Chapter 29: Half-Sister by Another Father and Mother

Perhaps it was because Tang Banxia’s gaze was too intense that she drew that person’s attention. He turned his head, caught sight of Tang Banxia, and looked a little surprised, a little guilty, then grinned at her ingratiatingly. “Wife~”

Tang Banxia offered a gentle smile.

The two of them smiled at each other. An old man in the cowshed witnessed the scene, shook his head with a chuckle, and said, “You can go.”

Wen Mubai didn’t hesitate for a moment; he turned and walked out. As he passed by Tang Banxia, he took the bundle of dead branches from her hands. “Wife, are we out of firewood at home? You should have told me. I could’ve done it. Why did you come up the mountain alone in the middle of the night? It’s not safe. Next time, just leave this to me.”

Tang Banxia’s smile was tinged with mockery. “If I hadn’t come, how would I have known you were hiding something from me, Xiaobai?”

Wen Mubai tried to gloss things over with his looks. “I was just climbing the mountain when I saw an old man fall over. Out of the goodness of my heart, I helped him back.”

“You? Kind?” Tang Banxia eyed him suspiciously. It wasn’t distrust without cause; this fellow never got up early without some profit in sight. Could he really be doing a good deed?

Wen Mubai scratched his nose. “He gave me a yuan.”

“Knew it,” Tang Banxia muttered.

“Banxia, am I really that greedy in your eyes?” Wen Mubai looked at her, wounded.

Tang Banxia feigned sudden deafness, “Let’s go.”

“Banxia, answer me~”

“Hurry up, I’m starving.”

“Fine, Tang Banxia, you’ve broken my heart!”

The next day.

Tang Banxia asked Wen Mubai to borrow a handcart, while she prepared provisions for the mountain. Wen Mubai held two taels of brown sugar, his gaze flickering.

Tang Banxia warned, “If I find out you didn’t give them the sugar, you’ll be eating wild vegetable soup for the next three days.”

Wen Mubai puffed out his cheeks. “Alright, alright~” Women, he thought, never know how to run a household. It’s just borrowing a cart—why give so much brown sugar?

Although he’d agreed to his wife’s request, where there’s a will there’s a way. Wen Mubai tucked the sugar into his pocket and headed straight for his third sister-in-law’s house, the one who was technically his half-sister.

“Third Sister-in-law, are you home?”

Her husband came out, saw Wen Mubai, and his face dropped instantly. “What are you doing here?”

The lack of welcome was obvious.

A few children in the house eyed Wen Mubai with hostility. The youngest even started to wail. Wen Mubai seemed not to notice, standing at the door as straight as a poplar. “Third Sister-in-law.”

“Coming, coming, it’s Xiaobai!” Third Sister-in-law bustled out, pockets bulging. “So early, you haven’t had breakfast yet, have you? Here, these are some walnuts I found a few days ago. Have a snack.”

Her husband and the children glared at Wen Mubai with angry eyes. Unbothered, he opened his bag wide. “Thank you, Third Sister-in-law, I won’t stand on ceremony.”

“No need to be polite with me,” she said, shoveling more and more walnuts into his pocket. “Come back for more when you’re done. If you don’t come, I’ll be upset.”

“Alright.” Wen Mubai smiled sweetly. “Third Sister-in-law, do you have your handcart at home? Banxia and I want to gather firewood today, so we’d like to borrow it.”

“It’s here, it’s here. I’ll fetch it for you.” She seemed to have completely forgotten that her husband also needed the cart, and agreed without hesitation.

She even offered, “Want me to go help? I’m off work for a couple of days.”

Wen Mubai thought, that’d give the game away. He pouted in grievance, “No need, Third Sister-in-law. I’m afraid my big brother would be upset and complain to my wife about me again.”

Her eyes flashed. “He wouldn’t dare!”

Wen Mubai hurried to assure her that he didn’t want to cause discord in her household because of him; a little hardship and toil was nothing to him. She was so moved that she stuffed even more walnuts into his bag, nearly escorted him all the way home, and returned with a face full of emotion.

Back home, she turned on her husband and children. “What are you glaring at? Everything I gave is from my own share, none of yours. Who are you sulking at!”

Her husband fumed. “So we just lend that kid our handcart for nothing?”

“So what? My own brother borrows a cart and you want to charge him? Hu Huasheng, what kind of person are you? I must have been blind to marry you!”

“How’s he your brother? Isn’t your brother living just fine in Muzi Village?” he muttered under his breath.

“None of your business!” She rolled her eyes and marched back into the house.

What did these people know? All they cared about was that she was a mother, the wife of the Hu family. Only Xiaobai ever said that she was herself first, then someone’s mother, someone’s wife. These men, who never knew what was what, even ostracized Xiaobai—none of them could hold a candle to a single strand of his hair.

If it weren’t for his tigress of a wife keeping him in check, how could she go so long without seeing Xiaobai? Poor thing, he’d gotten so skinny, clearly from not having her to help him eat and sleep well.

No, she needed to let the other sisters know—Xiaobai mustn’t be allowed to suffer.

Unaware that Wen Mubai was up to his usual tricks, Tang Banxia steamed a pot of sweet buns and stir-fried some pickles, packed them in a basket, and waited for Wen Mubai to return with the cart. When he arrived, she locked the door. “Let’s go.”

In the village, there was no fixed spot for firewood gathering—anywhere was fair game, but there was one rule: you couldn’t chop down trees. Anyone caught would be criticized at a village meeting. But nobody tried it anyway; the mountain was big, and you could fill a cart with fallen branches without ever breaking the rules.

Wen Mubai was familiar with the mountain, so he led the way, choosing a seldom-trodden path, ignoring the lower slopes and heading straight for the depths. Along the way, they ran into other villagers, but everyone tacitly chose different directions, so there was never any conflict.

After quite a walk, the two finally stopped. “Let’s do it here,” Wen Mubai said, handing Tang Banxia a walnut. “Let’s rest a bit before we start. It’s a whole day—no rush.”

Tang Banxia blinked at the walnut. “Where did you get this?”

Wen Mubai blinked back. “Third Sister-in-law gave it to me.”

Tang Banxia’s smile faded. Wen Mubai hurried to explain, “I gave her something too—I didn’t take it for free.”

“As long as you did,” Tang Banxia admonished. “You’re a married man now, you need to keep your distance from other people’s wives. Think about it: if one day I cooked and sewed for another man, always thinking of giving him good things, would you be happy about it?”

“You wouldn’t!” Wen Mubai was supremely confident. “There’s no one in the village better looking than me.”

Tang Banxia was speechless. “What about the commune? The town? The county? No one better looking there, either?”

“Of course not!” Wen Mubai lifted his chin. “In your eyes, I’m the most handsome. You’d never look at anyone else.”

Tang Banxia: I surrender!

There was no competing with that thick skin.

“Let’s get to work.”

If they talked any longer, she was afraid she’d smack that pretty face with her shoe, and that would only break her own heart.

Wen Mubai, delighted, said, “Leave it to me.”

The one thing the mountains weren’t short of was firewood. The two of them took their time, and by noon had already filled a cart. Looking at the pile left behind, Tang Banxia was reluctant to leave it. “Why don’t you take a load down first, and come back for the rest so we can carry it back together?”

“Alright.”

Wen Mubai, too, couldn’t bear to leave the firewood behind. He briskly pushed the cart down the mountain.

While he was gone, Tang Banxia searched for herbs in the area. She was still on the mountainside, and there were no large wild animals about. Not that it would bother her if there were—after all, a doctor always has some means of self-defense, and she knew more than a few powders and concoctions…