Carrying a Hoe to Cultivate

The sun was setting. Smoke created from cooking wafted from every house. Kirin had been playing outside with DaHua for the whole afternoon and came back home, satisfied, through the square-shaped hole designed for him at the yard’s wall.

No one is in the kitchen. Those two are still fighting in their room.

It hurried its way to its bowl, it’s empty? I don’t mind them fighting, but now they don’t even cook?

Kirin felt wronged and lied in its own bed.

Then, the front door was pushed open with Qi Zhou coming in, lifting up his sleeves on his way. He hesitantly asked, “Anyone? Are we eating?”

After a while, the door of the house opened. Gu Wen Zhu came out. He was awkwardly tidying his clothes while walking.

When Qi Zhou saw Gu Wen Zhu, a feeling of fear arose in him. He lowered his voice and said, “I will take the food back to eat in order not to disturb you.”

“I am cooking now. But I have to care for Yi for the next few days, so you will have to cook for yourselves. I will pack up some of everything for you. Take them back and cook at the old house. There is a stove, pots and everything.” Gu Wen Zhu rolled up his sleeves and walked towards the kitchen.

“I can’t cook!” When Qi Zhou heard him, he screamed in fear.

“Oh…” Gu Wen Zhu mumbled, “You can take Kirin and let it teach you. And you can also feed it.”

“This is… this is…” Facing Gu Wen Zhu’s tease, Qi Zhou lost his words.

Kirin looked at him and shook its tail innocently.

Gu Wen Zhu cooked a huge pot of noodles in chicken stock, filled up two bowls with it and went back inside the room, leaving a big pot for Qi Zhou and Kirin.

The door shut sharply when Qi Zhou was beginning to try peeking through the crack out of curiosity.

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The front door of the Gu’s had not been opened for days. No one had seen Gu Wen Zhu and Xia Yi. There was no response when people knocked.

Their dog had been eating at the houses in the village to barely survive.

Those two must have gone to the city to buy for the wedding.

Li Zhu and Er Niu stood in front of Gu’s door, then lied down to peek in through the crack under the door.

“What are you doing?” An unfamiliar voice rang coldly behind them.

“We are just looking. We haven’t seen them for days and we are worried…” Li Zhu was explaining and turning his head.

When he turned, he was stunned. He became speechless with his opened mouth.

Seeing Li Zhu like that, Er Niu turned to look as well. Then, similarly, he froze as if he was struck by lightning, unmoved like a statue.

Qi Zhou was back from his walk outside the village and passed by Gu Wen Zhu’s door. He noticed two young men, possibly villagers, peeking from the door. He frowned and asked them about it.

However, the two were stupefied as if they had been thunderstruck when they saw him.

The villager who was answering him looked okay. This one could be regarded as handsome. The other one who turned after the previous one only looked stupid and foolish with a rough look and dirt on his clothes.

Li Zhu was smarter and looked the other way right away when he recovered from the surprise. Er Niu was still staring at Qi Zhou with a slightly opened mouth and fixed eyeballs.

Seeing him fixing his eyes on him, Qi Zhou frowned out of disgust.

I want to carve out these eyeballs from this rude villager.

“There is nothing going on with their house. Do not overthink.” Qi Zhou did not want to explain too much to these boors. He only said a few words and left.

“Er Niu. This ger is an immortal descended from heaven, right?” Staring at Qi Zhou’s figure going further away, Li Zhu elbowed Er Niu after a long while.

Er Niu did not make a sound. He was still absent-mindedly looking at the direction that Qi Zhou left.

“Er Niu. Stop that. He’s gone.” Li Zhu gave him a punch.

Er Niu thus regained his consciousness.

After that, Er Niu’s mind wandered off and had been in a stupor.

Li Zhu had been talking to him for a long time without receiving any response. Just when Li Zhu was about to get mad, Er Niu stopped his steps and spoke haltingly, “I want to marry him.”

“Marry who?” Li Zhu was not able to make a connection.

“The ger we met just now. I saw him go to Wen Zhu’s old house.” Er Niu’s eyes lightened up as if he was still in his dreams, “Hasn’t my mother been urging me to get married? I have my eyes on him. I want him to be my bride.”

“Er Niu. Are you nuts? Judging from his looks, that ger is no average person. He must be some rich relative of Wen Zhu. He is only staying for a few days.” Li Zhu really wanted to shake his companion awake from his dreams.

Er Niu opened his mouth, then his face changed from befuddled to determined, “I have my eyes on him. I must marry him.”

After saying so, he told Li Zhu with a serious expression, “Don’t call me Er Niu from now on. Call me by my formal name, Gu Bei Cheng.”

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Gu Wen Zhu looked down at Xia Yi who was lying on his back. Xia Yi’s translucent skin on the neck was flushed with a few strands of hair sticking on it. Gu Wen Zhu used his hand to tuck the soft hair of Xia Yi’s to the back of his ear. He leaned towards him and said in a hoarse voice, “I will make you something to eat. Is that good?”

Xia Yi did not say a thing, reluctant to part with his lover, he only used his finger to gesture at him to come closer, making sounds like a kitty cat, staring at Gu Wen Zhu with desire in his misty eyes.

Gu Wen Zhu took a deep breath and forced himself to get up to finish cooking at his quickest speed.  He also boiled a big pot of water to let Xia Yi bathe comfortably.

Time went by. Two days had passed. 

In the morning, when the door of the bedroom had been opened, Gu Wen Zhu stepped out. His hair was messy, eye sockets sunken. He inhaled a breath of fresh air greedily. He let the fresh scent of the grass spread in his lungs, then exhaled slowly.

“Yi, I am cooking breakfast.” He briefly turned to speak towards the room, then moved to the kitchen swiftly as if he was running from something and would be snatched with any slower pace.

The moon set. The sun rose. A day passed.

The door was opened sluggishly, Gu Wen Zhu appeared there lifelessly. His legs were trembling. Dark circles surrounding his eyes. Clothes unbuttoned. He walked without strength and glided to the kitchen to cook as if he was a body floating in the sea.

He could not even flip the wok, his hand holding the spatula was shaking. At last, he had to travel two times to transport the food into the room, then closed the door with a squeak.

The sun rose again. On this day, the door of the room opened and Xia Yi walked out with a fulfilled expression.

He felt like he was radiating with a large amount of energy, feeling unprecedentedly comfortable. He had a long stretch, then walked to the kitchen with light steps. He caught that fish they had been feeding from the fish bowl, cut it up, removed the scales, and started to make soup with it.

Some time later, he took a bowl of fish soup with him and walked into the bedroom.

When he entered the room, Gu Wen Zhu was still sleeping. Xia Yi put down the bowl of soup, discreetly lifted the blanket and pounced on him to give him a bite on his face, “Get up and have breakfast.”

Gu Wen Zhu rubbed his face and opened his eyes slowly. He was calm when he woke up. He looked slightly absent-minded and stupefied, with a shallow tooth mark on his face.

Xia Yi felt attracted to him seeing him this way. He was about to get down to kiss him all over.

“How long have you been up?” Gu Wen Zhu tried to support himself to sit up, he trembled and half sat up, “You must be hungry. Let me cook for you.”

He still remembered his responsibility. For these few days, he had to satisfy a ger in heat and care for the ger at the same time. When gers had their first heat, they needed special attention in order to blossom like a perfectly beautiful flower.

“I am fine. Don’t get up.” Xia Yi looked affectionately at Gu Wen Zhu who was hardly getting up with shivering arms.

Zhu had been caring for a ger in his first heat in the past few days. He deserved sufficient attention so that he would be healthy like a lively little calf.

“Let me feed you.” Both Gu Wen Zhu and Xia Yi spoke and reached for the spoon at the same time.

Gu Wen Zhu was faster. Strength had been drawn suddenly from his wrist when he grabbed the spoon, the spoon then dropped back into the soup.

“Let me do it.” Xia Yi took the spoon and scooped a spoonful. He blew some air at the soup to cool it down.

“I will do it myself.” Gu Wen Zhu’s spirit was steady though his body was impaired. He tried to protect his pride.

Xia Yi ignored Gu Wen Zhu’s request and fed the soup into his mouth.

“Have another bite of fish, one more bite. Baby, ahh.”

“Yi, I can’t eat anymore…”

“One more bite. How can you have strength like a tiger if you don’t eat well?”

At night, the whole village fell asleep, except a conversation echoed from one of the yards in the village.

“Yi. Let me go get you some Herba Aqua Effugio. Why don’t you try a bite…”

“Who needs Herba Aqua Effugio? Throw it away. Come over!”

“Let me rest a little longer. Just a little.”

“I see you still have the strength to hide. You do not need rest!”

When the last wave of heat ended, Gu Wen Zhu was about to cry because of joy. He was like a cow which had been released from the plow after farming nonstop for days. He then fell into deep sleep with his head buried in the pillow.

Xia Yi silently leaned onto Gu Wen Zhu’s back. He closed his eyes and chuckled with lips pulled inwards, then he kissed Gu Wen Zhu’s earlobes, extended his arms to hold Gu Wen Zhu’s firm waist and fell into sleep.