A Young Woman's Heart

"Tsk, I knew it. So who are they?"

Bao Cheng didn't answer directly, but just glanced inside and asked, "Where's that kid, A-Guang?"

"They're cooking inside."

"Haha, this is the tomboy who used to roll around in the mud with us when we were little—uh, you don't know him, and that's his cousin."

"Oh, why don't you go in and have some fun? I'll be right back after delivering the honey."

"Okay, I just came to pick up the honey—I paid for it beforehand."

"Ask A-Guang, I don't know." The young woman shook her head. She looked up at Mo Xueyao with envy, her gaze lingering on Mo Xueyao's blue eyes for a moment before she quickly walked outside again.

With the Lunar New Year approaching, everyone seems to be exceptionally busy...

Bao Cheng walked in on his own, as if he were in his own courtyard.

Mo Xueyao hurriedly followed her inside.

The young man named A-Guang had just brought out the dishes and placed them on the large round table in the spacious living room.

He had grown a beard and was no longer the same person he was as a child. Mo Xueyao tried hard to recall, but she couldn't match him with the mischievous child she remembered.

Bao Cheng was explaining their identities when A Guang looked at him with surprise.

Then came some somewhat awkward small talk.

He mostly talked about the past, while Mo Xueyao listened quietly.

Li Wanyan wasn't very interested in the topic at hand. She squatted outside the door and stroked the head of the big dog sitting upright in the yard.

Now that it has seen them, it has stopped barking and is wagging its tail vigorously to show its friendliness.

Finally, A-Guang picked up two jars of honey and shoved them into Mo Xueyao's arms: "Come on, come on, it's rare for you to come back, take two jars of honey back with you."

"Uh, no, maybe we don't need to?"

"Yes, yes, it's just two bottles of honey, nothing valuable," he said with a worldly modest humility.

However, when he was a child, he was the kind of guy who wouldn't even share a single honey with anyone...

This small mountain village has undergone only a few changes, yet it is completely different from what I remember.

She seemed to sense a profound sense of change and transformation.

……

Chapter Thirty-Four: The Twenty-Ninth Day of the Twelfth Lunar Month

There are 365 days in a year, and so many things can happen.

But every year-end, it still feels like it's gone by too fast.

Life always seems a bit hazy, and the passage of time can never be grasped.

Mo Xueyao didn't get up on her own.

In fact, no one called her.

The noise from people bustling about downstairs was so loud that it practically dragged her out of her dreams.

The sky outside was gray, with some lights still on that could be vaguely seen.

Occasionally, a beam of flashlight would shine from around a corner along the narrow paths of the mountain village, causing Mo Xueyao, who was lying on the bed, to squint.

"What time is it...?" Mo Xueyao groggily grabbed the expensive watch on the bedside table and glanced at the time in the light from the window.

The hour hand is clearly pointing to the six, while the minute hand has just passed 'twelve'.

For people in the countryside, six o'clock in the morning is just as busy as nine o'clock in the city.

Mo Xueyao put down the watch she had won at her godfather's annual party, and her fair, delicate arms shrank back into the blankets. The air, mixed with the scent of snowflakes, made her shiver involuntarily.

"It's so cold..."

"What time?" Li Wanyan turned over and gently hugged her.

"It's only six o'clock... Hah... But it's so noisy downstairs..." Mo Xueyao muttered, pouting, and pulled the blanket over her head. "I'll sleep a little longer..."

Before he could finish speaking, he heard someone climbing up the creaking wooden stairs.

"Yaoyao, get up and go downstairs for breakfast. Mustard greens, porridge, and hot egg porridge."

Back in the countryside, my mother seems to have started to mix local dialect with Mandarin.

Mo Xueyao suddenly understood why people who had studied abroad always had a few English words mixed in with their speech.

"Isn't it too early..."

"It's getting late, it's already seven o'clock."

"You're kidding me... I just checked the time..." Mo Xueyao mumbled, huddled under the covers, "It's too cold, I can't get up, I'll sleep a little longer..."

"Get up! Lots of your old friends are downstairs! Don't you want to go play?"

“I’m not a primary school student…” Mo Xueyao poked her head out speechlessly.

"Hurry up, get up!"

"I know—" was the only reply she could give.

In this snowy mountain village, getting up is no easy task.

The cold air seemed to have a weight, pressing the quilt tightly against Mo Xueyao's body.

She struggled for a long time before finally managing to reach out and drag her sweater and fleece-lined leggings into the bedding.

Only after warming the two pieces of clothing and hearing her mother calling from downstairs did she finally put them on and then scrambled off the bed.

"Aren't you getting up yet?" The stairs creaked again. Bao Cheng was carrying a bowl of rice and was walking up when he saw Mo Xueyao, wearing only leggings, crawling out of bed. He quickly took two steps back. "You're up?"

"Yes." Mo Xueyao yawned widely, as if she were at home, and lazily put on the dress.

"Ah chirp!"

"Yaoyao, do you want to wear cotton pants today? Won't it be too cold to wear a skirt?" Her mother's loud voice rang out again.

"Oh well, I'm already dressed..." She staggered downstairs.

There are many relatives downstairs, some I know and some I don't.

"How pretty! You're wearing a skirt in winter!"

Some people joked about it.

Even if Mo Xueyao heard it, she pretended not to know anything.

After finally finishing washing up at the door, she immediately hid back inside.

Her aunt was burning firewood when she saw her running back and beckoned to her, "Xiao Yao, come here, it's warm here."

The fire on the stove was burning brightly, and the flames made the walls glow red.

These are some of her more familiar relatives.

But we don't actually interact that much, so we still feel a bit distant.

However, the warmth of the firelight still drew her over.

The aunt touched her thigh hard, whether out of envy or nostalgia for her youth, she said: "Oh my, these thighs feel so good to touch. I wonder how many men they must have charmed."

The other adults immediately understood and couldn't help but laugh.

Mo Xueyao pursed her lips. She wasn't embarrassed at all by this teasing that had a slightly adult connotation. It wasn't like she didn't understand; sometimes the jokes between girls were even more explicit than this!

It's perfectly normal for people to talk about food and sex, since these are basic human needs.

The advantage of being a child is that you don't have to think about anything; the bowl of white porridge was handed to her by an adult.

A hard-boiled egg, broken in half, was placed in the bowl, with a few drops of soy sauce on top, which turned the white porridge black.

The aunt even took out some meat floss she had brought from the cupboard and sprinkled it on the white porridge for Mo Xueyao.

"Okay, this is how you eat it, it'll definitely taste good."

Mo Xueyao didn't mind at all; in fact, she had no appetite in the morning, so it didn't matter what she ate.

She was warming herself by the fire when Li Wanyan came downstairs.

The two were wearing similar styles of clothes, only slightly different colors.

Whether it was because they had lived together for a long time or because of their clothes, many people thought the two were sisters.

When their mother said no, they didn't believe her. They even pointed out similarities between the two and insisted on proving that they were born of the same mother...

"Wanyan, this way." Mo Xueyao moved over to make room for Li Wanyan.

Earthen stoves typically have two fire holes; the inner one is used for cooking rice, while the outer one is used for cooking other dishes.

In the far corner of the wall, there was a pile of dry firewood, some of which was still slightly damp and seemed to carry a faint woody fragrance.

The roaring fire in the stove dispelled the chill, allowing Mo Xueyao to finally calm down and appreciate the snow outside.

My maternal grandmother's house was a two-and-a-half-story mud-brick house.

If you look up, you can see the tall wooden beams.

The ground was uneven, with some areas wavy and others resembling the surface of the moon, covered with craters.

The ground was white, somewhat like the color of an ant nest.

Perhaps they used clay back then?

Mo Xueyao speculated in her mind.

When I was a child, I asked the adults, but they couldn't really explain it either—anyway, it was that kind of clay that was used, and the craftsmen who came to do the work all knew about it.

Lunar New Year's Eve is an exceptionally lively day.

Many of his childhood friends, having heard that the "tomboy" from back then had grown up, came to visit him...

Some people are still as lively and mischievous as before, some have become much more mature, and some have undergone a complete personality change, as if they were completely different people.

Surprisingly, everyone was quite accepting of the fact that Mo Xueyao was a 'tomboy'.