How I Tamed My Wolfish Husband Back in 80s-Chapter 82: Grandiose Display_1

"Third Sister, you’re bringing pancakes this week."Li Jinhua’s eyes lit up; she instantly felt her own food wasn’t as appetizing, "I’m still bringing sorghum buns."

Li Qiao didn’t understand why Li Jinhua said this, was she hinting that she should share her pancakes? "I only brought one piece, and after this meal, I’ll have to eat rice."

"Have to? Li Qiao, what exactly does your man do? You eat rice or bread every day; your household must be in good conditions."

"What can a loser do?" Liu Lanlan mimicked Qin Jin’s identity.

Li Qiao gave Liu Lanlan a glance, "My man got a quota slip from the supply and marketing cooperative, and now he has proper work, busying himself with the supply every day." She took a bamboo woven pen holder out of her net bag, "This is a pen holder my grandmother made."

Hu Xiufang took it and examined, "How delicate, the phoenix painted on it looks just like a real one. How much does one cost?"

"Two or three dimes, I guess."

Hu Xiufang gasped, "That expensive?"

"This is considered cheap; the expensive ones use bamboo strips nearly as thick as pasta, polished and woven afterward. They can sell for around forty cents each, but you can only make two or three of those a day."

"Is it all made by your grandmother?"

"It was before, but now grandma has taken the village aunts as apprentices, teaching them and giving them pointers." Li Qiao said, "If you need any, you can buy them from me. I can sell these to you for twenty cents each."

"A bamboo basket sells for only twenty cents; you’re charging too much."

"I wouldn’t want it even if it was free," Liu Lanlan muttered.

Li Qiao countered, "Don’t worry, no one is going to offer it to you for free." She continued to argue, "Bamboo baskets are everyday necessities, whereas pen holders are handicrafts; it’s the style and craftsmanship that are being sold, and there’s no comparison between the two."

"Aren’t they both just bamboo?"

Li Qiao felt the conversation was going nowhere, so she packed away the pen holder.

.....

After breakfast, everyone walked to the classroom in small groups.

Li Jinhua took the initiative to link arms with Li Qiao.

Which Li Qiao pulled away from.

Seeing this, Hu Xiufang took a step to leave ahead of time.

Li Jinhua said, "Third Sister, where did Brother-in-law get this work from? Talk to him about taking Dad along to do it? That way our family can become wealthy, and when you come back home, people will praise you for being filial, and you’ll have face."

Li Qiao was speechless; Jinhua was actually eyeing a partnership.

These days, earning money was so hard; why would anyone who finally found an opportunity want to share it? "I’m not filial? Before New Year, our family had food for one meal and worried about the next. Your mother took my expensive dowry; why didn’t she think to give some of it to us to help out with the household expenses?"

It was Qin Jin’s first time traveling far from home, and the porridge at home got thinner by the day.

Others ate sorghum buns.

She and her grandmother drank watery gruel, one bowl per meal, scraping the pot cleaner than if it had been scrubbed.

No sooner had that gruel settled in her stomach than she would be hungry within an hour.

Several times, while feeding the rabbits, she picked up a knife but couldn’t bring herself to kill one.

If Qin Jin had been away for another two days, she might have done it.

Yet there was her grandmother, preparing cigarettes, liquor, meat, and eggs to give as gifts.

She couldn’t have been more thorough.

Was she not being filial?

It was Dong Lamei who didn’t measure up as an elder. She, living in the new millennium, knew full well that elders should give red envelopes to newlyweds in their first year of marriage.

Yet they didn’t give red envelopes.

The more she thought about it, the angrier she became.

She added, "Every time I hear you and your mom spout those sanctimonious reasons, I truly feel cursed!" She walked away.

Li Jinhua: "...." I’m cursed?

You’re the cursed one!

If it weren’t for you, the outsider, I would’ve been with Qin Jin by now.

Just wait!

Your days are numbered.

In the following week.

Li Jinhua observed Li Qiao’s complexion daily.

Dark circles were prominent, and her eyes were lifeless.

She believed that Li Qiao wouldn’t last the forty-nine days.

Hu Xiufang also noticed Li Qiao’s dark circles getting heavier, "You should really rest. And about that talisman, though I’m not superstitious, it still feels unlucky to carry it around. Better get rid of it sooner."

Li Qiao: "I put it somewhere else. I’ll just keep at it today, and I’ll catch up on sleep early on Saturday."

"What kind of willpower supports you to work so hard? Tell me about it, maybe it will motivate me too," Hu Xiufang said, yawning. She got up at five-thirty in the morning and went to bed at nine-thirty at night, too exhausted from studying all day, and she would even take a nap at noon.

Li Qiao never rested, as if injected with chicken blood.

Li Qiao: "Because I don’t want to be a farmer digging river ditches and tilling the soil, it’s too hard. I want to be successful in the future, provide for my grandmother in her old age, establish my own network to help my partner find a stable job."

Hu Xiufang: "Doesn’t your partner have a job now? Weaving should be quite profitable, shouldn’t it?"

"It won’t last a lifetime," Li Qiao said. Those woven goods might last a few years at most. Once beautiful glass and porcelain vases become widespread, those things will be phased out.

As for the supply and marketing co-op.

She had only read about it in history books.

She had to remind Gao Dagang to plan ahead for a better career.

Don’t wait until getting laid off when getting older.

Then, with elderly parents and young children.

Life would become difficult.

.....

On Saturday, when Hu Xiufang was planning to go home and saw that Li Qiao decided to stay at the dorm, she changed her mind. Since Li Qiao, an excellent student, was still putting in the effort, what right did she have to slack off? She asked a classmate from her village to bring some food for her over the weekend.

With a companion, Li Qiao happily said, "I was just worrying about being scared alone in the dorm at night."

"Isn’t there someone in the dorm next door?" Hu Xiufang laughed at herself, "Ah, if I had the energy I have now during last year’s exams, I surely would have passed. It’s all because I slacked off."

"There’s still time," Li Qiao comforted her.

After lunch, Hu Xiufang worked on practice problems while Li Qiao slept. When she woke up, it was nearly evening, and she went out with Hu Xiufang to buy two baked buns. After chatting for a while and washing up,

Li Qiao sat on her bed reading a novel.

Hu Xiufang continued with her workbook, "What are you reading? Aren’t you doing the newspaper anymore?"

Li Qiao: "I stopped. It’s the novel we bought together before, ’How Steel Is Made.’ I read it before but didn’t feel much. Now, I suddenly have a bit of personal connection to it." She flipped through a dozen pages, then put down the book, covered herself with the blanket, and went to sleep.

When turning over, she reached into the pillowcase and pulled out the yellow talisman. freewebnøvel.coɱ

Hu Xiufang, who was in the lower bunk across from Li Qiao, raised her eyes and could see what was happening on the upper bunk, "Didn’t you say you put it somewhere else? Why are you still holding onto it? Did Liu Lanlan put it there to curse you?"

Zhao Li became honest, so she could be ruled out.

Liu Lanlan, who jeered at Li Qiao both openly and secretly all day, seemed capable of such a deed.

Li Qiao said solemnly, "Li Jinhua has more motive than Liu Lanlan."

Liu Lanlan wore her scheming on her face, but Li Jinhua plotted in secrecy.

"That can’t be right? You are sisters after all," Hu Xiufang said in disbelief.

"Not sisters by blood. She was brought back by my stepmother," Li Qiao confessed family matters to Hu Xiufang for the first time, deeming her a trustworthy person after spending some time together.

Hu Xiufang: "No wonder. But your stepmother agreed to let you go to school, so she must be decent, right? Maybe Jinhua feels like you took away her mother’s love."

Li Qiao scoffed, "Bullshit! My education depended entirely on my two elder sisters who fought for me. They were both beautiful and got married into families that offered high dowries, not keeping a single cent for themselves." She had figured out the truth, "When I get married, my stepmother took a dowry of a hundred and one..."

Li Qiao couldn’t help but vent.