Champagne at Halftime: Woman, You’re Celebrating Too Soon

The revisions to "The Horseman" went smoothly and didn’t take Cheng Xueming much time at all!

They agreed that if there were more good manuscripts, they would definitely continue to submit them to Yanjing Literature. They also arranged with Bai Ling that, when time allowed, the educated youth from their Chengjiawan outpost would gather together. With Bai Ling watching them leave—her face full of wistful resentment and Zhang Dening brimming with pride—Cheng Xueming and Feng Jiayou departed.

“Xueming, you’re truly unfathomable—frighteningly impressive! Those two pieces you wrote so casually were both picked as the lead stories by Yanjing Literature. When did you become so amazing?!”

On the way back, Feng Jiayou clung tightly to Cheng Xueming’s waist, her excitement barely contained.

Back at Yanjing Literature, with so many outsiders present, she had felt too embarrassed to praise her husband so openly. But now that they were outside, her eyes sparkled with adoration.

She had spent more than a month drafting and revising her own piece, yet her mother’s journal, "October," wouldn’t accept it no matter how hard she tried. But her husband? When he finally made a move, both his pieces were immediately accepted by Yanjing Literature as cover stories. That kind of treatment—even the most celebrated masters couldn’t guarantee it for every submission!

“It’s nothing, really. You’re not bad yourself, dear! The manuscript Mom took this morning is sure to make it through too!” Cheng Xueming wanted to act smug, but it was hard to, given he had a heavily pregnant wife on the back seat.

“My piece? If it makes it, it’s all thanks to you, Xueming! You helped me revise it so well!” Feng Jiayou felt only defeat when talking about her own manuscript.

“It would have been the same whoever revised it. As long as it gets accepted and we get paid, that’s good enough!” Cheng Xueming laughed and added, “Honey, do the math—if all our pieces get accepted, how much in author’s fees and savings will we have?”

“Today you made three hundred and fifteen yuan for those two stories. I need to check with Mom to see if mine got accepted!” Feng Jiayou nodded, already calculating their current savings. “But even if mine is accepted, it’s only four yuan per thousand characters. My story is fifteen thousand characters—so about sixty yuan! That’s three hundred and seventy-five in total!”

“Add in the eight hundred we have at home... Wow, Xueming, our little nest egg is over a thousand!”

It was a shock—she hadn’t realized until now that their savings had topped a thousand yuan!

“How petty! Just breaking a thousand and you’re this happy?” Cheng Xueming pedaled hard, teasing her. “I asked Old Qian in the front yard—right now, a courtyard house in Yanjing is going for about three to four thousand yuan!”

“So if we want our own courtyard, our mission isn’t accomplished yet. We have to keep working hard!” Cheng Xueming’s short-term goal was to earn as much as possible in author’s fees and buy a home in Yanjing as soon as he could.

These days, writing did pay well. Those two stories had netted over three hundred yuan, and he’d only spent about a week on them. And that was when he’d just arrived in Yanjing, without a stable environment to write in. If he were settled, he’d be even faster.

He couldn’t do a hundred thousand characters a day, but ten thousand? That would be easy!

From now on, he’d aim for ten thousand characters a day.

“Are we really going to buy a house ourselves? Shouldn’t my dad’s place be ready for allocation soon?” Feng Jiayou had always been excited about the idea of buying a house—back when she didn’t have the means, it was just talk. But now, realizing they really could buy a courtyard house themselves, she felt a bit reluctant.

In these days of assigned jobs and housing, hardly anyone bought their own place.

Why spend thousands out of pocket when you could just wait for the unit to assign you one? Only a fool would buy!

Besides, her mother had said her father’s work unit’s housing allocation was nearly settled. After all, he was a director at a major foreign affairs unit, and he’d been back for almost half a year. The unit had to arrange something for them.

So why spend so much on a house? Wouldn’t it be better just to wait for her father’s allocation?

“Dad’s house is his. Ours is for our own little family—distance makes the heart grow fonder!” When it came down to it, now she was the one reluctant to buy? Waiting to move in with her dad’s allocation? Cheng Xueming wasn’t having any of it.

“You’re right!” Feng Jiayou nodded. “If we moved in with them, who knows how much Mom would criticize us!”

“Let’s buy!”

“Xueming, let’s work hard together and try to have our own little courtyard before our son is born!” Feng Jiayou set her mind to it. They really did need their own house. Distance does make the heart fonder—Xueming was right.

“Absolutely!” Cheng Xueming was confident—there were still six months to go, and he intended to have a story published every month.

And he wouldn’t limit himself to Yanjing Literature. He’d try for the even more prestigious "People’s Literature." Nor would he only submit to Yanjing—he could send work to "Shanghai Arts," "Harvest," and other provincial journals too.

Cast a wide net and catch more fish—he was determined to reach his goal of earning over a thousand yuan a month in author’s fees.

“Roast duck! Darling, we’re passing Quanjude—should we celebrate with a meal?”

Ever since he’d tasted Quanjude’s roast duck, Cheng Xueming had been hooked, wishing he could have it every week.

Today was a good day—it called for celebration!

“We should celebrate!” Feng Jiayou was reluctant, having just agreed to save for a house, and now they were spending on roast duck—too extravagant! But Xueming was right; they should celebrate. She said, “But let’s do as we did last time—take one home to eat!”

“Last time we had roast duck, Jiamo missed out and still complains about it—she hasn’t even called you brother-in-law yet! If we sneak out to eat again, she’ll never forgive us!”

“Let’s get two, then! There are a lot of us at home—one won’t be enough, they’ll fight over it!”

Cheng Xueming laughed heartily—money was meant to be spent! He was better than in his previous life, when he’d been a chronic spender and could never save.

“Two?! Are you crazy, Xueming?” Feng Jiayou shook her head. “One at most, and we’ll take the bones home for soup!”

“Let’s stop at the pigeon market on the way back and buy some meat and vegetables, too!”

They hardly had any meat coupons left, so if they wanted meat, they had to barter at the pigeon market.

“Alright, whatever you say, darling.”

Cheng Xueming nodded, not arguing.

In the end, just the roast duck, bones, and a few side dishes from Quanjude cost them fifteen yuan. At the Donghuamen pigeon market, two jin of meat cost another three, and some vegetables added another yuan.

Nineteen yuan gone, just like that.

“Xueming, we can’t do this every time you publish a story—it’s too expensive!” Feng Jiayou’s heart ached as she handed over the money. She made sure to tell Cheng Xueming this was a one-time thing.

“Alright, alright! Next time we’ll celebrate at home. You can eat as much as you want, darling!” Cheng Xueming burst out laughing.

“You’re impossible! Who said I meant that kind of celebration?” Feng Jiayou blushed, twisting his waist playfully.

“Ow, ow, not so hard, darling!”

When they got back to the courtyard, just as they were about to enter, Feng Jiayou spotted her mother riding up on her bike. She told Cheng Xueming to wait.

Feng’s mother, Gu Xueqing, saw her daughter waiting at the gate and tried to slow down to avoid arriving at the same time, but her daughter was clearly waiting for her, so she had no choice but to face her head-on.

When she saw the groceries and meat hanging from her son-in-law’s bike, her expression immediately soured. She demanded an explanation from Feng Jiayou.

“Hehe! Mom, did my story get accepted? This is to celebrate!” Feng Jiayou grinned, raising the Quanjude roast duck. “Look, Mom—a big roast duck from Quanjude!”

“Who said your story was accepted?” Her mother, displeased at the sight of her daughter’s smug face, blurted out, “Rejected! Old Liu killed it!”

“What? Rejected again?”

Now it was Feng Jiayou’s turn to be stunned. This was the classic curse of celebrating at halftime—just when you thought you’d succeeded, life threw you a twist.

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