Siheyuan: Relieve stress and relieve worries

Chapter 16: Sweet and Bitter
At the end of May 1952, the central courtyard of the Siheyuan
The courtyard is extremely gentle at night, with bright moonlight shining on the small flower bed in the front yard and on the locust tree in the middle yard.

Faint snoring sounds could be heard from each house, along with the chirping of crickets, occasional bird calls, and the meowing of cats in the distance, playing a serenade.

Suddenly, the door of the east wing of the central courtyard opened with a bang, and a figure rushed out, and then the lights in the room came on.

Jia Dongxu rushed out of the room, went to the west wing, and knocked on his master's door.

The loud knock on the door woke up the sleeping people.

"Master, Huairu is about to give birth." Jia Dongxu's low voice was heard, and the lights of the neighbors in the middle courtyard were lit one after another.

While putting on his coat, Yi Zhonghai asked, "What did your mother say? Should we give birth at home or send the baby to the hospital?"

"My mother didn't say anything. She just woke up and the family is not prepared." Jia Dongxu panicked.

Yi Zhonghai thought for a moment and said, "Go and take care of your wife. I'll go and borrow the car from Old Man Li to open the door. Let your mother prepare the things for the newborn."

Yi Zhonghai turned around and said to Li Cuilan, "It's okay, go back to the room and see the baby after it's born." Yi Zhonghai walked towards the front yard.

After a while, Jia Dongxu walked out of the courtyard holding Qin Huairu and Jia's mother carrying a big bag.

After getting on the bike, Jia Dongxu rode it, Jia Mu and Qin Huairu sat in the bike, and Yi Zhonghai pushed the bike, heading towards the Dongcheng District Hospital.

Front yard of the Siheyuan

Yan Bugui and his wife also woke up, and Yan Jiekuang woke up as well.

Yan Bugui went to the door of the outer room, listened, then turned around and came back.

"It's okay. It should be the Jia family. The baby is about to be born. Go to sleep." Yan Bugui said to Yan Bugui as he took off his shoes and got on the kang.

All of a sudden, Yan Jiekuang became excited. What was this? The King of Thieves was born. Would there be any strange phenomena in the heaven and earth?

"Dad, why don't you go to help?" Yan Jiekuang asked puzzledly.

Yang Ruiping tucked him in, "Silly boy, the fewer people who know about your birth, the better. That's the rule."

It turns out that in the old city, it is forbidden to let outsiders know when a woman is giving birth. It is believed that if one more outsider knows about it, the woman will give birth an hour later.

So many people in the courtyard heard the noise, but most of them did not come out.

After all this trouble, Yan Jiekuang couldn't sleep, and he was still wondering if there would be any strange phenomena in the heaven and earth in the near future.

However, Mom and Dad fell asleep after a while. Yan Jiekuang was bored and did not get out of bed. He used his mind to probe into the space warehouse and look through the albums of the Qing Palace's Imperial Household Department.

Looking at a large mansion with five courtyards, it was the residence of Prince Fu of the Qing Dynasty. Why did it look so familiar? The more I looked at it, the more it resembled the courtyard house where I lived.

The album of the Imperial Household Department records every courtyard of this quadrangle in great detail, except that there are east and west cross courtyards. There should be a garden at the back, and there should be another cross courtyard at the back.

He had never been to the middle or back yard, but judging from the front yard, there had been big changes as well. There should have been a stable, but now the door of the stable was sealed.

Yan Jiekuang's curiosity allowed him to successfully shift his attention from his soon-to-be-born classmate Jia Geng to the courtyard of Prince Fu.

As I watched, I fell into a deep sleep. (With such a small body, why would I stay up all night?)
The courtyard returned to its original appearance, and soon the Siheyuan serenade started playing again.

In the early morning, people in the courtyard woke up one after another, and soon the noise gradually became louder.

In the pool in the middle courtyard, He Daqing was holding He Yushui to wash, and Old Zhang was also beside them.

"Did you hear it last night?" asked Old Zhang.

He Daqing spat and said, "It's hard not to hear Dongxu's voice. I guess it happened today."

"What's the matter, Dad?" He Yushui also imitated him and spit out mouthwash and asked.

"It's nothing. Your sister-in-law Qin is going to give birth to a younger brother or sister for you." He Daqing answered vaguely.

With a chuckle, Old Zhang laughed, "You're still drunk and you don't even know your seniority. How much did you drink last night?"

He Daqing himself was amused, "It's a nephew or niece. Xiao Yushui is going to be an aunt."

"The one from Dongxu's generation is called aunt, and the one from his wife's generation is called aunt. Are you from Dongxu's generation?" asked Old Zhang in confusion.

"I'm good friends with Sister-in-law Qin. I'm her aunt." He Yushui understood and responded enthusiastically.

Front yard of the Siheyuan

Yan Jiekuang woke up but was still a little sleepy. Yang Ruiping ignored him. It was too busy this morning. Yan Bugui had to go to work, Yan Jiecheng had to go to school, and Yan Jiefang wanted to make trouble. The house was in chaos.

Yan Jiekuang got out of bed, put on his clothes, and walked out of the house. He felt that the courtyard was different, and thought about the picture album, comparing what had changed and what had not changed.

After looking at the front yard, I glanced towards the backyard.

"Xiao San, go home for dinner!" Yang Ruiping's voice came.

Yan Jiekuang retracted his gaze and ran back happily, wiggling his little butt, making Widow Wang and the wife of the Zhao family next door laugh.

Yan Jiekuang felt shy and suddenly felt that he should not wear open-crotch pants anymore.

Yang Ruiping saw that he was hesitant and didn't know what trouble he was going to make next, so he endured it and didn't ask.

Yan Bugui at the table also saw it. After drinking his porridge, he thought of the sandbags flying all over the playground during breaks at school, and looked at the old and the young seriously.

"What's wrong, third brother? Are you worried about something?" Yan Bugui asked seriously.

Yang Ruiping was very curious about his wife's attitude, but he didn't care.

Yan Jiekuang climbed onto his chair. His chair was custom-made by Old Man Zhang and had a ladder so he could sit on it by himself.

"I don't want to wear open-crotch pants anymore." The little one said shyly.

The couple looked at each other and laughed, and then the two brothers also laughed.

"You know you're shy now. Okay, mom will change it for you." Yang Ruiping always responded to the clever mistress's requests.

Yan Jiefang said proudly, "I stopped wearing it last year."

Apparently he had forgotten that he was already three years old last year, while Yan Jiekuang was less than one and a half years old.

Yan Jiecheng tapped him and asked, "How old were you last year? How old is your third brother now?"

Yan Jiefang also reacted and lowered his head and stopped talking.

The couple burst into laughter again.

Siheyuan (Ah! I’m here to visit you all, I’m the dividing line)
In the afternoon, Grandmother Jia came back happily, with a smile on her face all the time.

She greeted everyone she met, and soon, the news that Qin Huairu had given birth to a child spread.

Yi Zhonghai also came back. He walked straight into the house. He was a little tired.

I went home, picked up a towel and washed my face. As I turned around, I saw Li Cuilan coming back from the backyard.

Li Cuilan took the towel that Yi Zhonghai had used and asked, "Is it born?"

"Well, it's a boy, weighing 15.8 kilograms, and both mother and child are safe." Yi Zhonghai said, and one could feel the excitement in his words.

Li Cuilan's face darkened and she turned and walked towards the inner room.

As soon as Yi Zhonghai saw his wife's face, he knew something bad had happened and it touched his sad point again, so he quickly chased after her.

The door of Yi Zhonghai's house was closed tightly.

Yi Zhonghai looked at Li Cuilan who was sitting on the bed crying, and handed her a new towel.

"Zhonghai, if Ji Zong were alive, would he be the same age as Guang Qi?" Li Cuilan said sadly.

Yi Zhonghai felt a pain in his heart and consoled him: "Don't think too much, that is Ji Zong's life, and it is also our life."

"I heard that some Soviet experts will come to support us in a few days. We will go and take a look then." Yi Zhonghai continued.

Li Cuilan sighed and said, "You are tired too, take a rest. I am fine, I just miss Ji Zong."

Yi Zhonghai walked to the outer room and lit a cigarette for himself. His mind was filled with the scene of him burying his son with his own hands while fleeing from famine.

Tears flowed down my face but no sound was made. I just sat there quietly, smoking one cigarette after another.

Li Cuilan felt something was wrong after a while. The smell of smoke drifted into the bedroom. She hurried over and saw Yi Zhonghai with tears streaming down his face.

She suddenly threw herself into her partner's arms and burst into tears.

　Thank you all book friends for your monthly tickets and collections. I will write a good story.

　　
　
(End of this chapter)