"Hey, Auntie, why are your eyesight so bad during the New Year? Didn't you see I'm frying dumplings for you?"
Zhao Sufang, abandoning her usual timid demeanor, retorted directly, leaving Li Sangu momentarily speechless.
Normally, my third sister would say ten sentences and my sister-in-law wouldn't be able to utter a single word. What's wrong with her today?
Li Sigu, who was standing next to her, was quite shrewd. She smiled and tried to smooth things over, "Sister-in-law, let's go to our mother's for lunch together. Dalanzi and Yingzi can come too!"
"Hey, Dalanzi, where's your husband? He hasn't visited your parents' house in so many years, how come he came this year?"
Aunt Li's triangular eyes darted around for a while before finally finding a topic of conversation.
Li Lan looked a little pale. "Third Aunt, I came back by myself."
Aunt Li immediately perked up, as if she could smell gossip. "What's going on? Did the couple have a fight?"
These days, who goes back to their parents' home to visit relatives alone!
Li Ying said unhappily, "Third Aunt, don't you wish others well during the New Year? Does my eldest sister not have legs? Why can't she do it herself?"
Aunt Li rolled her eyes at her, "What are you yelling about? I'm just concerned about Dalanzi. You're really biting the hand that feeds you, not recognizing a kind heart."
Seeing the tension escalating between the two, Li Jin coughed and said, "Sufang, give the dumplings to Third Sister, and Fourth Sister, pack them up." He then said to his two younger sisters, "Alright, hurry back to Mother's!"
Aunt Li San was about to yell at her eldest brother, but Aunt Li Si stopped her immediately, still smiling, "Alright, let's go to Uncle's house to wish him a Happy New Year!"
After seeing his two younger sisters off, Li Jin sighed inwardly. He had never noticed before, but now it seemed that his third sister was always stirring up trouble.
As soon as they stepped out of Li Jin's house, Aunt Li San angrily shook off Aunt Li Si's hand, saying, "Why are you stopping me? Mother was right, my eldest brother has forgotten his mother after getting married! Look, he didn't say a word even when Zhao Sufang and Xiao Yingzi were arguing with us!"
Aunt Li said slowly, "They didn't criticize me!"
Third Aunt Li pinched Fourth Aunt Li's waist, sighed, and said worriedly, "Judging from the way my eldest brother is acting, he's really becoming estranged from our mother!"
In the past, on the second day of the Lunar New Year, the eldest brother would be waiting at his parents' home early to entertain the four sisters, and Zhao Sufang would be busy at the stove. But now?
Why!
Aunt Li said calmly, "We both have mothers-in-law. Which daughter-in-law wants to have her mother-in-law as a mountain on her head? So, sister-in-law, you can't do anything good! If you want to ease the relationship between mother and son, you can only have our mother lower her stance and warm my brother's heart."
"But when has our mother ever bowed her head?"
"We have to lower our prices now, even if we haven't done so before! My brother's family is about to get better, and if things continue like this, we won't get any benefits!"
Aunt Li San nodded with a worried look on her face, and then asked Aunt Li Si, "Fourth brother, what do you think of Wei Jun's wife?"
Aunt Li chuckled, "Not stupid, not shrewd, but shameless."
"I think our mother likes her quite a bit."
“Our mother has gone too far these past few years.”
After taking a few detours, the two went to Li Jinshan's house. They first greeted his uncle and aunt, and then chatted casually.
This time, Li Sangu's complaint was quite tactful. She said to her aunt, Zhou, "Sigh, my mother really regrets it, but no one is offering her a way out, and she can't bring herself to reconcile with my eldest brother. I don't know what's wrong with him now; he wasn't like this before!"
This is from the bottom of my heart. My older brother used to be so filial!
Zhou smiled and said, "Your eldest brother is only just realizing this now."
Aunt Li choked again; she was having a really bad year, being criticized everywhere she went.
After Zhou finished chatting with Tian Liao, Li Sangu and her companion immediately took their leave.
Zhou weighed the two bags of steamed rice cakes in her hands, then smiled and asked the old man, "Are there four pieces here?"
Li Jinshan sat on the kang (a heated brick bed), puffing on his pipe. He looked up and asked, "How much money did our family get this year? Why are you still arguing about this with them?"
Zhou used a broom to smooth out the wrinkled sheets on the kang (a heated brick bed). "How could I care about these two pieces of rice cake? I'm talking about this! The third and fourth sons were raised by their younger siblings, and their personalities are just like theirs."
"Did you listen to what the third brother just said? Wasn't he implying that Su Fang was sowing discord between his sister-in-law and her son?"
Li Jinshan coughed violently twice. "With Xiang Dong in charge of Lao Liu's family, nothing will go wrong! Hurry up and fry some dumplings to take back to your nieces later."
Li Jinshan and Zhou Shi didn't have a daughter, and their sons and daughters-in-law had all gone back to their parents' homes to visit relatives, leaving only the elderly couple at home today.
Zhou agreed and got up to go to the main room to fry dumplings.
Li Qingshan's home.
Aunt Li married far away and doesn't visit often, only returning to her parents' home during holidays.
When Li Ergu was young, she became deaf in both ears due to illness, and her presence in Li Wanshi's eyes was extremely low, almost non-existent.
As soon as Aunt Li San and Aunt Li Si entered the house, they saw that their eldest sister and second sister had come together.
Liu Yuxiu was busy cooking in the main room, while Chunhua, heavily pregnant, was helping her.
When Li Weijun and Liu Yuxiu got married, Li Dagu's mother-in-law was so ill that she couldn't get out of bed and was on the verge of death, so she didn't attend the wedding, but only sent a gift of money.
Upon seeing Aunt Li, Li Wanshi immediately began to complain, "So you still know how to come? Look at the time! You only come back twice a year, and you're always so late! You really don't want to see your mother's old face? When I die, you won't even be able to cry for your mother properly!"
Aunt Li is over forty years old this year, but she has a straight back, is full of energy, is 1.7 meters tall, and looks quite like her grandmother.
Upon hearing her mother's complaint, Aunt Li raised an eyebrow and said, "It's the New Year, can't you say something nice? If you're afraid you won't hear me cry when you die, how about I cry for you right now?"
Aunt Li was truly speechless. Her eldest sister was raised by her grandmother and wasn't close to her mother at all.
The eldest sister not only looks like her grandmother, but her personality is also a direct copy of hers. She is efficient in her work and never loses a verbal battle!
But her mother just loves to pick fights with her older sister all the time!
She also asked her mother, "You can't win an argument with your eldest sister, and you can't gain any advantage, so why do you always provoke her?"
Li Wanshi retorted indignantly, "Seeing your eldest sister is like seeing your grandmother. I suffered so much at your grandmother's hands!"
Aunt Li really couldn't understand her mother's thought process. Did she want to get revenge on her eldest sister for the loss she suffered at her grandmother's?
If you could actually get it back, that would be fine, but the problem is that you're no match for your older sister!
Sure enough, the mother and daughter started arguing again after exchanging only a few words. Li Wanshi didn't care that crying during the first month of the new year was unlucky. She cried and wailed, saying that her eldest daughter and eldest son were both heartless and unfilial!
To everyone's surprise, Aunt Li didn't respond at all and went to Li Jin's house on her own with her things!
This has really stirred up a hornet's nest!
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