Beatings and Abuse

Su Yuhe had long since considered him one of her own, and seeing that he was willing, she did not refuse.

Li Yun watched her leave, only turning back to Ruan Puchuan once her figure had vanished into the night. His tone was level. "What is it?"

Ruan Puchuan stammered, "Brother Yun, we have nothing left to put in the pot at home. Could you lend me some grain?"

This was not his first time coming to borrow grain. On previous occasions, Li Yun had taken pity on him and given him some.

But that had been before. Neither he nor Su Yuhe had needed to worry about food or drink. His family owned ten mu of land; he farmed one mu and rented the rest to others. The annual harvest and rent were enough to live on, so he would give Ruan Puchuan a little grain out of pity, letting him return with something to show for his errand.

Now, however, Su Yuhe had three more mouths to feed at home. She could not manage on her own, and he still had to help support her. He did not intend to keep helping Ruan Puchuan.

"Sorry, I don't have any grain to spare either."

Ruan Puchuan jerked his head up, then lowered it again. "Sorry for bothering you. I'll go, then."

Li Yun shut the courtyard gate. He had not hidden it from Ruan Puchuan when he gave Su Yuhe grain just now, making it clear that he did not want to give him any.

Before long, he heard the sounds of beating and cursing from next door. Liu Xiaobo's shrill voice scraped against his eardrums, leaving him irritated.

His house did not directly adjoin Li Wenxiu's; there were two or three meters between them. He could not hear ordinary conversation, so voices this loud were clearly meant for his ears.

Even if they were meant for him, it was no use. That old wretch tormented Ruan Puchuan every day. Whether he borrowed grain or not, it was always the same.

That old wretch had counted on his soft heart, often sending Ruan Puchuan to borrow grain without ever repaying it.

Ruan Puchuan would help him wash dishes, secretly take a couple of pieces of firewood from home and stack them in his courtyard, pick wild fruit for him, and sit down for a chat. If the grain went unpaid, so be it. He could spare that little bit.

If Ruan Puchuan had not belonged to Li Wenxiu's household, perhaps the two of them could have become friends.

What a pity.

Liu Xiaobo was a notorious shrew of a man in Reed Flower Village, shrewd, mean, and stingy.

When Li Yun's mother and father were still alive, they had suffered plenty at Liu Xiaobo's hands, and he himself had swallowed no small number of grievances in silence.

At that thought, he shook his head and went inside. He might as well turn in early; he still had dumplings to make tomorrow morning.

"You useless thing! I sent you to borrow grain, and you didn't get a single bit! How did you have the nerve to come back?" Tired from beating him, Liu Xiaobo rested for a while, his eyes constantly darting toward the doorway. Still no one came.

How strange. Li Yun had always come to meddle in his household's business before. Why was he not coming today?

He raised his arm and lashed Ruan Puchuan with the broom. Ruan Puchuan clenched his teeth, glancing toward the doorway from time to time, hoping that person would save him from fire and water as he had before.

When Liu Xiaobo tired of beating him, he planted his hands on his hips and muttered, "Huh, has that brat changed his nature?"

"Or did that damned girl Su Yuhe get to him?" He tossed the broom aside and snarled at Ruan Puchuan, "Go attend to your wife!"

Ruan Puchuan entered the eastern side room with his head lowered. Watching his retreating figure, Liu Xiaobo was still puzzled. "What's with that brat Li Yun today? Is he really not coming?"

Li Wenxiu was reading at the desk. Seeing him enter, she could not help berating him. "You shameless thing. It's not as though we can't afford to eat, yet you went begging for grain again. Now look what you've done-thrown away the Li family's dignity to borrow grain and come back empty-handed..."

He approached in small steps, crouching wordlessly to massage her legs. Li Wenxiu flew into a rage, seized his hair, and cursed, "I'm talking to you! Do you look down on me too?"

"Who are you to look down on me?"

Two trails of involuntary tears slipped from the corners of Ruan Puchuan's eyes. He forced the words out. "I don't."

"What do you think you are? If I hadn't bought you, you would've been sent to a brothel. The things in there get ridden by a thousand people. Remember this: I saved you."

Over the past two years, he had lost count of how many times she had said those words. At first, he had argued back. Even without her, he would have been studying music and dance in the government-run music and dance houses, waiting for someone to take him away.

He might have become some wealthy household's eighteenth concubine, or been bought as a bedchamber servant, or perhaps no one would have taken him away, and he would have stayed at the house as an instructor.

Every path he had imagined would have been better than being taken away by her.

He yielded to Li Wenxiu's force, his head flung against the corner of the desk with a thud. At last, she let go. "Get out."

Ruan Puchuan slowly climbed off the floor and headed outside.

Liu Xiaobo had just gone out to circle around Li Yun's gate. When he returned and saw Ruan Puchuan emerging from the side room, he hurried over. "I told you to attend to your wife! What are you doing out here?"

"My wife told this slave to leave."

"You leave just because she tells you to? Don't you know to stay?" Unable to contain his anger, Liu Xiaobo pinched him. "Useless thing. You can't hold a woman's heart. It's been two years since we bought you, and you still haven't gotten Wenxiu pregnant. If you can't do it this year, I'll sell you to a male brothel."

At the mention of a male brothel, Ruan Puchuan's expression finally shifted. Liu Xiaobo shoved him into the room. "Get in there!"

He had barely entered when Li Wenxiu snatched something off the desk and hurled it at him. A dull pain spread through his chest where it struck, and he knelt with his body bowed to the floor without a word.

"Get out! Make him get out!"

Liu Xiaobo hurried inside, kicked Ruan Puchuan aside, and went over to pat her back soothingly. "Don't get worked up, don't get worked up. Just let him stay for tonight. Once you're pregnant, Dad will get you another man, no matter what."

Li Wenxiu roared, "I'm already in this state, and you still want me to get pregnant? Are you really my father?"

Liu Xiaobo grew anxious too, patiently pleading with her. "I don't want things to be this way either. If I could give birth, I'd do it for you. But I'm a man. Our ancestors didn't pass the ability to bear children down to me!"

The two argued endlessly, but in the end, Liu Xiaobo gave in.

After kneeling on the floor for a long while, Ruan Puchuan stiffly stood and supported himself against the door as he returned to the woodshed.

He had lived here for two years, rising before dawn every day to work, enduring daily beatings and abuse, never eating his fill, and sleeping in the coldest woodshed.

He curled up and pulled some thatch over himself.

Now even the only person willing to help him would no longer do so.

There seemed to be little difference between living and dying.

When Su Yuhe returned, Meng Zhixian was waiting for her in the courtyard. She was a little surprised. "Didn't I tell you to go to bed first?"

Without a word, he took the lantern from her and pressed the hand warmer he was holding into her hands, calling softly, "Wife."

Lu Mingyi was water on an ice field. He did not keep people a thousand miles away like an iceberg, but he was still icy and aloof, inspiring no desire to draw close.

Lu Mingxi was a clear spring in the mountains. His face resembled his older brother's, handsome and distant, but it still held some baby fat and an innocence untouched by worldly affairs, making him seem a little more approachable.

Unlike the two brothers' cool, aristocratic looks, Meng Zhixian was strikingly beautiful. His features seemed to have been painstakingly sculpted by the creator, every part flawless. Yet one look at him gave her the impression that he was not a man who would know his place and behave himself.

At that moment, his peach-blossom eyes gazed at her pitifully, and his fair, lovely hand tugged at the hem of her clothes. "Wife."