The weather in September was unbearably hot and stuffy.
Hu Yan was lying on the bed, drenched in sweat.
Her last memory was of her body being caught in the machinery at the electronics factory.
A haze of blood filled her vision.
Pain swept violently through Hu Yan.
It was a pain that reached all the way to her bones! Instinctively, she cried out, “Ah…”
Hu Yan suddenly opened her eyes, jolted awake by the pain.
The noisy voices of a woman and several children reached her ears.
The racket made her head throb.
A soft, gentle female voice spoke soothingly,
“Be good. Fifth Auntie has a headache and isn’t feeling well. Let’s not disturb her.”
Three little children who looked exactly alike threw themselves onto the floor.
They kicked and flailed their arms and legs while their cries nearly shook the roof.
“I want candy! Fifth Auntie has some. Give me some!”
“I want cookies! If you don’t give me any, I’m not getting up!”
While coaxing the children, Zhang Qiulian glanced at Hu Yan on the bed.
“The floor is dirty. Get up quickly.”
Hu Yan rubbed her temples and, through her dazed eyes, saw Zhang Qiulian as she had looked in her youth.
Then she looked at the triplets on the floor, and her face twisted with fury.
She grabbed a feather duster from the cabinet and swung it at the mother and children.
Thinking of the tragedy of her previous life, she knew this mother and her children had played no small part in it.
The feather duster came down harder and harder.
Seeing this, Zhang Qiulian hurriedly shielded the children.
“Sister-in-law, what are you doing? They’re still young.”
Hu Yan had always hated Zhang Qiulian’s delicate, weak, and overly gentle manner.
“Get out! Don’t come here throwing tantrums and making a scene. If you come here again, I’ll beat you again.”
Everyone froze.
Seeing how fierce Fifth Auntie was, the triplets immediately stopped crying.
Zhang Qiulian saw that Hu Yan was about to hit them again. Muttering as she protected the children, she hurriedly ran outside.
After venting her anger, Hu Yan turned toward the bed, only to trip over the threshold.
Her knee slammed directly into the edge of the bed, and she sucked in a sharp breath.
This time, the pain completely woke her up.
She looked around.
The room was both familiar and festive.
The bedsheets, quilt, and pillows before her eyes were all red.
A red character for “happiness” was pasted in the middle of the window. A black-and-white television was locked inside the TV cabinet.
Beside it, the sewing machine still had an unfinished piece of clothing on it.
This scene was unmistakably the old house where she had lived decades ago, right after she got married.
She turned toward the calendar hanging by the door.
September 15, 1987.
A good day for marriage.
The bright red characters made her heart race.
This was the year she had married Chen Guangze.
She had been reborn.
Hu Yan was both shocked and delighted.
That year, the house in her hometown had not yet been demolished for redevelopment.
The Chen family had not yet divided up their household, and they had not adopted Chen Hao either.
Everything could start over.
She looked at herself in the mirror.
Young and beautiful, with cheeks so tender they looked as though water could be squeezed from them. Her hair was thick and jet-black.
There were no signs of age, no illness, no exhaustion weighing on her.
Her hands were smooth and delicate, without a trace of calluses or roughness.
Hu Yan squeezed her palm.
It hurt—terribly.
This wasn’t a dream.
She had truly come back.
Just then, her mother-in-law’s voice came from outside.
“Fifth daughter-in-law, come out and eat.”
Hu Yan instinctively answered, “Coming.”
She wiped the tears from her face and walked outside.
The Chen family was considered fairly well-off in the village.
Their courtyard was enclosed by rammed-earth walls, with three brick-and-tile rooms serving as the main house.
The elderly couple and their youngest daughter lived there.
Houses made of rammed earth had been built on both the east and west sides, one after another.
Whenever one of the five sons got married, the family would build him a two-room earthen house.
By now, the houses stood side by side, one attached to another.
Chen Guangze was the youngest son, and their house looked particularly new.
House after house, door facing door.
Whenever Hu Yan thought that these houses would all be demolished within a year, she wanted to beat some sense into her former self.
How could she have been so foolish in her previous life, handing over the family home just because she’d gotten carried away in the moment?
This time, she would guard this place with everything she had.
No one was going to take it from her.
When mealtime came, the entire courtyard was filled with the aroma of rice and dishes.
Adults shouted, children cried, and chickens ran everywhere. The whole courtyard was bustling with noise and activity.
In the eyes of the villagers, the Chen family had many sons, plenty of people, and a strong presence.
They were a family no one dared to provoke.
A sour-fruit tree stood in the middle of the courtyard.
It had been there for decades, its trunk thick and its shade broad and cool.
Whenever the weather was hot, the family ate beneath the tree.
The second son of the family was a carpenter, and he had built a complete set of tables and chairs beneath the sour-fruit tree.
There was enough room for more than twenty members of the Chen family to sit together.
The men in the family were either working regular jobs or laboring elsewhere.
Aside from the retired father-in-law, everyone there was female.
By the time Hu Yan arrived, everyone had already taken their seats.
At the center of the dining table were two plates of pickled vegetables and a plate of cucumber salad.
Each person had a steaming bowl of multigrain porridge in front of them.
Once everyone had arrived, they all looked toward the woman seated at the head of the table—Mother-in-law Bai Fengxia.
Her mother-in-law had been a teacher in the village all her life.
She had already retired, though village teachers did not receive pensions.
What she valued most was upbringing, propriety, and reputation.
She was a woman who placed great importance on “rules” and “proper conduct.”
Whether it was her husband, her sons and daughters, or even her grandchildren, everyone was afraid of her.
The moment she put on a stern expression, everyone fell silent.
Hu Yan genuinely admired her mother-in-law in some ways.
She had never suffered much in her life, and after the village was demolished and redeveloped, she became quite wealthy.
The old couple lived a comfortable and carefree life, yet even before they passed away, they never divided their money among their sons.
Nor did they demand that their sons support them financially in their old age.
She was a refined, self-interested woman.
But perhaps it was precisely because of this that she had lived such a free and easy life.
Hu Yan knew Zhang Qiulian must have already gone to complain to the old woman.
Sure enough, her mother-in-law, whose hair was combed perfectly without a single strand out of place, cast a stern glance at her.
“Before we eat, Fifth daughter-in-law, explain something.
“Why did you use a feather duster to hit your eldest sister-in-law and your nephews?
“Do you have no sense of propriety?”
After hearing that she had beaten the triplets, everyone in the Chen family gleefully watched the spectacle.
The third generation of the Chen family consisted mostly of girls. Only the eldest daughter-in-law had given birth to three boys.
The triplets were especially favored, particularly by Old Man Chen. Those three boys were the apple of his eye.
Sure enough, Old Man Chen looked at Zhang Qiulian and the three children.
Because of the heat, they were all wearing short sleeves and shorts.
Their exposed arms and legs were covered in purple bruises.
Old Man Chen angrily slammed his hand against the table and shouted,
“Fifth daughter-in-law, they’re just children. How could you bring yourself to hit them?”
“Come here, come here. Let Grandpa take a look. Does it hurt?”
As soon as the triplets heard their grandfather’s voice, they began wailing again.
Hu Yan completely ignored their ear-piercing cries.
“I’d like to ask you the same thing. How exactly does your Chen family teach its children?”
“I haven’t even been married into this family for two months, have I?
“These three children come barging in every day, throwing tantrums and demanding food from me.”
In her previous life, she had spent her entire life being a virtuous wife and devoted mother.
She had respected her in-laws, obeyed her husband, worked hard, been sensible, and always put her family first.
And in the end, she had nothing to show for it.
In this life, no one was going to manipulate her with guilt or morality.
She raised her eyebrows disdainfully and glanced at Zhang Qiulian.
“When the parents set a bad example, the children follow suit. If they come into my room again begging for food, I’ll put rat poison in the food. Why don’t you try them then?”
Everyone was stunned by her words.
Fifth daughter-in-law had been married into the family for nearly two months now.
They had already figured out her personality. She was the sort who could be pushed around easily, as soft as dough.
So what was going on today?
Had she suddenly lost her mind?