When She Stops Being Dramatic

Chapter 46: Chapter 36: The Forsaken Wife of the 50s (36)

Wang Xianbing nodded in agreement. Only families of regimental commanders or higher could afford a nanny, and a 24-hour live-in one started at forty or fifty yuan a month.

***

Mrs. Chu had specially taken the day off to come to the factory grounds. Although her son and daughter-in-law were participating in the collective wedding, their marital home still needed to be decorated and stocked with all sorts of odds and ends. Plus, she’d heard there were two families in this very building celebrating a wedding.

’When their colleagues come over to celebrate, won’t they inevitably make comparisons?’

Mr. and Mrs. Chu both worked in the education system, but Mrs. Chu came from a military family. And since the Bright Machinery Factory was a former military unit that had been collectively transferred to civilian work, she had her own channels for information.

Knowing her son had been a victim of a scheme, she felt a little inadequate in front of her future daughter-in-law and was determined to make up for it in other ways.

Guo Meiyun was a soldier in the military’s art troupe and the least attractive of the so-called ”Six Golden Flowers.” However, her father was the director of a parts factory, her mother was a head teacher at the high school affiliated with the machinery factory, and her grandfather was a retired senior official.

This time, Guo Meiyun had shot herself in the foot. Gritting her teeth, she accepted the marriage, but she was also very good at fighting for her own interests. She made an exorbitant demand, telling the Wu family to pay a bride price of 1,900 yuan, plus a television, a sewing machine, a bicycle, and a watch. If they didn’t, she would accuse Wu Quanquan of raping her.

The Wu family only had one son, but with five older sisters and several paternal aunts chipping in, each household contributing one item was enough to gather everything.

What Mrs. Chu had found out was that today was the day the Wu and Guo families were moving the big-ticket items into the young couple’s new home.

’How could I possibly vent my frustrations if I don’t upstage them during such a high-profile event?’

She knew the atmosphere in the residential compound all too well. The women living in the same building compared everything: clothes, jobs, salaries, family backgrounds, husbands, and children. Naturally, a headline-grabbing bride price was part of the competition!

She hadn’t come alone; she had her son invite his fiancée as well.

As soon as they arrived at the foot of the building, Zhu Yun’s eyes lit up. She suddenly felt a surge of excitement, as if from the Three Kingdoms period. Three factions had converged in one place, and their gazes clashed in an invisible battle that raged for five hundred rounds.

Her love of beauty was bone-deep. Even though she worked in the cafeteria every day and was fully covered in her work uniform, her personal style was always meticulous.

She wore a red-and-white checkered, waist-cinching, short-sleeved blouse, a navy blue over-the-knee cotton skirt, and white knee-high socks. On her feet were black, low-heeled, woven leather sandals with buckles. Her jet-black, shoulder-length hair was styled in a loose French braid, adorned with two homemade sunflower hair clips.

She wore a wide-brimmed, natural-straw hat tied with a small floral bow. Her whole look was incredibly chic and artistic, as if she were the daughter of a 1930s warlord, attending school and stepping right out of the hazy summer heat of a bygone era.

Not to mention her fair, smooth skin and delicate, beautiful features. When she smiled, her eyes curved into crescents, revealing a pair of sweet dimples that could leave anyone captivated.

”Oh my,” Old Mrs. Wang exclaimed, spotting the familiar face from a distance and rushing over enthusiastically. ”This must be my beautiful daughter-in-law from the art troupe, right? You’re even prettier than in your picture! Just gorgeous! Look at that skin, as white as a snowflake...”

Chu Shenyu stepped in front of Zhu Yun, blocking her from the old woman. He looked at Wang Xianbing, his expression displeased. ”Mr. Wang, what is the meaning of this?”

Wang Xianbing was stunned for a moment. He grabbed his mother and pointed to the person who had come downstairs after hearing the commotion. ”Mom, Lin Jin is over there.”

Lin Jin was wearing a floral dress. She was gaunt and haggard from not eating well, which made her cheekbones look especially prominent. Her ear-length hair was frizzy and dull.

Her four- or five-month-pregnant belly strained the fabric of her dress into a semicircle. With one hand on her lower back, she deliberately pushed her stomach forward, possessing none of her former stylish flair.

The old woman glanced over at Lin Jin and muttered, ”I thought she was supposed to be the prettiest one?”

Mrs. Chu was also taken aback, but having studied Zhu Yun’s features carefully before and now seeing her son’s protectiveness, she immediately took Zhu Yun’s hand. Her own face relaxed into a wide smile. ”My dear comrade, you have the wrong person. This is my daughter-in-law, Zhu Yun. She’ll be living right across the hall from you.”

’What the hell?’

Everyone was stunned, including the residents holding their children who had run over to watch the commotion. ’Is this Pig Feifei?’

Meanwhile, those who had seen Zhu Yun before couldn’t help but say to the people next to them, ”See? Now you believe me, don’t you? Pig Fei—no, I mean, Chef Zhu is a great beauty. I heard Mr. Wang’s mother originally came to propose marriage precisely because of her reputation as the ’village beauty.’”

”She’s worlds prettier than Lin Jin. I guess this means Mr. Wang must be truly in love with Lin Jin. What man could possibly resist Chef Zhu’s beauty? Even a married woman like me with a gaggle of kids wants to pull her into a hug!”

”No wonder Mr. Chu, the untouchable ’flower on a high peak,’ suddenly announced he was getting married...”

Hearing everyone praise Zhu Yun’s appearance, the mother and son from the Chu family beamed with pride. In contrast, Wang Xianbing, Wu Quanquan, Guo Meiyun, Lin Jin, and Old Mrs. Wang could only stare, clearly unable to accept the reality of her stunning transformation.