A Good Country Wife

Zhao Erhu removed his coat and climbed into bed, taking great care not to wake his sleeping wife; he gently gathered her into his arms.

In such hot weather, the little body in his arms was actually ice-cold. He carefully loosened the small hand that his wife was clenching and felt her palm was clammy with cold sweat. Zhao Erhu sighed deeply as he looked at the pale Niuniu in his embrace, his brow furrowing, then used a hand to smooth it out and kissed his wife’s forehead, which was also covered in cold sweat. He felt both pity and helplessness. Why was this Niuniu so stubborn, insisting on being contrary to him?

Alas, it seemed Niuniu had made up her mind to keep up the fight. It seemed he would have to be the one to back down first. A real man can flex and yield, and there was nothing wrong with apologizing to one’s wife. All other matters could be set aside for now. But even if he were to apologize now, his wife might not be willing to accept it; he had missed the right moment in a burst of anger and now needed to take his time and come up with a good plan.

Zhao Erhu thought back to the previous day when he tried to feed his wife some soup, and how she reacted so violently and with such disgust, clearly not wanting him to touch her. It was clear that before making up, he couldn’t make any excessive moves toward his wife. Not daring to let Lin Yue know he had held her while she slept, Zhao Erhu stealthily rose from bed at the crack of dawn and went to work in the fields.

The weather was extraordinarily dry now; they had to water the vegetable patch every day. With several acres of land and the plots spread apart, even with Zhao Dahuo and his wife helping, Zhao Erhu still had to lend a hand to manage the workload. Not to mention he had to deliver vegetables to the city. Apart from the Government Office, their farm had acquired two more customers, and Zhao Erhu, being too busy to manage alone, hired Wu Qiang to help transport the produce to the city, paying him a monthly wage for his assistance.

When Lin Yue woke up, there was no one beside her. Looking at the other half of her bed that had clearly been slept in, she realized Zhao Erhu must have come back last night, likely very late, and had gone out again early in the morning.

After sleeping through the night, Lin Yue’s mood wasn’t as bad as it had been the day before. Although she hadn’t intended to forgive Zhao Erhu, she also decided not to mistreat herself any further. She hadn’t eaten much the previous night and now felt ravenously hungry upon waking, so she prepared to go to the kitchen to get something to eat.

"Mom, you’re awake," Lin Yue had just opened the door when four little heads popped up in front of her simultaneously. Dalang and his brothers gazed at Lin Yue with eyes full of hope, their expressions tinged with a mixture of caution and eagerness to please.

Because of what Lin Yue had said the day before, the boys were worried she really might not want them anymore. They hadn’t slept well last night, and after eating breakfast, they all came and waited outside Lin Yue’s door, eager to make a good impression. Although Dalang always believed Lin Yue would never really abandon them, and Erhu mocked them for being foolish since their mother had only said those things out of anger and didn’t mean them, they all scrambled to get to Lin Yue’s room as soon as possible. Once there, seeing that Lin Yue had not arisen, they sat by her door, waiting, and none had left.