Before locking up, Lu Liu was still murmuring to his older brother. “The county town is quieter. It’s convenient to do anything, but it burns through money. Eating, drinking, using the toilet—everything costs silver. Even after scraping together enough for a storefront, it’s still not enough. You have to keep extra cash on hand to really live.”
Lu Yang agreed. “Exactly. I was chatting with Boss Ding from the wine shop not long ago. You look at him running a distillery—it’s a profitable business, pulling in over two hundred taels a year—but when he talks about daily expenses, his head hurts just the same.”
Talking as they went, they locked the door. Two carts rolled out of the alley and split off in different directions.
Lu Yang asked Zhao Peilan, “Mom, did we wake you last night?”
She shook her head. “No. I slept deeply. Didn’t hear a thing.”
In the past, she couldn’t stand loud noises. Even the slightest sound would wake her.
It was the same back when they had the shop. Lots of people in Shangxi Village knew where it was. Even after they won the lawsuit, deep down she was still afraid someone might come looking for trouble.
After moving, she could sleep straight through till dawn. Sound asleep.
Lu Yang told her about the wheat tea. “I heard people say before that when someone’s pregnant, they suddenly get cravings. They’ll be starving and miserable, and if they don’t get food they’ll cry. Looks like it’s true.”
Zhao Peilan thought back. “It is. I was the same when I was pregnant with A-Yan.”
Both brothers had gotten married on the same day, and now the younger one was already expecting. Afraid Lu Yang might feel disappointed, she said gently, “You’re still young. No need to rush having a child. Take your time and get your body strong first.”
Lu Yang smiled. “I know, Mom. Today I’m going back to Lujiatun. I want to bring over a couple more relatives from home to help at the shop. Once that’s settled, the two of us can free up our hands, take care of the household, and look after A-Yan properly. I’ll still stay busy with the mountain-goods business. You won’t have to work so hard anymore.”
He knew her temperament. After years of hardship, she knew how hard money was to earn. She’d rather work as an extra hand in the shop herself than hire one more person. He’d already thought through how to persuade her.
“Didn’t we get a lot of cloth this year? After the Dragon Boat Festival, it heats up fast. Ready-made clothes are expensive and don’t fit well anyway. It’s better to make our own—saves money and makes sense. Stitch by stitch, we can sew summer clothes, then make padded jackets and cotton coats. Shoes take even more work. I’ve never made shoes for A-Yan before. When the time comes, you’ll have to teach me.”
Xie Yan’s feet were well-proportioned, the instep neither high nor low. He’d been taught a scholar’s bearing since childhood, walked with proper posture, and didn’t travel long distances daily, so his shoes didn’t wear out easily. Those were the easiest shoes to make.
But Lu Yang had noticed that Xie Yan’s toes were long. Instead of tapering off like a fan, the five toes lined up evenly, nearly the same height, pressing straight into the toe of the shoe. For him, flat-toed shoes were best—more comfortable.
Flat-toed shoes weren’t as pretty as round ones, but Zhao Peilan had been making shoe patterns for years. She knew how to handle it so they’d look good and fit well.
She calculated the family’s clothes and shoes. This was important business too, so she agreed.
Lu Yang brought up another matter. “Mom, I also want to help my dad fix up the house. That little shack hasn’t been repaired in years. Every rainy season he climbs onto the roof to add straw himself. That’s no way to live. The rainy season’s coming again this year. I still have some silver, and I want to get it done. My younger brother and I will split the cost, half and half.”
Zhao Peilan nodded. “Alright.”
Thinking about it, now that their business was up and running, they were better off than the people in the mountain stronghold. She told Lu Yang, “You could put in a bit more too.”
Lu Yang understood. When they reached the shop, business out front was booming.
Ever since Wu Pingzhi introduced customers, their steamed buns had been selling in large quantities.
He needed to hurry and hire people to set up stoves for steaming buns. They also had to build another stove out front. The small burner couldn’t handle the growing number of steam baskets. If someone knocked it over, it’d be disastrous.
Before heading out, Lu Yang pitched in to help as well.
Meanwhile, Lu Liu and Li Feng took Shun-ge’er to buy rouge.
Shun-ge’er asked again and again, “Do you really have the money?”
They’d talked a lot yesterday, but the goods hadn’t even been shipped out yet.
Li Feng just told him to hurry and choose. “If you keep dithering, I won’t buy it for you.”
Shun-ge’er had never bought rouge before and didn’t know how to judge it. All the boxes were closed.
Lu Liu had a box himself. He found the same kind and pointed it out. “This is the kind Da Feng bought for me.”
Identical boxes were lined up in a row.
The clerk behind the counter said, “You’ve got a good eye. This is the best-selling rouge in our shop. Don’t let the small amount fool you—how many times a year do you really use it? One purchase lasts a long time. Open the lid and you can smell the flowers. The color’s true. Just a dab on your fingertip is enough for half your face. Long-lasting and beautiful! Other boxes may be bigger, but they’re really not as good.”
Lu Liu asked, “Can we see the color inside?”
The clerk opened one. Items displayed up front could be examined if the customer genuinely intended to buy. If you looked well-off, you could even try it.
The shopkeeper wasn’t there today. Seeing that Lu Liu already had this kind and that the couple had agreed to buy a box for the younger brother, he dabbed a bit on someone’s hand so they could see the color.
Since it was for Shun-ge’er, he applied it to Shun-ge’er’s hand.
The rouge was very red, but once spread out, the color softened.
Shun-ge’er thought that since he lived with his sister-in-law, buying the same shade would be a waste. He chose a rouge that turned into a peach-tip pink when spread.
Holding it, he examined it closely and recognized the carved pattern on the wooden box—it was peach blossoms.
Peach blossom rouge. He liked it.
Li Feng then had Lu Liu choose a box of lip balm.
Lu Liu felt excited, but choosing was hard.
He’d barely ever dressed up and had no idea what kind of lip balm suited him.
The clerk glanced at Li Feng and brought out a good one. “This lip balm—you can eat it!”
Lu Liu: “…?”
The clerk explained, “It looks great on the lips, brightens your complexion, and you can eat it. If you can’t bear to wipe it off, just eat it.”
As for how to eat it, or who would eat it, he didn’t say.
But to Lu Liu, it sounded like: if you can’t bear to wipe it off, then kiss it away.
Lu Liu: “……”
What an indecent lip balm.
Li Feng paid for it.
Shun-ge’er blinked and looked between them. The couple didn’t blush at all. He, the little ge’er, was the one whose face turned red.
Lip balm was pricier than rouge. A small box cost seventy copper coins. Edible things were different, after all.
Lu Liu had money too. Like Shun-ge’er, he worked at home, and his mother let him keep some pocket money.
He didn’t like using the family’s silver, so he spent his own savings—buy whatever he wanted.
He had little to spend money on in the mountains and carried three qian of silver.
He bought rouge and lip balm for his older brother. He’d seen that his brother never dressed up. Last time they went to the stronghold, when Lu Liu took out rouge, his brother didn’t even know how to use it.
That cost one hundred twenty copper coins. He also wanted to buy pork tripe for his mother. He’d promised her before that once he saved some money, he’d buy her pork tripe. Now that he was in the county, he’d make good on it.
After calculating, he’d still have over a hundred copper coins left.
His brother was going to Lujiatun later. It’d been a long time since Lu Liu had been home. His family would surely be reluctant to buy fresh meat. After thinking it over, he decided to buy pork tripe for both dads too—they hadn’t had any either.
That way, he’d still have twenty or thirty copper coins left.
He asked Li Feng, “Da Feng, what do you want to eat? Anything you want? I’ll buy it for you.”
Li Feng said, “Buy me a salted duck egg.”
Lu Liu choked. “Don’t be sulky. The eggs haven’t even been divided yet. What else do you want?”
Li Feng didn’t want anything else. He took them to a preserved-fruit shop.
Lu Liu had finished his sour plums, and the pickled radish was almost gone too. Now he used hawthorn to ease his cravings. Being pregnant, he couldn’t eat too much hawthorn. He held himself back, chewing one dried slice for a long time—pitiful, really.
Today he bought more sour plums. When he saw jujube-sour cake, he added three jin of that as well.
Li Feng had been to the preserved-fruit shop before, bringing his two younger brothers.
Back then, their family was poor. His two brothers had never had sweet snacks. He’d said they were coming to buy candy, but once inside, the copper coins he carried couldn’t even buy two taels of sugar.
Ten copper coins bought just a tiny piece. He’d break off little bits, and they’d catch them in their palms. After eating that bit of sweetness, they’d lick their palms several times.
That time, it had been dragon-beard candy.
Now he could read. Seeing the price, he realized how expensive it was. He’d never eat it a second time in his life.
Lu Liu was watching him. Seeing his gaze sweep around and linger on the dragon-beard candy for a long while—
He still didn’t recognize the characters for “dragon beard,” but he recognized candy and the price. So expensive.
Shun-ge’er whispered in his ear, “My big brother used to come here. He could only afford one piece.”
So Lu Liu bought dragon-beard candy for Li Feng.
He didn’t have many copper coins on him. There was no way to treat everyone evenly. To avoid a situation where “two candies kill three people,” he bought just one piece, for Da Feng alone. After all, he and Shun-ge’er already had rouge and lip balm.
Li Feng refused the candy. Lu Liu clung to him, coaxing and pleading, even holding it up to his mouth, insisting he eat it.
People were passing by on the street. Li Feng suddenly felt embarrassed and took a bite. Before he even tasted it properly, sweetness had already bloomed in his heart.
He smiled, and Lu Liu smiled softly too.
“Da Feng, I’ll buy you candy again in the future.”
He’d save up some more money. Next time they came to the county, he’d stock up like this again.
After that, they went to the shop to meet up with Lu Yang, then headed out of the city together for Lujiatun.
Lu Yang accepted the rouge and lip balm, deeply moved. His eyes even turned a little red.
“Why did you spend money on this? You can’t eat it or drink it. It’s just a waste.”
Lu Liu snuggled up to him, holding his arm, and whispered in his ear, “This lip balm can be eaten. If you can’t bear to wipe it off, just eat it.”
He believed his brother would understand!
Buying things you couldn’t eat—it was just for happiness.
Lu Yang suddenly laughed and pinched his cheek. “You’ve really grown bold, daring to tease me. I’ll put it on your lips and see how you eat it.”
Lu Liu laughed, covering his mouth. “You can’t put it on me. I’ve got Da Feng! You can put it on brother-in-law—he’ll definitely let you!”
Lu Yang lifted his chin slightly. “Of course.”
He was looking forward to it very much. He had to hurry and get things done. Tonight, when he got home, he’d put lip balm on the top scholar and eat it away.
…………………………………………………………………………………………….
Lu Yang had business in Lujiatun. After getting home and greeting his two fathers, he had his younger brother tell them about repairing the house. He took some fabric scraps and two jin of meat and went to visit his uncle.
The family’s situation was much better than before, but the two fathers were too honest. They still hadn’t built up much network among relatives. For hiring helpers, they still had to ask Uncle A-Qing to help look around.
He hadn’t announced his visit in advance. None of the three able-bodied workers were home, so the two sisters-in-law welcomed him inside.
Lu Yang saw that his second cousin’s wife’s belly was already big. Smiling, he congratulated her. “Why didn’t you tell me? I even saw Second Cousin Bai not long ago.”
Her face glowed with happiness. “It was still early before. Around here, we don’t announce it when the months are small. We were planning to tell you next time we went to the county. Didn’t expect you’d come back.”
With a big belly, she didn’t go out much.
The eldest cousin’s wife went out to call everyone back. It was about noon anyway—missing a bit of work didn’t matter.
Lu Yang sat in the main hall while the second cousin’s wife made him sweetened water.
If you added up all the sweetened water he’d drunk in the past ten-plus years, it probably still wasn’t as much as this year.
This year, he’d been taking medicine and had to drink some sweetened water every day to wash the taste down. After two months, he was sick of it and started using tea instead. Too much sweetened water wasn’t as comfortable as tea.
After returning from the provincial capital, he liked tea even more. That so-called “Top Scholar Promotion Tea” was really good.
Too bad there was little of it—and it was expensive. After finishing it, he couldn’t bear to buy more anytime soon.
Before long, everyone from his uncle’s family came back.
Uncle A-Qing hadn’t even stepped through the door yet when word spread inviting Lu Yang to stay for a meal.
Lu Yang stood up and went forward a couple of steps, smiling brightly and speaking clearly. “Not today. I haven’t been back in a long time, and this time I came back with my younger brother. We’ll eat together next time.”
The whole family knew about the child-sending incident back then. Miao Qing had recognized Lu Sanfeng on the street and brought it out in public. Everyone knew the man before them was Lu Yang. It was an unspoken understanding—no one exposed it.
When he mentioned his brother, Miao Qing asked about him as well.
Lu Yang smiled. “My younger brother’s expecting too—over three months now. Once the pregnancy was stable, he went to the county to see me. They’re heading back to the stronghold, and since I had time, I came back to take a look.”
After a bit of small talk, Lu Yang went around greeting everyone.
His uncle and two cousins had returned too. The eldest cousin’s wife offered to cook, but Lu Yang refused to stay. Tea was poured all around, and they sat and talked.
There were no pastries in a farm household. They brought out dried sweet potato slices, and there were still some dried persimmons from last year. They urged Lu Yang to have some.
Lu Yang didn’t like sweet potatoes much. He took a dried persimmon to eat.
Homemade dried persimmons were darker in color, evenly coated with frost, soft and sticky-sweet, with a very fine texture. Lu Yang found them good and didn’t stand on ceremony, taking a few to bring back for his brother.
After finishing the persimmon and chatting enough about daily life, he got straight to business.
“Uncle A-Qing, I’m swamped over there and want to hire two more people to help at the shop. There’s nothing complicated—kneading dough, making steamed buns, then learning how to make baozi and fry sauces. We also sell vegetables on the side. It’d be best if they’re quick-tongued and outgoing. I mentioned before that I’d help relatives out. These two should be the same gender—either two men, two girls, or two ge’er. There’s only one spare room. Mixed genders wouldn’t work. Sending a married couple isn’t ideal either.”
If two households lived together, there’d be friction. With equal conditions, comparison and competition were inevitable. Living under the same roof all day, it’d turn into sister-in-law quarrels in no time.
Unmarried ge’er or girls were fine. Lu Lin could manage them.
Miao Qing first agreed, then pondered it.
If there was a chance to work in the county, of course he wanted to place his own family first. His Lin-ge’er had gone to the county and, in just over half a year, seemed reborn. Who wasn’t envious?
But Lu Lin was a married-out ge’er—technically part of the Zhang family now. Their own family didn’t yet have anyone working in the county.
Usually they harvested vegetables and collected eggs—odd jobs here and there.
Miao Qing thought about sending Lu Song’s husband over, maybe finding another in-law to help at home.
After careful thought, he shook his head. It wasn’t easy.
Every household still had fields to tend. Unless, like Lu Lin, it was a couple earning together, families wouldn’t let a laborer leave on their own. The crops still needed hands.
Sending a wife or husband out could work, but over time conflicts would arise. What man could be separated from his spouse for long?
After sorting it out, he told Lu Yang, “I’ll go around these next few days and feel things out. It’s almost time to pay the summer tax. Around then, we’ll pick a clear day to go to the county. We’ll bring the two kids along. You can see if they’re suitable, and we’ll decide then.”
Lu Yang nodded. “Alright. When you get to the county, come rest at the shop. I’ll put together two good tables of food to treat you properly!”
After that, they chatted a bit more about everyday matters.
They talked about the crops in the fields and how the piglets were doing.
They’d had no experience raising pigs before, and there’d been some hiccups over the past few months, but overall it was going smoothly.
There weren’t many pigs yet. Farm households had little else, but front and back yards were big. They were afraid of diseases spreading, so at first they’d kept them together. Now that the weather was getting hot, the three piglets had been separated into different pens.
Pigs weren’t picky eaters—anything would do—but unlike cattle, you couldn’t just feed them grass.
They cooked for them like people: chopping pigweed, green grass, sweet potatoes, adding some wheat bran, boiling it all in a big pot, then pouring the fragrant mash into the troughs. The pigs loved it, growing plump and round.
Calling it “like cooking for people” wasn’t even accurate—it was more meticulous than that.
People could endure illness and speak up when something felt wrong. Pigs couldn’t talk, so everything had to be cleaned and tended to diligently.
