Old Lady Wang went to take a look, then sat in the tenant farmer's house for a while, learned about this year's harvest, and went back home to the attic to dig out the remaining bag of wheat.
Li Mingwei saw it and hurriedly came over to help her hold the ladder: "Mom, what are you doing?"
"Moving wheat." The remaining wheat was still a lot, she estimated that she couldn't hold it either, so she climbed onto the attic, checked the firmness of the bag, pushed it to the side, and let it roll down the ladder.
"Get out of the way!"
Li Mingwei took a few steps back, and then the bag fell to the ground with a slap.
Old Lady Wang also climbed down, untied the bag, grabbed a handful and showed it to her: "This is the wheat they sent over last year. Yizhu likes to eat rice instead of noodles. By this time, he still hasn't finished eating it!"
Li Mingwei snorted twice. She said, how come when Liu Yizhu was here, he always drank porridge, and when he left, he cooked noodles for her to eat. That's how it is.
"I asked today that they will also harvest wheat in the next two days. After drying, they will send it over. I will take out the old one to dry it, then take it to the mill to grind it into flour, and keep it for you to cook noodles.” she said, “This way we avoid mixing it with the new one when it comes."
Humph! She's only worth eating old wheat, right?
Old Lady Wang didn't get a response. She looked up at her angry look and didn't understand: “What's wrong?”
“Nothing.” Li Mingwei lowered her head, pinched the wheat in her hand, and murmured, “It will take until when to eat so much. Don't eat it all up and the new wheat will become old again.”
"Don't worry, the two of us, cooking noodles in the morning, making noodle soup, frying cakes when we have nothing to do, we'll finish it very quickly."
"Oh."
Li Mingwei nodded. She thought she would have to eat noodles all the time. If she changed the way she did it, it would be fine.
At this time, the sun was about to set, and Old Lady Wang had just taken out the wheat to take a look. As long as it hadn't got wet or moldy, it could still be eaten. She left it there and waited for the sun to come out tomorrow before pouring it out to dry.
Swish~ Swish~
Li Mingwei, who was immersed in her sleep, was awakened by the sweeping sound outside. She yawned, pushed open the window and looked out. Old Lady Wang was sweeping the dam in front of the yard.
The mother-in-law was working, so she didn't feel good about sleeping anymore. She tidied up properly and hurried out to help. She picked up the rake in the yard and looked at it curiously, "What's this?"
"A rake."
Old Lady Wang looked at her helplessly, poured out the wheat from the bag, demonstrated to her how to use it, and then let her flatten the wheat pile and turned to make breakfast.
Recently, many families have been busy harvesting wheat, so Wang Chunhua was bored. After eating breakfast, she carried Xiao Yan to come over to play with her sister. When she arrived, Li Mingwei was wearing a small straw hat and digging in the yard.
"What are you doing?"
"Sister, you are here. I'm drying wheat."
"You..." Wang Chunhua put Xiao Yan down, said displeasedly, "Did your mother-in-law ask you to do it?"
"Yes, she went to work, if I don't do it, who will?" Li Mingwei didn't mind this at all. She thought it was quite fun, just turning it over and chasing away the small birds that came to steal food.
Wang Chunhua hmmmed, "I never let you do this kind of work before."
"Did sister's family have wheat to dry?"
They always directly bought flour, right?
"You girl! I'm trying to speak for you, yet you talk back."
Seeing Wang Chunhua's anger, Li Mingwei hurriedly threw away the rake and led her and Xiao Yan into the room, "Oh, come in, come in, I'll pour water for you."
She touched Xiao Yan's head, "You've grown taller in just a few days."
Xiao Yan smiled sweetly, "Um!"
Wang Chunhua saw her indulgent look but didn't say anything. She let them play and sat on the doorstep to watch the birds with her.
She stared blankly at the wheat on the ground for a while, then turned sideways and leaned against the door, "Sister, do you think I should ask your brother to buy some land?"
Seeing others have grain harvests, she somehow felt itchy, maybe because she had money in her pocket, she wanted to buy a little, enough for her family of four to eat, just to get by. Her husband Dong Shan went out early and returned late every day. She was alone at home with nothing to do except taking care of the child and cooking. She was really bored.
Li Mingwei smiled, "Sister, if you want to buy, then buy it. The money was given to you so it's yours. You don't need to ask me."
"Alright, then I'll think about it more."
The fields were still planted with grains at others’ homes now. No one was willing to sell.
The more Li Mingwei looked at Wang Chunhua, the stranger she felt. She felt that the momentum she had today was gone, and her whole body felt depressed. She put Xiao Yan on the ground to play by herself, and also sat on the doorstep.
She held Wang Chunhua's hand and said softly, "Sister, what's wrong? You don't seem to be in a good mood today. Is something wrong at home?"
Wang Chunhua's eyes reddened and she couldn't hold back at once. She complained, "I had a fight with your brother-in-law."
"Ah?"
Li Mingwei didn't quite believe it. She felt that even if she had a fight with Liu Yizhu, her brother-in-law wouldn't fight with her sister. She confirmed, "You had a fight with brother-in-law, or did you two have a fight?"
Wang Chunhua...
"We, we, we!" Wang Chunhua confirmed repeatedly, "Your brother-in-law ignores me now."
"Impossible."
Seeing her so categorical, Wang Chunhua became anxious, "Girl, why don't you believe me."
Seeing that she didn't seem to be lying, Li Mingwei frowned and patted her comfortingly, "What happened?"
"That day I saw blood on his clothes, so I asked about it. He said it was accidentally stained."
After being with Dong Shan for so many years, she was no stranger to seeing blood either. She didn't know why, but this time she just felt something was wrong and couldn't get over it.
"When we went to bed, I tore open his clothes, and saw a long cut on his left arm. So I asked him why he didn't tell me."
There was no need to ask this at all. Li Mingwei blurted out, "He must be afraid to worry you."
Wang Chunhua lowered her head, somewhat helpless, "I know that too. Then I asked him if we should buy some land with the money you gave, instead of going to the mountains."
"But he insisted it wouldn't work, and said that even if we bought land, we still had to go to the mountains."
The annual income from going to the mountains was there after all. Dong Shan certainly wouldn't give it up easily. Besides, they hadn't farmed for more than ten years. Whether they could farm well was another matter. What if the harvest failed?
He couldn't put all his energy into such an uncertain thing.
Li Mingwei embarrassedly said, "What brother-in-law said makes sense too."
Wang Chunhua certainly knew what he said made sense, but she was afraid that if one day...
Today it was just a small cut, tomorrow it could be a big cut, and someday he could lose his life. How would she and her child manage?
"Didn't you worry before?"
Wang Chunhua deflated, "I didn't see him get hurt before."
Seeing the cut this time, she became afraid.
