Back To the Small Fishing Village In 1982 - Chapter 49

Chapter 49: Money to Share

“These aren’t mine. I brought sacks – these two bags are mine, plus this small pile here. The others didn’t bring sacks, so they just piled everything on the boat. They’ve all run back to get bags now.”

After explaining, Ye Yaodong handed the bamboo basket and bucket to his mother. “These are what I caught. Take them to A-Cai and ask if he’ll buy the sea centipedes. There are also seven mud crabs in this bamboo basket…”

His mother was stunned by his harvest. “So many mud crabs! There’s so much to catch on that lonely island? And sea centipedes too? This bucket isn’t light!”

Looking at the writhing sea centipedes in the bucket, she wasn’t disgusted at all. Instead, she was delighted, her eyes gleaming. Sea centipedes were valuable – they couldn’t find these on the mudflats near their home.

“Nobody goes to the lonely island. The reefs are teeming with all sorts of things. Look at these seaweed and these blood cockles – they’re huge. The others caught some mud crabs too. There’s quite a lot there. If I wasn’t worried about having too many shellfish that we couldn’t finish eating, I could have dug up even more to bring back.”

“This is enough, this is enough. It would be such a waste if they spoiled before we could eat them all. I’ll take these to sell. Is there anything else?” His mother happily held the bucket in one hand and the bamboo basket in the other. It was rare for her third son to be so reliable – she was even happier than when she earned money herself.

Ye Yaodong kicked the small pile at his feet. “The rest needs to be sorted. Some of the sea snails are quite big and can be sold, along with the geoducks. The seaweed isn’t worth much, right? Let’s keep it for the construction workers to eat.”

“Alright, alright. I’ll take these to sell first, and we’ll sort through those shells later.”

When the others came back with sacks to load their catch, Ye Yaodong’s father’s fishing boat also came in.

When she heard that their third son had a good harvest today – half a bucket of sea centipedes, seven mud crabs that sold for over ten yuan, and two sacks of shellfish – his father’s expression softened considerably. Today’s fishing net catch wasn’t as good as yesterday’s; they only made about 20 yuan in total.

For their third son to go out in the morning and return in the afternoon with such a harvest was quite impressive.

After the family helped transport all the shellfish home, his mother first sorted out some seaweed to cook a pot of noodle soup to send to the workers as a snack. She should have cooked it earlier but was delayed by going to meet his father and the others.

As soon as Ye Yaodong got home, he drank nearly half a pot of tea, then sat in the main hall to rest while waiting for dinner.

His father, bare-chested and taking a few puffs from his precious water pipe, asked Yaodong, “Did the others get as much?”

“Not as much as me.”

Tired from a full day’s work, he didn’t really want to talk, just wanted to eat quickly and get some good rest.

“There won’t be high tide tomorrow. When the tide’s high on the fifteenth, let’s see if we can rent another boat to go.”

“That old lady charges too much for rent, it’s not worth it. We’ll see when the time comes.”

If they couldn’t even recover their costs, wouldn’t it be a waste of a day’s work?

His father nodded, “We’ll see then. After dinner, go with your wife to A-Cai’s house to collect the over 1,000 yuan from yesterday’s sales. We’ll divide up whatever money we should divide.”

“Mm.”

After Lin Xiuqing received the money from the sales that Ye Yaodong’s mother secretly passed to her while delivering snacks, she rushed home without even eating, knowing her husband had returned.

When she ran back home, Ye Yaodong had just finished eating. He quickly put down his bowl, “Have you eaten any snacks? Mother left some in the pot.”

“Okay.”

After his father and Ye Yaohua finished eating, they went to the house foundation site, leaving the couple alone to talk.

While eating, Lin Xiuqing asked, “There were too many people around earlier, so mother didn’t say much, just secretly slipped me a bunch of bills, whispering that it was from your sales just now.”

“Mm…” Ye Yaodong told her about today’s harvest and pointed to the back door, indicating there was still a pile of shellfish there.

“After you finish eating, sort through them and see if there’s anything else we can sell. We’ll take them to A-Cai’s later and settle yesterday’s account too.”

Lin Xiuqing nodded with a smile in her eyes – nothing made her happier than her husband being able to earn money.

Seeing his wife’s clearly changed attitude these past few days, Ye Yaodong felt the exhaustion was worth it.

“Mother seems to have sold the three small cuttlefish too, otherwise we could have stewed them in wine for you to eat.”

“What’s there to eat? Anything that can be sold should be sold. Father’s been trawling lately, there’s plenty of small fish and shrimp. We’re not short of food at home, and you dug up so many shellfish – we won’t even be able to finish it all.”

How could that be the same?

In her previous life, she died of intestinal cancer, which must have been related to diet. He had always felt very guilty about it. Now that they had a second chance, he wanted to make sure she ate well.

“Well, we’ll talk about it after the family division.”

Living together in a big family, they couldn’t eat separately, and since he was previously seen as an unproductive waste, if they had special meals, his two sisters-in-law would have something to say about it.

Lin Xiuqing quickly finished her meal, washed her bowl, and went to the backyard to sort through everything, picking out anything she thought was worth money.

She put all the large snails, pen shells, and wild abalones in a separate bucket, leaving only the smaller ones that wouldn’t fetch much money for themselves to eat.

To be honest, he had already picked the larger ones while digging, and after her sorting, there wasn’t much left.

Fortunately, she wasn’t interested in the seaweed and blood cockles, so they could keep two bags of those.

“Should we open the oysters to sell?”

“Let’s not. With such a big bag, we’d definitely need mother and the others to help open them. You can’t finish it alone tonight. Since everyone would help, let’s keep them for the family to eat.”

“Alright then!” Lin Xiuqing was slightly disappointed – such a big bag of oysters could yield several jin of meat.

Ye Yaodong smiled at her money-loving expression, “Alright, just bring yesterday’s receipt. I’ll go call A-Guang and the others, and we’ll go to A-Cai’s place together to settle the money.”

“Okay.”

Coming out of A-Cai’s house with a large sum of money in his pocket, Ye Yaodong looked at the sea in the distance – this was the treasure house for the entire village.

He’d heard that his grandfather wasn’t originally from this village, but had come begging all the way from Zhejiang Province during a famine, then settled in the village, making a living from the sea.

This vast ocean had nurtured so many people.

After looking away, he said cheerfully, “Let’s go to A-Guang’s house to divide the spoils!”

1,601.88 yuan was a huge sum for people now – equivalent to two years’ wages for a worker. Split four ways, after deducting boat rental and fuel costs, each person would get about 397 yuan.

“My wife calculated it – about 397 each. Everyone count your own money, count to the whole number first, then we’ll see how much change is left and check if it’s correct!”

Ye Yaodong put all the bills on the table for everyone to count themselves.

Their other sales money had already been kept separately by Lin Xiuqing and wasn’t mixed in.

Everyone happily counted their money and tucked it away, leaving 1.88 yuan on the table. Ye Yaodong smiled and asked, “There’s still over 1 yuan left, do you want to split it or…”

“No need to split it, right? What’s the point of dividing a few mao each? Let’s buy some wine!”

“Yeah, let’s buy wine! After a full day’s work, let’s have a good celebration tonight. We happened to catch some fish in the nets during the day, and we have shellfish – we’ve got all the side dishes ready.”

“Sounds good, sounds good.”

“Should we call the others too?”

“They’re going to be envious again…”