Adultery leads to death—there's no truer saying than that.
After what happened to Liu Cuilan, Huang Meili was completely terrified, afraid that Zhou Zhimin might do something rash in a moment of foolishness.
She still kept meaning to ask Zhou Dana about that pair of underpants, but she didn't dare go up to him on her own.
Besides the underpants entanglement, Huang Meili had another matter weighing on her heart.
She had originally planned to go visit relatives in Dongshan during the New Year and have Zhou Xiaoying secretly get rid of the baby in Chuntao's belly.
But when the time came, she got cold feet—if someone actually died, she'd have to pay with her own life.
When Zhou Zhimin and Zhou Xiaowei went to Dongshan to visit relatives, Huang Meili didn't let Zhou Xiaoying go along.
Before the New Year, Wang Xiaoming had told Zhou Xiaowei that when he went to Dongshan to visit relatives, he should bring a little something for Chuntao.
Zhou Xiaowei remembered this and went to find Wang Xiaoming before leaving.
Wang Xiaoming packed two jars of pickled vegetables and some dried fermented soybeans, saying Chuntao loved to eat those.
When Zhou Xiaowei handed the things to Chuntao, her eyes immediately reddened, her heart both warm and sour—she hadn't expected Wang Xiaoming to still think of her.
Xiaoming studied so well, yet Liu Cuilan refused to pay for his schooling. How could there be such a heartless mother under heaven!
Chuntao had always felt sorry that Wang Xiaoming had to drop out of school.
Before she'd even settled into her seat, Zhou Xiaowei spilled the whole story about Liu Cuilan and the death.
"...That shrew Liu Cuilan got arrested, along with the Wang Haihu brothers—they're all in jail!"
Chuntao was stunned.
She knew Liu Cuilan was desperate for men, but she'd never imagined it was this outlandish—entangled with three men at once and causing a death to boot.
Zhou Zhijun, sitting nearby, showed no surprise at all. His tone was icy and full of contempt. "None of them were any good. Things like this happening is no surprise at all.
With Liu Cuilan, that troublemaker, rotting in prison, Wangjia Village can finally have some peace!"
In the next room, Zhou Zhimin also told Aunt Zhou about Liu Cuilan's affair. After hearing it, Aunt Zhou let out a cold laugh, her tone dripping with disdain.
"Liu Cuilan, that hornet's nest, spreading rumors in every household day in and day out, ruining other people's reputations—turns out she was the most shameless one of all!
And those Wang brothers, not a decent one among them. Now they're all locked up. Wangjia Village can finally be quiet..."
The trip to Dongshan to visit relatives was a long one—counting travel time plus stops at both ends, it took a full three days.
All three of Zhou Xiaoying's sisters had also gone to their maternal uncle's house to visit relatives, so Huang Meili finally had a chance to go find Zhou Dana.
But she hesitated again—would Zhou Dana be sleeping at the village headquarters during the New Year? And she was even more afraid of running into Shi Yanhua and causing more trouble.
After lunch, Huang Meili grabbed a handful of sunflower seeds and strolled slowly around the village, deliberately wandering in a circle until she was near Zhou Dana's house.
Seeing a few women sitting together on a wall in the sun gossiping, she joined them.
She heard them talking about Liu Cuilan and those men's scandals, and her heart skipped a beat. She immediately thought of her own affair with Zhou Dana, and her heart raced with panic.
Just then, Shi Yanhua walked over, and she was so startled she wanted to slip away.
"Meili, what's going on? Every time I show up, you leave. What have I done to offend you?" Shi Yanhua's words carried a hidden edge.
Huang Meili's heart tightened at that—Zhou Dana must have told Shi Yanhua about the two of them.
That pair of underpants was something Shi Yanhua had given to Zhou Zhimin.
She forced herself to stay calm. “Chief Shi, what are you talking about? I haven’t fed my cow yet—I need to get back and do that!”
“Fine, fine. Since there’s not much field work in winter, make sure you fatten that cow up good, so it’ll have strength to work come spring!” Shi Yanhua replied with a smile, though the warning in her tone was unmistakable.
Huang Meili gave a cold laugh inside and fired back without backing down. “Of course. My cow’s a real powerhouse—it’s been servicing other people’s cows, and the calves it sired are already over ten years old. This winter I’ll feed it well, and next year it’ll keep servicing cows again. One service earns me a few bucks!”
A woman couldn’t help but tease, “Meili, isn’t your cow a female? How can it service other cows?”
Huang Meili didn’t answer that. She just gave Shi Yanhua a meaningful look, tossed out “Chief Shi, you all keep chatting—I’m off now,” and turned to leave.
Watching Huang Meili’s retreating figure, Shi Yanhua was grinding her teeth in fury.
What did she mean by that? Could it be that Huang Meili had found out about her and Zhou Dana? She couldn’t sit still any longer. She headed straight to Zhou Dana’s house.
By then, Zhou Dana and his wife had just seen off their relatives. Wang Jinzhi was washing dishes in the kitchen, and Zhou Dana was squatting by the main door, smoking a toke from his pipe.
“Sister-in-law, busy as always?” Shi Yanhua called out.
Wang Jinzhi heard her voice and, without even setting down the bowl in her hand, hurried to the kitchen doorway and greeted her warmly. “Yanhua, you’ve come! Come in and sit!”
Zhou Dana also got up, putting on a serious face. “Yanhua, off visiting relatives?”
“Went already, just got back,” Shi Yanhua said, stepping into the main room, while constantly winking and gesturing at Zhou Dana.
Zhou Dana caught on right away, but deliberately shook his head and raised his voice. “Weather’s been pretty nice these days—just right for visiting relatives.”
The village had just seen a fatal incident triggered by an affair, and Zhou Dana was feeling uneasy.
Sure, Shi Yanhua no longer had a husband and claimed she only had him as a man, but Zhou Dana didn’t believe a word of it, so he wasn’t about to get tangled up with her again.
Seeing him playing dumb, Shi Yanhua mouthed the words silently at him: “Come to my place tonight.”
Zhou Dana’s heart sank even more. He didn’t dare go, and could only point helplessly toward the village committee office.
That murky relationship of theirs had gone on for eighteen years now, and Wang Jinzhi had never caught on.
For one thing, Shi Yanhua was the godmother of their son, Zhou Jinzhu, so the two families counted as kin.
For another, Zhou Dana was the village party secretary and Shi Yanhua was the women’s director—they had official dealings anyway, so it didn’t look odd for them to be close.
That evening, when Zhou Dana insisted on going to sleep at the committee office, Wang Jinzhi tried to talk him out of it. “It’s the new year’s holiday, why do you have to go sleep at the office?”
Zhou Dana’s brow was twisted tight. He made up an excuse. “I worry about it—afraid someone might try to steal from the office during the holidays.”
“Aren’t the village militia on night watch? Why do you need to bother yourself?”
Every winter, the village arranged for militia members to do night duty. It wasn’t all-night watching, but they’d at least make a round through the village at midnight.
“Those lads on watch are half-hearted at best—they don’t really care!” Zhou Dana was adamant, and seeing that, Wang Jinzhi didn’t push it further.
After supper, Zhou Dana headed to the committee office. Not long after he got there, Shi Yanhua arrived.
The moment she stepped in, she demanded, “Did you tell that bitch Huang Meili about us?”
Zhou Dana lit his pipe of dry tobacco, took a puff, and said grumpily, "I'm not some fool, how could I go around saying stuff like that?"
"Then how come when she saw me today, she said those things?" Shi Yanhua was furious, her voice growing more agitated.
Shi Yanhua repeated to Zhou Dana what Huang Meili had said about breeding, and as he listened, Zhou Dana's heart suddenly tightened—he knew something was wrong.
That night Huang Meili had left her underwear there. She must have come back to fetch it and overheard his conversation with Shi Yanhua from outside the door!
If Huang Meili really had something on him, she would use it to make trouble later. If their affair were exposed, the consequences would be unthinkable.
Seeing his furrowed brow, Shi Yanhua grew even more panicked. "If that bitch Huang Meili spreads this around, the two of us are finished! What do we do?"
Zhou Dana's mind was a tangled mess, but he forced a calm front. "What's there to fear? She has no actual proof, just running her mouth. Who would believe her?"
But Shi Yanhua wasn't as composed as he was. She said urgently, "From now on, we can't meet at the village office anymore. It's too dangerous!"
"I was thinking the same thing."
Zhou Dana took a deep drag on his pipe. "I'm getting old, and my body is getting weaker by the day. Yanhua, this... let's just end it from now on."
"What? Zhou Dana, what did you say?" Shi Yanhua exploded on the spot, her voice rising sharply. "You say your body's weak? I think you're just itching to get at that whore Huang Meili!"
The angrier she got, the more she threw caution to the wind. She clenched her teeth and said, "That day I gave the underwear to Zhou Zhimin and said I found it behind his house, and he recognized it as Huang Meili's right away.
If you don't cut ties with that bitch completely, I'll just come out and say I found those underpants on your bed, Zhou Dana!"
Backed into a corner, Zhou Dana banged his pipe bowl hard against the bed leg, his voice turning cold. "If you've got guts, don't take it out on me. Use that energy to figure out how to shut Huang Meili up!"
A cold, vicious look crossed Shi Yanhua's face. She gritted her teeth and spat out the words, "Shut her up? I'll tell you, Zhou Dana, in this world, only the dead stay silent forever!"
