A Young Woman's Heart

Perhaps it's because she's always been so beautiful and delicate-looking.

Even if she runs around with everyone in the summer, she won't get much tanned and will still be the fairest of the children.

As for her delicate facial features, they have remained the same since she was a child.

At first, she felt a sense of novelty when she met these childhood friends with whom she had spent some time together, and greeted them one by one.

But as the topics of conversation dwindled and the silences between them increased, she began to feel a bit bored.

These guys were chattering and making a racket around her, giving her a bit of a headache.

If she could, all she wanted to do right now was to stay quietly with Li Wanyan by the fire.

Mo Xueyao suddenly realized that her relatively quiet nature was actually quite comforting.

Being quiet means you won't be annoying!

Everyone seemed to sense the distance between themselves and Mo Xueyao, so they all found excuses to leave.

Many of the more childlike kids even went outside to build snowmen and have snowball fights with the younger children.

"Yaoyao, aren't you going to play with them?" her mother asked, puzzled.

Someone explained for her, "Haha, the girl has grown up, of course she shouldn't be playing with these young men anymore!"

"That's it!"

Mo Xueyao lowered her eyelids, wanting to explain, but in the end she could only say that she was afraid of the cold and didn't want to go out.

She did not deny what others said.

It's not just the changes in her identity, status, and gender that have created a distance between her and everyone else, but it's also undeniable that the fact that "the girl has grown up" is a contributing factor.

Or perhaps this is actually included in the reasons that lead to the estrangement!

Of course, the firewood couldn't burn indefinitely, and eventually it burned out little by little.

Grandma scooped out the ashes and poured them into an iron basket.

The embers, still faintly glowing, can provide some warmth, and importantly, they are convenient to carry around to other places.

In the countryside, you'll see that everything is used to its fullest potential.

Almost every bit of value was utilized.

From this perspective, it seems that people in rural areas are closer to the concept of 'environmental protection'!

Mo Xueyao couldn't help but make fun of herself in her heart.

Of course she knew that burning firewood was definitely not an environmentally friendly practice.

"It feels like time has flown by. It's already New Year's Eve. It seems like I'm not ready to welcome the New Year yet." Mo Xueyao warmed her hands over the embers and gently nudged Li Wanyan beside her.

"Hmm? Hmm." Li Wanyan was a little distracted and hesitated for a few seconds before responding, "Time flies."

"Let's stay up all night tonight! Let's stay up past midnight!" Thinking of this, Mo Xueyao suddenly became excited.

For her, who usually goes to bed early and gets up early, New Year's Day is the only day when she can legitimately stay up all night.

"it is good."

"Oh right, we also need to set off firecrackers... Should we set them off at night or during the day? It's still snowing outside..."

Bao Cheng, who had just gone to have a snowball fight with everyone, ran back soaking wet. He borrowed a dry towel from Mo Xueyao's grandmother and vigorously wiped his down jacket: "Xiaoyao, let's go have a snowball fight!"

What's wrong with you?

"Haha, you got pelted with over a dozen snowballs! Hurry back and wipe yourself off, or you'll get soaked! Come on, let's have a snowball fight! Didn't you used to love it?"

"Ah..." Mo Xueyao scratched her head and pulled Li Wanyan to stand up together. "Then... shall we... go?"

"Don't you dare bully our two girls, or they'll come after you if they catch a cold or fever!" the mother said, half-jokingly and half-seriously.

"Don't worry, I'll protect them!" Bao Cheng, whose dark skin appeared even more striking against the white snow, patted his chest vigorously and answered with a loud laugh.

……

Chapter Thirty-Five: The East Wind Blows a Thousand Trees of Flowers

Sometimes a day is very long, and sometimes a day is very short.

The day of New Year's Eve always feels somewhere in between—both long and short.

Perhaps we were all still young at heart, and the awkwardness caused by not seeing each other for a long time quickly faded away as we played in the snow and set off firecrackers together.

Mo Xueyao also felt a genuine and unpretentious joy.

Although she had a lot of fun, she ended up getting her clothes all dirty—even though she was being careful, she still inevitably fell a few times.

Li Wanyan also joined in the snowball fight, and her clothes, like Li Wanyan's, became soaking wet.

When the two returned home, she seemed even more apprehensive than Mo Xueyao.

Surprisingly, the mother showed concern for the somewhat disheveled couple – a smile that hinted at knowing this would happen.

"Your clothes are ready. Go take a shower first. You can't eat New Year's Eve dinner all dirty like this, can you?"

"Ah..." Mo Xueyao was a little surprised, and scratched her head even more embarrassedly, "Where did we go to take a bath again?"

“You can wash in the village, but you two definitely wouldn’t be able to stand it.”

"Oh..." Mo Xueyao remembered how she used to take baths when she was a child.

My grandmother's house didn't actually have a bathroom; even the toilet consisted of two wooden tubs—not modern ones.

One was for urination and the other for defecation. During the day, they had to be carried out and thrown away, otherwise the smell would be unbearable even in winter, after two or three days.

When I was a child, we would take a big basin and wash ourselves on the second floor near the terrace.

Firstly, it's uncomfortable, and secondly, it's easy to catch a cold.

This is probably why people in the countryside rarely take baths in winter.

So in winter, if a child gets dirty, they're bound to get a beating, because for people with weaker constitutions, every bath in winter can easily lead to catching a cold...

"You guys go to Jietan to shower, there are public bathrooms there. Yaoyao, have your cousin take you there on his motorcycle."

"Jettan?" Mo Xueyao didn't know if that was the name from where it was called or if it was a local dialect, but she repeated it after imitating her mother's pronunciation.

"Not far."

Jietan is the largest village closest to my maternal grandmother's house.

It is located halfway to the 'town'.

"Where's my cousin?" Mo Xueyao didn't know anyone from her hometown, but she wasn't actually that familiar with her maternal grandmother's relatives either.

She looked around and finally saw a young man who bore a resemblance to her grandfather sitting astride a motorcycle, waiting for her.

He didn't open his umbrella, and snowflakes were already falling on his head. With a gentle shake, they fell down like dandruff.

"Cousin?" Mo Xueyao asked tentatively.

"You're here? Did you bring a change of clothes? Did you bring soap? Here, put on your raincoats, or you can wear them when you come back!"

"What about you?"

"Me? I don't need it."

"Aren't you going to take a shower?"

"Wash it?"

"Won't you get soaked in the snow when you come back?"

"Hahaha, this little bit of snow is nothing to me... to a man!" My cousin deftly put a cigarette in his mouth and lit it with a flint and steel with a few clicks.

Smoke billowed in the snowy air, drifting upwards in a crooked and distorted manner.

Mo Xueyao got on the motorcycle first, followed closely by Li Wanyan—the motorcycle wasn't particularly spacious, so she had a good reason to hold onto the former tightly.

With a roar, the red motorcycle broke through the drifting snowflakes and nimbly sped forward along the country road.

It's even faster than a car.

Because there was no protection around her, Mo Xueyao felt a little nervous.

The farmland on both sides rushed past, and the howling cold wind made Mo Xueyao's breathing become rapid.

"Xiaoyao, you've grown up now."

"Yes, why?" Mo Xueyao certainly still remembered her cousin, but her memory of him was already very vague.

After all, it's been three or four years since I last went back to my maternal grandmother's house, hasn't it?

My cousin seemed to have already started working by then...

No, to be precise, he didn't have a proper job at all. He basically worked for a month and rested for a month. He had done all sorts of things, but he couldn't hold down any one job for long. He also changed girlfriends one after another.

"Do you remember? I took you for a bike ride back then, and we both rushed into the fields!"

Uh... do I?

"Hahaha, of course I did, but you didn't even cry back then!"

"What's there to cry about?" Mo Xueyao pouted. "Cousin, when did you buy this motorcycle?"

"Hey... guess how much it costs?"

"Hmm...two thousand yuan?"

"Hahaha, two hundred!"

Why is it so cheap?

“Because I bought a car that someone stole.” His tone was tinged with pride. “It’s a car belonging to a rich kid in the city. Hehe, stealing it and selling it to me is like robbing the rich to help the poor.”

"That's not a good idea..."

"What's the big deal? It's not like I didn't pay!"

Mo Xueyao rolled her eyes. Sometimes, she really felt that her values ​​were very different from theirs.

Having grown up in a big city, she always preferred to follow the rules.