The next day, the twenty-eighth of the lunar month, was A-Zheng's wedding day. Ye Yaodong got up early and headed to his house.
His doorway was bustling with people. His mother wore a red flower in her hair and cheerfully mixed wedding candy, sunflower seeds, and peanuts together in a large bag, ready to hand out to the neighbors and the children who came asking for wedding candy.
Ye Yaodong looked around before finally spotting A-Zheng, who was unpacking cigarettes. As soon as A-Zheng saw him, he handed him a pack.
Ye Yaodong accepted it with a grin. "How does it feel to be the groom?"
"I don't know about anything else yet, but collecting all these red envelopes sure feels good. Having lots of older sisters is great! Hahaha!" Smiling, he patted the two breast pockets of his Mao suit, both bulging with red envelopes.
"No kidding. Why don't I have any older sisters? My two younger sisters aren't married yet, either. What a shame." A-Guang looked on with a little envy.
The red envelopes in A-Zheng's breast pockets were called pocket-weighting red envelopes. Married sisters in the family had to give one of these in addition to their usual wedding gift, and the amount inside wouldn't be small.
"When are the sedan chair and horse coming?"
Their local wedding custom was to walk if the bride lived nearby, and use a bridal sedan chair and a horse if she lived farther away. In recent years, plenty of young people had chosen to fetch their brides by tractor, but the bride's family had still opted for a sedan chair.
"Soon, I guess? No rush. It's still early. Go inside and have a couple of poached eggs."
"Sure, sure. Let's go have some eggs first."
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