Lijuan's mother was still bedridden and unable to walk easily. Yaping's mother entered, her gaze fixed on Lijuan's mother, as if she were walking through a maze of blades. She put down the gifts and then plopped down beside Lijuan's mother's bed, offering a soft, ashamed apology. Her sincerity and humility were so palpable that Yaping couldn't bear to look away. Fortunately, Lijuan's mother was worldly-wise and remained unmoved: "Don't try that on me. Our two families are completely estranged. See you in court. And you'll have to cover my emotional distress, hospital expenses, everything. You can leave now! Take your things; I don't want them." With that, she shooed the visitors away.
Yaping's face flushed red, whether from anger or shame, it was hard to tell, but he was about to explode. Yaping's mother stopped him from speaking with a look. Guanhua's family, on the other hand, remained quiet and didn't utter a word. Even the mischievous children were too frightened to say a word.
At this moment, Lijuan's brother stood up decisively and said, "The accident has already happened, so we can only try to resolve it in a positive direction. Auntie, let's talk about the money slowly. I can't say I don't want it, after all, I also need to live in Shanghai. Please try your best to pay it back, and we won't rush you. The biggest loss this time is to people. It's not worth making such a fuss over such a small amount of money. We're all family, so let's not be so formal. On behalf of Mom, I accept your apology. Let's make up! Dad! Would you like some tea?"
Lijuan's mother was about to argue when Lijuan's brother pressed her down with his hand: "It's just a little money. Is a person more important or money? As long as you're alive, you'll have plenty to enjoy! In three to five years, 100,000 will be worthless; you can just grab it and have it. Why are you so narrow-minded? Stop arguing. This is your sister's mother-in-law; you should at least give her some face."
Yaping was extremely grateful after hearing his brother-in-law's words.
The money issue is now resolved.
When Yaping's mother returned home, she said to Yaping, "Lijuan is about to give birth, and I'm not feeling well either, so we need to hire a nanny. This money will come from the money your father didn't spend on his medical treatment. We need to be careful when hiring a nanny. First, safety is paramount; there are too many cases of nannies stealing children these days. Second, she needs to know how to care for children; truly caring children are rare. I've thought about it. Your older cousin is currently unemployed; she's only in her early forties, the prime of her life, and she can lift a gas cylinder in one hand. Plus, she's family, so I feel safe having her hold the baby. In Shanghai, hiring a nanny costs at least 700 yuan. Giving that money to outsiders, who knows how well they'll do? It's better to use it on family. At least she'll be fine with her nephew. What do you think?"
Yaping nodded repeatedly.
Lijuan firmly objected: "I don't use relatives, they're hard to manage. Since you're living with us, there's no safety issue. A nanny is just there to do the work, you just need to keep an eye on things. Go to the employment agency instead. Besides, my cousin has a family, can she work here long? She comes here making a fuss today and leaves tomorrow, I won't even be able to cover her travel expenses."
Yaping's mother assured her, "Don't worry. She's your cousin, so you can use her as you please. Don't be shy about asking her to do anything. I can't watch over the nanny we hired outside 24/7. If she really had bad intentions and wanted to steal our child, it would be right under our noses. Since she's here, she should stay. Her whole family depends on this money to make a living, right? I already told her beforehand that she can't keep coming back and forth. Is that okay?"
“Okay!” Yaping agreed on behalf of Lijuan.
Cousin Yaping arrived quite efficiently. All her belongings were easily contained in a large shoulder bag. As soon as she entered, she exclaimed with a sigh, "My goodness! Upstairs and downstairs, electric lights and a telephone! We've achieved the Four Modernizations ahead of schedule! This is practically a villa in the sky! To me, it's much better than any detached villa outside! There's even a security door downstairs! So safe! Yaping's got guts!"
Yaping's mother beamed with joy: "Absolutely! This is Shanghai, after all! Yaping has to pay several thousand yuan in loan repayments every month!" "Won't that kill Yaping?" "Yaping earns over ten thousand a month! No worries!" "Oh my god! You're really something, young man! You earn more in one month than I do in a year! Auntie, just you wait and see! With Yaping by your side, your family will be living the high life!"
Lijuan watched coldly, without saying a word.
Yaping's cousin, Yuxi, is incredibly hardworking. She can create work even when there isn't any. In the mornings, when Lijuan goes to work, she even ties her shoelaces for her; she's very considerate, even better than Yaping. Although she's a bit loud-mouthed, sometimes her voice is so loud it shakes the door, and she snores quite loudly when she sleeps, which can be a little annoying, but otherwise, she's fine.
A week later, Lijuan started experiencing intense itching all over her body and kept scratching at work. She initially suspected it was due to dry skin in late pregnancy, but applying a thick layer of Vaseline didn't help. When she told her mother, Lijuan's mother picked up Lijuan's clothes, smelled them, and said, "Your clothes weren't clean enough; the soap powder stung you."
After Lijuan returned home, she kept a close eye on Yuxi washing clothes.
Yu Xi doesn't use a washing machine to wash clothes, which pleases Ya Ping's mother. She washes them purely by hand. She scrubs them once with soap powder, then rinses them twice with clean water. The first basin of soapy water isn't thrown away; it's saved to wipe the stove and table. The second rinse water is collected in a bucket to mop the floor and flush the toilet. And that's it. The clothes are wrung dry and hung outside the window.
Lijuan, startled, followed behind and tried to stop her, saying, "Sister Yuxi, is this clean enough?" "Of course it is! It's been washed three times and it's still not clean? The washing machine only washes three times, right? I scrubbed each piece one by one! Don't worry, I scrubbed the oily spots first."
"That's not what I meant! There were still bubbles floating in the water when you rinsed the clothes the last time! You can't wash them like that! I feel itchy all over after wearing them!"
"That's just psychological! How could a human hand wash clothes less effectively than a washing machine? You don't itch when you're washed in a washing machine, so why do I feel itchy?" "That's different. A washing machine uses more water! It spins the clothes dry after each wash, making them easier to clean. You can't get them clean by hand. The soap residue stays inside the clothes. I think you need to rinse them at least four times until there are no more bubbles on the surface!"
"Hey! Lijuan! This water is free! Didn't you see how much I wanted to drink it all? Having money is one thing, but you can't waste energy! Water is so precious! Besides, it's perfectly normal for there to be bubbles in the water. Just swirl it around a couple of times and bubbles will float on top! Look, look!" Yuxi wouldn't back down, and even splashed some water in the basin. Sure enough, several big bubbles appeared on the surface.
"These are two different things! These are big bubbles, they're air, yours are small bubbles, they're soap bubbles!"
"Then you're putting me in a difficult position! What if there are both big and small bubbles floating on the surface of the pot? Which one should I use as the reference?"
"If there are many small bubbles, it means that the soap powder is not completely removed. Keep washing until there are many large bubbles."
"What do you mean by 'too much'? How much is too much? Give me a percentage, 30/70? 40/60?" Yu Xi was annoyed. "Fine! I'm straightforward, I can't beat around the bush," Yu Xi ran upstairs, grabbed a piece of paper and a pen from the study, and pushed them in front of Li Juan. "Draw a diagram for me. How big of a bubble is considered air, and how big of a bubble is considered soap? I'll use that as a guide. What if I still have small bubbles after washing four times?"
Lijuan was speechless. After thinking for a moment, she said, "In short, when washing clothes, you should rinse them under the tap, not scrub them from start to finish with a basin of water. Rinse them at least three times."
Yaping's mother sat in the living room listening to Lijuan and Yuxi arguing over a bubble. Yuxi had a loud voice and a strong voice, which immediately overwhelmed Lijuan. In the end, Yuxi took out a pen and asked Lijuan to sign it. Yaping's mother almost laughed herself silly, and she just kept pursing her lips and chuckling to herself.
"Also, pour out the water after washing clothes. Don't keep it to wipe this and that. There are underwear and socks in there. If you use it to wipe the stove, one is for eating and the other is for wearing. If you mix them together, you won't be able to tell the difference." Lijuan originally didn't care about these things, but because she felt that she had lost ground in the argument with Paopao, she casually said, "Our family doesn't lack this little bit of water money."
"If you don't need it, why don't you just give me the money? I'll keep what I save. It's all pure water, why waste it like this! What's the big deal about underwear and socks? They're all worn close to the skin, they're not dirty. You all take a bath every day, do you think your bodies are dirty?" Yu happy retorted.
Lijuan was clearly no match for them, and left the kitchen dejectedly to return to her room.
Downstairs, she could hear her mother-in-law and Yu Xi whispering, sometimes loudly, sometimes boisterously. Lijuan was furious; she knew the two were mocking her behind her back. Lijuan felt the family's balance of power had suddenly shifted to one where she was powerless. The struggle was intensifying. She shouldn't have agreed to Yaping's mother's idea in the first place; that old woman, every idea she came up with was malicious.
"Sister Yuxi, peel an apple for me." Lijuan was leaning back on the sofa watching TV. She was annoyed to hear her mother-in-law and Yuxi chatting and laughing in the kitchen, so she deliberately picked a fight to order Yuxi around.
After Yu happy finished speaking, she didn't rush to come out and continued chatting about whatever she wanted to say.
"Sister Yuxi, could you please peel an apple for me?" Lijuan's voice was noticeably louder, revealing her displeasure.
"I'm soaking it right now! Here you go!" Yu Xi stepped out of the kitchen and handed Li Juan a Fuji apple that had been scalded by boiling water and lost its pink color, leaving only a dull yellow skin.
"I want you to peel it, so you take it and soak it! Is this even edible? Fine, I don't need you to peel it anymore. Just hand me a knife, I'll peel it myself."
"Lijuan! You're still a college student! Why don't you read books and newspapers? Oh, right, you even work at a newspaper! I just read in the newspaper the other day, the one you run, that 60% of the vitamins in apples are in the peel, and the peel is full of the essence! It's such a waste to peel them!"
"Not peeling it? Not peeling it means eating the pesticides on the surface? Which apple these days isn't grown with pesticides? Are you going to feed me a bellyful of poison? Besides, look at how you soaked it in hot water, the color has changed, how can it still have any nutrition?"
"People! You can't be too careful! I've never heard of someone dying from eating pesticides on an apple." Yu Xi took the apple, took a big bite out of it, and shoved it back into Li Juan's hand. "You're not dead, are you? Women in my hometown back home can be saved by drinking a whole bottle of undiluted pesticide! This is poisonous, that is poisonous, cigarettes are poisonous enough, right? My uncle smoked two packs a day for 40 years before he got sick. When will the pesticides on an apple kill someone? Besides, what doesn't have pesticides these days? The vegetables you eat every day don't have pesticides, right? How do you peel the leaves? You blanch them in boiling water, soak them in water, and then eat them. What do you do? The thinking of Shanghainese people is really hard to understand. According to you, pesticides are unclean, but manure is clean? It's okay to eat vegetables with a little manure on them, but not a little pesticide? Hahahaha..." Yu Xi laughed without any restraint.
Yaping's mother stood at the kitchen doorway, listening to their bickering. Her smile almost spilled over her face.
Lijuan coldly surveyed her mother-in-law and her bodyguard, who, though not on the same side, were clearly aligned. She slammed the apple down on the coffee table, slowly stood up, slipped on her slippers, and lazily went upstairs to her room. As she went, she tossed out a remark: "Fine! I spend 700 yuan a month, not to hire a nanny, but to have a university professor come and teach me. Even eating an apple is so difficult, I dare not trouble you anymore. You should find a university job elsewhere! It's such a waste that you're stuck in our house! The National Longevity Research Committee should offer you a high salary! Your layoff is such a waste of your talent! You read books and newspapers, you know everything about the world. Why didn't Jiang Zemin invite you into his think tank? You're much better than that 'red' guy! Oh! I forgot, you're currently using my salary to advise my mother-in-law!"
Yu happy said, "Hey! I don't like what you're saying! Stop making veiled accusations. Let's talk things out. If you can convince me, I'll change it according to your suggestion! Why are you dragging my aunt into this? Besides, I'm here to take care of your whole family's livelihood. I wasn't invited here by you, and my brother paid for it. What are you being so arrogant about? Pshaw! You call yourself a college student? You're more shrewish than a shrew!"
Yaping's mother quietly walked over, tugged at Yuxi's hand, and said, "Don't pay any attention to her! She's a crazy woman. She never talks back and doesn't know any better!"
"Can I just ignore her? She's telling me to leave! Fine, I'll leave then, it's not like I have to stay here! But you should at least give me a reason, right? Are you just getting angry because I was wrong?"
“Every single thing she did, not one of them is something anyone could emulate. Do you know how your uncle died? Do you know what she said about that fundraising thing? She said she was going to sue Guanhua! That’s it! That’s it! That’s what our daughter-in-law said! I’m ashamed for her! I swallowed my pride and apologized to her mother for Guanhua’s sake! Have you ever seen anything like this? My own family member died, and I still have to apologize to someone. I didn’t tell you because you just arrived and I didn’t want you to get into trouble. I didn’t even want to mention it, but she still…” Yaping’s mother lowered her voice and began to list a hundred major crimes on her fingers. Her teeth chattered, her eyes were like a tsunami, her hands were as cold as ice, and her body was like a steel knife. Upon hearing this, Yu Xi felt as if her heart was being torn apart. She almost rushed into the kitchen, grabbed the cleaver, and, like a modern-day Yan Po-xi (a notorious womanizer), dismembered him and even roasted him over the fire. But Ya Ping's mother stopped her, saying with a mixture of anger and pain, "If it weren't for my grandson, I! I! I! I've thought it through long ago. Ya Ping absolutely cannot spend his life with this woman. His father has already died at her hands, and I'll die at her hands sooner or later! This child is my family; we absolutely cannot let her ruin him. We can't give him to her! Otherwise, he'll learn to be heartless and cruel from this mother. Back then, how much hardship did our family endure to send Ya Ping to school in Shanghai! His sister only left him enough for food each month; our whole family supported his university education. Now, this woman has ruined him! When Ya Ping first graduated, his salary was only 1,600 yuan, yet he still sent 5,000 yuan home at the end of the year. Since meeting her, his salary is now over 10,000 yuan, and I haven't seen a penny of it! Even if my son is ruined, I'll just consider him lost!"
Friday night, the family had a rare opportunity to eat together. Yaping came home early today.
The family of four sat at the dining table, the other three chatting animatedly. Lijuan, too lazy to interject, silently peeled shrimp shells and tails by herself.
"Oh dear! Shrimp shells contain calcium, which pregnant women need to supplement. How could you throw away such nutritious food? What a waste! A pound of shrimp costs seventeen or eighteen yuan!" Yu Xi exclaimed with heartache.