings and wild shallot tofu. Zhang Guoqing's mouth watered in the middle of the night as she recounted each wild vegetable delicacy. He planned to take Jiaojiao to their old place to pack up some wild vegetables. From now on, if he craves them, he won't even be able to sleep peacefully.
Nature is the most generous. Since their last visit, the dense forest had been violently excavated by Zhang Qingshan and his cousins. After a while, it was covered with lush vegetation again, with wild vegetables and weeds everywhere.
Zhang Guoqing, clutching the hatchet he'd retrieved from his space, carried a bag full of rocks, and walked forward, protecting Zhou Jiao. They headed first to the wild fruit tree they'd visited last time. This time, he wasn't planning on picking pears, but rather prying away at the tree with a hoe and other tools.
Yes, he took it away with the roots. This man, obsessed with his wife, had gone to great lengths to take the entire tree away because Zhou Jiao had lamented the previous day that it would be nice to have a fruit tree in the yard, planning to secretly plant it in the yard in the county town at night.
Even before returning to Beijing, he had already returned the flowers and plants that Old Master Liu had asked him to care for in the yard, along with the soil. This angered Old Master Liu, who cursed him for his future as a warrior. He even dared not tell Old Master about his original plan to plant chrysanthemums in the flowerbed, fearing that the old man would be angry and ask him to return the book.
His back ached from accompanying Zhou Jiao to dig wild vegetables, so Zhang Guoqing reluctantly resorted to his reserved activity—hunting. His wife's only hope now was to collect food to shake off her hamster instincts.
As expected, after venting his anger, in addition to a bunch of wild animals, Zhou Jiao also prepared a fishing net for him. Should he admire his wife for being able to prepare everything in advance?
After casting the fishing net, he suddenly realized that his wife might have prepared this fishing net for him to cast the net next time he went to the beach.
When Zhou Jiao heard his question, she was so angry that she punched him, which made Zhang Guoqing laugh out loud.
To save time, they didn't even bother collecting wild game this time. After Zhang Guoqing finished hauling in a dense net of fish, large and small, he saw her looking at him expectantly, and he immediately began to cast the net. As for whether the fish in the stream would become extinct? It was because his wife loved to scrape the ground, even more than his mother-in-law, who loved to take everything.
After all, she was a mother. After four o'clock in the afternoon, the weather began to change, with the temperature fluctuating by about ten degrees between day and night. She had to get her child back to the county town as soon as possible. As the time drew to a close, Zhou Jiao glanced regretfully at the wild vegetables spread out before her and hurriedly pulled Zhang Guoqing down the mountain.
Holding the child in his arms, he said goodbye to Zhang Dad and his family, who were reluctant to leave. The carriage sped towards the city.
Inside the carriage, Zhou Jiao breathed a sigh of relief. Afraid the coachman might hear her joke, she whispered a list of dishes and asked Zhang Guoqing for his opinion.
This made Ping An in his arms mistakenly think that Zhou Jiao was playing with him, and he responded happily with "ah ah".
The old man driving the cart heard bursts of laughter coming from inside and laughed along with them.
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