Chapter 26: Longing for Mother's Love
Qin Xue and Liu Zhiyan's marriage hadn't been finalized, after all. Out of courtesy and respect, she came out to greet Liu Yulan, but it wasn't appropriate for her to stay too long. After exchanging greetings and chatting for a few minutes, she got up and returned to the backyard, leaving Qin's father to continue entertaining the two brothers.
Thinking about the things Ye Qinghan brought her, Qin Xue couldn't wait to rush to the backyard as soon as she left Qin's father's study.
The bundle was placed in the flower hall where she usually ate and received guests.
The entire bundle looked as long as she was tall and was placed flat on the ground.
Because of the long distance of transportation, the outermost part of the bundle has been worn out beyond recognition.
Qin Xue first used her hands to touch it from beginning to end. It felt like cloth and she couldn't feel what was inside.
She then took a pair of scissors and began to remove the cloth layer by layer.
She didn't cut quickly because she was afraid that she might accidentally use too much force and damage the things inside.
It took a whole cup of tea to cut through more than ten layers of cloth.
After cutting it open, there were three small packages inside.
Not to mention what was in the three small packages, just the layers of cloth wrapped around them made Qin Xue's heart deeply moved.
They had only met twice and were not close friends, yet Sister Ye took so much trouble to send her so many things from afar.
Since Qin Xue grew up, besides her father, the only person who treated her unconditionally was her sister, whom she had only met twice.
How could she not treat him as a respected elder?!
With this feeling, Qin Xue reached out her right hand and touched the closest small bundle. This bundle looked plump and felt soft. The second bundle had particles of varying sizes visible to the naked eye, and the graininess could be felt with the touch. The third bundle was square and felt hard.
Qin Xue opened the third bundle first. Even though the things inside seemed to be not easily damaged, she opened it very carefully.
However, this time it was wrapped in only two layers of cloth, which she quickly unwrapped, revealing books.
The book looks very new.
She counted them and found there were seven books in total. Five of them had the same words and titles on the covers, so they must be from the same set. The other two had completely different words and titles from the other five.
Looking at the words that she didn't recognize at all, Qin Xue knew that these must be foreign languages, and three different foreign languages at that, but they were completely different from the Latin she was currently learning.
Fortunately, Ye Qinghan was thoughtful enough to write the title, introduction, and summary of each of the three books in Zhaoguo language on the title page. Qin Xue then realized that the five-book set was the Italian version of The Decameron, which tells the story of ten young men who took refuge in the countryside to escape the plague. Each of them told a story every day, for a total of one hundred stories.
The other two books are "One Thousand and One Nights" in Arabic, a collection of Arabic folk tales, and "Gargantua and Pantagruel" in French.
Ye Qinghan didn't specify the specific contents of these books, only saying that she would read them slowly and at her own pace after she had mastered these languages. Ye Qinghan also said that Liu Zhiyan knew all of these languages, and if she had the time and interest to learn more, she could slowly begin to learn them.
After understanding it, I am not interested and I don’t force it.
Anyway, she happened to come across these books and found out that the content was pretty good, so I wanted to give her a few to read.
Ye Qinghan's hands stroked seven books, which she could not understand at the moment.
I thought to myself, if you had given me these books a few months ago, I would have probably put them aside. But after a few months of study, I've discovered the joy of learning. More importantly, I'm about to marry a very capable husband, and I want to become even more capable, to be a better match for him. So, I will work hard to learn these languages as quickly as possible and carefully study the contents of these books.
Without asking anyone else to help, he carefully moved the seven books one by one to the antique shelf in the west room and placed them in order.
Qin Xue returned to the flower hall and opened the second bundle where she could feel the grains.
This time, she found tiny cloth bags, each filled with small pellets of various shapes. Inside each bag, Ye Qinghan had thoughtfully written a note, explaining the contents and how to consume them.
That's right, the second bag was filled with food, including seasonings and drinks. She had the seasonings taken to the kitchen to see if she could follow the instructions and add a few new seasonings to make a lunchtime meal for Liu Zhiyan and his brother. She placed the drinks on the table in the living room, planning to find time in the afternoon to figure out how to prepare them herself.
Then he squatted down again and continued to unpack the last small package.
The small bundle felt soft from the outside, and Qin Xue unpacked it with extreme caution, figuring it might contain something fragile. After the outer cloth was removed, she saw a white blanket of cotton. After the cotton was removed, she discovered transparent glass lids separated by cotton, each with a label attached.
Qin Xue saw words like clove, agarwood, and perfume. It was obvious that the bundle was filled with various spices.
She carefully took out a glass bottle. The bottle was not big and she could hold it in one hand, but it was quite long.
She took out Malacca perfume. The liquid in the bottle was transparent and there was no obvious smell when she opened the lid.
This bundle also contains instructions for using each item, as well as a letter.
The content of the letter mainly said that whenever she went to a place and encountered these little things, she would ask someone to bring her a portion. She said these things were not worth much money, so she asked her to try them and see what she liked. Then, if she had the chance in the future, she would bring her favorite ones.
Although the words were simple, Qin Xue felt warm inside when she read them.
Even though there has never been any problem between mother-in-law and daughter-in-law in their family, Qin Xue knows more or less the subtleties between them. She used to think that she would bring a son-in-law home and not have to worry about the mother-in-law and daughter-in-law problem.
When Qin Xue learned that Sister Ye was Liu Zhiyan's mother, she was worried that she would not want her son to be their son-in-law, and she was about to back out. But now, after receiving Sister Ye's gift and her simple yet heartwarming letter, Qin Xue felt that if she had opposed Liu Zhiyan becoming a son-in-law, she would take the initiative to step back and marry into the Liu family.
She wanted to have a mother-in-law like Sister Ye.
Because she had no mother since childhood, she actually didn't know what a mother should be like.
But at this moment, the image of her mother became concrete in her mind.
Mother should be like Sister Ye.
She wanted a mother like that.
She wanted to treat her as her mother.
…
After lunch at noon, Qin Laicai saw off Liu Zhiyan and his brother and strolled to the backyard. Before he could say anything, his daughter said, "Dad, I want Sister Ye to be my mother." He was stunned and subconsciously asked, "What do you mean by wanting Sister Ye to be your mother?"
Qin Xue told her father all the things Ye Qinghan had brought her, along with the notes on each item. "Everyone says I'm a child without a mother's love, but I always thought I had a father who loved me wholeheartedly. Even if I didn't have a mother, I didn't lack anything."
"But now I feel that my mother's love should be completely different from my father's love."
"I'm greedy. I want the love of both my father and my mother."
Qin Laicai actually knew that no matter how careful a man was, he could not be as attentive as a woman.
Over the years, he has tried hard to be both a father and a mother, wanting to give his only daughter an environment where she is loved by both her parents.
But he knew that no matter how much love he gave, he would never be able to fully fulfill the role of mother.
His daughter was already very close to him, but she certainly couldn't tell him some things that involved her family.
However, the little girl never said that she wanted her mother.
Now that she suddenly told him this, she must have felt her mother's love from her sister Ye.
He always responded to his daughter's requests, but this time he was unusually silent. "So what does Niuniu want to do?"
"Sister Ye must be very busy and rarely at home, so I thought that when she is at home, we will go and stay at her house." Ye Qinghan said carefully. She actually didn't know what to do, but she just wanted to be with Sister Ye.
Qin Laicai had actually been considering the matter of Liu Zhiyan coming to his house.
He could see that neither Liu Zhiyan himself nor Liu Yulan, who came today, cared about the matter of a live-in son-in-law.
But if Liu Zhiyan really wants to take the imperial examination and become an official in the court, becoming a son-in-law will have some impact on him.
Qin Laicai is not an unreasonable person. Others always put their family first in everything, so he has to think about things from their perspective.
Hearing his daughter say this again, he suddenly had a new idea, "Then I think you two shouldn't talk about who will marry who, but just take care of both. When your future mother-in-law is at home, you can go to the Liu family. When she's not, you can live in the Qin family. I think that way, Minxing's grandmother won't be so opposed."
The more Qin Laicai thought about it, the more he felt that this was a win-win solution.
This way, Liu Zhiyan wouldn't have to bear the burden of being a live-in son-in-law, and he could still take care of the Qin family. "Of course, the child still has to have the surname Qin."
Qin Xue's eyes lit up when she heard her father's words. "This is a good idea. Dad is really amazing."
"Since you think so, then let's do it." Although it was different from what he had always planned, he had to let the Liu family and Liu Zhiyan know that they were also promoting this marriage with great sincerity.
After saying this, Qin Xue twisted the corner of her clothes and revealed her father's bottom line to Liu Zhiyan in the morning. After hearing it, she told Qin Laicai everything from beginning to end about how Liu Zhiyan responded to her.
“…” Qin Laicai finally understood what it meant for an extroverted girl.
No matter how hard he tried to fight for her, he couldn't handle her suddenly sabotaging him behind her back? ! !
However, Liu Zhiyan's words made him look at him with new eyes, especially the sentence "I am no worse than your father. I can't let the girl he raised with love become a worrywart just because she marries me. How can I have the face to ask him to hand over his treasure to me?" It really touched his heart.
With his intention, Qin Laicai felt that his proposal of not talking about marriage was the best thing that could not be better.
PS: This article was probably written in the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries.
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