Chapter 16: Hu Xiuxiu’s Doubts

Although Shen Tingjun repeatedly insisted that he earned more than he spent, Jiang Wanwan couldn’t help but worry.

This concern directly led to the fact that over the next week, whenever Shen Tingjun asked her to go out to eat, she simply wouldn’t go. But unlike him, Jiang Wanwan wasn’t footloose and fancy-free; she was busy with work every day. The only time they had together was during lunch and after she got off work.

To spend more time with her, Shen Tingjun started getting her food from the cafeteria in advance, then waiting for her to finish work so they could eat together. While this inevitably drew some curious glances, Jiang Wanwan did the math and realized that eating at the cafeteria saved her enough money each month to equal her entire salary.

“Could this be what my grandma from my previous life meant by being a great homemaker?” she mused happily, feeling that Shen Tingjun was incredibly lucky to have found such a beautiful and kind-hearted girlfriend.

So when Shen Tingjun asked her to the movies that weekend to see a new release, she agreed without a second thought, feeling that she had already saved him a significant amount of money. After all, a movie ticket was only a few dimes.

But she went in happily and came out weeping.

Jiang Wanwan had always been a crybaby. As she watched the protagonist, a young girl, first enslaved by a landlord, then tormented by enemies, and finally sacrifice herself to save others just as the dawn of victory arrived, she couldn’t stop sobbing uncontrollably. Shen Tingjun did his best to comfort her and finally managed to get her tears to stop.

But as soon as they arrived at the family compound, they ran into two of Shen Tingjun’s buddies.

“Hey, Jun, where have you two been?”

“There’s a new movie out; we went to go see it.”

“What was it about? Was it any good?”

Before Shen Tingjun could answer, the irrepressible sound of Jiang Wanwan’s sobbing started up again from behind him. Oh, good grief, was she already reliving the movie’s plot?

He pointed helplessly at Jiang Wanwan, who was on the back of the bicycle. “I don’t know if it was any good, but it was certainly touching.”

While Jiang Wanwan was lost in the sorrow of the film, someone else among the sent-down youth was consumed by an entirely different kind of fear—a fear of the unknown that came from memories not aligning with reality.

Hu Xiuxiu sat on the train, looking at the familiar yet unfamiliar faces in the sent-down youth team, trying to find the one that she hated the most.

But no matter how many times she scanned the faces, she couldn’t find her. With the train about to depart, Hu Xiuxiu finally couldn’t sit still any longer. She went to find the captain in charge of the entire sent-down youth team traveling from Jiangcheng to the Great Northern Wilderness.

“Captain, is anyone else supposed to get on?”

“No, I’ve checked the list three times. Everyone’s here, no one’s missing.”

“That can’t be right. Captain, check again. Isn’t there someone named Jiang Huiwan who hasn’t arrived?”

The captain looked over the list from top to bottom and said impatiently, “There’s no such person on this list. Now, go back to your seat. The train is about to leave.”

Hu Xiuxiu returned to her seat and stared blankly out the window at the crowds.

Where did things go wrong? In her previous life, Jiang Huiwan had sat right next to her on this journey. Because she had looked after her a few times on the road, Jiang Huiwan had considered her a friend. But in this life, not only was she not sitting next to her, but her name was also missing from the list of sent-down youth.

Could it be that Jiang Huiwan was also reborn?

The thought shocked Hu Xiuxiu, and she broke out in a cold sweat. But then she thought of Qi Yin, and she dismissed the idea.

No, that’s not right. If Jiang Huiwan was really reborn, she would have been even more determined to go to the countryside to find Qi Yin.

After all, he was her only means of living a life of luxury as a wealthy wife in her previous life. When Hu Xiuxiu had first been reborn, she had worried about this and even went specifically to the Xu family to look for Jiang Huiwan. But according to her stepfather, she was at the hospital taking care of her mother. She recalled Jiang Huiwan vaguely mentioning something similar in her past life.

Although Jiang Huiwan always obeyed her mother, she never really wanted to go to the countryside. A leader’s son at their machinery factory liked her, and she had considered getting married to stay in the city. But her mother had discovered their budding relationship and was so angered that she was hospitalized. In the end, Jiang Huiwan couldn’t escape the fate of being sent to the countryside.

So, in Hu Xiuxiu’s mind, since Jiang Huiwan’s mother was hospitalized just like in her past life, Jiang Huiwan’s fate of being sent down should have been sealed.

Could it be that my rebirth caused some kind of butterfly effect? Did it change Jiang Huiwan’s life path and send her to a different place?

Then, Hu Xiuxiu’s thoughts took a turn. Who cares if Jiang Huiwan was reborn or sent somewhere else? As long as she’s not being sent to Qijiazhuang, no one will be there to steal Qi Yin from me.

Doesn’t Qi Yin just love that kind of gentle, innocent little flower? Then I’ll pretend to be as pitiful and delicate as Jiang Huiwan and let him fall completely in love with me. Hu Xiuxiu thought, a half-mocking, half-triumphant smile playing on her lips.

Meanwhile, in the Qijiazhuang production team, villagers were gathered at both ends of the village, whispering among themselves. As they talked, they glanced toward the home of Qi Sanzhu at the village entrance.

Qi Sanzhu was the cousin of the team leader, Qi Youren. But unlike his sharp and capable cousin, Qi Sanzhu and his wife were lazy and gluttonous. Their home was so poor even the rats found it unappealing. Of their five children, two had starved to death, leaving them with one son and two daughters. Like breeds like—lazy parents don’t raise hardworking children—and their kids were just as lazy and greedy. The only one in the family who showed any ambition was their youngest daughter, Qi Miao. But she was a little too ambitious, going so far as to jump into the reservoir after her parents refused to let her go to middle school. Thankfully, two sent-down youths were secretly fishing there and managed to rescue her, preventing a girl they had raised for over a decade from simply vanishing.

“Even being rescued doesn’t guarantee she’ll live,” one villager said, hands tucked into his sleeves, shaking his head. “I saw the girl’s face; it was completely white, and her chest wasn’t moving.”

“Sigh, Qi Sanzhu and his wife are a curse. If the girl wants to study, let her study. Maybe the whole family will have to rely on her one day.”

In Qi Sanzhu’s home, the team leader, Qi Youren, was saying the very same thing.

“The girl has excellent grades. If she wants to study, let her. If you really can’t afford it, I’ll pay for it. Why did you have to drive her to do something so desperate? Are you satisfied now that she’s lying here?”

Qi Sanzhu squatted on the ground, one hand scratching his head, the other holding a pipe, sighing but saying nothing. His wife, Wang Guihua, sat on the kang bed, wiping away tears and complaining.

“Her big uncle, it’s not that we don’t want her to go. It’s just that we don’t have the money. Her big brother is twenty-three and still doesn’t have a wife. If we take on debt for her to go to school, what are we supposed to do when we need to get a wife for our oldest?”

“I’ll pay for her to go to school for three or five years, for the sake of our family having a successful person. You won’t have to pay a thing—how’s that?”

“Well, if you have money to pay for a girl’s schooling, you could just use it to get our oldest a wife!”

Qi Youren was speechless. The most capable man in Qijiazhuang was nearly choked by his sister-in-law’s shameless words.