There were quite a lot of fish surrounding the entire boat. After picking for a while, the family stood up and pounded their waists, then bent down to pick up fish again.
Ye Yaodong started picking up the trash from the outside first. After all, the tide would soon rise. It would be a pity if the trash was pushed back into the sea by the high tide.
After filling a basket, he pulled the bamboo basket forward, and he and his father carried it onto the boat. Then they picked up an empty basket and continued to pick up.
The family of four were so engrossed in picking up items that they had forgotten everything that had happened before.
By the time they had picked up almost all the fish around the hull, the tide was rising little by little.
Ye's father had been suffering from rheumatism for several days and was afraid to walk too far. Seeing that they had picked up almost all the fish, Ye Yaodong asked his father to get on the boat and stack the baskets of couple fish better, and they could just pick up the remaining little bit.
An hour had passed until all the fish were eaten up and everyone was so exhausted that they could no longer straighten their backs.
After the last basket of goods was loaded onto the boat, Ye Yaodong twisted his waist and sighed, "This is all hard-earned money..."
"Otherwise, do you think it's that easy to make money? It's been pretty good in the past few years. Look at the big pot meals in the past. Don't even think about making money. Everything was collective."
"Yes, life is much better now," Ye's father also agreed, "Thinking back then..."
"Don't think about the past..." Ye Yaodong interrupted his father's reminiscence of the past. Who had the time to listen now
"The tide has risen. Let's carry the shellfish we just dug onto the boat first. Otherwise, the water level will be too high to carry them, and it will be even harder to walk on the rocks."
"Yes, yes, yes. Go and move it onto the boat first."
Mother Ye said with some regret: "It seems to be still early, should I go dig some more?"
"It's getting late, past two. I have to collect the longline and sticky nets later. It will be four or five when I get back. It's almost time."
"It's so fast, I feel like I didn't do anything today..."
"Isn't your waist sore? Doesn't your back hurt?" Ye Yaodong looked at her mother who was holding her waist with one hand and was still saying that she didn't do anything today
The boat is almost full, and you still say you haven’t done anything
The older generation is so capable!
"A little bit. I just feel like time is passing by so fast."
"Isn't it? When there's work to do, doesn't time pass quickly?"
After Ye Yaodong and his father had piled the goods in the corner, they went down the boat together to move them. Ye's mother and Ye Huimei were waiting on the boat and offered to help.
After getting everything on the boat, they rested for a while. After the tide rose a little more, the boat was barely able to move out.
The longline fishing didn't catch anything special, just those bottom fish. However, the sticky net did catch a lot of palm-sized nine-segment shrimps, which made Ye Huimei very happy.
Among the common seafood these days, nine-segment shrimps are relatively expensive, especially such a large one. There are about twelve shrimps per pound, and they cost several dollars per pound.
This net caught about seven or eight kilograms of shrimp. The nine-segment shrimps died as soon as they came ashore. They all committed suicide. They are the most cautious shrimps.
After coming out of the water, it will spit out secretions, causing its own death, so that people who like to try new things will not be able to get their hands on it. It is quite heroic and brave, "rather die with honor than live in disgrace."
But they are about to reach the shore, so if they die, it doesn’t matter.
Ye Yaodong shook the nine-segmented shrimp in the basket and said with a smile, "You are getting engaged tomorrow, so you can keep some for the table."
Ye Huimei's cheeks flushed with shyness, but she said nothing.
He looked much more pleasing to the eye now. Before on the island, he had always been pale.
Mother Ye also nodded, "Pick some out later and keep some goods. They are our own things after all."
It was another day of returning with a full load. Couple fish were not very rare in this era, and fishermen could occasionally catch a few, but a boat full of them did attract the curious eyes of many villagers.
When they were lifted off the boat, everyone gathered around and asked, "Where did you catch so many couple fish? Aren't these only available in summer?"
"How many baskets do you have? I see that your boats are full, and every basket is filled to the brim..."
"Recently, there have been toadfish and flounder. These fish are rare, but we caught so many..."
Mother Ye smiled and said as she carried the fish away: "They swam up by themselves, circling around our boat in piles, and stacked up on top of each other in pairs. We spent a long time trying to catch them, and our backs were almost broken. I don't know where so many came from. It was exhausting to pick them up..."
Ye Yaodong raised his hand and said nothing. Whatever he wants to do...
He had never eaten this thing before, so he kept a few for tasting and weighed the rest.
There were twelve baskets, and after weighing, the net weight was 667 kilograms. At that time, it was not expensive, only 0.2 cents per kilogram, but it was sold for more than 100 yuan. There were also goods from longline fishing and trawling, which together sold for nearly 200 yuan.
He kept the few conchs and cat's-eye snails he picked up, planning to take them home and eat them himself.
When Lin Xiuqing saw the couple fish he brought back, she didn't know where to start. "How do I cook this? I've never killed one before."
"I can do it."
I haven't eaten it before, but I still know how to kill it.
Take out the meat, but don't keep the shell. Then wash the meat and chop it into small pieces with a knife, not too small.
After telling Lin Xiuqing to stir-fry it, he left it alone. He only knew how to eat and not how to cook, so division of labor and cooperation were good.
However, it should be noted that adult horseshoe crabs are not poisonous, only young horseshoe crabs are poisonous. Young horseshoe crabs are also called ghost horseshoe crabs, and their entire body is poisonous.
Fortunately, they only caught adults, and the useless little ones were released.
Afraid that Lin Xiuqing would worry and scare her, Ye Yaodong did not mention a word about encountering the drifting fish at sea when he came back, nor did he go to buy pearl powder to eat. He thought it was all in the past and did not take it to heart. There was no need for him to take pearl powder to calm his nerves.
But I didn't expect that I would have a nightmare at night. I dreamed that my face was swollen and my facial features couldn't be seen, but now it was clearly visible. And that face was so familiar. It was clearly what he looked like when he was old.
He woke up from his dream instantly and sat up.
He felt that whatever he thought about during the day would appear in his dreams at night. An unintentional association in his mind during the day actually made him have this dream. It was too scary. Did he collect his own corpse? Did he ask his past life self to bless his current life self
"What's wrong?" Lin Xiuqing felt the movement beside her and sat up.
"Nothing, just a nightmare."
"What kind of nightmare is that? You're so old, and you still have such a big reaction to a nightmare." Lin Xiuqing patted his chest to comfort him, "It's okay, it's just a dream. Go to sleep quickly. My younger sister is getting engaged tomorrow."
Ye Yaodong grabbed her hand and said, "Well, go to sleep."
"What nightmare?"
"You'd be scared to death if I told you this, so don't listen and go to sleep."
At this time, Ye Chengyang also turned over and whimpered, and Ye Yaodong quickly picked him up, "Be good... I'll hold you while you pee..."
After busying himself for a while, he temporarily put the nightmare behind him and felt relieved hugging his wife. His hands couldn't help but cover her belly, which was already slightly bulging when she lay flat on her back.
After Lin Xiu woke up, she couldn't sleep anymore. "Tomorrow is the second day of the Chinese New Year. There is less than a month until the Chinese New Year. We should prepare some gifts to send back to my parents."
"Well, okay, wait until my younger sister gets engaged. You can decide whether to go before or after the winter solstice. It's fine. If there's nothing to do, people probably won't go out to sea before the New Year. It's time to rest for the New Year. I'm free either way."
"It's about the same. The weather may not be good in the future. It's almost the New Year and I'm busy. After sending New Year's greetings, I have to clean the house and go to the market to prepare New Year's goods."
"We don't need to wash it, right? We just moved in not long ago."
"Well, our house doesn't need to be cleaned, just clean the glass and tidy up the things. The old house must be cleaned, so I'll go over and help when the time comes."
"I don't need you, just take care of the children."
In the dark night, Lin Xiuqing turned her head to look at his profile, with a smile on her face. He had really changed a lot in the past six months.
"Adong..."
"Um?"
Lin Xiuqing turned sideways, put one leg on his waist, put her arms around his waist, and rubbed her head against his shoulder.
"What's wrong?"
"nothing!"
"Why are you so proactive? Have you thought about it?"
"No… "
He turned his body to the side and turned her to lie upright, "Don't press on your stomach, I'll do it..."
"Go to bed, it's late at night..."
Ye Yaodong was just teasing her with his dirty talk.
He put one hand into her skirt, lingered on her body, and stroked her slightly bulging belly. "How many months?"
"How dare you ask? How can you be a father if you don't even know him for a few months?"
"Don't you women know this kind of thing? Who would bother to count the months? Isn't it enough for me to know that it's my own child?"
Lin Xiuqing pinched the soft flesh on his waist, "If it's not yours, who else could it be?"
"Hiss~ You are just being unreasonable... I already said I knew it was my own child, but you still pinched me..."
"Then how many months have I been pregnant?"
"How can I guess?"
His wife was so spoiled by him that she actually asked him questions back, but he didn't even bother to remember them.
After thinking about it, it seems that I got pregnant in August of the Gregorian calendar, so now it should be, "5 months?"
"A little over five months."
"That's right, it's mine! Hiss~ It's mine~ That's right~ Hiss~ Let go~ Let go~"
I felt like my flesh had rotated 90 degrees, and there were definitely two bruises on my waist. I was really spoiled by him and I even pinched him out of habit.
Lin Xiuqing glared at him angrily and kicked him, "Go to sleep! Go to the small bed, don't lie next to me!"
"Hey... How come you turned against each other so suddenly..."