Wang Guihua looked at her tall and strong eldest son by the door and a smile slowly spread across her lips. "When I found him when he was a child, he was already eight years old. At that time, he seemed to have just come to the city from the countryside. He spoke with a dialect. He carried a little girl who had drowned into the hospital, crying and shouting for the doctor to save the little girl."
"Later, he just squatted in the corridor wiping away tears. A male doctor in our hospital joked with him and asked, 'Was that young girl your wife?' Guess what he said?"
How should I answer?
Ling Huanwu curiously stretched out her ears.
"He said he doesn't have a wife, and what he hates most is getting married and becoming a henpecked husband, hahaha..."
As her mother-in-law spoke, she laughed until tears streamed down her face, and Ling Huanwu couldn't help but chuckle as well, covering her stomach with a smile.
She could hardly believe that Zhou Jiuzhen understood the meaning of "marrying a wife" at such a young age.
"Later, we found out that this rascal had run away to find his wife in the city, saying he wanted to break off the engagement. But then he rescued a drowning girl on the way, and he said he had to take responsibility for her. Isn't this rascal stupid? One minute he's stubbornly saying he doesn't want a wife, and the next he's saying he has to take responsibility for that girl. It made everyone at the hospital laugh so hard."
"Later, Shuyao's father and I helped him find his family, but we couldn't find them, maybe because he didn't want to go back. So Shuyao's father and I decided to adopt him."
Upon hearing this, Ling Huanwu couldn't help but pout, a hint of jealousy in her voice. "So Jiuzhen not only had an engagement when he was little, but he also planned to take responsibility for that girl!"
Just then, Zhou Jiuzhen came in carrying a plate of stir-fried garlic sprouts and cured pork. Hearing Ling Huanwu's grumbling, he blushed and coughed lightly, "Mother, why are you telling Huanwu this?"
"You silly child, if your mother doesn't explain your background and past to your wife, don't come crying to me when she runs away!"
The mother-in-law shook her head repeatedly, and Ling Huanwu echoed her, speaking sourly, "That's right, do you think you're the only one who wants to take responsibility for a girl? Back in the day, I was also drowning, and a young man saved me. I even wanted to give myself to him."
Zhou Jiuzhen glanced at Ling Huanwu with a resentful look, then snorted, "I really just wanted to take responsibility back then, I wasn't interested in that girl at all. I guess the guy who saved you was just doing it out of kindness..."
"Oh dear, the loofah soup in the pot should be ready soon!"
As Zhou Jiuzhen spoke, he quickly turned around and rushed back to the stove.
Meanwhile, her mother-in-law patted Ling Huanwu's shoulder and smiled meaningfully, "Don't mind him. His only flaw since childhood has been his stubbornness."
"People are often the most stubborn when they care about something!"
Ling Huanwu suddenly realized something after being reminded by her mother-in-law.
No wonder she initially thought Zhou Jiuzhen seemed quite normal, without any flaws, neither warm nor cold towards others, just average.
It was only recently that she realized he seemed to have suddenly become stubborn from time to time.
Could it be that he's starting to care about her more?
Just then, the mother-in-law paused in her drinking, and asked curiously, "By the way, daughter-in-law, you just said that you were also rescued from drowning when you were a child. Where were you rescued?"
"It's in the clouds..."
Ling Huanwu was halfway through her answer when Zhou Jiuzhen brought in a steaming bowl of loofah and oyster noodles, urging the two of them to come and eat.
Zhou Jiuzhen filled a bowl with rice and placed it in front of Ling Huanwu.
Just as Ling Huanwu picked up her chopsticks to scoop up some rice, two pieces of juicy cured meat were placed in her bowl from both sides at the same time.
Eat more!
Zhou Jiuzhen and her mother-in-law simultaneously served her meat and spoke at the same time.
Ling Huanwu stared at the white rice and the two tempting pieces of meat in the bowl, her eyes stinging, and tears fell drop by drop into the bowl.
She kept her head down, but her heart was filled with warmth, afraid that the two of them would see her vulnerable side.
After my mother-in-law returned to her dormitory.
Zhou Jiuzhen brought over an enamel basin, the water inside still steaming.
He sat on a small chair and gently helped Ling Huanwu take off her shoes, then cupped her bare feet and placed them in the water.
The rough fingertips gently caressed each of her uneven toes, like a pair of large hands gently soothing her numb and cold heart.
"You must be in a lot of pain."
A hoarse voice, choked with sobs, unexpectedly reached her ears.
With red-rimmed eyes, Ling Huanwu punched his hard shoulder. "Didn't you say you didn't care about me? Why are you concerned about whether I'm in pain now?"
Zhou Jiuzhen didn't say anything, but lowered his head and carefully wrapped a towel around her feet to wipe them.
"You big brute, you weren't crying, were you? A man sheds blood, not tears. You know, I didn't cry at all..."
Ling Huanwu originally wanted to tease him about how such a grown man was still such a crybaby as her mother-in-law had described him when he was little, but before she could finish speaking, the man in front of her grabbed her arm and pulled her from the bed into his broad embrace.
"I don't care about you at all!"
“Huanhuan…” His voice was like sandpaper rubbing against a rusty gun barrel, his eyelashes trembled violently, and hot tears fell onto her cold hand.
The man, who used to be impeccably dressed in his general's uniform, now hunched over, burying his face in the crook of her neck, the scent of soap mingling with the smell of gunpowder, a salty, damp aroma seeping through.
Ling Huanwu's eyelashes trembled slightly as she raised her hand to gently touch his tense jaw.
This man, who hadn't even blinked when bullets grazed his brow on the battlefield, now resembled a lone wolf with broken claws, tracing every tear stain on her face with trembling lips.
His kiss was almost reverently cautious, finally settling on her slightly trembling lips.
The sea breeze outside the window remained unchanged, and the waves gently lapped against the beach, piling up layers of sand.
Waves of seawater crashed against the stone pillars on the shore, producing sounds like the roar of dragons and the howl of tigers, swirling and soaring straight into the sky.
＊
Zhou Shuyao returned home exhausted from the island police station. Looking at the empty room, he felt a huge emptiness in his heart.
He immediately spotted the small toenail that Ling Huanwu had just left on the ground.
When he placed a tiny fake toenail in his palm, he felt an unbearable pain, as if it were embedded in his palm.
Curled up on the bed, his palms clenched tightly around the toenail, he seemed to be trapped in a nightmare, unable to move.
In his dream, he was holding a strange woman who smelled strongly of cosmetics.
The woman's small feet, painted with red toenail polish, gently traced his body.
He gripped the woman's slender neck tightly, his words chillingly cold: "Who gave you such beautiful toenails? Who gave you the right to seduce me?"
Even though he resisted in his dream, his body honestly gripped the woman's feet, indulging in succumb to debauchery time and time again.
Until he turned around and saw that familiar figure at the door, he felt as if he had fallen from heaven to hell.
"Huanhuan, Huanhuan..."
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