C18 An Family

Yifan stopped and turned to look at her, admiration in his eyes. "Thanks!"

"It was nothing!" Yifan smiled.

Seeing he was about to leave, Xiaoxia quickly blocked his path, still puzzled. "Aren't you worried you might have helped the wrong person without knowing the full story?"

"I overheard their conversation on the way here. If I had confronted them directly, they wouldn't have admitted anything, so I used this approach instead."

Understanding dawned on her, and she thanked him again.

Coincidentally, all four of them were heading back to the village, parting ways only at the entrance.

Dawang had initially wanted to follow and help, but Xiaoxia declined. His time wasn't limitless, and they'd already taken up enough of it. The rest they could handle themselves.

Back at the rundown house, they called for Mr. Zhang. He had assumed only two of them would return at most, surprised to see them all back. No wonder the three sisters had been cast out by their family; they were resilient.

"Mr. Zhang, are you still selling this house?" Xiaoxia asked coldly, not liking the disdain in his eyes.

Mr. Zhang nodded repeatedly, eager to sell. He brought out the deed, and after Xiaoxia reviewed it, she handed over the money—exactly one tael, all she had.

"Alright, the house is yours now. I'm off!" Mr. Zhang weighed the silver in his hand, then turned and left.

At least we've got a place to stay!

As I pushed the door open, dust fell from it, making me wave my hand to clear the air. The house was rundown, but thankfully it had some furniture. With a good cleaning, it could be usable for quite a while.

"Xiaoqiu, see if there's anything in the house we can use for cooking. Take it to the backyard and wash it. We can have some salted fish and wild vegetable soup today. Xiaodong and I will tidy up the house!"

Even though we were hungry, we had to endure it. If we didn't do the work, no one else would help us. The place was a mess and needed to be cleaned up before it was livable.

Xiaoqiu nodded, her face now free from the fear she showed at the county office, replaced with a smile.

The two of us fetched water and cleaned the house thoroughly, which took about an hour.

I couldn't remember the last time I worked this hard; my back was aching. Xiaodong didn't look much better, her face pale. "Alright, go help Xiaoqiu. The sooner we finish, the sooner we can eat, and then we can tidy up some more after dinner!"

"Okay!"

I finally went into the inner room. It wasn't very big, with two bedrooms and a living room. The kitchen was in the backyard, but it was completely unusable. It looked like we'd have to build a new one!

At least the three of us sisters had enough space to live.

We tidied up a bit and found a few clean boards to make a bed.

When they left, they didn't bring any bedding, so this is how it has to be now!

"Sis, it's time to eat!" Xiaodong's voice called out.

Heading outside, they found a bowl, though it was chipped, it could still hold soup, but there were no chopsticks!

Xiaodong, holding a bowl of salted fish and wild vegetable soup, was puzzled. "Sis, what do we do without chopsticks?"

Looking around, they noticed several trees in the backyard. They went over, snapped off a branch, and broke it into two pieces. "There, problem solved!"

The sisters shared a smile and each picked a peach tree branch to use as chopsticks. The meal was simple, but they enjoyed it thoroughly!

After the three sisters finished their meal and tidied up, Xiaoxia found a rusty knife and began sharpening it on a stone in the backyard.

"Sis, why are you sharpening a knife?"

"We don't have much money to buy things, so we need to make use of whatever we can find around here. Did you see that bamboo grove? I'm going to show you a little magic trick!" Xiaoxia explained.

If she hadn't experienced this firsthand, she could hardly imagine her life becoming so challenging!

But there's something satisfying about earning everything with your own hands!

After all, didn't people originally rely on their hands to create everything they needed?

They went to the bamboo grove, cut down some stalks, and trimmed them to the same length, arranging them neatly. But there was no rope!

Seeing Xiaoxia's furrowed brow, Xiaodong asked, "Sis, what's wrong?"

"What else can we use that works like a rope?" Xiaoqiu nudged Xiaodong's arm, pointing toward the front yard.

"Yes, sister, there's a tree by the gate. Its bark can be used to make rope!"

Great! They immediately went over and peeled off a good amount of bark. As long as they didn't strip the entire tree, it wouldn't harm its growth, and the bark would eventually grow back.

"Sister, what are you planning to do?" Xiaoxia smiled, recalling a time when she and her colleagues went on a life skills retreat. She had seen locals there weave bamboo into mats, which were much softer and more comfortable to sleep on than hard wooden boards.

Although she didn't have the same skills as the locals, she could certainly give it a try! She wove a large bamboo mat, big enough for three people to sleep on. "Let's carry this inside!"

With some help, they laid the mat on the bed frame, securing it in place. The room felt different with the bamboo mat in it.

"Sister..."

"Why don't you two sit on it and see if it's comfortable?"

They sat down, and it was indeed much more comfortable than the hard bed boards. They had never slept on anything this soft before. "Sis, this bed is even better than Second Aunt's!"