Chapter 120

All the sisters-in-law were silent for a moment.

Doudou's mother shook her head and laughed: "I finally know the difference between you and us! It turns out that it's not because you and Lu Ying are a good match, but because you are Xu Wen!"

Song Baoying nodded in agreement: "Yes! It is said that being a stepmother is difficult. If most people were to become a stepmother, they would feel caught between a rock and a hard place. They would be terrified every day, afraid that if they did something wrong, people would criticize them. But you are so good, you made being a stepmother sound so refreshing and unconventional! It has even become the key factor in your family harmony!"

"So! Sometimes you can't just envy others' happiness, you have to see what they do?! But, sister-in-law Xu Wen, have you really never had a quarrel with Lu Ying?"

Xu Wen thought about it carefully and shook her head, "It seems not? I wavered once before marriage, right?! Other than that, I really didn't. Maybe it's because of my personality that I will weigh things over and over again before doing something. Once I make up my mind, I will not regret it and will stick to it. Since I decided to marry him, I only thought about how to make both of us live more comfortably. If he is busy, then I will be busy too! Why should I stop and just watch him busy? If he is tired, I will be tired too, right?"

The only time was probably when she was tempted by Wen Yiming. She didn't want to be bound by marriage.

"As for grievances, there are certainly some. I was seriously injured while accompanying the army on a long expedition, and the news reached us saying that he had died. Then there were also people saying that I was unlucky in marriage! I also have parents, brother and sister-in-law, and a grandmother in her seventies at home. I can't leave Dongsheng to them anymore, as that would increase the burden on our family. I don't want my parents to share my burdens and responsibilities just to make my life easier.

I once thought about taking a leave of absence and whether I could take Dongsheng to college. But the financial aid for the school might not be enough for the two of us to have a family, so I was in a dilemma.

Song Baoying exchanged glances with Doudou's mother.

Song Baoying spoke, "Sister-in-law, I have an impolite question to ask. You received the college acceptance letter, and mistakenly thought that Lu Yuanzheng had also died, but you never thought about giving up raising him..." She glanced at Dongsheng who was sleeping next to Xu Wen.

Xu Wen shook his head without hesitation, "No! At first I was just entrusted by Lu Yuanzheng, but later on, Dongsheng was just my son and had nothing to do with anyone else. No mother would abandon her son no matter how difficult life is, right?"

The sisters-in-law nodded one after another and praised Xu Wen.

Jiang Yiyi's eyes sparkled as she looked at Xu Wen with admiration: "Sister-in-law, I want to learn from you! Learn your mentality! I will apply for a normal school when I return, and when I graduate, I will come to the island to teach, okay? You have to save a position for me then! I feel that with your charm, even if I graduate successfully from college, there will be no place for me in this office."

Xu Wen laughed: "Okay! Go back and study hard, and I will definitely reserve a spot for you when the time comes!"

Jiang Yiyi stood up excitedly and asked Xu Wen: "Really?"

Xu Wen shook his head: "That's fake! I'm not the principal, so I don't have the final say. You know I'm lazy. If you want me to save a seat for you when we play, I can agree. The rest is none of my business!"

Jiang Yiyi said "oh" and turned her gaze to Song Baoying again.

Song Baoying was so amused by her, "How can you be so cute! Okay! I promise you, as long as you pass the entrance exam to the Normal College, I will definitely reserve a position for you in the office!"

Wang Lingling called out to Xu Wen, "Sister-in-law, you haven't told me how you and Lu Ying met and got married?"

Doudou's mother looked at Wang Lingling curiously and said, "Sister-in-law Lingling, it's rare to see you so interested!"

Wang Lingling's presence is very low at ordinary times, but she is particularly eye-catching when she is working.

She smiled innocently, a little embarrassed, and scratched her head, "I always feel that Sister Xu Wen is like the lesbian in the movie. Not only is she beautiful, but even her wedding is like in the movie, which must be very passionate!"

"Then you are flattering me! There was no such fierce conflict between us as there was between Sister Yiyi... and Platoon Leader Li. My family was very poor, with seven or eight people sleeping on one kang. It was too hot in the summer, so I secretly ran to a pond in the wilderness to take a bath. Lu Yuanzheng thought I was drowning and saved me, and then he wanted to be responsible for marrying me!

Just marry him! He was urgently called back before I could even take me to their house, and it was Dongsheng who completed the second half of the wedding process for him.

After that, we lost contact for half a year and he almost died. When we got news about him, Dongsheng and I came here. Later, he accompanied me to register at school. We agreed with the school that I only needed to go back to take exams every year, and then he came to the island. You all know the rest. We even had a wedding on the island last year."

Sisters-in-law: "..."

I can't describe the feeling. It's quite different from what I imagined.

In the middle of the night, after his sisters-in-law had fallen asleep, Xu Wen quietly got up and returned home.

With the alertness of a long journey, it is impossible for him to remain indifferent if someone suddenly lies next to him.

Before he even opened his eyes, he reached under the pillow.

The other hand went to grab Xu Wen, and the moment he touched Xu Wen, he came to his senses, withdrew his hand that had reached under the pillow, and put both hands around Xu Wen. Without blinking, he turned sideways, hugged her, and yawned, "Why are you back?"

"I miss you."

Lu Yuanzheng opened his eyes when he heard this. It was dark in the room and he couldn't see Xu Wen's expression. "What's wrong? Did you have a fight with your sisters-in-law?"

"No! I just missed you."

Lu Yuanzheng's chest was shaking, and he chuckled softly, "That's not like you. You seem a little overwhelmed by the favor."

Xu Wen curled his lips, "So you are not confident, or you don't believe me?"

"None of that. I believe you really miss me. But, it's definitely not for no reason. Tell me?"

"This person! You can't be too familiar with me. You see, if you are too familiar with me, you will lose your sense of boundaries! When I said I missed you, your first reaction was not to be touched but to question whether I had been wronged?! Comrade Lu Yuanzheng, please tell me why I usually don't show that I love you enough to make you feel that I said I missed you because of other reasons?"

Lu Yuanzheng's vision had recovered a lot by now, and he traced her slightly pouting lips with his index finger, "Maybe it's because your mouth is usually like a clam shell, and it's hard to pry it open, so it's hard to get you to say something nice!"

It was only when they were doing it, when he tortured her to the point of losing her mind, or when she could no longer bear it and begged for mercy, that she would whimper and say that she loved him, calling him husband and begging him to finish quickly.

As for the number of times she said she loved Dongsheng, it was at least ten times the number of times she said she loved him, maybe even more.

It’s not Lu Yuanzheng’s fault for not being confident, it’s mainly because he has never been treated preferentially.

Xu Wen probably remembered it too, and chuckled. As she laughed, she stretched out her hands to pinch his cheeks and pull them to the sides, "Hubby, I missed you!"

She deliberately used a pretentious tone to tease him.

Lu Yuanzheng raised his arms, grabbed her hands that were messing with his face, pulled them over his head and put them together, then used one hand to hold her two slender wrists, and with the other hand pushed her to lie flat, turned over and covered her, and said in a hoarse voice: "Don't you want to sleep?"

"Yes! I'm so sleepy."

"You won't be sleepy in a while." Lu Yuanzheng used his mouth and hands at the same time, leaving her no chance to regret.

…

"Shouting so loudly? Aren't you afraid that the neighbors will hear it?" Lu Yuanzheng reminded Xu Wen in a hoarse voice.

"There's no one next door..." Xu Wenjiao panted and tilted his neck back, her beautifully manicured nails mercilessly scratching his back, just as he lowered his waist heavily.

…

The clouds and rain have stopped.

After a short nap and a satisfying rest, Lu Yuanzheng felt refreshed. He waited on Xu Wen to finish his shower, cleaned himself up, and went to the terrace to smoke a cigarette.

After being tortured by him, Xu Wen fell into a deep sleep.

Lu Yuanzheng leaned against the wooden railing and looked at the big bed in the moonlight.

The moonlight was white, and Xu Wen's skin was even whiter. There were some horrible marks on the skin exposed outside the sheets.

Lu Yuanzheng licked his lips, reached out to touch his burning back, and chuckled.

His girl seems to be a good-natured person who doesn't fight or compete, but in fact, she never suffers any loss!

When Jiang Yiyi left, she only informed Xu Wen.

Xu Wen sent her to the shore and asked her, "You really didn't tell Li Mao?"

Jiang Yiyi shook her head, "I have packed my luggage and left it at home for several days. If he had come back, he would have seen it. But I don't know if he really didn't see it or if he just doesn't care about me at all. He didn't ask or mention it. Since he doesn't care about me, why should I go looking for him? It's just a waste of time to annoy him, and he might even think that I'm trying to torment him again!"

"I think you two can have a good talk. You have to know that he doesn't know what you think, and you can't always ask him to do what you imagine. I tell you, men also need to be taught. Maybe he really doesn't think that much, and you have to teach him how to treat you well."

"It doesn't matter! If we are really destined to be together, we will still be together. I hope that by then I will just be Jiang Yiyi and not Li Mao's Jiang Yiyi. Besides, I left him a letter."

Seeing that she had made up her mind, Xu Wen didn't say much. He took out two things from his pocket and handed them to her.

Jiang Yiyi looked down at the small glass bottle and another strange-shaped object in her hand and wondered, "What is this?" It didn't look like a farewell gift.

"One is anti-wolf spray, the main ingredient is pepper spray. The other is a stun gun, but the material is limited and the power is not very strong. I guess it can only make people's hands numb at most. You have to be careful on the road as a girl! Let me know when you are safe."

Jiang Yiyi nodded, her eyes reddened, "Sister-in-law, thank you! It's great to know you!"

Xu Wen patted Jiang Yiyi on the shoulder and said, "Have a safe journey!"

Jiang Yiyi shed tears, "I will come back!"

Xu Wen couldn't help laughing out loud.

Jiang Yiyi was dumbfounded, "Sister-in-law, what are you laughing at?"

"I once watched an animated film where a villain... the bad guy, would say 'I'll be back!' every time he was defeated in an episode."

Jiang Yiyi: “…”

I laughed out loud without holding back, and the sadness of parting just disappeared.

The construction of the primary school is also gradually coming to an end.

By the end, everyone actually bought several buckets of paint.

The sisters-in-law who could draw sketched some patterns on the outer walls of the wooden house, the playground, and the courtyard wall, while the rest of the sisters-in-law and children took brushes to color the patterns.

In the late 1970s, due to limited communication channels, there were not many cartoons. Most of the paintings on the walls were flowers and plants.

While waiting for the paint to dry, Song Baoying sorted out the teaching materials for this semester, and all the sisters-in-law with a junior high school education or above were called over to participate in the pre-job training for teachers.

There are not many people like this.

The traces of the times are too obvious in some details, for example, more boys can go to school than girls, especially rural girls, who go to junior high school.

Yes, there are many girls in the city.

Xu Wen once again secretly thanked the Xu family, who really doted on her.

There are not many children on the island now, and those who are there are barely first graders, so Song Baoying is the only teacher who is enough for the time being.

Xu Wen was free again.

But she couldn't sit still. She was reading her university textbooks while studying how to build a boat.

She promised Guo Dongsheng that she would build a houseboat to take him to the sea for fun.

Building a wooden house is not difficult, but the difficult part is how to make the house float smoothly on the sea.

Xu Wen went to the scrap yard in Haicheng and bought some used tires.

She was in charge of the purchase, and the repairs and supplements had to be done on a long journey.

After all the tires were fully inflated, they were left for two days to make sure there were no leaks before moving on to the next step.

This tire is not a hard outer tire, but a soft inner tire that can be inflated with a pump.

It took a lot of time just to inflate so many tires, so much so that Lu Yuanzheng frowned first when he saw the inner tube.

The inflated tires were fastened together one by one with ropes, and then covered with a thick layer of foam, which was then wrapped with a fishing net, and then a thin layer of wood was laid on top.

A wooden house, no, it's a bamboo house. In order to reduce unnecessary weight, the two small houses are nailed together with bamboo strips. It is for entertainment, not for real living, so the requirements are not that high. Leaks are acceptable, but it won't leak for the time being.

When building the bamboo house, Dongsheng stayed at home all the time and didn't go out to play. He didn't even look for his favorite friend Doudou. He just followed Xu Wen or Lu Yuanzheng happily.

It took the family of three about half a month to finally get the houseboat out to sea.

When Lu Yuanzheng called a few people to lift the houseboat into the sea, Dongsheng ran out.

After a while, Dongsheng brought Doudou over.

Xu asked: "..."

I thought he didn't go to see Doudou these days because he liked the houseboat more, but it turned out that he just wanted to give Doudou a surprise.

Dongsheng held Doudou's hand and explained the houseboat to her: "Look, one of the two rooms is the living room, and the other is the bedroom. My mom put an ice bucket in it with juice and fruit. We will go upstairs to eat later.

There is a big open space in front of the house, we can play there..."

Xu asked: "..."

Xu Wen nudged Lu Yuanzheng, who was busy fixing the boat, with his elbow and said, "Comrade Lu Yuanzheng, you now have a goal to strive for!"

"Hmm?" Lu Yuanzheng turned his head to look at her in confusion.

"According to the prices of goods in ten years, it will cost a lot to marry a wife. I guess at that time, I will need at least a gift of one in ten thousand, and a house, right? The house prices in the millennium... don't seem to be expensive, but it must be at least several hundred thousand, right?"

Lu Yuanzheng didn't understand so he asked, "What does it mean to pick one out of a million?"

"That's 10,010!"

"So much?" His current allowance is firmly in the middle of the national wage level, but it would take him ten years to save ten thousand yuan without eating or drinking, right?

"Don't be afraid! Your allowance will increase, and it won't always be this amount." Xu Wen comforted him, "In fact, 11,000 is very cheap. The main thing is the house. The millennium is about ten years later. Buy a few houses while the house prices are much cheaper. Otherwise, in a few years, we won't be able to afford even one square meter, and the bride price will rise to 158,000!"

Lu Yuanzheng: "How much?"

"158,000! And a house and a car worth at least a million! It's like a sea of ​​​​colors and a single green, and it doesn't move."

Xu Wen also explained to Lu Yuanzheng what a riot of colour meant and what being motionless meant.

After listening to this, Lu Yuanzheng was silent for a long time, and suddenly said, "Wife, let's have a baby, shall we?"

Xu asked: “……?”

Why did we suddenly jump to having a baby?

"Have children early, grow up early, and get married early. Otherwise, I'm afraid my salary won't increase as fast as the price of goods!"

"Oh! Don't be afraid! Your salary should be able to keep up with the price of goods, but forget about the house price!"

Lu Yuanzheng: "..."

"But don't be afraid! Just protect your home and country, and I'll go make money next year! I guarantee you won't have trouble finding a wife in the future!"

"It's my son's business to find a wife! Why should I worry? I'm only responsible for raising them, not for finding wives for them!" Lu Yuanzheng paused, "Will you leave the island next year?"

"I haven't decided yet! We'll see how things turn out next year!"

Lu Yuanzheng stopped talking.

After a while, he said calmly: "Come on board! Let's try it!"