Back To The 80s-Chapter 216 - 226: Quack Doctor (Extra 240 monthly tickets)_1
Qin Li quickly got up and ran to knock on Zhang Yufen’s door: "Mom, where’s the cold medicine? Sister Xiaobei has a fever."
"A fever? Xiaobei is pregnant, she can’t take fever medicine. Wait a minute, I will get up and make her drink a bowl of ginger and spring onion soup." Zhang Yufen said as she started to get dressed.
"Mom, you don’t need to get up, I can do it. It’s just boiling spring onions with ginger, right?" Qin Li asked in a hurry.
"Yes, simmer it for about ten minutes. Let her drink it while it’s hot. After sweating, she will be fine." Zhang Yufen opened the door and instructed Qin Li.
Once the onion soup was ready, Qin Li nudged Gu Xiaobei awake: "Sister Xiaobei, get up and drink the onion soup. Once you sweat, you’ll feel better."
Gu Xiaobei forced her eyes open, resisting the body aches, sat up, and looking at the bowl Qin Li was holding, suddenly became alert. "Do I need to drink such a big bowl?"
Qin Li had prepared a large bowl of thick porcelain, full of onion soup.
"Hmm, my mom said you have to drink it warm, after drinking and sweating, you’ll feel better. Drink it quickly." Qin Li urged.
Gu Xiaobei felt like she was risking her life, drinking down this strangely-flavored onion soup. Halfway through, she felt the soup was up to her throat, and quickly shook her head, "I can’t, I can’t drink anymore."
"You have to drink more, otherwise, your cold won’t be better." Qin Li persuaded.
Gu Xiaobei thought about the baby in her belly, gritted her teeth and, with the onion soup now cool, picked up the bowl and finished it in one breath.
As the last mouthful went down, she felt her stomach churning and a gush of liquid coming up. Gu Xiaobei couldn’t help but leaned over the edge of the bed and threw up all over the floor.
"I can’t handle it," Gu Xiaobei said, lying on the edge of the bed and gesturing with her hand.
Zhang Yufen, ultimately not at ease, came over just to see Gu Xiaobei vomiting by the bed. She hurriedly asked, "Why is she throwing up?"
"I don’t know, she threw up after drinking." Qin Li frowned.
Zhang Yufen looked at the bowl on the table, "Did you make her drink a big bowl?"
"Yeah, isn’t it better to drink more?" Qin Li nodded innocently.
Zhang Yufen lightly tapped Qin Li’s arm: "How did I raise such a silly daughter like you? Who won’t throw up after drinking so much? Just a small bowl will do."
Qin Li felt awkward, scratching her head and smiling goofily at Gu Xiaobei.
Gu Xiaobei felt awful, looking reproachfully at Qin Li, realizing she had been bamboozled by this novice doctor.
"Alright, at least she has consumed some. Quickly cover her with the blanket and let her sweat it out." Zhang Yufen said, helping Gu Xiaobei to lie down and cover her with the blanket.
"Lily, you go sleep in your sister’s room, I reckon your sister won’t be coming home tonight." Zhang Yufen said while pushing Qin Li out the door.
Gu Xiaobei found the onion soup rather effective; not long after, she started to sweat and sleepily drifted back to sleep under the blanket.
Gu Xiaobei didn’t wake up until ten in the morning the next day, feeling like she was not feverish anymore.
"You finally woke up, are you hungry? I can heat up the porridge that my mom boiled for you." As soon as Gu Xiaobei opened her eyes, Qin Li immediately chimed in.
"You didn’t go to work again?" Gu Xiaobei sighed, holding her head.
"Yeah, I asked my dad to go to the office and call in sick for us. I have to stay home to take care of you," Qin Li nodded as if it was only right.
Gu Xiaobei felt helpless, though after sweating out her fever, her body felt much lighter. She got up and got out of bed.
"You go freshen up, and I will heat up the food. After eating, you can go back to sleep." Qin Li quickly finished speaking and ran off to the kitchen.
When Gu Xiaobei came out after freshening up, she saw Qin Li alone at home and curiously asked, "Is it just you home? Where’s Aunt Zhang?"
"She went to my uncle’s house; hurry up and eat." Qin Li served the hot porridge and bread that she had warmed up, along with the shredded potatoes that Zhang Yufen had stir-fried in the morning.
As Qin Li watched Gu Xiaobei drinking her porridge, she couldn’t help but say, "Should I make you another bowl of onion soup later?"
"Can you spare me? That was just too hard to drink, and I’m feeling much better now." Gu Xiaobei felt nauseous at the mention of onions.
Qin Li laughed a bit sheepishly, "I just didn’t have any experience."
Gu Xiaobei fell silent. She didn’t know if it was because of the cold, but she felt a tightness in her chest and her appetite wasn’t great.
By the afternoon, her fever was gone, but she was completely devoid of appetite, and didn’t feel like eating anything.
Zhuang Shuxian laughed and said, "You’re having pregnancy cravings. Can you think of anything you really want to eat?"
"I want a popsicle." Gu Xiaobei felt like there was a fire burning in her stomach.
"Sister, it’s winter now, where can you find popsicles?" Qin Li was helpless.
Gu Xiaobei felt a little wronged. Why had becoming pregnant made her so fussy?
"How about I freeze some sugar water in the fridge for you? It’s cold and will help you cool down." Zhuang Shuxian suggested.
So, by the evening, Gu Xiaobei was contentedly sipping on the sugar water that had been made for her. 𝓯𝙧𝓮𝓮𝒘𝓮𝙗𝙣𝒐𝒗𝒆𝓵.𝓬𝓸𝒎
"This is delicious, but don’t drink too much, it’s not good for your stomach." Zhuang Shuxian cautioned Gu Xiaobei as she worriedly stood by her side.
After dinner on the third day, Lu Zhanguo came to pick up Gu Xiaobei and Chen Gang. The small oil burner was burning brightly, and Gu Xiaobei was tightly wrapped in warm clothes.
The temperature was lower at night and the fog had risen, making visibility particularly low. It took them four to five hours to get home.
When they arrived, it was already midnight. After three days away, the stove at home had long since gone out, making the house as cold as an ice house.
Lu Zhanguo knocked on Zhang Lijun’s door to borrow some embers and relight the stove.
Gu Xiaobei and Chen Gang, decked in padded jackets and covered with a small blanket, sat by the table. She assumed the bed was also cold and decided to wait until the fireplace was red hot again.
As Lu Zhanguo washed his hands, he told Gu Xiaobei, "There are cookies in the pocket, if you are hungry, you two can have some."
At the mention of cookies, Gu Xiaobei suddenly perked up. She opened the cloth pocket, removed the oil paper package, and she and Chen Gang began to eat.
The cookies were homemade, shaped like flowers, toasted to a golden brown on both sides in a flat-bottomed pan. One side was sprinkled with a layer of white sugar and a red dot in the middle.
Gu Xiaobei suddenly found the sweet treat extremely appetizing. While she used to love these cookies, this time she found them more delicious than ever before, consuming more than ten in one sitting.
"Eat slowly, we need to wait for the fire to grow strong, then we can boil water," Lu Zhanguo cautioned Gu Xiaobei, worried that she might choke.
"It’s okay, I don’t know why, but I lost my appetite these past two days. Only when I ate these cookies did my stomach feel alive again," Gu Xiaobei said contentedly, but inwardly pondered curiously, isn’t it said that if you’re in the mood for sour foods you’ll have a boy and if you’re in the mood for spicy foods you’ll have a girl? But she loved eating sweet, so was she having a boy or a girl?
After the New Year, some of the non-military family members began to come for the holiday one after another.
The guesthouses were vacated, each family got a room. Ge Chunling’s mother-in-law, along with two little sisters-in-law also arrived. Since winter was a time for relaxation in the countryside, and there wasn’t much to do, they decided to come early.
Ge Chunling’s mother-in-law, Mrs. Wu, was an old lady who had bound feet. At one glance, you could tell that she was shrewd and calculating.
The two younger sisters-in-law, the elder one was called Wu Hehua, same age as Ge Chunling, both were 24 years old, and the younger one was called Wu Xinghua, two years younger and 22 years old.
Both had inherited Mrs. Wu’s shrewdness, and when they spoke, their eyes flitted around uncertainly.
After her first encounter with the three women, Gu Xiaobei immediately took a dislike to them.
