Chapter 15

Li Muwu and Mingxi tightly held onto the pig meat on their backs, neither of them dared to open the door. But if they were to kick it, they didn’t have the guts.

Li Muwu called out “Mother” twice, but when no one responded, he shifted the pig meat to the side and forcefully used his shoulder to bump the door. There was a loud crash, and Li Laotai trembled again. “Can’t you open the door? Why do you act like bandits? Can’t you do things properly…”

Before she could finish her sentence, Li Muwu had already brought most of the wild pig inside. Li Laotai quickly turned her tone, “Oh my, you should’ve said something! I could’ve opened the door for you!” She yelled toward the other side of the house, “Mingnan, Mingbei, hurry and come out to help!”

The two brothers had just returned to the room and were about to lie down on the bed when they heard Li Laotai shouting for them in the yard. Mingbei, covering his ears, yelled back, “Didn’t hear!”

“You little rascal, you’ve got some nerve!” Li Laotai scolded, while directing Li Mingxi, “Hurry and put the meat down. How much meat do we have here, about two to three hundred pounds?”

“Meat?” Mingnan heard the key word and immediately tugged Mingbei. The two brothers didn’t even bother taking off their shoes. They jumped up from the bed, rushed to the window, and looked outside. They saw Li Muwu placing the pig meat onto a broken cabinet in the yard, then reaching up to unhook the four pig legs from Mingxi’s shoulders.

“Dad, let us help you!” Mingnan and Mingbei’s voices suddenly turned sweet, as if they had just eaten honey. They didn’t even go out the door, but instead jumped out the window from the bed, sprinted to Mingxi, and helped him take the pig legs off. They then eagerly moved to Li Laotai’s side, massaging her back, “Grandma, how are we eating this meat tonight?”

“Not eating? Just look at it!” Li Laotai leisurely watched her two grandsons, picked up her pipe, and gave them each a tap on the backside, “You little rascals, you’re so bold now, I can’t even boss you around anymore.”

“How could that be?” Mingbei laughed awkwardly, rubbing Li Laotai’s arm, “I just heard you call me, and I jumped out the window without even using the door. I didn’t want to delay anything for you.”

Li Laotai couldn’t help but laugh, “Oh, now your legs aren’t tired?”

“They were tired before, but grandma, when you gave the order, they instantly weren’t tired anymore. Don’t believe me? I’ll run a couple of laps around the yard and you’ll see!” Mingbei said, running around the yard twice before swiftly dashing out the front door.

It was the first time Mingxi had carried something so heavy and walked so far. After putting the pig legs down, he felt his legs go soft. Since it would take some time for the water to boil, he, relying on his young strength, stood in the middle of the yard and poured cold water from the tank over his body to rinse off the blood.

Once the bloody smell was gone, Mingxi went inside, took off his clothes, and threw them in the basin. He wiped his body with a towel and put on a clean set of clothes. Only then did he lie down on the bed, preparing to take a nap before dinner.

Although Li Muwu was older, he had long been accustomed to this kind of hard labor. After resting briefly on a small stool in the yard, he found a hook and hung the wild pig on a wooden fence. When Mingnan finished boiling the water, Li Muwu didn’t rush to wash but first burned the pig’s hair off, then scalded it with hot water. Several pots of hot water later, the pig was cleaned up.

The pig skin was thick and the fat was plentiful. Li Muwu first removed the skin, then cut off thick chunks of fat, saving them for making pig lard. The ribs were cut off, and the back leg was chopped into large pieces. By the time Li Muwu’s family arrived, most of the pig had been processed.

“Wow, this wild pig is really big! Did you carry it back yourself?” Li Muwu’s brother, Li Mosen, entered and saw the yard’s broken cabinet full of meat. He then looked at Li Muwu, who was covered in blood, and hurried to help, “You go wash up, I’ll take care of the rest.”

Li Muwu sat down on a small stool, breathing heavily, “Mingxi and I went up the mountain together. We were planning to hunt a roe deer, but we ended up walking too far and encountered a wild boar. I shot it, but the boar didn’t even flinch. You don’t know how scared I was at that moment. If Mingxi hadn’t been behind me, I would’ve had to climb a tree.”

Mingnan had already boiled another pot of water and handed it to Li Muwu. He drank it all in one go. Li Mosen, a regular hunter, felt a chill down his spine hearing the story, “So how did you kill the wild boar? Did you manage to hit its eye?”

“Not that lucky. I was stunned at the time, just aiming to hit it anywhere,” Li Muwu said, lighting a cigarette, “The boar was so smart. It shook me off and charged at Mingxi. But Mingxi is really something. He wasn’t scared at all and with one hit, he shattered the boar’s skull.”

“Really?” Li Mosen looked at Mingxi with admiration, “I didn’t expect him to be so capable. From now on, we’ll take him hunting. After two years of training, when we’re too old to climb the mountains, he’ll be the one to hunt the wild boars for us.”

“You’re right. When we go hunting in the winter, we’ll bring Mingxi along. We’ll carry the guns, and he’ll have the hunting knife. The three of us will definitely bring home a wild boar,” Li Muwu said with pride, puffing on his cigarette.

Mingxi, lying on the bed and about to nap, suddenly heard his uncle’s words, and immediately snapped awake. He climbed up to the window and stuck his head out, crying, “Uncle, don’t listen to my dad’s nonsense. It was just a coincidence.”

“A coincidence? And you managed to smash the wild boar’s skull? If it wasn’t a coincidence, would you have turned its head into mush?” Li Mosen said, laughing at himself.

“You’re right!” Li Muwu nodded proudly and turned to comfort Mingxi, “It’s fine, next time, I’ll go with you. You won’t even need a hunting knife; an axe would be more useful. You’ll easily chop off a wild boar’s head.”

Mingxi sighed, pulling his head back inside, silently deciding that once he entered high school, he would focus on studying and never go up the mountains to hunt wild boars again. The sight of the boar charging at him was simply too terrifying.

After Li Mosen finished dividing the meat, he looked at all the wild pig meat and felt a bit confused, “So much meat. How are we going to store it for the winter? We can’t let it spoil!”

In the past, the Li family usually hunted wild boars in the winter, when they could throw the meat outside and it would freeze hard in a day, staying fresh for months. When they wanted to eat, they would bring it inside and cook it with sauerkraut. It was delicious!

It was summer, and although the weather wasn’t overly hot, so much pork couldn’t be kept for long. There was no sauerkraut to pair with the wild boar meat, but for a family that hadn’t bought any pork since the new year, it didn’t matter what it was stewed with—just as long as there was plenty of meat.

Both large pots were heating up. Guihua looked at the row of fat pork and generously poured some more soybean oil into both pots. One pot was used for stewing fish, while in the other, a large bowl of pork spine was stir-fried, sizzling with oil smoke.

Mingnan, Mingbei, and Li Minsen’s sons Mingrong and Mingguang all gathered around the cupboard where the meat was placed, unwilling to move, their eyes fixed greedily on the large pieces of meat.

Li Laotai, smiling, said, “After dinner, your sister-in-law will cook the pork fat, and whatever oil is left, we’ll sprinkle sugar on it for you.”

As soon as Mingnan and Mingbei heard that, their mouths watered. Mingguang swallowed his saliva and tugged at Li Laotai’s sleeve, saying, “Granny, can I stay at your house tonight?”

“Of course,” Li Laotai replied. “Your brother’s room has a big bed, and you two brothers can fit in there.” She took a puff from her pipe, glanced at her little grandson, and couldn’t help teasing him. “As soon as you hear about the oil being fried, you’re already drooling. You can come tomorrow morning too. Your mom might not agree to let you stay here.”

Mingguang got anxious when he heard this, pulling at Li Laotai’s sleeve and acting coy. “Granny, talk to Mom for me. I’m afraid if I come tomorrow, there won’t be any left. Mingnan and Mingbei will definitely wake up and sneak some!”

Mingrong, squatting nearby, nodded in agreement. Li Minsen shot him a look, unable to resist saying, “You and Mingxi are about the same age, and look at him, he can go up the mountain to hunt wild boars. You’re just sitting there eating! When winter comes, you’d better not just sit around. Come with us to the mountain. Let Mingxi show you how to kill a wild boar with one strike.”

“It’s smashing the boar’s head!” Li Muwu corrected him. “Smashing it. The wild boar’s head was taken home by Li Er’s wife to cook. I should’ve brought it back for you all to see, but Mingxi smashed the boar’s skull clean off.”

Lying on the kang, Mingxi thought about the wild boar charging at him and felt a sense of despair. He lay on the south bed of the east room, listening to the adults talk, looking conflicted. Could they please stop mentioning smashing the boar’s head?

After a while, Li Muwu recovered his breath, thinking dinner was almost ready. He asked Wang Sufen to find him a clean set of clothes. He then went to the back room to wash thoroughly from head to toe, even luxuriously using soap to remove the blood scent from his hair. Clean and fresh, he changed into new clothes and came out to eat.

A pot of stewed fish, a pot of cabbage and pork with vermicelli, and a pot of braised pork ribs with potatoes were placed on the table. Mingnan quickly fetched a bowl and chopsticks, while Mingbei picked the tenderest pieces of fish from the fattest part of the fish head and placed them in a small bowl, handing it to Wang Sufen. “Give it to my sister.”

Zhenzhen, smelling the fragrant fish, couldn’t help but reveal a couple of small white teeth in a grin. “You’re so considerate. Next time you fish, I’ll come help you.”