Fifteen

"But the favor," Dong Mei whined.

"I won't carry this unless you say this is the favor you want and we can forget about me owing you anything," Cang Mang made sure to make matters clear.

Dong Mei sighed, "I don't know. I don't really have anything to ask you for. What if this is the favor I really want? And seeing that you worked hard, maybe I can forget what you owe me."

Cang Mang scoffed and was ready to walk away, "if it's not a favor then it's not a favor. What are you exaggerating everything for?"

He knew for sure that she was simply hell bent on torturing him.

"Fine," Dong Mei called, "since it's hard for you to keep your word, I also won't keep mine. Forget about me accepting your bargain on brother Bai."

"Fine," Cang Mang retorted as he walked away, "then we'll just continue to dance like we used to."

"Don't slander me!" Dong Mei shot back, "I've never danced with you."

In the next moment, Dong Mei ran up to him and held his arm, "I don't know why you're so against it. You have such big muscles that you can carry the entire village."

"Look! Look!" she said while trying to grasp his entire arm between her two palms, "I can't even hold the entire thing with my two hands. Yours must be the biggest I've ever seen. I don't think any man can compare to this size. Cang Mang, you're so strong. Or is it that you're secretly a weak chicken but you have big muscles? What's so hard about carrying a pail of water? Cang Mang! Cang Mang! The body is so good, you must be capable!"

The result was that he arrived in the Dong residence with two pails, full of water.

He left with a single statement, "next time, don't be so nagging."

Dong Mei only smiled to herself and mumbled, "what's nagging if it can get you to do it?"

Summer had only just began. Flowers on trees were falling and fruits appeared where they left scars.

Dong Mei sat in the shade of a tree, fanning herself and occasionally looking up among the branches. Cang Mang leaped from one thick branch to the next, plucking the best fruits he could find.

"Were you raised by monkeys?" she asked when she saw his expertise.

"I'll take that as a compliment," Cang Mang responded after a bit of silence.

Knowing Dong Mei, she would never say anything good about him unless she wanted something out of him.

When she called him, he found her already seated on one of the roots of the tree and it was not hard to tell what she wanted. She spouted some nonsensical ambiguities about the favor and Cang Mang just followed through because he also wanted to taste some fruits.

Further more, he had dressed perfectly for the occasion. He was wearing an ordinary set of grey pants and shirt, held together by a sash at his waist. It was the normal outfit for people who had to do hard labor everyday. It was unlike the robes he and Bai Yang Wei normally wore.

Dong Mei's comment on his outfit was, "you finally grew a mind of gold and stopped putting on those hideous robes."

He also took that as a compliment.

Soon he came down with a good number of fruits.

He placed them down on the ground, "these should be good for the next three days," he said, "they are already ripe so they won't last long."

Dong Mei looked at the fruits in the ground then back at Cang Mang, "aren't you going to wash them?"

Cang Mang refused. Since he had been the one to climb, she must be resourceful in some way.

In that way, they made their way to the nearby river. From it, small streams of water branched off. These were normally clean since it was hard to fetch water from them due to the shallow and rocky bed.

The river had two parts. There was the side, whose water was gentler and was an open area. The banks there were normally muddy because of how frequently everyone used them.

The other part of the river was less gentle and the bank was immediately surrounded by tall green bamboo shoots. The small streams branched off into the surrounding bamboo forests and disappeared within.

Dong Mei and Cang mang sat at an opening of one of the streams and directly threw all the fruits in to the water. Cang Mang started by washing his hands while Dong Mei directed a fruit to her mouth. After washing his hands, he carefully washed a fruit and sat back to eat it.

"By the way," Dong Mei started, "when will your thing start?"

She was asking about the 'speed dating' thing he opened up one time. Ever since he brought it up and they agreed, he hadn't really brought it up until she mentioned it.

"Soon. In the meantime, you should prepare," he replied

Dong Mei ate beneath the peels of her fruit, "did you fail to start it?"

"I'm setting everything up," he replied.

"I thought you have already done that before you came to me," she said.

"No," he responded, "what if you refused, should I have collected men just for the sake of it?"

Dong Mei frowned, "how many have you collected?"

Cang Mang shrugged, "possibly a handful." Or less than a handful.

Cang Mang was having a hard time finding male participants. All the good men were busy in their parent's gardens and had a marriage already arranged for them. Willing participants were ruffians and caravan merchants. There were no hopes in that aspect. Some willing men couldn't even afford to keep a wife.

Dong Mei shrugged, not really caring.

Cang Mang watched her reach out for another fruit after dumping the last oke behind her. She had just taken a bite and spat it out when Cang Mang grabbed it from her.