The Little Beauty in the Courtyard

Chapter 1-5

　　Chapter 1 Stay Here

　　July 1990.

　　Xin'an City is in the height of summer in mid-July. On weekdays, the air feels like it has been baked, and it feels hot and dry when it blows over your body.

　　However, it had just rained that afternoon, and the heat was blown away by the heavy rain, and the weather suddenly became much cooler.

　　Linjialou has a good location and there are no tall buildings blocking its view nearby. When the house was built, special attention was paid to ventilation. Zhang Xiumei and her family live on the third floor, with a cross-breeze blowing through, which is a rare comfort in midsummer.

　　After Zhang Xiumei finished cooking, she carried a plate of food from the kitchen to the main room. As soon as she reached the door, she heard the quarrel between her youngest son and daughter in the room.

　　"Mine! That's mine!"

　　The twelve-year-old daughter Zhou Meizhu screamed at her thin and dark son Jiabao.

　　But even though she screamed, she didn't move her hands holding the plate.

　　Ten-year-old Zhou Jiabao was holding a piece of cantaloupe in his hand. He didn't bother to pay any attention to Zhou Meizhu and just put the melon into his mouth with his face and hands covered in juice.

　　The two of them divided the melon before eating, one portion each. However, Zhou Jiabao ate quickly and after finishing his own, he took his sister Zhou Meizhu's.

　　"Isn't it just a cantaloupe?"

　　Zhang Xiumei stepped over the threshold and said to her daughter, "Xiaobao is your younger brother, you have to give in to him."

　　Zhou Meizhu pursed her lips in grievance, but perhaps because she was used to it, she did not refute.

　　Zhang Xiumei brought the plate to the table and said to Jiabao lovingly without saying anything to Zhou Meizhu, "Okay, Xiaobao, don't eat too much. We'll have dinner when your dad comes back. How can you have room for dinner if you eat so much melon?"

　　Zhou Jiabao didn't know whether it was because of what his mother said or because he smelled the aroma of meat, but he put down the melon in his hand and looked at the two dishes on the table.

　　A plate of sweet and sour pork ribs and a plate of scrambled eggs with bitter melon.

　　He reached out and took a piece of pork ribs and stuffed it into his mouth. It was probably a little hot, so it made a "hiss" sound and he quickly bit it a few times before swallowing it down his throat.

　　Zhou Meizhu no longer felt aggrieved, and followed her brother, picked up a piece with chopsticks and put it into her mouth.

　　"Slow down, don't be so impatient, be careful not to burn your mouth,"

　　Zhang Xiumei quickly handed him a glass of water and said, "It's just been fried. It's still hot."

　　"mom,"

　　Zhou Meizhu finished chewing the ribs in her mouth, spit out the bones, looked up at her mother, and said, "Mom, can we stay here forever? I don't want to go back."

　　The Zhou family originally lived in a remote mountain village, where they were very poor. They were lucky to have some minced meat in their meals, let alone a big plate of sweet and sour pork ribs. They also had eggs. They raised chickens, but they were very strict at home. How could they have eggs every day? Every ten days or half a month, they would have a bowl of mixed vegetable and egg soup with some egg drops floating on the table.