I was reborn after my cousin stole my life.

Chapter 97: Dowry

"What do you want?"

Zhou Lei wondered if he had misheard and turned his head to look at his mother.

Grandma Zhou tightened her grip on her granddaughter and said to Aunt Yuan and her daughter sitting opposite her, "I've never heard of a married woman who gets pregnant and still demands a bride price. Go ask around the whole compound, you won't find a single case like this!"

Aunt Yuan looked worried: "I know I shouldn't say this, but I have no choice. When I came here, her grandparents and her father gave me a task, saying that no daughter of the Yuan family ever gets married off by paying extra."

She looked at Zhou Lei: "Son-in-law, you have to think about my Juan'er too. She's a young, unmarried woman, and she married you without asking for a single penny of dowry. If word gets out, she'll be ashamed to face everyone in our area! People will say she married a useless and stingy man!"

"This practice of paying a bride price is also rare in our area. Many families can't afford it all at once, so they have to pay it off gradually later."

Zhou Lei glanced at Yuan Juan, who was looking down with a troubled expression, and then sighed inwardly, "So, how much do you plan to ask for?"

Aunt Yuan immediately held up two fingers, making eight, "Eight hundred! We don't need your bicycle or radio, just eight hundred in cash."

Aunt Zhou nearly jumped up, "Why don't you just rob it!"

"Look at what you're saying, in-laws. These days, when people get married, they want 'three turns and one sound' (referring to a house, a watch, a radio, and a watch). I don't want those. If you convert it to cash, eight hundred is about right."

"Bullshit!" Aunt Zhou cursed directly, not caring about saving face anymore. If her daughter-in-law's whole family was shameless, what did she have to worry about? It was Yuan Juan's parents who would lose face!

"A bicycle only costs around a hundred yuan, a watch a hundred, a radio forty or fifty, and even with a sewing machine, it's at most three hundred yuan. You're asking for eight hundred? Is your daughter made of gold?!"

"No way you're asking for a bride price!"

Aunt Zhou slammed her hand on the table, not caring if anyone outside the door heard. "If your daughter hadn't been so desperate, banging her head against the wall, would my Shitou have married her? She threw her virginity at a man and clung to him like that, and now she's bringing up Qiao! Does she really think she's some kind of refined lady?!"

"She's shameless! Unable to marry Battalion Commander Jiang, she tried to marry my Shi Tou by faking an accident. If it had been an ordinary soldier who rescued her from the water that day, she would have run away faster than anyone else! What are you pretending to be, this virtuous and chaste woman in front of me!"

Aunt Zhou's curses were so offensive that Yuan Juan found them grating, her face turning red and then white. She almost couldn't help but curse back at Aunt Zhou.

She kept her mother's words firmly in mind, and looked at Zhou Lei with tearful eyes, her face full of grievance.

Zhou Lei: "...Mom, please don't put it so harshly."

"No matter how harsh my words are, they're not as despicable as what they did!"

Aunt Zhou knew her son was infatuated with her beauty, and her heart softened again. She slapped him angrily, saying, "You've already married her, and you still want to bankrupt us? What's the difference between giving the money and directly subsidizing her family? You've listened to all my advice! Anyway, this money is not going to be given!"

Aunt Yuan sniffed: "Sigh, if they won't give it, they won't give it. Then I can only take my Juan'er back to my parents' home. My Juan'er is so young, she can find a good one back home. Before we left, the director of our supply and marketing cooperative even asked about him, saying that he has a son who is about the same age as my Juan'er, works in a factory in the county, his wife is dead and he has no children. I think it would be perfect for my Juan'er to marry into that family. They even give a dowry, and they provide everything you could want, like a 'three turns and one sound' (referring to a watch, a radio, and a bicycle) and 'thirty-six legs' (referring to a pair of bicycles)..."

Yuan Juan turned to look at her mother. "Really?"

The director of their supply and marketing cooperative did indeed have a son who worked in the county town. When Yuan Juan left, that man hadn't been married for very long...

Was his wife really dead?

If she really dies, she...

Zhou Lei believed him and said urgently, "Mom, you can't say things like that. Xiao Juan is carrying my child."

Aunt Yuan didn't take it seriously. "She got beaten up. Those were her father's exact words. He doesn't care about my daughter's in-laws. Why have a child? The child will be a heartless person who doesn't recognize his own family."

Zhou Lei: "My father-in-law..."

Despicable!

"That won't do!"

Aunt Zhou rolled her eyes at her son: "What's the rush? If she's got the guts, let her go and hit her!"

She looked at Yuan Juan and said, "Perfect timing! The doctors at our military hospital are very skilled. After this abortion, you might even get pregnant again in the second half of the year, which won't delay your remarriage!"

Threat!

The Zhou family isn't easily intimidated!

After saying that, she said to Zhou Lei, "If she doesn't want to be with you, you can get a divorce. The army won't say anything. After the divorce, we can marry someone better! This time, we don't need to spend 800 yuan to marry a virtuous wife and loving mother. She won't hold you back from time to time, causing you to be criticized by your superiors and looked down upon by your neighbors and comrades!"

"..."

Zhou Lei glanced at his mother-in-law and wife's expressions and realized that they were using the threat of hitting the child to force him to give in.

A surge of anger welled up inside him: "My mother-in-law probably doesn't know, but you're ruining a military marriage! Ruining a military marriage is illegal!"

Before Aunt Yuan arrived, Uncle Yuan had already given her instructions, so she wasn't afraid: "Son-in-law, don't scare me. Your father-in-law said that we only want a bride price, which doesn't count as breaking up a military marriage. As long as my Juan'er wants a divorce, you two can get a divorce."

Zhou Lei looked at Yuan Juan: "Little Juan, what do you say?"

Yuan Juan looked at her mother, then at her husband, her face full of difficulty. "Old Zhou, my parents raised me with great difficulty. What can I, as their daughter, do? Can you help me?"

Aunt Zhou: "Why are you asking her? Do you think she doesn't know? She and her mother are playing good cop/bad cop, trying every possible way to get money out of our Zhou family!"

Aunt Yuan: "My dear in-laws, you've misunderstood. I had no choice. I can't make decisions about family matters."

"Get lost! You think I can't tell? Load the cargo!"

Ignoring the two elders' quarrel, Zhou Lei looked at Yuan Juan and said, "If we really give this bride price, will your parents give it to you? If they don't, what will our child eat and use after birth? You have to think about the child, right? We're family now."

Yuan Juan lowered her head and said, "I can't help it, my dad won't listen to me."

"Don't worry about whether they listen to you or not. These days, it's all about freedom of marriage. If you don't want to, no one can control your mind! If you don't want them to come, they can't even get into the compound. Just tell them what you think!"

Yuan Juan was extremely annoyed, but she had to pretend that she had no choice.

Unable to answer Zhou Lei's question, she could only cover her face with her hands and sob.

Aunt Yuan: "Oh, my Juan'er! I know you're in a difficult situation! Why is everyone putting pressure on you? You're pregnant with a son! My Juan'er, my heart is breaking!"

Aunt Zhou: "..."

Zhou Lei: "..."