Wang Ya covered her mouth, her shoulders shaking. She looked as though she were crying, but in fact she was laughing so hard she was practically spasming. She murmured, “It’s over, it’s over… Uncle’s underpants… Once I’m enjoying the good life in the future… I’ll definitely make it up to him with ten new pairs…”
Auntie Zhang laughed until tears came to her eyes and patted Wang Ya on the shoulder. “You’d better! You absolutely must! Let your xiucai father wear silk and satin underpants! Let this pair go! Hahaha!”
Auntie Zhang quickly finished washing the remaining clothes. She could hardly wait to go to the big tree at the village entrance and tell everyone about the “underpants bringing good news.”
That day, the village was soon circulating classic jokes such as “the Second Branch of the Lin family is daydreaming,” “Lin Changdong’s underpants couldn’t wait for the good fortune of his xiucai son and went swimming on their own,” and “the Old Lin family hasn’t become prosperous yet, but their underpants have already floated away.”
Old Madam Liu, however, still didn’t know that sending the Second Branch’s wife to do the laundry that day would cause such a huge commotion. She was at home supervising Erya’s work.
In the backyard of the Old Lin family, beside the pigsty.
Lin Xiaowei held a heavy cleaver in her hands and was carrying out a slow-motion “slaughter” of the tenacious pigweed and rotten vegetable leaves in the wooden basin.
At that speed, it was less like chopping pig feed and more like giving the pigweed acupuncture—once, then again, and then again… It was filled with a bizarre sense of ritual.
Old Madam Liu had brought over a small stool and sat beside her. Her triangular eyes stared fixedly at Xiaowei like searchlights, while the sole-making awl in her hand was nearly bent from being clenched so tightly.
The longer she watched, the angrier she became. That slow, unhurried rhythm was practically challenging the limits of her nerves!
“Are you planning to spend all the way until next New Year chopping that pig feed?!” Old Madam Liu finally exploded, spittle flying everywhere. “Haven’t you eaten anything?! You ate so much of this old woman’s food this morning! Faster! Even the pigs make more noise than you do!”
The wowotou in her stomach had not even been digested yet…
Lin Xiaowei raised her sweaty little face, her eyes filled with a kind of… feeble determination.
She stopped her “acupuncture,” took a breath, and spoke in an especially serious tone, as though she were truly concerned for Grandmother. “Grandmother, don’t rush. Aren’t I working properly?”
“Working properly? Even an ant crawling would be faster than you!” Old Madam Liu was so furious that she wanted to stab Xiaowei with the awl.
“Grandmother, you don’t understand.” Lin Xiaowei began her performance with a solemn expression. “My father said this is called… called ‘sustainable development’! We can’t drain the pond to catch all the fish!”
Old Madam Liu: “???”
She didn’t understand, but it didn’t sound like anything good.
Lin Xiaowei patiently “explained.” “It means we can’t use up all our strength at once. Just think about it: if I were to chop away furiously right now, my arms would become so tired I couldn’t lift them, my back would become so sore I couldn’t straighten it, and my vision would go black. What if I collapsed from exhaustion with a crack? Then we’d have to call a physician and spend money, wouldn’t we? Wouldn’t that be an even bigger loss?”
Old Madam Liu: “You…”
Lin Xiaowei didn’t give her a chance to interrupt and continued her onslaught. Her gaze began drifting into the distance, filled with longing. “But! If I conserve my strength now and work steadily, taking things slowly, then although I’ll be a little slower, my body will stay strong! In the future…”
She suddenly emphasized her words, as though she had seen a glorious future.
“When Big Brother passes the xiucai examination, becomes a juren, and takes up a high official post, how many things will there be for the family to deal with then! Big Brother will surely need several trusted members of his own family to help him, won’t he?”
“My father—wouldn’t he have to help Big Brother manage the estates and look after the shops? How could he do that without a strong body?”
“My mother—wouldn’t she have to help Big Brother manage the inner household and entertain the wives of officials? How could she afford to wear herself out?”
“As for me, perhaps I could run errands for Big Brother, deliver messages, or keep the accounts and things like that. If I wear out my hands now, how will I work an abacus in the future?”
“And there’s Goudan. He has to study hard too. In the future, he’ll be Big Brother’s right-hand man!”
She delivered her conclusion in a tone of profound earnestness. “Grandmother! If we conserve a little of our strength now, that isn’t slacking off. It’s so that we’ll be able to serve Big Brother better in the future! It’s so we can enjoy the good fortune that comes from Big Brother! If you wear us out now, wouldn’t that be killing the chicken to get the eggs… Er, I mean, wouldn’t that be delaying Big Brother’s important affairs? Don’t you think I’m right?”
She blinked her “sincere” big eyes at Old Madam Liu.
Old Madam Liu had already been thoroughly bewildered by this long string of “crooked logic and heretical nonsense.”
She clearly felt that every sentence was wrong, yet every sentence struck directly at the thing she cared about most: her eldest grandson’s future. For a moment, she unexpectedly couldn’t find anything with which to refute Xiaowei!
Old Madam Liu’s wrinkled face flushed bright red. She pointed at Lin Xiaowei and trembled for half a day before finally sputtering, “You… you… you little dead brat! You’ve actually managed to find a reason for chopping pig feed?! Enjoying the good life? Enjoy your head! Hurry up and chop! If you say another word, I’ll tear your mouth apart!”
Although she continued cursing, her imposing manner had clearly weakened.
She had discovered that she seemed unable to outargue this granddaughter, who had suddenly become so sharp-tongued. Even more inexplicably, she felt that… there might actually be just the tiniest bit of sense in what Xiaowei had said.
That had to be an illusion!
Lin Xiaowei was laughing herself senseless inside, but on the outside she wore a wounded expression that seemed to say, “Why can’t you understand my painstaking concern?” She picked up the cleaver again and continued her “slow-motion acupuncture therapy,” muttering under her breath, “Honestly… Grandmother is just too anxious… No need to hurry, no need to hurry. Slow and steady… slow and steady… It’s all for Big Brother…”
Old Madam Liu was so furious that her liver hurt, yet she had no way to refute her. She could only glare viciously at Xiaowei, feeling as though supervising her was about to give her a heart attack.
Meanwhile, Lin Changsong was slacking off in the fields. His stomach was rumbling with hunger, and he was thinking that his good son should have finished roasting the yams and brewing the astragalus tea by now and be waiting for them, shouldn’t he?
So, once again claiming that he needed to use the outhouse, Lin Changsong slipped away.
Unfortunately, he ran into Sixth Uncle on the road, the village’s biggest gossip. Sixth Uncle had already heard the rumors about “The Underpants’ Voyage” and “The Theory of Enjoying the Good Life,” so he grabbed Lin Changsong by the arm and stopped him.
With a teasing smile, he asked, “Hey, Second Son, where are you off to? I hear your family is going to enjoy the good life alongside Minghai in the future, huh? Don’t forget us poor neighbors when the time comes! Hahaha!”
Lin Changsong stopped walking, and a typical smile appeared on his face—a smile belonging to an honest man who had been crushed beneath the weight of life yet still carried a trace of illusory hope.
He rubbed his hands together. His gaze was somewhat evasive, yet also carried a hint of shyness and determination. “Hehe… Sixth Uncle, you’re joking… What good fortune or anything? It’s just that Mother and my elder sister-in-law feel sorry for us and are giving us something to look forward to…”
The villagers standing nearby found this amusing. “Oh? How are they feeling sorry for you?”
Lin Changsong sighed. His expression became “sincere,” even tinged with “gratitude.” “Just think about it. The work in the fields is so heavy now, and there are so many things to do at home. Why doesn’t Mother make Big Brother work in the fields and insists on sending me instead? She’s training me! She says my body is weak and I need more exercise, so that I’ll be able to shoulder responsibilities in the future!”
…
He continued to “analyze” the situation. “And why is it that when my wife and daughter work slowly at home, Mother curses them so fiercely but doesn’t actually beat them to death? She’s tempering their dispositions! She says that once they go to my nephew’s household, wealthy families have many rules, and people with impatient tempers are liable to suffer!”
…
“Mother and my elder sister-in-law both said that the hardship and exhaustion we’re going through now are only temporary! Once Minghai passes the xiucai examination, everything will be different! We’re all family. How could he refuse to help his own uncle and aunt?”
In the end, he did not forget to “feel sorry” for his nephew. “It’s just that Minghai has it hard. He’s still so young, yet he has to study diligently, and in the future he’ll still have to worry about this entire family of ours… Sigh, as his uncle and aunt, the most we can do now is work a little harder for the family, let him study in peace, and reduce the burden we place on him in the future. That counts as doing our best…”