After Awakening, the Control Group’s Husband Decided to Lie Flat - Chapter 1

Chapter 1 – The Prophetic Dream

“Qingtao—Qingtao-er, why aren’t you up yet?”

A shrill voice rang by his ear. Xia Qingtao jolted up from the bed, rubbed his eyes to steady himself, and only then realized that daylight was already flooding the room.

“Qingtao-er!” The voice sounded again outside, accompanied by the knocking of a door.

“Yes!” He quickly scrambled out of bed, hastily throwing on an outer robe as he rushed to open the door. “Mother—”

It was his mother knocking. She was already dressed neatly, even the hair at her temples was combed smooth. Upon seeing him, she scolded lightly, her tone carrying a hint of reproach:

“Still sleeping? In a while, the scholar’s family will be coming to meet you. With you looking this slovenly, what an ill omen it would be! Hurry up and tidy yourself.”

Ah, that’s right. Today, it was his distant maternal aunt who was acting as matchmaker, bringing a scholar from the neighboring village to meet him.

“Mother, I…” Xia Qingtao hesitated, as though wanting to say something, but no words came out.

“What is it?” His mother didn’t seem concerned and continued, “Don’t dawdle. Hurry. Dress up nicely and use the hair ribbon your brother bought you from town last time, alright? I’ll make some wheat-glue cakes1 later for the scholar’s family to have as snacks.”

“Mother…” Xia Qingtao tried to speak again, but she had already turned to leave. With heavy thoughts, he closed the door and returned to get dressed.

The clothes he was to wear today had been prepared long beforehand—new garments usually reserved for banquets or festivals. Beside them lay the hair ribbon he had never brought himself to use. He still remembered how joyfully he had prepared this outfit last night, yet now he felt no happiness at all.

He remembered vividly the dream he’d had the night before—he dreamed that he was a supporting character in a storybook, while the boy from the neighboring house was the protagonist. Without any effort, that boy merely needed to be a kind, naive beauty to win the favor of the county magistrate’s son, thereafter enjoying wealth and status for life. Meanwhile, he himself carefully chose to marry a scholar. In the dream, he worked tirelessly for the scholar’s family—laboring in the fields, doing laundry, cooking meals, even bringing things from his own family to supplement their household—enduring hardships he had never known in his own home. Two years later, the scholar finally passed the provincial exam and became a Juren2.

But he did not share in the scholar’s good fortune—just as in the operas, once the scholar became a Juren, he turned heartless, clinging to a wealthy family in the county town. He divorced Xia Qingtao and married the daughter of Merchant Zhao. He remembered it vividly: the scholar’s finger nearly stabbing toward his face, his expression cold and cruel as he snarled:

“Xia Qingtao, don’t think I don’t see through your little schemes. You’re good to me because you want to become a Juren’s wife, isn’t that so? Nagging me every day to study, scolding me constantly—what kind of domineering, detestable fellow are you?!”

“I won’t let you have your way. Here’s ten taels of silver—get back to your Xia family. From now on, bridges are bridges and roads are roads; don’t come pestering me again!”

After being cast out and sent back to his family, because he had often taken things from home before, he became estranged from his brother and sister-in-law. His father scolded him harshly, and the neighbors pointed and whispered. Unable to bear the shame, he hanged himself one night.

His hand rose to his neck. In the small bronze mirror, his neck was smooth and fair, without the slightest scar. Yet the suffocating pain of hanging still lingered in his heart, as though it had truly happened.

In truth, he knew his intentions at the start had not been pure—his neighbor Xia Mian had been born just a day apart from him, and ever since, they were constantly compared by others.

Xia Mian’s grandfather and father were blacksmiths, and his uncle owned an iron shop in town. Their family was one of the wealthiest in Xia Village. Xia Mian had always eaten and dressed better than he did, and he was also strikingly handsome. Aside from not having fair skin, in every other respect he surpassed him.

When the two of them stood together as children, neighbors would always praise Xia Mian, calling him pretty and well-behaved. True to his name, Xia Qingtao was like a green, unripe peach—unable to compare to the sweet, luscious honey peaches.

His mother had always taught him: since he was not as good-looking as others, he should work harder, learn more household skills and needlework. “We country folk choose spouses who are capable, not merely pretty.”

So Xia Qingtao learned cooking and needlework from a young age, even followed his brother in learning to read. He might not recognize thousands of characters, but at least a few hundred. He thought that by these merits, he could at least compare to Xia Mian in marriage prospects. Who would have thought Xia Mian, while playing in town, would catch the eye of the county magistrate’s son and leap from a farmer’s boy to the magistrate’s son-in-law?

He secretly envied him and thought the only way he could surpass Xia Mian was to marry a scholar—if the scholar passed the exams, not just the magistrate, but even a prefect’s rank was possible, and wouldn’t that make him the prefect’s wife?

Thus came the dream of marrying a scholar. But even if his intentions were impure, he still regarded the scholar as his husband, gave him everything good, and served him wholeheartedly. How could that dream-scholar be so heartless and cruel?

Was it simply because he was just a supporting character?

Xia Qingtao gazed at the bronze mirror, at his own face that could only be called delicate, and sighed. Forget it. Accept fate. He wasn’t the protagonist—why foolishly dream of being the prefect’s wife? What wasn’t fated to be shouldn’t be forced.

So he reached up and swiftly untied the hair ribbon.

Taking a deep breath, he rose and opened the door.

“Mother, what’s for breakfast? I’m a bit hungry.”

“I made your favorite vegetable buns. Your brother just had some and wanted more, so I had to wrestle them away from him for you,” his mother called from the eastern kitchen. She turned her head, noticing her son hadn’t tied the new hair ribbon, and asked curiously. Her Qingtao usually loved to look nice: “Why didn’t you use the ribbon your brother bought you?”

While washing up, Xia Qingtao replied, “It’s too pretty—I can’t bear to use it. I’ll save it for New Year.”

His sister-in-law Xinghua, who had just come in from feeding the chickens and ducks, overheard and laughed: “If you don’t use it today, then when will you? If you like it, have your brother buy you another one later.”

His brother liked to tease him, but was actually kind-hearted. Whenever he went to town, he always brought things back for him. His sister-in-law was generous too, never stingy.

In the dream, he didn’t know what possessed him—he had been so excessive that even his good-hearted brother and sister-in-law harbored resentment toward him.

Wiping his face dry, Xia Qingtao joked playfully: “He just likes to bully me. If I call him ‘good brother’ every time he gives me a hair ribbon, I’ll wear out my throat. Better not have him buy it—saves money and saves breath!”

His mother and sister-in-law laughed, saying:

“These brothers still haven’t grown up. They’ll only mature once they’re both married.”

By the hour of Chen3, the daughter-in-law of his fourth great-grandfather—his aunt Chunmiao—came over, saying that the scholar and the matchmaker were at the village entrance, urging them to hurry.

His mother quickly called his sister-in-law and took him along with fruit and wheat-glue cakes.

It wasn’t proper for a suitor to visit the prospective spouse’s home directly, so they arranged to meet at a familiar neighbor’s house. The refreshments for the matchmaker and the suitor’s family couldn’t be expected from the host, so naturally they were provided by Xia Qingtao’s family.

Now that it was September, autumn pears and persimmons were ripe. His mother selected the best-looking ones to serve to guests.

Upon entering the house, his fourth grandmother and aunt Chunmiao kept praising how handsome he looked today, saying he was famously capable and would surely be chosen by the scholar—perhaps even becoming an official’s wife in the future.

In the past, such praise would have filled Xia Qingtao’s heart with joy, but now he felt strangely calm. He merely smiled, handing a pear to his little cousin Qiuyan:

“Qiuyan, have a taste—this pear is very sweet.”

“Thank you, Brother Qingtao!” Qiuyan, only five years old, skipped away with the pear.

Soon after, his brother and Uncle Mingyun returned. Although Mingyun was of the uncle generation, he was only four years older than his brother—more like a peer. Since the fields were less busy lately, they often went to town to work together. Today, they had specially taken half a day off to receive the scholar.

As they entered, the matchmaker and the scholar followed right behind them.

Xia Qingtao was in the backyard, beneath the jujube tree, doing needlework with Aunt Chunmiao when he heard the bustle from the front yard. Strangely, his heart remained still—after all, he wouldn’t marry the scholar anyway, so there was no need to be nervous.

“Qingtao-er—”

A moment later, his mother called from the front: “Bring out the wheat-glue cakes.”

“Go on, Qingtao.”

“Okay!” Xia Qingtao carried the cakes out, walking past Aunt Chunmiao’s teasingly amused gaze.

Letting a young woman or boy deliver refreshments to allow the two parties to see each other was standard procedure.

Only now did Xia Qingtao feel a twinge of nervousness—would the scholar be the same as in his dream?

Turning the corner into the main hall, he saw a crowd gathered around an eight-immortals table4. There were so many people, especially men, that he couldn’t immediately tell which one was the scholar.

“Qingtao-er is here!” Uncle Mingyun called out from the crowd.

“I’ve brought the wheat-glue cakes,” he said as he approached the table. Lifting his gaze, he saw on the west side a young man in a light blue long robe, slender and refined in appearance—exactly like the one in his dream.

His heart lurched. Startled, he quickly lowered his head and set the cakes down on the table.

“Everyone, please try them. Our Qingtao is well-known for being capable—at New Year or festivals, the pastries and dishes he makes have never received a single complaint!” Fourth Grandmother chimed in.

“Oh, just a child’s clumsy attempts,” his mother said with a smile, though her tone carried pride. She turned to look at Xia Qingtao. “Our Qingtao loves learning from others—why, he even learned to read alongside his brother. He can recognize all those deed and contract writings!”

Though modest, her tone was undeniably proud.

“That’s true,” his brother added. “I’m no good at reading, but Peach is better—teach him once and he remembers. If boys were allowed to attend school, our family would have raised a scholar for sure.”

Everyone laughed, and Xia Qingtao blushed, hastily saying:

“I’ll go back to embroider handkerchiefs.”

With that, he fled the room.

notes

1. Wheat-glue cakes (麥糊燒) — A rustic pastry made with wheat paste or batter, often fried or baked, common in northern Chinese countryside cuisine. ↩

2. Juren (舉人) — A successful candidate in the provincial-level imperial examination in imperial China; one rank below the highest jinshi degree. ↩

3. Hour of Chen (辰時) — Traditional Chinese timekeeping divides the day into 12 two-hour periods; Chen corresponds to roughly 7–9 a.m. ↩

4. Eight-immortals table (八仙桌) — A square table named after the Eight Immortals of Chinese legend; large enough to seat eight people comfortably, commonly used in traditional households. ↩