Chapter 5 – Room Division Details

Lin Yingxian didn’t care much about the gossip swirling around the building. That kind of thing was easy to brush off. What really bothered her were two things: having to shower in a communal bathroom, and the complete lack of privacy at home—any little thing that happened could be known by the entire floor within the hour.

She’d been living here for over a year, and she still hadn’t gotten used to showering naked alongside strangers, with no barriers at all. One time, someone even made comments about her body from head to toe. So she always waited until everyone else was done. She was usually the last one to shower, slipping into the bathroom only when it was empty.

“No doubt about it—it must’ve been Auntie Liu running her mouth again. Nobody in the building, no, the whole block, loves stirring up drama more than she does,” Lin Yingwan muttered irritably. Just hearing Auntie Liu’s name put her in a bad mood. The woman was always causing trouble. Yingwan would turn around and walk the other way just to avoid her.

Everyone in the Lin family agreed—it had to be Auntie Liu.

They hadn’t forgotten what happened when the three Lin siblings were kids and went to the fields on the outskirts to learn farming. They picked a bunch of wild vegetables to bring home. Auntie Liu saw them and asked about it. The kids were shy and too polite to refuse when an elder asked, so Yingwan handed over her bundle of greens.

Auntie Liu had taken them happily enough—at least on the surface. But the very next day, Yingwan heard her downstairs telling someone that the greens she got were tough, full of weeds, and basically inedible.

The way she talked, it sounded like Yingwan had forced her to take them, like she’d been terribly put on the spot.

Yingwan had been so mad, she ran down and confronted her. But Auntie Liu flipped the situation, accusing her of being rude and disrespectful to her elders, twisting the story until Yingwan was the bad guy. Yingwan, still just a child, couldn’t outtalk her. She ended up in tears and went upstairs to complain to their mom.

Mama Lin came down and dealt with it. She didn’t raise her voice or use harsh words, but every sentence hit where it hurt. In the end, Auntie Liu was completely shut down. After that, everyone in the building knew what she was like—greedy for what little kids brought home, always twisting the truth, always playing the victim.

Since then, the Lin family and Auntie Liu had kept things polite on the surface, but there was no love lost between them. Auntie Liu never missed a chance to spread rumors about them. That’s why, back when Yingxian had attempted suicide, the family had worked hard to keep it under wraps. If Auntie Liu had gotten wind of it, the entire building would’ve exploded with gossip.

A few months back, Auntie Liu’s second son got married. His new wife turned out to be a real firecracker, constantly butting heads with her mother-in-law. The two were locked in daily skirmishes, leaving Auntie Liu too busy to bother with the Lin family anymore.

That was a relief for the Lins. Sure, they’d never let Auntie Liu take advantage of them, and her gossip hadn’t caused any real harm—but having someone like that buzzing around like a fly, always watching, always judging, was just plain exhausting.

That night, past ten o’clock, Lin Yingxian returned from the communal showers. The lights at home were already off. She climbed to the top bunk with a flashlight in hand, pulled the curtain shut, and curled up in bed.

Their little home was no more than a dozen square meters, but the Lins made full use of every inch. Four people lived in the inner room. One bunk bed held Yingxian and Yingwan. A long desk stretched across the middle, separating their space from the bed opposite. Behind the curtain on that side was a custom-made bed, slightly wider than a single, where their parents slept. It wasn’t a proper double, but it fit two adults and saved space—Papa Lin had had it built to order.

The Lin family had partitioned off a section of the living room to create a room for Lin Yingwei and Zhou Donghong. It barely fit a double bed and a vanity, and though it was cramped, it had good lighting. The window that used to light the living room now belonged to the small room, leaving the rest of the living room to rely on that for light…

A few days later, the pharmaceutical factory put up a notice on the bulletin board outlining the new housing allocation rules.

Lin Yingxian and a few female coworkers from her group walked over to take a look, the bulletin board surrounded so tightly that it was hard to get near. Lin Yingxian and Sister Peng from her group slipped through the crowd like slick eels and made it to the front.

“One, employees with more than ten years of service at the factory;
Two, married employees without housing;
Three, high school education or above;
Four, recipients of Outstanding Worker or Model Employee awards…”

There were eight criteria in total. Meeting one earned ten points.

Lin Yingxian glanced at the last line: Only those who scored over thirty points could apply for housing.

Of the first four rules, Lin Yingxian only met the third—having a high school education. The remaining rules were all aimed at technical staff or engineers—none applied to her.

She had a feeling that this year, a bunch of young people at the factory would rush into marriage, and competition for the awards was going to be fiercer than ever.

Sister Peng, standing beside her, met the first two criteria but didn’t have a high school diploma. Her only hope was to aim for the Outstanding Worker award.

…

That evening, while eating dinner, Zhou Donghong hesitantly announced, “Yingwei went with me to the hospital today… I’m over two months pregnant.”

Mother Lin had already suspected it. Zhou Donghong had been craving sour foods and vomiting a lot lately. So she’d asked Yingwei to take her to get checked out.

Everyone had mixed feelings about the news. A baby was certainly a happy thing—but raising one wasn’t as simple as just getting them a small bed. They’d need all sorts of things, and the already cramped home would only feel more crowded.

Even Zhou Donghong and Lin Yingwei had been surprised by the pregnancy—they’d been using protection.

When Zhou Donghong first married into the family, she’d wanted a baby right away to secure her place, but it hadn’t happened. Later, she realized Lin’s parents and Yingwei didn’t actually want kids so soon. The house was small, they were still young—waiting until their late twenties seemed more reasonable.

Back then, Zhou Donghong was supposed to go work in the countryside as a sent-down youth. When she heard a neighbor’s daughter had died out there, she panicked. She didn’t want to go. She couldn’t find a job either—her mother had already given her job spot to her older brother, and her father wasn’t about to give his up. So she set her sights on her junior high classmate, Lin Yingwei. She seduced him, they slept together, and ended up getting married.

Yingwei had a stable job and didn’t have to go to the countryside, which gave her something to cling to. Papa Lin and Mama Lin saw through her right away.She didn’t have a job, wasn’t very bright, and clearly had ulterior motives. They didn’t like her.

To win them over, Zhou Donghong tried extra hard, but it backfired badly. She ended up pushing Lin Yingxian over the edge and nearly caused her to take her own life. That incident became the final straw. Her plan to use a pregnancy to secure her place had backfired spectacularly. The Lin parents were even more disappointed in her and almost convinced Yingwei to divorce her.

Zhou Donghong had gotten down on her knees to apologize. She begged Lin Yingxian, and Lin’s parents, for forgiveness. Her own parents came over to plead her case and offer their apologies.

She might not have treated others well, but to Yingwei, she was sweet and thoughtful—and not bad-looking either. Yingwei still liked her, and once Lin Yingxian recovered, he wasn’t quite set on the idea of divorce.

So the matter was dropped.

Later, Yingwei talked some sense into her, and Zhou Donghong slowly started changing. She tried to be a better daughter-in-law, and last year even found a temp job—finally no longer the only one in the family not bringing in any money. The Lin parents began to show her a little warmth. Before that, they’d basically treated her like thin air.