Chapter 197: I Just Want to Cry
The weather gradually became warmer, and Zhou Qian now woke up at 5 a.m. every day to work in the vegetable garden. However, today, just as he swung his hoe, he suddenly heard a sound coming from Huai Yu’s room—
“Ahhhhhhh!!!”
He held the hoe and stood there, feeling that the sound didn’t seem like fear, but more like impotent fury.
A moment later, he heard a muffled sound of a pillow being struck from inside the room. This wasn’t anything unusual. After the catastrophe, those with physical abilities suitable for military defense had subtle enhancements in their physical qualities and senses.
What on earth was going on this early in the morning?
He put down the hoe, hesitated, and walked over, knocking on the door. “Xiao Yu?”
After a moment, various loud sounds came from inside, and the door was suddenly flung open with a loud crash against the wall.
Huai Yu, her hair in disarray and her pale face tinged with a slight blush, seemed to be practically exuding fire—
(╬◣д◢)!
Zhou Qian fell silent.
It was pretty rare for someone to get so worked up over a nap.
He became interested. “What’s wrong? Didn’t you eat a full banquet in your dream?”
“No.”
Huai Yu’s voice was filled with resentment and anger, speaking in an eerie tone. “I’m filthy.”
Zhou Qian: “???”
He didn’t dare respond directly to that and hesitated for a while before asking, “What exactly happened?”
Huai Yu seemed to collapse, grabbing her hair, her face filled with desperation as she looked at him. “What do I do? What do I do? I dreamt of my ex-boyfriend! His name is really Wu Yue!”
Hiss!
Now, Zhou Qian’s expression also darkened.
Huai Yu seemed to have found a vent for her frustration, and her words flowed out in a rush.
“I never thought this would happen! What did I do in the past? I just went up the mountain to pick mushrooms, trying to make a little money, and then I ran into this kind of person?”
“And what about me? How am I so useless? I’m so poor that I have to pick mushrooms for money, yet I still think about dating! Shouldn’t I focus on getting rich first?”
“No, no, no! It’s not that I’m useless! It’s that the other person is shameless and calculating!”
“I’m so gentle, kind, generous, and self-reliant. I must have had terrible luck to meet such an ex-boyfriend. Now, I’m so embarrassed. I’ll never be able to hold my head up again!”
She recalled the scenes from her dream, and now she was so furious that she was practically seething.
Zhou Qian hesitated for a moment before cautiously asking, “In your dream… he… what did he do to you? You said you’re filthy, is it…”
Huai Yu went even crazier. “He grabbed my hand! He has no shame!”
Zhou Qian: …
Such is the rise and fall of life.
He let out a long breath, then helplessly laughed. “What era is this? Holding hands, and you’re calling it a big deal?”
“No!”
Huai Yu stretched out her hand, repeatedly looking at it in the morning sunlight. “This is the hand of a laboring person. In my dream, when he grabbed it, it felt like I wouldn’t be able to earn any money anymore.”
Zhou Qian was at a loss for words. What kind of nonsense was this?
But Huai Yu really seemed angry, so he raised his chin. “Tell me more.”
And “telling more” wasn’t much to speak of.
At just 18 years old, Huai Yu had dropped out of school after finishing high school and went up the mountain to pick mushrooms, hoping to make a little extra money by selling them at the market. But on the mountain, she unexpectedly bumped into Wu Yue, who was in his first year of university and had come with some friends to climb.
He fell off the mountain slope, but unfortunately, he wasn’t with his friends on the same path, so she helped him down. It took a great effort for him to limp his way back down the mountain.
Huai Yu was furious when she spoke of it. “Turns out, I wasn’t called Yu Qian’er before, but ‘Excess’ Yu!”
To be precise, it was Huai Yu.
But growing up in the orphanage, she had become prematurely mature. As she got a bit older, she changed her name to Huai Yu—twice returned, what else could she be but excess?
What about “yu” (jade)?
Every couple who came to the orphanage to adopt her would speak softly and sweetly, promising to treat her like their own daughter and saying she would have a home from then on.
Huai Yu believed them at the time, thinking they truly meant it.
But before long, they had their own child.
Once the pregnancy started, the outsider in the family, she, became more and more unnecessary.
The first family said, “You’re so busy at work, and you’re pregnant. Next year, you’ll have another baby to take care of. Why keep her around? She’s at the age to go to school, and there are too many school matters to handle.”
Another family said, “Raising a child, especially one who’s not your own, is difficult.”
“If you raise her well, people will think it’s what you should do. But if there’s anything not quite right, they’ll say, ‘See, she’s not really our daughter.’”
“You don’t know, people in the housing complex are already talking about me… this young girl, and she’s so smart.”
“Send her back…”
Huai Yu thought of the flashes of memory from her dream, and her nose became stuffy, her eyes red.
Zhou Qian had been patiently listening to her recount the details of her dream, but after she mentioned a name, she already had tears welling up in her eyes.
The next moment, the tears began to fall.
“Hey, what’s… what’s wrong with you?”
With dirt still on his hands, Zhou Qian raised both hands helplessly.
Huai Yu had already buried her face in his chest, sobbing uncontrollably, the hot tears quickly soaking through her summer clothes. Her voice was muffled:
“I… I’m crying because of her… I don’t even know why. I used to never cry. I wouldn’t even cry when I was wronged…”
“But now, I just want to cry… I really want to cry…”
She clutched Zhou Qian’s clothes, and her tears soaked a large portion of them. Zhou Qian hesitated for a moment, gently patting her head. After thinking for a while, he finally managed to say:
“Well… you’re already crying, right?”
Huai Yu paused for a moment, then cried even louder:
“I’m going to cry! If I’m wronged, I should cry it out!”
“In this world, only I can feel sorry for myself. If I don’t cry it out, I’ll get sick!”
“I don’t care if it bothers others, whether they feel uncomfortable, I’m going to cry!”
She said it fiercely, and her tears kept pouring out uncontrollably.
Huai Yu knew that she was crying for the former version of herself.
Zhou Qian looked at the dirt that had stuck to the top of her head, cleared his throat, and said, “Well, it’s fine, cry. Cry as much as you want. Who cares? Are there still a lot of tears? Should I go get you a cup of water?”
Huai Yu: …
After a while, she wiped her tears with the back of her hand, sniffed, and stood up, complaining, “You’re really something. I pity myself, and you’re still trying to spoil the mood…”
She couldn’t stop crying.
After a pause, she added, “I know why she wanted to date.”
Because she needed a family, and that scumbag promised her one.
