Chapter 38: Stay Away From Me, Bad Luck Mouth!
Cheng Fei pushed open the window and stuck her head outside. What she saw left her speechless.
Just a hundred meters away, the ground was completely dry. Forget the hail, even the rain had not touched it at all!
A moment ago, her face had been full of worry. Now it was full of disbelief instead.
Gao Ming also wondered what had happened. He leaned outside to look and became just as confused.
It was as if someone had grabbed hold of the clouds and stopped them there.
Was it Cheng Fei’s good luck, or someone else’s bad luck?
In the blink of an eye, the wind stopped, the rain ended, and the dark clouds disappeared. The sky returned to its usual calm state.
Extreme weather came quickly and left just as quickly. Nobody knew whether it would suddenly happen again the next second.
They needed to leave this place soon.
The old lady’s prices had never changed. Sour plum juice and old-style popsicles still cost only one yuan each. Outside, people would be overjoyed to see prices like that, yet Cheng Fei still felt like she was taking advantage of the old woman.
Sure enough, when Cheng Fei left ten yuan on the table, the old lady immediately became unhappy.
“One popsicle and two cups of sour plum juice. That’s three yuan total. This old woman has always charged the same price. I never overcharge people,” the old lady said seriously.
Even Gao Ming was surprised. At those prices, she probably could not even cover her costs.
Seeing the serious look on the old lady’s face, Cheng Fei helplessly took back the change.
As soon as they stepped outside, they saw hailstones scattered everywhere. Cheng Fei immediately picked up a broom.
“No need, girl,” the old lady called out.
“There’s ice all over the ground. When it melts later, the place will get dirty.”
“When ice melts, it becomes water. Water flows downhill, so won’t it just flow to the tree roots?”
Cheng Fei nodded, thinking that made sense.
The old lady treasured that tree more than her own life, so Cheng Fei did not dare argue and quickly put the broom back down.
But Gao Ming noticed something unusual on the old lady’s face. In the second half of her sentence, when she looked at the tall poplar tree, the smile on her face became brighter than ever before.
It was as if she were looking at an old friend.
“Let’s go! Who knows what weird thing the weather will do next!”
Cheng Fei shouted, and only then did Gao Ming turn around and follow her.
When he looked back again, the old lady had already returned to her rocking chair. The way she looked at him now also felt a little different.
The two of them practically ran back to the field entrance. The trailer behind the tractor was now filled with “gifts” left behind by the hailstorm.
After starting the tractor, Cheng Fei pulled a lever. The trailer tilted upward, dumping all the hailstones back into the field. Then she looked toward Gao Ming.
“You driving or me?”
Gao Ming had no choice. Cheng Fei also did not want to sit in the wet trailer anymore, so she squeezed herself over a little to make room for him.
Put-put-put—
The tractor moved forward “steadily.”
Meanwhile, Cheng Fei was being bounced around so hard by the rough dirt road that it almost felt exciting.
As the shaking grew worse, Gao Ming became more distracted by the questions in his mind. During one turn, he almost drove the tractor straight into a ditch!
“I say, Mr. Experienced Driver, can you drive a little more carefully? Maybe you don’t care about your life, but I still want to live a few more years!”
Gao Ming awkwardly gripped the handlebars and slowly guided the tractor back to the middle of the road.
“The old lady is already so old. Why does she insist on staying alone in the middle of nowhere just to guard a tree?” Unable to hold back his curiosity any longer, Gao Ming finally asked.
“Simple. Because that’s her home!”
Cheng Fei’s answer only confused Gao Ming even more.
As the tractor continued bumping along, Gao Ming listened to another story.
It turned out that forty years ago, the road they had just traveled was the only connection between Fuxian and the outside world.
When the old lady was younger, she and her husband survived by farming. Since their family owned an ice cellar, during the farming off-season they used plums they grew themselves to make sour plum juice and sold it by the roadside to travelers passing by.
Every day, they worked at sunrise and rested at sunset, living a very simple and old-fashioned life.
Originally, they thought they would peacefully spend the rest of their lives that way. But sadly, the old man passed away first.
Before dying, he made a bold request. He said he wanted to leave something behind for future generations. So he told the old lady to cremate his body and plant a tree afterward.
The old lady was very traditional and strongly believed that people should rest peacefully in the ground after death. No matter what, she refused to scatter her husband’s ashes by the roadside because she thought it would deeply disrespect the man she loved.
“But in the end, the old lady still did exactly what the old man asked before he died!”
Cheng Fei nodded. “Yeah! The old man said that when he left this world, he should leave alone and cleanly. Leaving behind a grave would only take up space for future generations, and it would just make people feel uncomfortable. Instead of that, he would rather leave behind some cool shade for others. He said that if she didn’t do as he asked, he would never rest in peace. In the end, the old lady could not refuse him.”
Gao Ming suddenly understood and nodded while looking at Cheng Fei’s face.
But just as he was about to look away, the tractor’s bumping made something shake up and down in front of his eyes.
Putting everything else aside, her figure really was good.
She was not explosively sexy like Zheng Qi, but everything about her body was balanced and just right from head to toe.
Gao Ming froze for a moment.
As a result, the tractor drove straight into a huge pit they had almost fallen into earlier.
Cheng Fei turned around angrily and immediately noticed Gao Ming hurriedly avoiding her gaze.
It did not take long for her to realize what had happened. She looked at him with a mix of disdain and understanding.
“You should just go find some club later and enjoy yourself there.”
“......”
“Men are all the same. They all like beautiful women with good figures.”
“Correct!” Gao Ming answered firmly.
“Then please let me go already. Go find someone like Zheng Qi and spend day and night together. Wouldn’t that fit your wishes perfectly?!”
Gao Ming twitched the corner of his mouth. “The time hasn’t come yet. Besides, divorcing during the honeymoon period would bring heavenly punishment!”
“What kind of line is that supposed to be...”
Boom—
Before Cheng Fei could finish speaking, a deep rumble sounded overhead.
Tall poplar trees lined both sides of the road. They were not enough to completely block the sky, but under their shade it was hard to tell what the weather looked like.
Looking outside through the tree branches, Cheng Fei saw that the bright sunny sky had once again been covered by dark clouds that seemed to appear from nowhere.
The gloomy sky looked no better than before. Cheng Fei subconsciously swallowed nervously.
“Go, hurry up!”
Gao Ming no longer cared about driving carefully. But even with the throttle pushed to the limit, this was still just a tractor. Its pulling power was fine, but speed was its biggest weakness.
It became a little faster… but only a little.
Compared to normal cars driving over a hundred kilometers per hour, this thing crawled like a turtle.
They finally reached the asphalt road, but then a fierce wind suddenly roared toward them. Huge raindrops slammed down from the sky, instantly soaking both of them completely.
“Damn it!” Cheng Fei shouted with all her strength, but her voice still sounded weak against the heavy rain. “Can’t you go any faster?!”
“This is already the fastest it can go! I told you we should’ve driven a car, but you wouldn’t listen!”
“And whose fault is that, you jinx?! You just had to talk about heavenly punishment!”
“Well, your wish came true. Here comes the heavenly punishment!”
“Get lost!!”
While yelling and cursing at each other, the tractor continued moving painfully slowly compared to the occasional cars passing by.
Unfortunately, this was their only transportation. At a time like this, there was no point hoping some kind stranger would give them a ride.
Eventually, they finally reached home.
A few minutes earlier, their clothes had already become completely soaked. After that, they simply sat on the tractor calmly and hopelessly, letting the wind and rain hit them however they wanted.
But the moment they arrived home, the rain suddenly stopped.
The two of them looked up at the huge bright sun above at a forty-five-degree angle, both wearing helpless expressions.
What terrible sin had they committed to have such horrible luck?!
Cheng Fei grabbed her pajamas and went into the bathroom, quickly washing off the dirty rainwater while also trying to prevent herself from catching a cold.
She glanced at the water dripping from her clothes.
“This is enough water to raise fish in!”
Being soaked for no reason had already put her in a bad mood. She was too lazy to wash the clothes now, so she simply threw them into a basin of water to soak.
Back in the living room, Bread came over again.
The little cat jumped onto her lap, meowed twice, and curled itself into a ball. Its warm body felt especially comforting after getting chilled by the rain.
In the inner room, Gao Ming came out carrying two cups filled with dark brown granules of some kind.
“What?”
“Xiao Chai Hu medicine. We got caught in the rain, so drinking this should help prevent a cold.”
“You carry this around when going out?”
Gao Ming smiled and carried the cups toward the water dispenser. He pushed open the hot water switch with his thumb.
Crack—
A sound like biting into ice rang out, and then the bottom of one cup suddenly separated from the rest.
Looking at the shattered glass bottom on the floor, Cheng Fei was completely stunned.
It was a tempered glass cup that had been used for almost ten years without any problems. Yet the moment this guy touched it, it broke.
After learning from that mistake, Gao Ming carefully filled the second cup with warm water first to stop it from exploding too.
He tried handing the cup to Cheng Fei, but…
The moment he reached out, Cheng Fei hugged Bread tightly and quickly moved away, staring at him cautiously.
“Put it down. Don’t come near me!”
“.…..”