When She Stops Being Dramatic

Chapter 55: Chapter 39: The 1950s Wife of Chaff and Bran

Zhu Yun sat on the low solid wood bed, swinging her legs. ”It’s all thanks to the old lady across the hall. When I first married into the Wang Family, I wasn’t exactly idle back at my parents’ home. But I was young and naturally pretty. My parents wanted to marry me off for a good bride price, so they didn’t make me do heavy labor. I was what you’d call fair-skinned, radiant, and beautiful.”

”Comrade Chu Shenyu, just think about it. If even a seasoned catch like you is into me, could Wang Xianbing really have been unmoved?”

Chu Shenyu’s expression gradually darkened. He said gruffly, ”Whatever happened between you two is in the past. From now on, we’re the ones building a life together. If you want to best the people across the hall in every little thing, I can help you with that. But you are not to think about any other man, not even for a second!”

Zhu Yun snorted with laughter. ”Oh, Comrade Chu Shenyu, do you really think a lamb being sold to the slaughterhouse is going to have fond memories of the butcher?”

”I had a pair of scissors hidden under my pillow. It was Wang Xianbing’s first time as a groom. He’d just worked up the courage to get into bed, but before I could even raise the scissors, his mother pushed the door open with some soup to sober him up.”

”In a single night, that eccentric woman, Mrs. Wang, came and went seven or eight times. She was worried the blankets were too thin, she was bringing in a chamber pot, she was reminding us not to let the candle go out all night... She could pull any excuse out of thin air.”

”Even the most determined man would have been... deflated by her. And it went on like that for three days straight. If Wang Xianbing had actually managed to sleep with me, it would’ve been a miracle!”

The corner of Chu Shenyu’s mouth twitched.

To be fair, when he agreed to be with Zhu Yun, he had considered all sorts of scenarios and had already mentally prepared himself. He knew the rumors couldn’t be trusted. Zhu Yun and Wang Xianbing had been married, after all; it would have been perfectly normal for them to have been intimate.

So, hearing directly from Zhu Yun that his new wife was still a virgin was a pleasant surprise. It was just... his wife was a real firecracker. She had none of the typical demureness of an unmarried girl or a new bride.

Seeing her recount the story so triumphantly, Chu Shenyu could only shake his head with a helpless smile.

”The old lady was just trying to establish her authority over the new daughter-in-law. She wanted to make it clear that even what happened in the marital bedroom required her approval. She was also afraid that if her son and I actually became a real couple, he’d forget all about her, and she wouldn’t be able to control the lion’s share of his salary.”

”In her mind, if her son had a piece of meat he couldn’t eat, he would always be craving it. That fulfilled her original purpose in getting him a wife in the first place. She knew full well that her son and I had never consummated our marriage, but she pretended I was an ignorant little girl and went around ruining my reputation. She called me a hen that couldn’t lay eggs and did everything in her power to humiliate me.”

”But she never expected it to backfire. Her son’s new wife is someone else now. HAHA! And with someone like Lin Jin, who’s all sweet on the surface but bitter underneath... we’ll just see what kind of silent suffering she has in store for the old lady!”

”So,” Zhu Yun concluded, ”the old lady is going to try and pull the same stunt on you. Hmm, maybe not to establish her authority over us, but making it... difficult for you to display your manly vigor will be a piece of cake for her.”

’And if it leaves him with a psychological scar, that would be a serious problem!’

Chu Shenyu froze, saying hesitantly, ”She wouldn’t, would she?”

Suddenly, there was a knock on the front door.

”And there’s your proof,” Zhu Yun said, raising an eyebrow and motioning for him to open the door.

Chu Shenyu opened the door, his lips pressed into a thin line, only to look down and see two Little Doudings.

When the Little Doudings saw it was him, they got a little scared. But tempted by the promise of candy, they squeezed their eyes shut and shouted in one breath, ”We wish Uncle Chu and the pretty sister a happy marriage and a baby boy soon!”

When they finished, they looked up at him expectantly.

Chu Shenyu nodded.

He never knew how to handle children. To him, kids were just little monsters—boys and girls alike were rowdy, messy, and rude.

He said, ”Thank you,” stared at the two Dou Dings for half a minute, and was about to close the door.

It was Zhu Yun, laughing uncontrollably, who stopped him. ”Go grab a handful of candy for them.”

It dawned on Chu Shenyu. He went to the candy dish and grabbed a big handful.

His hands were large, so it was a very generous handful.

The Little Doudings’ eyes lit up, and they grinned from ear to ear.

But Zhu Yun plucked just two candies from the pile. ”In our residential building, we don’t really have a tradition of going door-to-door for wedding candy, do we?”

”If you tell me the truth, all the candy in Uncle Chu’s hand is yours. If not, you only get these two.”

The Little Doudings practically fell over each other to speak. ”It was the new Grandma Wang! She just went downstairs and told everyone! She said you guys prepared lots of candy and were probably waiting for people to come wish you a happy marriage and a new baby so you could hand it out!”

”Yeah, and Hu and the others are waiting downstairs. They said if we got some candy, they’d bring more people up to get some too...”

Zhu Yun shot Chu Shenyu a meaningful look. ’See? The old woman’s schemes are endless.’

With a brilliant smile, she took all the candy from Chu Shenyu’s hand and the rest from the dish on the table, stuffing it all into the two children’s pockets. ”There you go. As you can see, that’s all the candy we have in the house.”