Over the past two weeks or so, Ye Yaodong had brought home nearly four hundred in one go, and now there was another hundred-plus. The smaller sums of a few yuan or ten-odd yuan had come quite frequently too. It was far more than she had earned making fishing nets over the past few years.
She had not even noticed that lately, whenever she faced her husband, her face was full of smiles. Compared with her previously indifferent attitude, it might not have been a world of difference, but there was clearly more warmth.
She had never demanded that he earn a certain amount to bring home to her. As long as she saw him working hard, she was perfectly content.
Delighted, Ye Yaodong wrapped his arms around her from behind, bent down, and said into her ear, "Pretty impressive, aren't I? Work out how much I've earned for you in these past two weeks or so. Seven or eight hundred, right?"
"Not that much. Six hundred and something. We haven't even got this hundred-plus yet."
"That's still quite a bit... Ah! Fuck!"
He had been about to strike while the iron was hot and take advantage of the good mood to fish for some praise. Who could have known that his eldest son, who had just been on the bed playing a great swordsman with a sheet around his shoulders and a bamboo switch in hand, would leap straight onto his back? Caught off guard, he staggered, and all three of them nearly fell.
He reached behind him to catch the boy and swore, then turned, snatched the bamboo switch from his hand, and smacked him on the bottom.
"You little brat! Just you wait! Is that something you can just jump onto? What if you'd fallen on the