FMT 15

Chapter 15 Bai Lianye

Ever since he saw the bite mark beneath Chen Shuangning’s collarbone, Liandan felt a little flustered whenever he faced him.

Chen Shuangning was still the same, cold face, few words, but there were subtle changes. For example, he no longer disappeared without reason, and he had fixed everything broken in the house.

This house had been lived in for decades. Old Madam Chen never bothered to tidy it up, Liandan did not know how, and they had no money to hire anyone, so they just lived with it as it was.

There were moldy and broken places everywhere.

Chen Shuangning could not cook, but his skill at repairing things was good. After two days of work, the house was indeed in better shape.

Liandan had lain in bed for a whole day and really could not lie any longer. He had not felt that unwell in the first place, he was young, used to labor, and could not sit idle. So he got up to work.

Chen Shuangning went with him.

Before leaving, Liandan arranged the sling, planning to carry Xiaodan on his back. He was used to work and strong, but with his thin body carrying a big fat baby, it still looked tiring.

Two hands reached out from the side and took the child before the straps were tied. Liandan was startled, and saw Chen Shuangning, a bit clumsy, sling Xiaodan onto his own back. Liandan quickly came back to himself and rushed to help.

Xiaodan was already three months old and had grown a lot. He had just drunk his fill, slept well, and was full of energy. Liandan feared this young man, but Xiaodan did not.

All the way, the fat baby chewed the back of his neck with toothless gums, drool dripping.

Liandan stole a glance at Chen Shuangning’s expression. Seeing him indifferent, he let out a breath of relief.

Many villagers were heading to their fields at this hour. When they passed by, they stared curiously at Chen Shuangning.

The young man acted as if he was unaware, just kept walking, paying them no mind.

Liandan followed behind, a bit anxious, trying to keep up with his pace.

After a while, perhaps he noticed the weak ger struggling behind, Chen Shuangning looked back once and then slowed his steps.

The Chen family’s ten mu of land grew corn, sorghum, soybeans, as well as rows of beans and melons.

Once they arrived, the two each took a hoe and a sickle to clear weeds.

Chen Shuangning was unpracticed at farm work, but he picked it up quickly, and before long moved like a skilled hand.

Liandan watched for a moment, then reassured, bent to his own work.

They weeded in opposite directions. With Xiaodan on his back, Chen Shuangning gradually grew farther away from Liandan.

As he neared the edge of the ridge, voices of a man and a woman came from outside the cornfield.

Chen Shuangning had already known there were people working nearby, but whether they were there or not had nothing to do with him, so he paid no attention.

The two chatted while working. At first it was lively, but soon their voices grew louder, and they started quarreling.

The man said, “You tell me to cook, I cook. You tell me to work the fields, I work the fields. What more do you want from me? Every day you never show me a kind face!”

The woman spat, “You dare talk about the little work you do? You never bring home a single coin. A man who cannot earn for his family, with the house so poor it rings with emptiness, do you even deserve to be called a man?”

Chen Shuangning’s hoe suddenly paused.

The quarreling next door only grew harsher.

When the work was nearly done, Liandan took Xiaodan down, gave him water, played with him a bit to ease him. Then Chen Shuangning put the child back on his back, and the three of them went home together.

Entering the village, before reaching their gate, from afar they saw a young woman standing outside, peering this way.

Chen Shuangning turned his head to look at Liandan. Liandan, seeing her, was first stunned, then joy lit his face, and he ran towards her.

Chen Shuangning heard him call out as he ran, “Sister.”

….

Inside the house, Liandan and a woman of about twenty-three or twenty-four sat by the window table, talking warmly.

This woman was Bai Lianye, Liandan’s elder sister. They also had a younger brother named Bai Jizu, two years younger than Liandan, who had just married last year.

Their father, Bai, was idle and a drunkard. He never cared for family affairs, had a bad temper, and whenever drunk he caused trouble, keeping no one at peace, often beating wife and children together in the middle of the night.

Sometimes he gambled a little. He did not lose much, but the family was already miserably poor, so even a small loss was hard on them.

After having a son, he gambled less, but he still did not earn much. Bai Jizu only managed to marry a wife thanks to the betrothal money from his elder sister and second brother.

With such a family background, the Bai family could not reach any good match. To get more money, they naturally could not afford to be choosy.

Bai Lianye and Bai Liandan, the siblings, had both married poorly, one worse than the other.

Lianye’s husband was surnamed Zhang. He was lame, walked unevenly, and was often mocked by the village children who chased him imitating his gait with laughter.

His family was also very poor, but at least he was someone Lianye chose herself.

Back then, there were two marriage proposals. The other family’s conditions were a little better, and the man was whole and healthy, but after asking around, Lianye learned his character was not good, so she flatly refused.

But Bai Father had already taken the Zhang family’s betrothal money, and the Zhang family still came up short.

Seeing that the match with the other family was about to go through, Lianye gritted her teeth and secretly gave Zhang’s family all the money she had saved over the years. They borrowed some more elsewhere, and only then did they barely gather enough.

Lianye was unwilling, but she had no choice.

Fortunately, after marrying, the Zhang family treated her well. But her in-laws were old, her husband’s health was poor, and life was indeed not easy.

Earlier that year, she had heard that the man from the other family had also married, but afterward was restless. Any coins in his pocket were sent to the brothel, and his family was so hungry they nearly had nothing to eat.

Bai Liandan’s fate was worse. He had married a dead man, with a harsh and fierce mother-in-law.

Before his marriage, Lianye had returned home once. The two siblings met and wept in each other’s arms.

Now that Chen Shuangning had returned, such a strange affair quickly spread through all the surrounding villages.

When Lianye heard, she grew anxious. Whenever she had free time, she told her family she was going out, and came to see for herself.

The village she married into was called Beicha, close to town, but far from Kaoshan Village.

She walked the whole way, bound feet carrying her seven or eight li, while also bringing a basket of sweet potatoes. It was no small effort.

Liandan, distressed for his sister, wanted to keep her for a meal. He found two eggs and wanted to fry them, but hesitated and did not dare.

Someone walked up from behind, reached past him, took the last two eggs from the basket, and pushed them into his hand.

Liandan turned and saw Chen Shuangning’s expressionless profile.

“Two are too few. Use them all,” Chen Shuangning said faintly.

Liandan pressed his lips together, lowered his head, and gave a soft “Mm.”

Like her younger brother, Lianye was sharp.

Other than when she first entered, she barely spoke to her brother-in-law.

At the meal, she only exchanged a few polite words.

Chen Shuangning’s background was strange, and his temperament cold. He was not someone easy to grow close to.

But he was at least attentive to the house, not the type of man who did nothing and still picked faults. Lianye thought this was satisfactory enough.

After they had finished eating and cleaning, Xiaodan awoke. Lianye and Liandan sat by the bed, amusing the child.

When Lianye saw Chen Shuangning go out to feed the goat, she leaned close to her brother, who was changing Xiaodan’s diaper, and whispered, “Since your man came back, has he gone out to find work? Does he bring money home?”

Neither of them noticed that the young man working in the yard had paused in his movements.

Liandan remembered how, when they returned from the fields, he had noticed new calluses on Chen Shuangning’s white fingers. That image kept flashing in his mind for no reason.

Liandan said, “He used to be a scholar. He never did such work before. Besides, he has not been back long.”

Lianye sighed, held her brother’s hand, and said, “Money aside, as long as he cares for you, if husband and wife support each other, life can go on.”

After eating and sitting for a while, Lianye had to leave. The siblings quietly wiped their tears.

Though the distance was not great, it was not easy to meet, and who knew when they could see each other again.

Chen Shuangning accompanied Liandan to send her to the edge of the village, then the two of them returned home.

Not long after they stepped inside, Liandan had just washed his hands and was about to pick vegetables for dinner when he saw Chen Shuangning come out of the inner room, holding a cloth bag, which he handed to him.

Puzzled, Liandan took it and opened it. Inside were seven or eight taels of silver. He was stunned on the spot.