Chapter 38 Chapter 38 Li Hong breaks the defense.

After reaching a consensus, Liu Suqin took Fangfang for a walk downstairs the next day, and by the way, she went to the gate of the community to call Brother Li to tell him about this matter.

As soon as he got to work, he received the good news of another order from a major client. Even through the phone line, he could hear the excitement in Li Liang's voice. "Okay, no problem. I guarantee I'll find a property that will satisfy you both!"

After finishing his business, Li Liang pulled Liu Suqin aside to chat about family matters. He said his wife went out with them yesterday and came home very happy. "Amin hasn't worked since she got pregnant and doesn't have many friends here. The only one, Ahui, is busy working and can't come over every day. It's rare that she gets along so well with you. The two children are about the same age, so they can play together. You can visit more often in the future."

Putting aside Brother Li's relationship, Amin's personality made it difficult for him to get along with anyone. Liu Suqin naturally agreed without hesitation. "Okay, I'll take Fangfang to visit Brother sometime, and I'll have your Amin and the kids come over to my place. Our houses aren't far away, and you know my address."

"I'll tell Amin," Li Liang chuckled. "I heard your family bought the latest color TV. Let Amin and the kids go watch TV at your house."

Liu Suqin: "Then I'll be waiting."

After the call, the temperature outside began to rise, so Liu Suqin slowly carried her daughter home.

However, she did not wait for Amin at home, but waited for another guest, Li Hong.

Li Hong was indeed an impetuous girl. After attending their warm-home party that day, she went to the village Aunt Jin to get a border pass a few days later.

When she got the certificate, she had only worked four days that month. Li Hong thought about it and decided not to take her salary for these days. To cut her losses in time, she packed up her bedding overnight and went to the city to stay with her good friend.

The night before departure, Li Hong called Liu Suqin to tell her about this and told her not to drive to pick her up. She asked in detail about her residential complex and street, and expressed confidence that she could do it. If she couldn't find the way after arriving in the city, she could take the address and ask someone for directions.

Liu Suqin thought about Li Hong's usual behavior and felt that it was not a big problem. When she heard that she did not have much luggage and it would not affect her ride, she felt more at ease waiting at home. She also went to the kitchen to make Li Hong's favorite stir-fried kidney and liver.

This dish was what Li Hong taught her how to make before her rebirth. Liu Suqin thought it would definitely impress the other party, but the person who had agreed to take the bus into the city early in the morning was nowhere to be seen until noon. Instead, the two men who loved spicy food ordered half an extra bowl of rice.

After delivering the meal, Liu Suqin went home and took her daughter to take a nap. When she woke up, she still didn't see Li Hong. She was a little worried, so she went outside the community to make a phone call.

A friend at the factory told her that Li Hong had indeed gone into the city with her luggage early in the morning, and a fellow villager even went to see her off to the bus, confirming that it was the bus going into the city and that it would not be lost.

Liu Suqin waited patiently at home for half a day, and finally received a call from Li Hong in the evening.

Li Hong had overheard a few girls chatting about their salaries on the bus, so she casually went over to chat with them. The more she listened, the more envious she became of their high salaries and good benefits, including the overtime pay they received for working overtime every day. So, she got off the bus and followed them to the electronics factory where they worked. Turns out, they were hiring, and the salary and benefits were just as they'd promised. Overjoyed, she signed up right there, followed her team leader to the dormitory to stow her luggage, and then went straight to work on the shop floor that afternoon.

I made this call during dinner time. After telling Liu Suqin about the situation, I had to go back to the workshop to work overtime.

Li Hong's cheerful voice came through the receiver clearly. "When luck strikes, it's unstoppable. The factory is short on workers for this batch of goods, and the price per unit is high. I heard from the team leaders that we'll have to work overtime for at least another half a month. I'll come visit you when I'm done with this busy schedule."

Liu Suqin's silence was deafening. "No, you're really too brave. You dare to go with them just because you took a bus together. Aren't you afraid of being sold to the mountains?"

"We're all girls, there's nothing to be afraid of." Li Hong was carefree. Liu Suqin thought that she had already started working smoothly, so she didn't want to be embarrassed. She hurried to get down to business. "By the way, where is your factory exactly? I just got here today. Did you bring everything with you? I'll come to see you tomorrow and send you anything you need."

"No, there are many factories here, and it's a bit dirty and messy. It's not safe for you to come here alone. I'd better go to your house when I have time, and I can go see Fangfang."

"Okay then." Liu Suqin didn't insist, "Then tell us in advance so we can prepare your favorite dishes."

Li Hongying promised to do so, but ended up working overtime for more than half a month before finally finding time to visit her friend. She didn't even notify her in advance, and arrived with a few bags in her hand, looking familiar with the place. When Liu Suqin opened the door, she was almost startled. "Aren't you going to work today? You agreed to let me know in advance. Have you eaten yet? We don't have anything prepared at home right now, so why did you bring so many things..."

"I don't have to work overtime these two days. I'll come to see you as soon as I get off work. It's true that I haven't eaten yet, but you don't need to prepare anything. I can just eat whatever leftovers there are." Li Hong changed her shoes and walked in without any hesitation. She sat down at the dining table and took the warm water handed to her by Aunt Zhang and gulped it down.

Liu Suqin didn't bother to be polite with her. "There's no leftovers. We just finished eating. Can I find some frozen scallops and prawns in the refrigerator and make you some seafood fried rice?"

"I knew I could have a feast here." Li Hong smiled so hard that her teeth were visible. "You don't know, everything in the city is good. It's just that the food around the factory is too expensive, and the canteen only serves bland soup. I've been starving these past few days."

"Okay, I'll put some of our homemade chili powder in your fried rice."

Li Hong nodded vigorously.

Aunt Zhang came over and took the seafood from Liu Suqin's hand. "I'll go get it. You two can have a good chat."

"Thank you, Aunt Zhang." Li Hong said, and couldn't wait to pull Liu Suqin over to see the little dress she bought for Fangfang. "We didn't work overtime yesterday, so after work, we went shopping with some girls from the dormitory. I fell in love with these two dresses at first sight. Our Fangfang has fair skin and big eyes. I don't know how beautiful she will look in these princess dresses. Let's try them on for her to see if they fit. If they're too big, we can exchange them soon."

"It doesn't matter if it's a little bigger. It will fit after a while." Liu Suqin picked up the clothes and gestured to her daughter, expressing her approval of Li Hong's aesthetic taste and vision. "If you have a daughter in the future, she will be blessed. Look at these two clothes you picked for Fangfang. Not only do they fit her well, but the matching is also so beautiful. But don't waste money next time. Children grow up quickly, and such nice clothes and skirts can only be worn a few times. And you know, our Fangfang already has a lot of clothes and shoes..."

"I know, I know. The boss lady isn't short of money. But don't worry, I'm rich now. I couldn't say too much over the phone before, but I calculated that based on the current overtime trends, this month's salary, overtime pay, and other things combined, I can probably make around 500 or 600. Starting next month, as long as you don't take leave or be late, you'll get an extra 80 yuan for perfect attendance."

Liu Suqin was also surprised when she heard this. "I've already missed a few days of work this month, and if I still make 500 or 600, then starting next month, won't it be 800 or more?"

Li Hong's mouth was almost grinning to the back of her ears, but she was still trying to be modest. "I asked the girls I'm close to in the dormitory. As long as you don't take leave or slack off, you can basically get 700 to 800 yuan. Of course, the more overtime you work, the higher the salary. For example, our team leader and others, no one earns less than 1,000 yuan a month."

"Your factory is really good, the salary is considered high even in the interior."

"It's not as good as those foreign-funded factories you mentioned, but their requirements are just as high. With my education, I'm very satisfied to have found this job. It's also because I worked in an electronics factory before, and they value my experience." Li Hong had been holding it in for half a month, and today she was finally able to share her happiness with her friends. "Also, our factory has a great advantage. We have a lot of orders, and if you want, you can work all year round. You can even apply to stay on for Chinese New Year shifts, and your salary will be doubled."

Liu Suqin jokingly said, "I don't know you. As long as there's work in the factory, you'll work yourself to the bone. If you work this way from the beginning of the year to the end, you should earn close to ten thousand, right?"

"If I could earn that much, I would wake up laughing in my dreams."

Liu Suqin smiled knowingly and said half seriously and half jokingly, "I know there's a job. Once you get started, earning a thousand a month won't be a problem."

Li Hong, who was originally imagining working overtime at the end of the year and counting overtime pay until her hands cramped, suddenly sat up straight and asked, "What kind of job? Doing business with you guys?"

Liu Suqin thought for a moment and then continued, "Of course, doing business is the fastest way to make money. I remember that you're a good cook too, so you could consider setting up a small stall and selling snacks in crowded places. The cost is low, but the income is definitely better than working."

"Me?" Li Hong pointed at herself. Seeing that her friend wasn't joking, she started to think seriously. She quickly shook her head decisively, "I can't do it. The cost of setting up a stall is low, but that's because we were lucky at the beginning and rented a car from the landlord. If you include the cost of the tricycle, the cost is higher than opening a store. Besides, I'm a woman. Even if I had a car, I'd still have to move things up and down every day. Even if I could make some money, I'd be exhausted sooner or later."

"It's really inconvenient and unsafe for you to do it alone. It's best to find a partner, a man who is strong and intimidating. It's easy to run into bad people when doing business now." So Liu Suqin just agreed with her and quickly got to the point. "The money I just mentioned is actually learning makeup. It's a skill that can make a living long-term and is also suitable for us girls. I recently met a friend who used to work in a factory. She saved up money to learn this and started working in this industry after graduating last year. She now makes 1,500 to 1,600 yuan a month."

Liu Suqin knew how to catch people's attention. Li Hong was originally immersed in the happiness of earning seven or eight hundred yuan a month, but when she heard that others earned three times as much as her, she suddenly felt that this job was not so attractive anymore. While eating the delicious seafood fried rice, she kept asking about the details.

Liu Suqin also cooperated and told the other party all the information she had learned. At the end, she asked, "By the way, is your factory also closed on the 1st? We went shopping the other day and stopped by that school to take a look. We also ran into Ah Hui's teacher. The teacher told us that the next registration will be on the 1st. If you're interested, you can go and check it out. If you have time, would you like to come with me? It won't hurt to learn more."

Li Hong was speechless when she heard the training fee of 5,000 yuan. However, it only takes three months of training before she can find a job and the salary can be several hundred thousand yuan. This is very attractive to her. After all, what Suqin said is right. People have doubled their income within a year of entering the industry. After working for a few more years or even decades, wouldn't they be earning 3,000 to 5,000 yuan a month?

I can’t imagine how happy a little girl she will be if she earns more than two thousand a month in the future.

So no matter how high the tuition was, Li Hong decided to continue to learn more. "Okay, since I won't get paid on the 1st anyway, I won't stay to work overtime. I'll go to that Cultural Palace with you to see the world."

Whether to learn this in the future or not, she would decide after she had learned more about it. Li Hong put her own affairs aside for the time being and began to care about Liu Suqin. "So, have you decided to learn makeup and become a makeup artist in the future?"

Li Hong herself is a person who can't sit still. She doesn't think that Liu Suqin doesn't need to make trouble just because she has enough money. But she can't help but worry about her. "Fangfang is still breastfeeding. If you go to school during the day, what will happen to the child?"

Liu Suqin also patiently explained, "Although it is a full-time training, the class hours are relatively flexible. They are from 9:00 am to 12:00 pm and from 2:00 pm to 6:00 pm. There are no morning and evening self-study sessions. I can go home after class to feed her. If she gets hungry during class, she has milk powder and complementary foods to fill her stomach. Oh, and when the weather gets better, Aunt Zhang can bring Fangfang to school with me. There are rest areas and empty classrooms in the Cultural Palace. They can play outside while waiting for me to finish class."

"That sounds good. Having a capable Aunt Zhang will save you a lot of trouble." Li Hong said, and her brows, which had just relaxed, furrowed again. "But what about after you finish the training? The training period is only three months. You will definitely have to find a job after you finish the training, otherwise it will be a waste of such a large sum of money. Once you start working, it will be difficult to take care of the family. Then Aunt Zhang will have to take care of Fangfang and do the housework at the same time. Can she handle it all by herself?"

Liu Suqin: "We've discussed this issue before. If classes start next month, we'll graduate at the end of the year. It's a good time to go home for the New Year and ask my mom if she wants to come to Shenzhen and help take care of Fangfang with Aunt Zhang. That way, I can finally wean Fangfang off breastfeeding and find a job."

Li Hong agreed very much. Since the child was so young and Suqin and her husband were busy making money and not at home, the safest way was to ask Fangfang's grandmother or her great-grandmother to take care of the child here. She even thought that if Suqin's mother was willing to come, Aunt Zhang could save her salary.

But then she thought, Suqin's husband can make money. I heard that all the family savings are in Suqin's hands. When she goes out to find a job after the New Year, she will soon be earning more than a thousand yuan a month, and she will have no shortage of money to hire a maid. As a working girl, I should not interfere in the lives of rich people.

Thinking of this, Li Hong stopped worrying about anything and kept clapping her hands. While talking, she didn't forget to eat hard. Before she knew it, she had finished a full plate of fried rice.

Aunt Zhang took the empty plates away and turned around to cut another plate of fruit and brought it over. Li Hong then continued to sit at the dining table, eating ice watermelon with a toothpick while looking around and jokingly saying to Liu Suqin, "I used to say you were a spendthrift woman. Isn't it a waste of money for a family of three to buy such a big house? Now it seems that you are more far-sighted. A bigger house will always come in handy. When your mother comes to Shenzhen, she can live with Aunt Zhang. Such a spacious and bright room, it will be very comfortable for the two of us to live in."

Liu Suqin thought that they had no shortage of housing now, and if her mother didn't want to live with someone else, she could still arrange it.

But saying that would be too Versailles, and it didn't conform to her principle of making a fortune quietly. Liu Suqin tried hard to hold it in and revealed another piece of information, "After the New Year, maybe Brother Quansheng will move out."

Li Hong was indeed very excited. "Why do you say that? Please don't tell me that Lin Quansheng is also going to buy a house in Shenzhen!"

"It's just this plan, don't tell anyone else yet."

"Really?" Li Hong couldn't believe it. "Is he really that rich?"

If Li Hong was caught off guard by the success of her good friend and his wife, then Lin Quansheng's counterattack really broke her defenses.

Apart from their gender, Li Hong and Lin Quansheng are very similar in all aspects. Both are the eldest children exploited by their families. Their parents always ask for money. But girls are always more perceptive. After Li Hong turned 20, she realized that her parents treated her like a workhorse. She began to plan for herself, hiding the news of her salary increase every year, and leaving herself at least 1,000 yuan in private money every year.

Over the years, she has secretly saved more than five thousand.

This time when she went to the city to find a job, Li Hong specifically asked her fellow villagers not to tell her family, so that they would think that she was still earning three to five hundred yuan a month.

Just in case, she didn't plan to tell her fellow villagers about her current salary. When she couldn't hold it in any longer, she only shared it with her good sister Liu Suqin.

If she had not moved to the city, Li Hong's plan was to return to her hometown in two years to get married. With a few thousand yuan of private money in her hands, she could make a living even if her parents did not give her a penny of dowry. By the way, she could also completely get rid of her mother's family who only knew how to suck her blood.

So in the same situation, she was somewhat disgusted with Lin Quansheng's desperate behavior. She, a girl, could be self-reliant and work hard to get out of the predicament, but he, a grown man, only knew how to give up. It was too hopeless.

Li Hong suddenly found out that someone she disliked was also going to buy a house in Shenzhen, and she felt terrible.

Liu Suqin had originally intended to use Lin Quansheng's story to motivate Li Hong, but she almost got her into a tizzy instead. She quickly tried to make amends, "No, calm down. Brother Quansheng is planning to buy an old apartment with a small area and high floors, so the price isn't as high as we thought."

"How much will that cost?" Li Hong asked quietly.

"Um...about 30,000 to 50,000, depending on the situation."

"No, where does he get so much money?" Li Hong asked a soul-searching question.

Liu Suqin was a little amused and helpless. Her good friend was not jealous of her family's "luxuriously decorated" "big house" at all, but was so upset about Quansheng's upcoming purchase of an old and dilapidated house. It was simply the opposite of what Tiangang was doing.

She had no choice but to explain further, "I don't think I told you that Brother Quansheng was a bit of a slacker at the factory, but ever since he came to help us, he's been very hardworking and never complains, no matter how hard or tiring it is. After we moved to the city, he wanted to buy a house with us, so he worked even harder. The two of us run the shop during the day, and after closing at night, we have to go to the nearby urban village to sell midnight snacks. We're busy until midnight every day, and Brother Quansheng is already in charge of the snack stall, so it's Nanjiang's turn to help him..."

Li Hong calmed down a bit. "Are you really talking about Lin Quansheng? He seems like a completely different person."

Liu Suqin laughed and said, "It's not that exaggerated. He just slacked off a bit in the past two years. When we first met, he was still working overtime very hard. Besides, men like them are very concerned about their reputation and are loyal. Since Brother Quansheng is willing to come and help his good brother Nanjiang, of course he will work harder than working for a boss."

"Was he very ambitious before? Why don't I remember?" Li Hong tried to recall, but failed. She didn't bother to care about it anymore. She couldn't get over the fact that Lin Quansheng also wanted to buy a house. "Even if he works very hard now, you paid him a salary of over a thousand yuan a month, including food and accommodation, which was already very generous. We all wanted to squeeze him out of this job. Even if he didn't spend a penny, he would have saved tens of thousands of yuan at most by now. Why would he buy a house?"

Facing her good friend's suspicious gaze, Liu Suqin just wanted to deny it three times in a row. She was not, she did not, and she really did not feel like a fool.

"Well, Brother Quansheng's salary remains at 1,000, but the night snack stall they run is a different story. The more you work, the more you get, so it's a disguised pay raise." Without the consent of the parties involved, Liu Suqin couldn't reveal his income, so she could only say vaguely, "Of course it's still far from enough to buy a house, but we have Nanjiang and I. I'll tell you this, Brother Quansheng has helped us a lot, and he wants to buy a house sooner, so we'll help him make up the difference. After all, house prices are rising every year, so it's more cost-effective to buy early."

"That's right." Li Hong thought to herself that Lin Quansheng's salary was only slightly higher than hers. This guy was just lucky, having gotten married to Suqin and her husband early on, but unfortunately, they were already well-off. She wasn't bad at all, and Li Hong's mindset suddenly settled. She gave her friend a reassuring voice, "If you have any extra money, you could lend it to him to buy a house. You wouldn't worry about him not paying it back. Besides, he couldn't just walk away after owing such a big favor. Wouldn't he have to give you a few more years to work for him?"

Liu Suqin agreed. "But that's all for the future. I'm bringing this up today mainly to remind you that the experiences of my family, Brother Quansheng, and my new acquaintance, Ah Hui, all illustrate one point: it's a waste for young people to stay in factories working. Doing the same thing day after day doesn't bring any improvement to us except for the salary, and the salary increase can't keep up with the rate of price increases. It wasn't possible before, but now that you've moved to the city, you can work and save money in the next few months while carefully considering your future. If you want to start a small business or learn a craft later, just ask and I'll definitely help if I can."

Li Hong was indeed moved by Lin Quansheng's deeds, and this time her eyes were much more determined. "I understand what you mean. I will seriously consider this matter. I will go to that school with you on the first of next month."

Seeing this, Liu Suqin smiled with relief, "That's good. You should come earlier that day and have dinner at my house before leaving."

Li Hong smiled and said, "I won't be polite with you, Madam Boss."