Chapter 52
Zhou Yong and his two brothers were on vacation, after they received a month’s wages, they rushed to Qinghe Village and returned before dinner was to be cooked at home.
Zhou Yong and his brothers entered the courtyard, and Zhou Yuan’s sister-in-law, Zhou Li, was surprised when she saw Zhou Yong and the others coming back.
“Husband, why are you coming back so suddenly!”
When the elder sister-in-law Zhou Li called out, the second sister-in-law Zhou Yang and the third sister-in-law Zhou Wang came out one after another in the kitchen. Seeing that it was their husbands, they were happy to come forward to greet them.
The sharp eyes of the three women saw that the eldest, Zhou Yong, was carrying meat and a few packs of greased paper.
Zhou Li saw that Zhou Yong was carrying things among the three brothers, and mistakenly thought that Zhou Yong was the only one who bought those things and carried them home, and said angrily, “Why did you buy so many things?”
The elder sister-in-law Zhou Li stretched out her hand and wanted to take the things from her husband. After the others saw this meat then she’ll have to cook it in the kitchen. It meant that the other two got to eat meat for free She wanted to carry the oil paper bag back to her room because she didn’t want to share it with others thinking that it was something her husband bought.
Zhou Yong let the things be handed to her, “The meat will be cooked and eaten today. The candies and preserved fruits in the oil paper bags would be shared among everyone. The second and third younger brothers and I bought the things together.”
The second sister-in-law Zhou Yang, and the third sister-in-law Zhou Wang were greedy for what the eldest sister-in-law Zhou Li had, and they were also a little happy that they would have meat tonight without spending money. Immediately hands shot out, “Sister-in-law, we’ll get it for you.”
The three women shared the oil paper bags, and they insisted on holding one bag in each hand, lest someone secretly hide it.
Father Zhou and Mother Zhou came out of the house and saw the three sons coming back full of energy. They were immediately very happy.
Mother Zhou glanced at the oil paper bags in the hands of her three daughters-in-law. The sons rarely come back, they could only do so a few times a month- she was very happy and didn’t bother to discipline the three daughters-in-law.
“Are you the ones who bought this?”
Mother Zhou asked so because her son-in-law is very generous. The last time the three sons came back temporarily, they brought back a lot of sauces from the grocery store. The family used the sauces to cook vegetables every day and the villagers are envious of the smell.
Who in the village doesn’t know that her son-in-law is generous and often buys things for their family?
Mother Zhou would not have thought that the three sons bought it. The last time the three sons came back to tell the family that they had not officially started working for a long time, and they were selling goods in the county every day.
It’s been half a month since they last came back, and she didn’t think her sons had already earned the money to buy such things when coming home.
We’re sorry for MTLers or people who like using reading mode, but our translations keep getting stolen by aggregators so we’re going to bring back the copy protection. If you need to MTL please retype the gibberish parts.
Zhou Yong smiled heartily, “Wei Cheng wanted to buy it, but we wouldn’t let him buy it. This time, your first son and his second and third brothers bought it together.”
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It’s not good for the villagers to be so jealous and hot-eyed.
And as a son, how can he be filial to his parents if every time, Wei Cheng takes the lead?
“Have you received your wages?” Father Zhou asked.
Their second son, Zhou Shan, replied, “It’s still my father who is amazing, and guessed it right.”
Father Zhou smiled as he found his son’s words very pleasant.
Zhou Yong said to his parents, “Me, my second and third brothers have all received our wages, this time it’s our three brothers’ turn to buy delicious food and come home to honor you.”
Father Zhou and Mother Zhou suddenly smiled, they didn’t care how much their sons earned, and they were happy with their son’s kindness.
Father Zhou and Mother Zhou didn’t ask Zhou Yong how much wages they received, but the elder sister-in-law Zhou Li’s sister and the other wives were eager to know how much wages their husbands received.
“How much did you get paid?”
Sister-in-law Zhou Li’s temperament is always the loudest among the three sisters-in-law.
The smiles of Father Zhou and Mother Zhou faded.
Zhou Yong glared at his wife, and Zhou Li’s neck flinched. Ever since she quarreled with Yuan-ger last time when Yuan-ger went back to the county seat alone, she found that her husband would sometimes get angry with her, and although he didn’t scold her directly, she couldn’t say anything more without a look.
“Let us go back to the house and talk about it.”
Father Zhou spoke, and the Zhou’s family members went back to the house.
The three Zhou brothers took out their remaining wages from their pockets and put all the wages on the table. Looking at the silver taels and copper coins on the table, the family members exclaimed, “So much!”
Zhou Yong said, “This month, my second brother and I received two taels of wages. The third brother sold better than us, and received two taels and one hundred wen wages.”
Father Zhou was surprised and asked, “Do you earn so much a month as a salesman?”
Or did their son-in-law raise his salary?
“Eldest, tell the truth, is it because our son-in-law takes care of you in private and pays you a lot of money?” Mother Zhou and Father Zhou thought of the same things.
“Father, mother, are we that kind of people? Wei Cheng wanted to give us more wages in private but we didn’t want it. This is what we earn through our hard work. There is a corresponding commission for how many things we sell every day and ours is not too much, There is a peddler named Wu Da. He has sold things from our brother-in-law before. He has accumulated many regular customers and he finds it much easier to sell than ours. My brother-in-law said that Wu Da sold to a small wealthy family in the outer county and his salary is more than three taels of silver a month just from that house.”
“Three taels—!”
The Zhou family exclaimed again!
Father Zhou and Mother Zhou heard the eldest son say that they sell things and accumulate customers… These words are not quite clear, but they still understand that their sons’ wages are earned by their hard work.
It is a good thing that their sons gained a lot of knowledge when they went to work with their son-in-law.
“Mother, I will leave the silver to you for collection. We have discussed it. We will hand over most of our monthly wages to you, and keep a small part for our use. Most of it will be handed over to mother, and we’ll let mother help save it so that when the children grow older, we can send them to school.”
The three brothers studied with their brother-in-law, and the most troublesome thing they had to do was to learn how to read every day. They knew some, but most of them were things they couldn’t read.
They are not as smart as their youngest ger, who was like their mother. He was well-behaved and obedient when he was young, and he learned characters quickly. The three of them grew up wild in the village, and they would rather run out to play than learn characters.
After learning business from their brother-in-law, they realized the importance of knowledge.
They handed over most of it to prevent their wives from taking the money away. If they keep more, the money will be taken by their wives and they will secretly subsidize their mother’s family if they take it.
They kept hundreds of Wen for them because they still love them very much, no matter how bad they are, they are their wives and the mothers of their children.
“Okay, Mother will save for you, if you don’t have enough money, ask Mother for more.”
The three women watched Mother Zhou collect the money but they didn’t dare to bring up any dissatisfaction in their hearts. In the past, half of the money they earned was handed over to their households, it was like peeling their skin off.
These were silver taels, there was one or two of them, but now they were gone.
In the eyes of the three, they only lost money, and they didn’t think that their husbands were using this to beat them and were dissatisfied with their behavior.
The three brothers knew that their wives had objections to their ger not marrying and staying at home. This was normal for rural people, and it wasn’t too much. Their ger was protected by them so in the past, no matter how much their wives had objections to their ger, they couldn’t truly bully him.
However, after the last time, after the incident happened when their ger returned to his mother’s house, the three brothers finally understood that their wives hated their ger not because he was not married but because it was they who let things go too far, which made it normal for them to be dissatisfied with their ger.
Their brother-in-law said privately that the three sisters-in-law were not under control in the Zhou family. It was because his father-in-law and mother-in-law had good personalities, and the three elder brothers did not take the responsibility of being in charge of the house.
The three sisters-in-law took their attitudes into account, stepped on the bottom line of the family when doing things, and scolded Yuan-ger at will when they were dissatisfied. They didn’t care about it, which made them form a habit of bad attitude towards Yuan-ger, and it became a matter of course to subsidize their mother’s family.
If the three sisters-in-law are ignored, and the family earns money in the future, the three sisters-in-law will have more money on hand, and they will use more money to subsidize their mother’s family, and they will have a confident attitude towards this family.
*
At night, when they went back to their rooms.
Most of the copper coins on the three brothers were taken away by them.
Zhou Li took the money and thought about the lost money, complaining non-stop.
The second sister-in-law Zhou Yang muttered as she put away the money thinking that less is better than none.
The third sister-in-law, Zhou Wang, was very considerate. She put away the money that Zhou San handed in. Her expression was as gentle as usual, and dissatisfaction flashed in her lowered eyes, but she was very smart and said nothing.
The third sister-in-law Zhou Wang squeezed the money in her hand and put it in her private purse. She gave birth to a daughter in this family. If she gave birth to a son, she could use the son as an excuse to make her husband give less!
If you don’t have a son, you are doomed to have no confidence.
The next day, the three brothers were at home on vacation. They only come back three or four days a month so it was rare for them to come back. Their sons and daughters were very happy, pestering them all morning, and then when they sent the children out to play, they were still very happy. Their dear dads have given them their own pocket money for two wen, they’ll find the peddlers to buy sweets and then find their friends to show off.
The three brothers of the Zhou family didn’t know if they didn’t follow their brother-in-law too much, and learned from him to sit leisurely and drink tea whenever they had time. They don’t drink tea, but boiled water, and the three brothers sit in the yard to enjoy the cool.
It’s rare to have time to relax, and it doesn’t feel bad.
The three brothers were lamenting that life is so comfortable but their wives were looking for trouble.
Thanks for the chapter <3
How did such good men get such messy wives smh 😒
It’s called normalization… giving roles and conforming to stereotype like: wives are naggy and they hold the money and men should stay silent and just work… convoluted things like that compound and turns our lives into misery.
Oh they are, they are… =.= I can’t understand their way of thinking at all
Thank You for the new chapter (๑˙❥˙๑)
I feel so bad for these guys to have married such terrible women!