I am chasing a rough man in the 80s
Chapter 22: A Grand Chorus of Maternal Love and Filial Piety

Chapter 22: Chapter 22: A Grand Chorus of Maternal Love and Filial Piety

Yu Jiaojiao stood at the door, her hand on her hip, a crafty glint in her eyes.

"Feeling tense again? Let your brother loosen you up." Yu Jingting’s nose was sore from a bump from his wife, so he decided to vent on his sister.

Jiaojiao made a face at him.

Suizi looked on as he teased his sister.

"Jiaojiao, come inside!" Wang Cuihua’s roar came from inside the house.

"Bro, save me!"

Jiaojiao hopped into a large empty soy sauce barrel nearby, and Jingting quickly covered it up.

Just after he finished, Wang Cuihua stormed out, a feather duster in hand and murder in her eyes.

"Where is that little rabbit?"

"She ran off." Yu Jingting obviously had practice covering for his sister.

Wang Cuihua brandished her feather duster at him.

"You’d better protect that little rabbit."

"Knocking off dust? Doesn’t hurt at all, let’s get this side too." Jingting turned himself, the padded cotton jacket he wore in winter making the feather duster strikes harmless.

Wang Cuihua, enraged, was about to ditch the duster and use her shoe instead.

"Mom, cool down! What’s this all about?" Suizi quickly intervened, not forgetting to give Jingting a disapproving look.

To be honest, he was really asking for it.

"Look what this brat has hidden in her backpack!"

Wang Cuihua led Suizi into the house.

The bed was strewn with homework books, not a single assignment done, all the pages filled with lively doodles of various little animals.

Suizi casually picked up a battered Chinese textbook and flipped through it; it was all doodles.

She was certainly talented in drawing. She managed to turn a portrait of Li Bai into a monster rolling its eyes, alongside it, written rather haphazardly, were the words ’Yu Jingting’.

The math textbook was similar, scant notes but abundant with all sorts of illustrative drawings.

Jingting took the book from Suizi, flipped through it, and nodded.

"Isn’t the drawing pretty good?" He even took the liberty to erase his own name and wrote Jiaojiao’s in its place.

This was not helping, it was pouring fuel on the fire. Wang Cuihua looked ready to explode again.

"Sent her to school to doodle? Math - 5, Chinese - zero, and she dared to hide her midterm paper! Told me that the results hadn’t been released. Oh boy, I can’t catch my breath."

Suizi sympathetically looked at her mother-in-law, Jiaojiao was really infuriating. As she was about to say some comforting words, Jingting flung the book onto the bed with a laugh.

"I was much better!"

"What scores did you get then?" Suizi was the same age as him.

She started school early and was a year ahead. Jingting barely managed to finish the junior high, and during school, both he and Suizi were often seen on the school playground’s podium.

Suizi was a school representative, the standard of academic excellence. She was also the flag bearer at their weekly flag-raising ceremonies.

He, on the other hand... was notorious for having to make school-wide apologies.

Pick fights, smash windows, hit teachers...he was quite the troublemaker.

"When I was her age, I could score more than 20 points in math. Who gets 5 points, hahaha!"

The academic dunce mocked the scholastic slacker ruthlessly.

The academic deity remained silent.

At that moment, Suizi felt a surge of empathy for the teachers who had to deal with these two. Teachers had it rough.

Like an old cadre, Jingting paced back and forth at the edge of the bed, hands clasped behind his back, critiquing his sister’s test results.

"I’ve been telling her not to hide test papers after examinations, isn’t that dumb?"

Suizi watched him skeptically, wondering since when did this guy start mentoring his sister?

"Stealing the teacher’s red pen and changing a 5 to 95 and a 0 to 100? This girl can’t even be bothered to change the marks, how unfilial!"

Wang Cuihua’s anger, which had just subsided, flared up again, she kicked angrily.

"You’re not teaching any good either! You tricked me exactly like this back in the day! Now your sister is doing the same, when she fails to get married, you’ll look after her!"

"It’s just an extra pair of chopsticks, it’s not as if I can’t afford it."

"Mother, don’t kick him anymore." Suizi tried to intervene.

"Heh, my daughter-in-law is concerned about me."

"He’s got thick skin and a padded jacket, kicking won’t hurt him, mother, I’ll bring you a spade."

"???" Yu Jingting found out that this young wife learns really fast, picking up bad habits especially swiftly, even learning to butter up to her mother.

"Just looking at you irritates me!" Wang Cuihua roared at her son, then turning to grab Suizi’s hand, "Don’t get close to this fool, lest his stupidity rubs onto my little grandchild in your belly. Sleep with mother tonight."

"I will listen to mother." Suizi lowered her eyes obediently like a submissive daughter-in-law, a faint smile on her lips.

She also didn’t want to share a bed with this big bad guy Yu Jingting.

This strong young man has a fire in him and a thick skin. What if it hurts the baby?

Upon hearing that he was going to lose his bed privileges again, Jingting left the room. A minute later, loud, ear-piercing shrieks from Jiaojiao resounded from the courtyard.

"Yu Tiegen! You’re such a disappointment! You betrayed your little sister for a woman!"

"She scored zero and still dares to argue? Go, apologize to our mother."

The man, who was just glowing with reliable-big-brother energy, mercilessly pushed his little sister out just like that in order to share a bed with his wife.

Pulling his wife out and pushing his sister in, as the door closed, a symphony of Wang Cuihua’s loud roars and Jiaojiao’s sobbing mixed up into a chorus of ’a loving mother and a filial son.’

Fearing that her mother-in-law would cause harm to her young sister-in-law, Suizi tried to stop it, only to be firmly held back by Yu Jingting.

"Don’t interfere, it’s useless. Unless she gets a good beating, this house will never be peaceful."

These days, everyone’s parenting style was pretty rough, rather than preaching long-winded lectures, a beating seemed to solve problems more efficiently. The act of Jiaojiao hiding her test papers was definitely deserving of a rigorous punishment that hardly lasts five minutes.

Through the small glass window on the door, Suizi could see Cuihua wildly brandishing a small broom. Most of the strokes, however, fell onto the bed edge instead of the child.

Jiaojiao wept until she was hoarse, crying more loudly than she was being punished. From time to time she would sneakily peep at her mother’s reactions.

Yu Jingting crossed his arms and quietly counted down the seconds.

"After mother scolds Jiaojiao for being unfilial, she’ll probably start crying about father dying too early—"

"Oh, your father! You bastard, why did you have to die so early? It would’ve been better if you took me with you!"

"After crying for about a minute, she’ll curse again."

A minute later, as expected, the scolding resumed.

"Well, that’s that, work’s done, calm after the storm." Upon hearing the silence in the house, Yu Jingting reassuringly patted Suizi, this will just take some getting used to.

Suizi massaged her temples. While her mother-in-law’s seemingly strict methods of discipline weren’t wholly ineffective, they weren’t particularly meaningful either.

Wang Cuihua opened the door, looking just as content as Jingting said she would, as if nothing had happened.

Jiaojiao was happily scribbling with her new pen, her tear-streaked face showing no signs of regret for her errors.

Suizi couldn’t look on any longer. She needed to step in.

That night, when no one was paying attention, Suizi slipped up to the doodling Jiaojiao. Trying to seem unassuming she asked Jiaojiao, "What do you want to be when you grow up?" When it came to educating the little ones, it was important to instill in them dreams and the correct values from the beginning.

"I want to be the second shaman!" Jiaojiao announced proudly.

Suizi was taken aback.

In rural areas, shamans usually perform in pairs: one takes the lead while the second narrates.

Wang Cuihua was a lone shaman, which wasn’t standard.

"Next year, I will stop going to school and become my mother’s assistant shaman."

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