The rain weakened, but never quite stopped. The wind blew the fine strands of falling water at an angle.
Gu Lanshi breathed out softly, feeling some of the tightness in his chest ease.
Perhaps he'd watched that play and kept thinking about it, and that was why he dreamed of such things at night.
He rolled over, rested his cheek against his palm, and thought a little longer. Cold air came in through the window, making him more alert. Footsteps approached, and then the door opened.
Miao Qiulian saw him lying there, his face still somewhat pale. Remembering how hard he had shivered in the kitchen, she hurried over and felt his forehead again.
"Not bad. You've cooled down." She'd barely spoken when a gust rattled the window. Marching over to shut it, she scolded him. "No wonder you're cold to the touch! You've been sitting in a draft. You're this old and still don't know how to close a window. I swear you're trying to anger me on purpose."
"Careless all day long! It's bad enough you don't think to put on more clothes, but you can't even shut a window. When you're married and keep losing things and don't know how to do anything, getting scolded by your husband's family will be the least of your troubles. If they actually beat you, I won't be able to help."
Her stream of nagging and scolding abruptly brought Gu Lanshi back to reality. He covered his ears, looking thoroughly miserable.
Miao Qiulian turned and saw him. Her temper flared. "You're covering your ears now? Do you need a beating?"
"No, Mother!" Gu Lanshi quickly lowered his hands. Seeing her anger, he sat up and grinned ingratiatingly. "I was only rubbing my ears. Mother, I can already smell the meat. No one can fry meat as well as you."
Miao Qiulian was torn between anger and laughter. In the end she glared and headed for the door. "Come carry the dishes. All you do is make trouble for me."
Gu Lanshi sat on the edge of the bed to put on his shoes. He hesitated, then called, "Mother."
He'd been having the same dream for several nights, and wanted to ask an adult about it.
"What now?" Miao Qiulian turned, sounding impatient.
Gu Lanshi opened his mouth, but couldn't decide how to explain. Finally he scratched his head. "Never mind. It's nothing."
"Honestly, you child." Thinking he was making a fuss over nothing, Miao Qiulian muttered something and hurried away. The food in the pot was hot, and Zhu could be clumsy. She needed to take it out herself.
Gu Lanshi stood after putting on his shoes. He knew that if he asked her, Mother would scold him for speaking nonsense and bringing up such an unlucky dream.
Besides, he'd had all sorts of strange dreams since he was a child. With no evidence of anything, perhaps he really was imagining things.
This reasoning lifted most of the weight from his mind. More importantly, they were having meat today. He couldn't scrape the oil from the bottom of the pan once Mother finished cooking, and if he got to the table late, there might not even be any savory oil left at the bottom of the serving bowls for him.
Press a steaming bun against the inside of a bowl and wipe it around once, soaking up all that fragrant oil—now that was delicious. The thought made him quicken his steps.
*
It rained on and off for several days. When the sky finally cleared, the early-summer sun already had some strength. Within two days, the ground was dry.
Gu Lanshi hurried home along a dirt path between the fields with a basketful of weeds on his back. He had been weeding in the flooded rice paddies, leaving mud on the hems of his clothes and sleeves.
The others were still working the fields. As he had to go home to cook, he washed the mud from his hands and feet and left first.
When rain kept them indoors, they could rest a little. Once the weather cleared, however, pulling weeds was a never-ending task, whether in the rice paddies or the wheat fields. Weeds grew so quickly. A stray gust could carry their seeds into the fields, and within days they would sprout.
Just outside the village, he met his eldest brother carrying a shoulder pole. Gu Lanshi stopped to exchange a few words.
Hearing that he was going home to cook, Gu Lansheng said, "Ask your sister-in-law for a bowl of pickled vegetables. We made them a while ago; they should be ready to eat."
"All right." Gu Lanshi had just agreed when another person approached from the rice paddies before they could part: Lin Jinpeng's mother, Li Xiangju.
Gu Lansheng saw her first. "Auntie Xiangju!"
It was the hour when someone had to make lunch, either a person left at home or one who returned from the fields for the purpose.
Li Xiangju smiled as soon as she spotted Gu Lanshi, even before reaching them. Years of fieldwork had tanned and lined her face. "Lansheng, heading out to the fields?" she asked cheerfully.
Then she hastened to add, "Oh, and Lanshi's here too."
"Auntie," Gu Lanshi greeted her. The way she gazed at him was so eager that even his ears grew hot. Embarrassed, he looked aside.
Li Xiangju thought him very good-looking. She glanced at the bright red mark between his eyebrows and assessed his build. He wasn't short, even by the standards of girls and dual-born youths, and he looked sturdy and healthy rather than sickly.
When her son had first declared his interest in the Gu family's child, she hadn't been pleased. A dual-born young man wasn't as likely to bear children as a woman. Their family wasn't so poor that Jinpeng couldn't afford to marry a wife. Why take a male spouse instead?
She'd been angry several times over the matter, but no amount of persuasion changed her son's mind. Finally, reluctantly, she went to take a closer look at Gu Lanshi.
Though they belonged to the same village, the Gu family lived at the far end and the Lins near the entrance. Little River Village might have the word 'little' in its name, but it wasn't small: there were sixty or seventy households, not to mention the younger married couples who had established their own homes in recent years. The number of houses and courtyards kept growing.
Because they lived far apart, she and Miao Qiulian rarely visited one another, and she knew the Gu children even less. Besides, Gu Lanshi was unmarried. Unlike older women and male spouses, he couldn't sit gossiping where people constantly came and went near the village entrance. An unmarried youth who appeared too freely in public would give people something to talk about.
Gu Lanshi had shot up and grown handsome this year. Li Xiangju had heard villagers say that Miao Qiulian had raised a beautiful dual-born child, but she'd paid little attention. However good-looking a daughter or dual-born son was, could they compare with an ordinary son? They were all destined to marry into another family anyway.
Her Jinpeng was such a handsome young man. In her eyes, only a wife as lovely as a celestial maiden would be worthy of him.
But when she finally looked Gu Lanshi over in secret, Li Xiangju had to admit her son was right. The boy really was beautiful, and his family had plenty of sons and was not poor. Slowly, she came around.
Seeing that her stare had made Gu Lanshi blush, Gu Lansheng changed the subject. "Auntie, your harvest should be good this year. I passed your fields earlier and saw how well the wheat had headed."
"Oh, not really. I think we planted too densely this year." Li Xiangju's face glowed with obvious pleasure. "Last year I told your uncle to scatter less seed, but would he listen? It's so thick you can hardly get through the field to pull weeds."
"There's only a month to go. The wheat heads are formed, so the weeds can't do much damage now," Gu Lansheng replied casually.
"Exactly. Otherwise, with all the work in the fields, Jinpeng couldn't have gone to town to work." Her eyes changed as soon as she mentioned her son.
Gu Lansheng took the opportunity to ask, "How is Jinpeng's work coming along?"
As the eldest brother, he naturally took an interest in anyone hoping to marry his younger sibling. At the very least, he needed to learn more about Lin Jinpeng. He'd heard last year that the Lin family wanted to secure him a good job in town, keeping accounts at an eating house.
Lin Jinpeng had studied and could read, write, and calculate. A few strokes in an account book would earn him a wage each month, far better than laboring in the fields. And that wasn't all. If he got on well with the proprietor and made useful connections, wouldn't there be other small benefits and ways to make money?
Gu Lansheng knew a little of this already. If Lin Jinpeng became an accountant, at least their Lanshi shouldn't have to suffer once married.
"Oh, that boy of mine? He's nothing special," Li Xiangju said, though her face was practically a blossom of delighted wrinkles. "A couple of days ago, his great-uncle used his connections in town. There were meals to treat people to and gifts to deliver, and he spoke up for Jinpeng. So he's gone over today to work under the old accountant and learn the trade, something to make a living from in future. His great-uncle says it's almost certain—once the old accountant retires, Jinpeng will take over."
Hearing Lin Jinpeng's name no longer made Gu Lanshi as happy as before. He'd had the same dream again the previous night, and the name now left him feeling vaguely troubled. "Auntie, Eldest Brother, I'd better go home and cook or lunch will be late."
They had all worked in the fields the entire morning and would be hungry. Country folk understood that well enough. Li Xiangju said quickly, "Of course. Go on, then."
Back home, Gu Lanshi crouched to wash the vegetables. Remembering how Li Xiangju had stared at him, he belatedly realized he didn't like being looked at that way. Frowning, he recalled a hushed conversation he'd overheard between his parents the night before.
There were two reasons the Lins had yet to make their formal proposal: one was that they were busy securing Jinpeng's job in town. The other was Gu Lanshi himself.
When he was little, his mother had taken him to visit his maternal uncle. A distant relative had been there, an old man skilled at fortune-telling.
His mother had begged the old man to tell his fortune. Most of what he said was unremarkable, but he insisted on one warning: Gu Lanshi must not marry until after his seventeenth birthday, or his life would be in danger.
Because of this, his family had decided long ago that they would never let him marry before seventeen. A matchmaker had approached them last year, but when his mother explained the condition, the interested family never contacted them again.
Gu Lanshi was fifteen now. Some dual-born youths of about his age had already married, and most others would marry by sixteen.
There were also those who didn't marry until seventeen or eighteen. The worst they endured was a little village gossip, which he didn't fear. But Lin Jinpeng was seventeen this year. If he waited two more years, he'd be nineteen.
His parents said the Lin family was bound to have reservations about waiting.
Besides, when a man didn't marry until after nineteen, people generally assumed his family was too poor to afford a bride and had been forced to postpone the wedding.
Gu Lanshi scooped the washed vegetables from the water in one motion. The trembling surface broke into fragments, reflecting his uncharacteristically troubled expres—
