" Do you really have to do this?" Old Master Tong looked at the women who were leaving his house after drinking and eating with his daughter while happily carrying the couplets which his daughter had written with a smile on their faces and disdainfully snorted.
His daughter was so much better than those village women who could not even string two words together much less write a couplet and yet now his daughter who had always been proud was reduced to this point where she had to act solicitously with these uneducated women.
Second Aunt Yu rubbed her forehead and turned to look at her father who was frowning while looking at the village women and hurriedly closed the door when she saw that her father was silently glaring at the women.
" Don't find trouble unnecessarily, Father," Second Aunt Yu told her father when she saw that he was not happy. " We are already ostracized by the villagers, if writing a few couplets can help us gain some goodwill from the rest of the villagers, there is nothing to lose all right?"
After living with her father for so long, Second Aunt Yu knew that he despite being the same as the rest of the women in the village looked down on them because he gave birth to her.
Usually, Second Aunt Yu had no qualms with Old Master Tong acting all haughty with the villagers but this was a crucial time for her. She was being suppressed by the woman who was promoted to the position of manager in the mill where she worked, if she wanted to make a turnaround, she had to make sure that Yu Dong would stand by her side.
This was the reason why she could not allow her father to cause a disturbance.
When Old Master Tong heard that he had to gain the goodwill of the village women, he was very dissatisfied. He headed towards his bedroom while muttering as he said, " I am not saying that I am not willing to show some charity but look at how much those women ate!? They ate away half a pot of dried nuts that you brought from the trip to the city of mazes. How can I not find them disgraceful? It's all right if they want to eat, I am not petty to stop them but eating until the pot is half? How can that be done?!"
As Old Master Tong looked down at the pot which he was carrying in his hands, he felt his heart ache. These dried nuts were so expensive that he could not buy them ever again which was why he couldn't bear to eat them but now he had to serve these nuts to those women who simply lacked tact!
Second Aunt Yu also felt dissatisfied when she thought of how those women ate the nuts until nothing was left, she only put them in front of them for show. They should have been smart enough to eat only a single bite and then leave the rest but instead, they continued to eat until the whole bowl was empty!
How disgraceful!
What Second Aunt Yu did not know was that the women of her village were much simple and honest. They did not learn the schemes which Second Aunt Yu learned while working in the town thus they did not know how to pretend and thus ate the nuts without any qualms, while thinking that Second Aunt Yu was willingly sharing those nuts with them.
If they knew that she was this unwilling, they would not have taken a bite!
While Second Aunt Yu was rubbing her forehead, she heard a gagging sound behind her which caused her to turn around and look at her father who was pressing a fist against his mouth while trying to stop the meal he ate to come out of his mouth.
Seeing him like this, Second Aunt Yu couldn't help but frown as she asked, " What is wrong with you? Why are you throwing up on the eve of the new year ?"
Old Master Tong's expression was really pale as he turned his back to his daughter and touched his belly carefully before turning to look at Second Aunt Yu and saying in a soft voice and an embarrassed smile, " I think it's because I ate stale rice."
Since they were no longer a large family, there were a lot of leftovers nowadays. With Second Aunt Yu's attitude, she refused to eat leftovers and only wanted warm meals because of this Old Master Tong was the one who had to take care of the leftovers.
He couldn't bear to throw them away nor could he push his daughter to eat them which was why he ate them all without a complaint.
Because of this Second Aunt Yu did not doubt him and nodded. She turned her back on her father while she continued to write a couplet.
On the other hand, Old Master Tong who was smiling till now stopped smiling as soon as he turned to look at the front and rushed inside his room and took a look at his reflection in the small mirror that his daughter brought for him while she was on a trip.
He pushed the bangs which were covering his forehead and saw that the cinnabar mark which was in the shape of a red lotus was glowing brightly clearly showing his pregnancy.
" What am I supposed to do?" Old Master Tong muttered nervously under his breath, he had been fooling around with one of the young women of the village. He thought that she will marry him out of sincerity but soon he realised that he was too naive.
Even after offering his body to that woman, he realised that she had no intention of marrying him.
It was just that she liked old mers like him which was why she hooked up with widowers and divorced mers like him.
From start to finish, she did not wish to take responsibility for him. Now that he was carrying her child, what was he supposed to do?