Becoming the Villain's Discarded Wife
Chapter 28: Premonition!_1

Chapter 28: Chapter 28: Premonition!_1

Even though a cool breeze was blowing outside the window, Nanzhi was not at all sleepy.

The images in her dream were too real, and they scared her.

"Mommy, mommy."

Asleep on her side, Gougou whimpered a few times. He seemed like he was dreaming about something terrifying, suddenly he waved his hands in the air, as if trying to fight off something.

"Mommy, mommy."

"Mommy is here." Nanzhi thought Gougou was feeling too hot, so she lightly fanned him with a woven fan. But all of a sudden, he opened his eyes.

Upon seeing Nanzhi still by his side, he breathed a sigh of relief, and big tears started to well up in his eyes.

Gougou crawled into Nanzhi’s arms, whimpering, "Mommy, mommy, Gougou is scared."

"Mommy is here, so Gougou shouldn’t be scared anymore." While lightly patting Gougou’s back, Nanzhi tried to comfort him.

Only after crying for a good quarter of an hour did Gougou finally raise his tear-filled eyes, stuttering, "Mommy, Gougou, Gougou had a nightmare. I dreamt that you were gone; the house had collapsed, and I kept calling for you, Mommy, but you didn’t answer."

Upon hearing Gougou’s words, Nanzhi’s heartbeat quickened. She pressed her lips together before asking, "Gougou, you dreamed of our house collapsing. What else did you dream about?"

Gougou wiped away his tears, and replied in a pitiful voice, "I dreamt that we were waiting for Daddy to come home. And then you disappeared, Mommy. You and Daddy were both gone."

"Good boy, Gougou; it was just a nightmare. Don’t be scared. Mommy would never leave you." Nanzhi’s mind was in a jumble, but she still spoke soothingly to Gougou.

Children are most afraid of being abandoned, especially a child like Gougou who has always been with his mother. He cried for as long as an hour. It took Nanzhi a great effort to finally get him back to sleep, but even then he continued sobbing in his dreams.

After putting Gougou back to sleep, Nanzhi couldn’t sleep at all.

If she were the only one who had the strange dream, she would consider it a random occurrence. But now, even the little lucky star, Gougou, had seen it in his dream too. Did this mean that an earthquake was truly about to come?

However, this was illogical in a way. After all, in their dreams, her husband and Gougou’s father were present, but Shen Xiaolang had been gone for three years already.

In the wooden basin in the backyard, the river clam slowly opened its shells again, releasing a stream of bubbles.

...

"Sister Nanzhi...?" Shen Miaomiao was shocked to see a person with dark circles under her eyes.

Looking at Shen Miaomiao reminded Gougou of what Nanzhi had said the day before, and he reluctantly greeted her, "Hello Auntie."

"Oh, good boy, Gougou." Shen Miaomiao began to smile and reached out to pinch his cute little face, but stopped when she saw how listless Gougou looked.

Had she and her son stayed up all night?

"Miaomiao, you’re up pretty early today." Nanzhi yawned, feeling the heaviness in her eyelids.

"This isn’t early at all..."

Shen Miaomiao looked at the bright sky a bit puzzled; when she woke up that morning, her mother had scolded her, mentioning that by this time, Nanzhi and Gougou would already be up on East Mountain gathering chestnuts.

It seemed as if Shen Miaomiao had realized something and she asked in an exaggerated tone, "Sister Nanzhi, surely you and Gougou didn’t stay up all night fishing in the river?"

"That’s not it, I had a nightmare last night and couldn’t get back to sleep." Nanzhi waved her hands, looking completely drained.

"So, are you still going to go to the mountains to collect chestnuts today?" Shen Miaomiao glanced at Nanzhi and then at Gougou who looked like he could fall asleep any moment.

"Why don’t you stay home and rest with Gougou today? There aren’t many chestnuts left in East Mountain anyway."

Nanzhi thought for a moment, then nodded, "That sounds good, I won’t go today."

"Then, I’ll head home. I’ll come over to see you after lunch."

Without waiting for Nanzhi’s response, Shen Miaomiao waved her hand and trotted all the way home.

"Mom, Gougou is tired." Gougou held on to Nanzhi’s sleeve with one hand and rubbed his eyes with the other.

Holding Gougou, Nanzhi walked back to their courtyard: "Good boy, Gougou, mom is taking you to bed."

That sleep lasted for the whole day. It was only when dusk had started to fall that they woke up, their faces pale.

Nanzhi was just pale, but Gougou was much worse, his body was soaked in sweat and he was shivering.

"Mom, mom, Gougou, Gougou is scared."

Gougou burrowed into Nanzhi’s arms, repeating the same phrase in a low voice.

A thin layer of sweat formed on Nanzhi’s back.

She had dreamt it again.

In the dream, she was resting at home with Gougou, when suddenly the ground started shaking and the entire house rocked. She had barely escaped with Gougou in her arms when she saw the house of the neighboring Li Family collapsing.

In her dream, she had seen Ms. Wu get hit on the head by a falling beam because she couldn’t run fast in her Luo skirt. Even in her dream, Nanzhi could smell the scent of brain matter.

Both Li Liang and Li Tian were directly crushed by the house. She also saw the outstretched hands of Ms. Liao’s two daughters.

"Gougou, don’t be scared. Good boy, Gougou, don’t be scared." Nanzhi had to calm herself first, no matter how scared she was, so she could comfort Gougou.

Gougou was probably having the same dream as her, and if she was this scared, the child, Gougou, must be faring much worse. She didn’t want him to develop a psychological trauma because of a dream.

Once Gougou started crying, he couldn’t stop and the sobbing could be heard in the neighbor’s Shen and Li Families as well.

Everyone came out to see what was happening.

"Little..." Before Ms. Wu had finished her sentence, she swallowed her words and kept them stuck in her throat for a moment before speaking again.

"Lin Nanzhi, why is your Gougou howling like this in the middle of the night? Are you beating the child behind our backs?"

Just as she was about to say something else, Mrs. Liu had already stepped forward and glared at her, which forced Ms. Wu to close her mouth in indignation.

Look at her, she pretends to be a good mother during the day but beats her child at night.

Seeing Ms. Wu close her mouth, Mrs. Liu rolled her eyes and turned to walk towards Nanzhi’s yard, asking worriedly, "Girl, what’s wrong with Gougou? Why is he crying so late at night? Is he feeling uncomfortable somewhere?"

"Should we get a village doctor?" Hearing the crying, Ms. Liao also felt uncomfortable. Her own daughters were only a few years older than Gougou. Being a mother herself, she couldn’t bear to see a child suffer.

"It’s fine." Nanzhi, who was both worried that the dream might come true and terrified that it was all just a coincidence, was conflicted. She did not know whether to warn the villagers not to sleep too heavily at night.

It wasn’t until she held Gougou in her arms and opened the door to see Ms. Wu’s impatient face and the clothes she was wearing that Nanzhi was completely stunned.

Nobody in Lihua Village was really poor, but since the drought, no one was willing to wear their good clothes out, afraid of ruining them while working and thus feeling heartache. Generally, everyone wore tight clothes.

Ms. Wu had also been dressed the same way until now, but today, wasn’t she wearing the same Luo skirt from her dream?

Nanzhi stood rooted to the spot, staring at Ms. Wu as if she were possessed, forgetting to soothe Gougou who was whimpering in her arms. "You, you, this Luo skirt, did you wear it yesterday?"

"Why? This Luo skirt is mine, even if you envy it, you can’t have it." Ms. Wu felt a shiver down her spine looking at Nanzhi and quietly moved behind Ms. Liaos’s back.

"I asked you, did you wear this Luo skirt yesterday?!"

"No, no, I just put it on today." Seeing Nanzhi, Ms. Wu felt like she was looking at the face of a devil and shook her head in denial, not caring about her grudges.

Feeling wronged, thinking about how this skirt was her best outfit and that she had only changed into it because her husband had started to thaw after giving her cold stares for days due to an argument they had had, she wanted to please him. But before she could do anything, she was disturbed by Gougou’s cries and got accused by Nanzhi.

The more she thought about it, the more wronged Ms. Wu felt. She was on the verge of crying.