Chapter 9

After Zheng Yunsheng left, Gu Qijiao returned to her bedroom and pulled off the patterned sheets that had been spread on the bed last night.

She held the sheet in her hands and looked at it, and found a small red bloodstain in the middle of the sheet.

This is the virgin’s blood.

It represents a woman’s transformation from a girl to a woman.

When Gu Qijiao climbed into bed at the beginning of the year, Zheng Yunsheng was drunk and did not do anything to Gu Qijiao at all.

Last night was the first time they had sex.

Gu Qijiao took out a small piece of soap from the bedside, carried the bed sheet and soap out, and came to the well in the backyard.

There is an ancient well more than three meters deep in the backyard. A wooden bucket tied to a rope on a crank is lowered into the well, and water can be pumped up from the well by shaking the crank.

After throwing the bed sheet into a new wooden basin next to the well, Gu Qijiao threw the bucket into the water and started drawing water.

She drew a bucket of water and poured it into the wooden basin, then put the bucket into the well and drew a second bucket and placed it next to it, then squatted down and began to wash the sheets.

The sheets were new and there was nothing else to wash or dry, so the main point was to clean that small mark.

Gu Qijiao found the spot directly, put some soap on it and started rubbing it with her hands.

After rubbing for only a few times, Gu Qijiao heard a young woman calling her name outside the yard.

Upon hearing the voice, Gu Qijiao frowned.

Because as soon as she heard this name, a name immediately emerged in Gu Qijiao’s mind: Wang Sufen.

This girl named Wang Sufen is Gu Qijiao’s best friend in Yueya Village.

Of course, the identity of good friends is only Gu Qijiao’s unilateral opinion.

In Wang Sufen’s mind, Gu Qijiao is an uneducated and shameless idiot.

In her previous life, Gu Qijiao was very kind to Wang Sufen.

But Wang Sufen is a real ungrateful person.

Wang Sufen never went to school. Her family had a serious patriarchal ideology and only sent her to a free literacy class at the entrance of the village for a few months.

It’s not just Wang Sufen. There are not many children in the village who have the opportunity to go to school. Most of the boys don’t have the chance to go to school, let alone girls.

Gu Qijiao is one of the few children in the village who has the opportunity to go to school.

Because of this, Wang Sufen particularly liked dealing with Gu Qijiao, and often praised Gu Qijiao for being beautiful and well-educated, and for having a bright future.

At that time, Gu Qijiao was very vain and was often flattered by Wang Sufen, so she wishfully regarded Wang Sufen as her best friend.

After Gu Qijiao followed Zheng Yunsheng into the city, she accidentally heard on her way back to her parents’ home that Wang Sufen’s parents wanted to marry her to a bachelor in his 50s in exchange for a dowry.

In order to save Wang Sufen, Gu Qijiao contacted the director of the steel plant immediately after returning to the city, and asked the director’s son Zhang Zhe to go to Yueya Bay to propose marriage.

Before the Wang family married Wang Sufen to the old bachelor, Zhang Zhe married Wang Sufen and brought her to the city.

Why would the son of a steel plant director be willing to marry an illiterate country woman? There is certainly a reason for this.

The main reason is that Zhang Zhe is physically disabled.

When he was young, Zhang Zhe also worked in a steel mill. A few years ago, he had an accident and accidentally got his hand caught in a machine in the steel mill, resulting in the loss of his entire right palm.

After Zhang Zhe became disabled, his fiancée broke up with him. He has been single ever since. Now he is almost 30 years old, and his parents have been working hard to find him a wife, but still haven’t been able to do so.

In Gu Qijiao’s opinion, although Zhang Zhe is disabled, his family is well-off and his parents are factory workers, so the woman will not suffer after marrying him.

Besides, Zhang Zhe can read and write. I heard that after losing his hands, he can still earn some royalties every month by writing poems and publishing them in magazines, so supporting his family is not a problem.

Moreover, Gu Qijiao had met Zhang Zhe in person. The young man with thick eyebrows and big eyes could be considered a good man that a woman could entrust her life to.

Let’s look at the old bachelor that Wang Sufen’s family found for her. I heard that the old bachelor is a wife-beater. Two of his previous three wives were beaten to death by him.

Wang Sufen’s family decided to sell their daughter because they were attracted by the dowry that the old bachelor could offer, which was several times more than that of ordinary families.

In contrast, between marrying an old bachelor and marrying the slightly disabled Zhang Zhe, anyone with a little bit of common sense would know what to choose.

Of course, Gu Qijiao did not make a decision for Wang Sufen on her own. She asked Wang Sufen and only after getting Wang Sufang’s consent did she return to the city and let Zhang Zhe propose marriage in Yueya Village.

Originally, Wang Sufen married into the city with the help of Gu Qijiao and escaped the difficult situation arranged by her family. Logically, she should be grateful to Gu Qijiao.

But in fact, Wang Sufen didn’t do that. She felt that Gu Qijiao could find her a healthy man to marry in the city, but Gu Qijiao introduced a disabled man to her.

Little did people know that even Zhang Zhe, a disabled man, hesitated for a long time after hearing that he was going to marry an illiterate woman.

If Gu Qijiao hadn’t praised Wang Sufen for her ability, hard work and perseverance, and said a lot of good things about her, a family like the Zhang family would not have married Wang Sufen.

Not long after Wang Sufen came to the city, she was assigned by the steel plant director to wash dishes in the steel plant canteen.

Originally, Gu Qijiao was happy to be able to go to and from get off work with Wang Sufen, but when Wang Sufen saw Gu Qijiao, she avoided her as if she didn’t know her.

A few days after entering the steel mill, Wang Sufen told everyone in the steel mill that Gu Qijiao had married Zheng Yunsheng by climbing into his bed.

For a long time, people at the steel mill were pointing fingers at Gu Qijiao, and she almost lost her job at the steel mill because of her work style.

If Zheng Yunsheng had not written a letter of guarantee to Gu Qijiao, proving that they were married out of free love, Gu Qijiao would probably have left the steel plant.

In her previous life, Gu Qijiao had invited a wolf into the house, and she had personally brought the evil wolf, Wang Sufen, into the city.

Now Gu Qijiao already knows in advance the consequences of helping Wang Sufen, so she certainly won’t do such a thankless task again.

The main reason why Wang Sufen resented Gu Qijiao was that she felt that Gu Qijiao introduced her to a disabled husband.

Well then, in this life, she will watch Wang Sufen marry that fifty-something old bachelor.

It would make sense to see if she could live a better life than in her previous life if she didn’t marry Zhang Zhe.

Thinking of this, Gu Qijiao secretly concealed the emotions in her eyes. She stood up, shook off the water droplets on her hands, and walked towards the front yard.

Wang Sufen has already walked into the Gu family’s courtyard.

“It’s Sufen, why are you here? Come and sit down!”

As she spoke, Gu Qijiao walked towards the wooden table in the yard.

Because it was so long ago, Gu Qijiao could no longer remember that Wang Sufen came to see her on the first day of her marriage.

Naturally, she didn’t know what Wang Sufen came to see her for.

Seeing Gu Qijiao sitting down, Wang Sufen also walked over and sat on the square stool next to Gu Qijiao.

She immediately saw Gu Qijiao’s slender white hands that had just been soaked in water, and then looked at her own hands that had become rough due to long-term farm work. A hint of jealousy flashed across Wang Sufen’s eyes.

They are all country girls, why did Gu Qijiao have the privilege of studying? Why did Gu Qijiao, who was so unruly and domineering, still receive endless love from her parents?

She worked so hard but her life was not half as comfortable as Gu Qijiao’s.