They walked until they reached the road that was the only way to town. Tian Yao had a bundle on his back. Little Gray seemed to know he was leaving and kept tugging at his trouser leg with his mouth.
Tian Yao crouched down, and Little Gray immediately came closer, placing its paws on Tian Yao’s shoulders.
“Be good, Little Gray. Stay home with Father. I’ll be back very soon.”
Little Gray whimpered, full of reluctance.
Yu Nian sat in his wheelchair, watching the man and dog bid each other an affectionate farewell.
After a long while, Tian Yao seemed to finally remember that Yu Nian was still beside him. He let go of the hand petting Little Gray’s furry head and came over to Yu Nian.
It was still early, and the road, usually bustling with people, was very quiet at this hour. The roadside trees swayed gently in the breeze.
Tian Yao cupped Yu Nian’s face in his hands and kissed him from his forehead all the way down to his lips, with pure affection and no hint of desire.
Their foreheads touched. Neither of them was quite used to this sudden separation, especially Yu Nian.
The warm and peaceful days of the past half-year had almost made him forget his previous life of displacement and hardship. But all of this had been brought to him by Tian Yao, and he had never imagined that Tian Yao would one day not be by his side.
No matter how long he lingered here now, he still had to leave.
In the end, Tian Yao steeled his heart. He gave Yu Nian one last kiss on the lips, then turned and walked towards the road leading to town.
Only when Tian Yao’s figure had completely disappeared from the road did Yu Nian call Little Gray to go home. Little Gray had followed Tian Yao for a stretch before remembering Tian Yao’s instructions to take good care of Father, and only then did it return to Yu Nian’s side.
After Tian Yao left, Yu Nian’s life seemed unchanged on the surface, but he found himself with much more time each day to think about him.
When he went to the chicken coop behind the house to feed the chickens and spotted an egg in the nest, he would turn around, wanting to share the discovery with someone, only to remember that Tian Yao wasn’t home.
When he saw the vegetable seedlings they had planted grow another inch taller, wanting to tell him to make him happy, those joyful feelings could only be experienced alone.
When Little Gray went up the mountain alone for the first time and came back carrying a rabbit in its mouth, Yu Nian’s longing for Tian Yao reached its peak.
It had already been five days. He should go to town to see Tian Yao.
During the days Tian Yao had been gone, Yu Nian had pored over the recipe notes Little Dad had left for Tian Yao countless times. Tian Yao had cooked many of the things in it for him. If he was going to see him, shouldn’t he also make something Tian Yao liked to eat?
Looking at the rabbit Little Gray had brought back, Yu Nian flipped through the recipe book Little Dad had left for Tian Yao, and an idea formed in his mind.
He found the cleaver Tian Yao kept in the kitchen. When he gripped the handle, his hand felt it was slightly heavy. Only then did he realize that all the kitchen knives in Tian Yao’s home were forged from refined iron, making them heavier than ordinary knives. When he first lifted it, he wasn’t quite used to it.
But after moving his arm around a bit, he became proficient in using the knife.
He boiled water and skinned the rabbit. Yu Nian’s skinning technique was very skilled; he removed a complete rabbit pelt in one piece. Yu Nian thought Tian Yao might want this, so he saved it.
Then, using Tian Yao’s knife, he disemboweled the rabbit and removed its innards. Little Gray had been watching intently from the start. Yu Nian glanced at it, and it stopped moving closer. “You can eat it after it’s cooked.”
Little Gray had not lived in the wild since it was young, so its stomach couldn’t adapt to a wild wolf’s diet. Therefore, they always cooked its food before giving it to Little Gray.
Back in the kitchen, Yu Nian diced the rabbit into small cubes and found the chili peppers Tian Yao treasured so much.
In Little Dad’s drawings, there was a method for cooking rabbit.
The rabbit meat was marinated, the wok heated with oil, and then the chili peppers were flash-fried in the wok.
The unique, pungent smell of the chili peppers made Yu Nian cough violently several times. Even Little Gray sneezed a few times and ran out of the kitchen.
When the dish was finished, Yu Nian’s eyes were red-rimmed. He first tasted a bite with his chopsticks and only then felt that the life of someone who had never eaten a dish made with chili peppers was not quite complete.
He carefully placed the finished dish into a food box he had borrowed from Aunt Shun’s house. Aunt Shun knew he was going to see Tian Yao and also made some flatbreads, saying some were for Yusheng, some for Tian Yao. The elderly worried most about whether their children were well-fed and warmly clothed.
As it happened, the Village Chief was going to town, so Yu Nian hitched a ride on his cart, carrying the food box with his wheelchair placed at the back of the ox cart, and went with them to town.
He left Little Gray behind. After all, there was a fortune at home. Although no one knew about it, he still felt somewhat uneasy. It was a bit laughable, thinking about it – he had never imagined in the first half of his life that he would one day be anxious over twenty-five taels of silver. But this very emotion enriched his somewhat barren heart.
“Going to see Yao Ge’er?” Tian Dazhuang drove the cart while the Village Chief sat inside, looking at Yu Nian.
“Mm.” Yu Nian nodded.
Neither of them spoke further. When they reached town, Tian Dazhuang helped Yu Nian off the cart and into his wheelchair. “We’ll head back around the middle of the Wei hour (1-3 PM). Just wait here when the time comes.”
Yu Nian nodded and bid them farewell.
With some effort, Yu Nian found Squire Liu’s residence. The place where Tian Yao and the others were working wasn’t in the Liu family’s main house, but in another area. Yu Nian inquired with someone at the gate and happened to run into Tian Yusheng, who was returning from an errand.
“Yu Nian? You’ve come to see Yao Ge’er?” Tian Yusheng handed the things in his hands to the gatekeeper, then pushed Yu Nian towards the place where Tian Yao and the others worked. “Don’t worry, Squire Liu’s household are all good people. Yao Ge’er doesn’t stay with the other laborers; he’s staying in Squire Liu’s residence, sharing a room with a ger who does the sweeping in the compound.”
“Thank you, Brother Yusheng.”
“We’re all from the same village, no need for thanks.”
Soon they arrived at a place where a building was under construction. Yu Nian spotted Tian Yao immediately. He was carrying two stone slabs on his shoulders, which seemed weightless to him as he easily carried them to another spot.
There were many slabs piled on the ground. Tian Yao’s main task was physical labor like carrying these stone slabs.
Yu Nian’s hand gripping the handle of the food box tightened. He forced himself to suppress the surging emotions in his heart.
It was already nearing noon, almost time for the midday meal break. Everyone had stopped working, but Tian Yao carried one more load of slabs before stopping. He looked around casually and then spotted Yu Nian off to the side.
Tian Yao’s eyes instantly lit up. If the foreman hadn’t still been speaking, he would have run over immediately.
He finally waited until the foreman finished speaking. While the others flocked in groups to wait for their meal, Tian Yao ran towards the gate without looking back.
His fellow workers called out to him to eat. Only then did he smile and say, “My husband has come to see me!”
Only then did the others notice the person off to the side, sitting in a wheelchair. They instantly understood why Tian Yao, a ger, had come out to sell his physical strength.
“Yu Nian! You came to see me!” Tian Yao’s face was dusty, but his eyes were bright. Still, Yu Nian felt he had lost some weight.
Tian Yao saw the food box on Yu Nian’s lap. “Did you buy food for me too? You really didn’t have to, the food here is pretty good.”
Yu Nian shook his head and took out a bundle of flatbreads from the food box, handing them to Tian Yusheng. “Brother Yusheng, Auntie asked me to bring these for you.”
Tian Yusheng took them smoothly and, not wanting to disturb the couple’s conversation, left. Tian Yao pushed Yu Nian under a shady tree. “What did you bring for me?”
Yu Nian took out a handkerchief and wiped the dust from his face before saying, “Little Gray went up the mountain by itself that day and caught a wild rabbit.”
Tian Yao plopped down and sat right by his legs. “It’s that amazing?”
“I followed the method Little Dad drew for you and cooked it. Would you like to try some?”
Tian Yao felt a bit incredulous. The first thing he’d noticed about Yu Nian today was that he seemed thinner. Yu Nian already had difficulty moving around, and then Tian Yao had left home. Although he’d asked Aunt Shun and others to look after Yu Nian before leaving, Yu Nian was someone who disliked troubling others, so he must have had a hard time these past few days.
Yet here Yu Nian was, coming to see him and bringing a dish he’d made himself. Tian Yao silently vowed that even if Yu Nian’s cooking was terrible, he would finish every last bite.
He looked at the contents of the food box and could faintly smell a pungent aroma. “Did you use chili peppers?”
Yu Nian nodded.
Tian Yao picked up the chopsticks Yu Nian had prepared for him and took a bite of the diced rabbit. The savory, spicy, and numbing flavors instantly burst in his mouth. He never would have thought that rabbit meat, which had always tasted so awful when he made it himself, could become so delicious when prepared by Yu Nian.
Having worked all morning, Tian Yao was already hungry. He ate very quickly. Yu Nian sat beside him, breaking off pieces of flatbread and occasionally lifting a water pouch for him to drink from.
“Yu Nian, how did you make it so delicious?” Tian Yao asked between voracious mouthfuls.
A sense of satisfaction filled Yu Nian’s heart. “I just followed what’s in the booklet. But according to what’s written in Little Dad’s notes, it’s still missing a few seasonings. If I had them, it would probably be a little better.”
Tian Yao nodded vigorously. “It’s already wonderful as it is. Yu Nian, I thought only my Little Dad could make something so delicious.”
“Little Dad left us everything. We just have to figure the rest out ourselves.”
One rabbit wasn’t a huge amount, and Tian Yao quickly finished it. Only after eating did it hit him – Yu Nian had come all the way from Huailing Village, so of course he hadn’t eaten yet either. He covered his mouth in dismay. “Yu Nian, you haven’t eaten yet, have you? It’s all my fault! It was so delicious, I completely forgot you hadn’t eaten.”
Yu Nian smiled and shook his head. “I’m not hungry. Watching you eat makes me happy enough.”
Tian Yao held Yu Nian’s face in his hands and planted a kiss on his lips with his oily mouth. “Let me ask for some time off, and then let’s go stroll around town.”
Because Tian Yao had always been the hardest-working and most productive at the worksite, the foreman agreed to his request to go out at noon without a second thought, only instructing him to be sure to return on time.
They left the food box with Tian Yusheng. Tian Yao pushed Yu Nian into the town. After the rumors of refugees passed, Yunxi Town had returned to its usual bustle. They typically only visited the street selling daily necessities and rarely came to the part selling food. As they approached this area, the air was filled with the mingled aromas of all sorts of foods – whether pleasant or not was hard to say.
After consulting Yu Nian, Tian Yao decided, and they sat down at a wonton stall, ordering one bowl of wontons. Its light, somewhat bland soup was topped with a sprinkle of chopped scallions and cilantro. The skins were thin, but the filling was sparse. Wontons like these, Tian Yao could probably eat ten bowls of and still not feel full.
And yet, a single bowl of these wontons cost five wen.
Tian Yao leaned in close to Yu Nian and whispered, “Yu Nian, the way they wrap these wontons, they could wrap them for a whole year, and the pig would still only have a surface wound.”
Yu Nian chuckled. “Careful, or the owner might beat you up.”
But then, Yu Nian looked at the bowl of wontons in front of him, and an idea began to sprout in his mind.
