After leaving the courtyard gate, Bai Chao didn't head straight to the vegetable plot. He stood by the row of canna lilies by the entrance, craning his neck and staring at them for a long while. He had seen this flower before and knew it held sweet water inside.
Looking up at the sky, Bai Chao sighed at the expanse of blue. With the sky so clear, it surely wouldn't rain. He wondered whether dunking them in water would work—he'd splash a few ladles over them later and see if the sweet water could be drawn out.
In the vegetable garden, Bai Chao picked peppers while glancing around. He had been asleep when he arrived at this village, so he didn't even know where the village entrance was, let alone how far the village was from town. There was no big horse at home, and walking to town on two legs would be exhausting.
Picking peppers wasn't hard work, so Bai Chao could let his mind wander as he worked. He spotted a plum tree beside the pepper field, and following along past it, he saw a paddy field and a bamboo grove. He nibbled his lip lightly—he knew bamboo shoot stewed with chicken was delicious.
He wondered if there were bamboo shoots in that grove.
Bamboo shoot stewed chicken would have to wait, but the little sweet flowers he could taste right away.
After carrying a winnowing basket of peppers back, Bai Chao came out again carrying a small bucket of water.
Father Luo came back carrying grain on his back just in time to catch Bai Chao watering the flower leaves. The boy was cheerfully explaining that you can't water flowers when the sun is strong—it has to be morning or evening—and you can't pour water directly on the leaves either; you have to water at the roots so it soaks into the soil and moistens the roots.
Bai Chao had no mind to analyze the stream of babble from his father. He just smiled at him and kept on with his work. Once he'd watered them, Father Luo could come out later and have a taste too.
During the busy farming season, everyone was run off their feet with barely a moment to catch their breath. Father Luo dumped the grain from his back into the courtyard, picked up the fish-fragrant leaf water Luo's Grandmother had steeped, and headed right back out. The moment he stepped out the gate, a flower appeared before him.
"Father, it's sweet." Bai Chao had already tried it—not just after rain; after being watered, the canna lily flowers held sweet juice too.
Father Luo naturally knew these flowers held sweet water. Smiling, he took the flower from the child's hand and immediately put the stem to his mouth for a couple of sucks. Seeing the sweat beads on the boy's face, he told him to hurry inside.
His dark little boy, once washed clean, wasn't just fair-skinned—his skin was tender too. He mustn't let it get sunburned and peel.
"Got it, Father." Wiping the sweat from his forehead, Bai Chao picked a few more flowers and carried his wooden bucket inside. After giving the flowers to Grandmother, he went to keep watch over the grain so the birds wouldn't snatch it away.
If the birds ate it, what would he eat?
Holding the flowers in one hand and the wooden bucket in the other, Bai Chao bounced off toward the back courtyard. Before he even reached the kitchen, he started calling out "Grandma!" Just as he reached the small door of the main room, one foot stepped through, but the toes of his other foot failed to catch the sole of his shoe. Losing his balance, he toppled forward toward the ground.
In the blink of an eye, he was sprawled on the ground. The wooden bucket had rolled away, but the flowers in his hand were fine, still clutched in his grip.
Luo's Grandmother came out only after hearing the commotion outside. The moment she stepped out of the kitchen, she saw him lying sprawled on the ground, two tears hanging in his eyes as he looked up at her.
"Ouch! How could you be so careless!" Luo's Grandmother hurried over and hauled the boy up, half supporting him, half dragging him. Seeing his red palms, she ached for him herself.
Bai Chao sniffled but didn't cry out loud; the tears just kept falling. It hurt—his hands and knees both hurt so much.
Seeing the aggrieved look on his face, Luo's Grandmother didn't have the heart to scold him anymore. As she bent down to pick up his shoes, she spotted the oversized cloth shoe and immediately understood why the child had fallen.
"That stingy old man!" Everyone else in the family had feet much bigger than this child's, and he had no shoes that fit. Yet that stingy old man refused to buy ready-made ones, insisting that with the scraps of cloth at home, making shoes themselves would save several coins a pair.
Did he never think that these days the whole family rose earlier than the chickens and slept later than the ghosts—when would anyone have time to make shoes for the child?
Bai Chao had been worried he'd get scolded, but hearing Grandmother's muttering, he nodded along and agreed quite earnestly: "Grandpa is a stingy old man."
Grandmother was amused by his solemn little remark. As she checked him over, she shook her head at him. "Don't go saying such things. If Grandpa hears you, you'll get a beating."
"Okay." Bai Chao naturally knew that Grandpa was the most powerful person in the household, the one everyone had to obey. He certainly wouldn't dare provoke him. After answering obediently, he shook his head at Grandmother to show he was fine, then held out the flowers in his hand.
"Grandma, sweet." Bai Chao had been clutching the flowers, his palm slightly curled into a fist, so he'd landed on the edge of his hand rather than flat on his palm—which hurt less. What really hurt were his two knees.
He was so thin, without an ounce of fat to cushion the impact. Bones slamming straight into the ground hurt terribly.
Looking at those red-and-yellow cannas, Luo's Grandmother knew the child had picked the flowers for that bit of sweetness. She led him to sit down in the kitchen and told him to roll up his trouser legs. When she saw both knees were scraped red, though her heart ached, she was relieved the skin wasn't broken.
If the skin had broken, he'd really be in for a miserable time.
"Be more careful when you walk from now on, especially around ditches and bumps." She pulled his trouser legs back down and sighed as she spoke—only to find Bai Chao gazing at her expectantly.
She hesitated for a long while, feeling terribly sorry for him, and finally went to the drawer of the shrine and grabbed some pumpkin seeds and melon seeds they'd been keeping as seed stock.
When a child feels bad, you just give him something tasty to cheer him up. There was no sugar in the house, nothing sweet for him to taste, so something savory would have to do.
Bai Chao got his melon seeds but didn't smile. Listlessly, he wandered back outside to keep watch over the grain under the eaves.
"Still hurts." He pinched the flesh beside his knee and tossed a melon seed into his mouth. Even with seeds to eat, it still hurt, so he behaved himself, sitting quietly and steadily on the stool—not even going to tease the ants he spotted in the corner of the wall.
When the two Luo men came trudging back one after the other, grain sacks on their backs, and saw him eating melon seeds, they were remarkably united in their reaction: they told him to throw the shells out into the fields—somewhere inconspicuous, ideally onto the barren slope beyond the vegetable garden.
Hearing their instructions, Bai Chao tilted his head and muttered quietly, "Stingy old man."
He knew—Dad and Big Husband must have been afraid Grandpa would scold them, that's why they'd warned him like that.
Time drifted by slowly, and the sun gradually sank westward. More and more grain piled up in the courtyard, and the aroma of dinner wafted from the kitchen. It was already past mid-You hour, and those who had labored in the fields all day would soon return for dinner.
The Luo family had six mu of paddy fields in total. The bulk of them lay in the paddy plots below the village entrance, with a few scattered parcels around the village. Today the family had mainly worked the fields outside the village; the ones within the village had been finished in a single day.
When everyone returned, only Luo's Grandfather was still missing. The whole family of seven or eight people had worked from Mao hour until now, with only the last two fields remaining. He had told everyone to go home and eat first, and after the meal, to send the relatives home while the family brought him food and continued working.
It was almost mid-month, and the sky was clear tonight. If they could gather all the remaining grain under the moonlight, he could finally rest easy.
Even after everyone had picked up their bowls and started eating, Grandfather still hadn't appeared. Only then did Bai Chao couldn't help asking why Grandfather hadn't come back yet. Luo Yang brushed him off with a few casual words and focused on eating. During the busy farming season, the family's meals were always good—today they had stewed cured pork, and he was gnawing on a big bone with no time to talk.
Hearing that Grandfather was working alone in the fields, Bai Chao couldn't help sniffling, thinking that the "old miser" was a little bit pitiful.
If even Bai Chao felt sorry for those laboring in the fields, the rest of the Luo family certainly wouldn't waste a moment. They wolfed down their meal in a whirlwind, grabbed the food set aside for Luo's Grandfather, and immediately hurried to the fields.
This time, it wasn't just the Luo family's able-bodied members heading to the fields—Bai Chao went along too. Only Luo's Grandmother had to stay home; with so much grain in the house, someone had to watch over it.
By now the sky was completely dark, but that didn't hinder the work at all.
Luo's Mother and Luo's Grandfather cut the rice, while Father Luo and Luo Yang threshed it. Once the threshing tub was full, father and son took turns carrying the rice stalks home. As for Bai Chao, he wasn't idle either—he was responsible for carrying the stalks that Luo's Grandfather and Luo's Mother cut over to the threshing tub, so the threshers could get right to work without wasting a moment.
Today was the twelfth of the eighth month, and the moon in the sky was nearly full, casting bright moonlight. The Luo family wasn't the only one rushing their work under this bright moonlight—other households were busy in the paddy fields near theirs as well.
After working continuously for a good while, Bai Chao began to feel tired. Seeing him raise his hand to wipe his sweat every few moments, Luo's Mother told him to rest. He obediently headed to the edge of the field, but he had just sat down when a few teasing voices came from a nearby paddy.
"Old Luo, how come your new husband is slacking off?"
"That's right. My new husband is a lazybones. Your daughter-in-law is hardworking and sensible. Old Wang, call your daughter-in-law over to help my family out." Luo's Grandfather didn't even lift his head, but his mouth was far from idle—one sentence left the neighboring field silent for a good long while.
Old Woman Wang, working next door, gestured for Old Man Wang beside her to shut up. And indeed, Old Man Wang did need to shut up at that moment, because he was too angry to speak.
The whole village said the Luo family had married a foolish husband, but how was Luo's husband foolish at all? He was actually pretty decent, and could even help with the work. The Luo family had truly gotten a bargain—not only had they acquired a husband without spending a single coin, they had also solved the family's predicament. Their son no longer had to serve hard labor corvée, and the family no longer had to pay taxes.
His family had two sons—one spent a fortune in silver marrying off a wife, and the other, unable to afford the bride price, had gone off to hard labor corvée last year, and who knew if he'd even live to come back. That damn Old Man Luo had such a nasty mouth yet such a good life—it made him furious!
Of course, the Luo family had no idea how angry others were; they only knew that Grandpa had won the war of words. Say what you would about their grandpa, but when it came to talking, he could infuriate anyone, and he rarely suffered at anyone else's hands.
The whole family worked until around the hour of Hai before finally finishing up. On the way home, everyone was chatting and laughing. These past few days had been tiring, but not only was this year's harvest good, their outside debt was down to just a few coins of silver. They wouldn't have to sell off the bulk of their grain like previous years only to save not a single copper.
This year, the family would have plenty to eat, and they could even save a little from selling their grain. With savings came confidence, and their spirits naturally lifted.
For farming families, working during the day was one thing, but once night came and the strength drained from their bodies, they didn't want to move even a finger—they just wanted to collapse into bed.
The Luo elders washed their faces and got into bed, drifting off to meet the Duke of Zhou almost in the blink of an eye. Luo Yang, however, took a bath. He had experience—washing up meant sleeping more comfortably and shaking off the fatigue better.
Bai Chao wiped himself down as well. By the time the two lay down in bed, within a few breaths Luo Yang was nearly asleep, but Bai Chao, with something stuck in his heart all day, couldn't sleep.
Feeling the person beside him breathing more and more steadily, Bai Chao finally couldn't hold back. He tugged at Luo Yang's sleeve and called out, "Big Guy, don't fall asleep yet."
Luo Yang, just sinking into oblivion, was hauled back up. He asked in a drowsy, muffled voice without even moving his eyelids, "What is it?"
"I fell down today." As soon as the words were out, Bai Chao simply sat up, rolling up his trouser leg with one hand while groping for Luo Yang's hand with the other.
Hearing that Bai Chao had fallen, Luo Yang came back to his senses a little and sat up, following the tug on his hand.
Bai Chao pulled one of Luo Yang's hands and placed it just above his knee, saying in a tone that brooked no argument, "Blow on it for me."
"Huh?" Blow on it? Luo Yang was a bit confused.
Seeing that Luo Yang didn't even know about "blowing on it," Bai Chao thought of his grandmother again from earlier in the day, and his mood actually improved a bit. After a sigh, he explained, "When you fall, someone has to blow on it or it hurts."
"Haha." Luo Yang laughed, half his drowsiness scattering. So all this time, he was being asked to kiss it better.
Now that he understood the purpose, and since it was hardly an unreasonable request, Luo Yang willingly went along. He hurriedly bent his head and blew on the knee, blowing for quite a while.
Feeling the breath land on his knee, Bai Chao nodded silently. Only after both knees had been "blown on" was he satisfied.
There—all better now. He could sleep in peace.