"All you do all day is play. You're a young lady, don't you know how to wash all these dirty clothes piled up here?"

When Xu Lixia got home from get off work, she saw that the dirty clothes on Zhan Chunlan's bed hadn't been washed yet. She started yelling at Zhan Chunlan, who was cooking in the kitchen: "You wretched, good-for-nothing girl! I work all day to earn money to raise you and send you to school, and this is the lazy thing I've given you! There's such a huge pile of clothes in front of you, and you just pretend you don't see them. If you're so blind, you just pick them out. Are you going to wait until I get off work to wash them?"

If this one thing isn't done, then everything we did before is wiped clean.

She started doing housework when she was 5 years old. At first, she swept the floor and picked vegetables. Later, she cooked, did laundry, and made bed sheets and blankets. Gradually, she did all the housework by herself. She seemed to have become the only servant in the house. Everyone could order her around. But that was the original Zhan Chunlan. Now she was unwilling to serve the whole family like a maid.

At the dinner table, Zhan Hongyu looked at Zhan Chunlan, who seemed completely unaffected, and said unhappily, "Third sister, why haven't my clothes been washed yet? I won't have any clean clothes for the next couple of days."

Zhan Chunyun chimed in, "Yeah, third brother, I already brought your clothes to your bed, and you still picked out your own clothes to wash, while leaving ours for Mom to wash?"

"I don't care who does the laundry! Mom and my older sister have to go to work, I have to go to school, and you're the only one who's idle. What are you doing all day?" Zhan Chunlan wasn't afraid of them. Anyway, she was already a junior in high school this year and would graduate in one semester. They couldn't do anything to her anymore. "Anyway, I'll do my own things from now on, but I can't do the housework by myself anymore. You guys figure it out yourselves. Otherwise, don't come looking for me if there's no one to cook or do the laundry."

Xu Lixia had just been scolding Zhan Chunlan out of habit; all the household chores had always been Zhan Chunlan's responsibility, and since she hadn't done anything, scolding her was enough. Now that Zhan Chunlan had brought it up, she suddenly remembered there was a good-for-nothing second child in the house. Anyway, it was fine as long as she didn't have to do anything.

"Okay, from now on, either one of you will cook and the other will do the laundry, or you can take turns. You can decide for yourselves."

“We’ll take turns, one person per day.” Although Zhan Chunyun really wanted to choose to cook, washing clothes in the dead of winter was simply unbearable, and she was unwilling to do so. But cooking was something she did every day, while washing clothes was something she did only once a week.

She didn't even think about resisting. Anyway, since Zhan Chunlan hadn't brought up the family matters before, and she had brought them up at the dinner table today, there was no room for objection. She didn't want to waste her breath.

"Then you should wash your own clothes, Mom and Dad and Zhan Hongyu, and wash your own underwear too. I don't want to wash those things anymore."

"Why should I? I also work, and I even pay my own living expenses." Zhan Chunhua had already agreed that she had paid such a high amount of living expenses, but in the end, she still had to wash her own clothes.

"I don't care. I'll just pick out your clothes when I do the laundry." Zhan Chunlan wasn't going to spoil her. Anyway, not a single penny of the living expenses she paid ended up in her hands.

"Alright, it's settled then. These young ladies are so reluctant to do housework. You're a bunch of lazybones." Zhan Zhiqiang made the decision directly, not wanting to hear them arguing about housework anymore. If others heard them, they would laugh at him to death.

Damn it, it makes me angry just hearing it. He's lucky to be a man. He had his mother to take care of him when he was young, his wife to manage things after he got married, and now he has three daughters who earn money for him and do housework. Only he and Zhan Hongyu are the kind of people who won't even pick up a fallen broom at home, yet they call others lazybones. They can't even light a coal stove themselves. If all the women in the family were to leave one day, he'd probably starve to death.

Thump! Thump! Thump!

Someone knocked on the door, and Zhan Chunlan, who was on the outside, immediately got up to open it.

A middle-aged woman stood outside, her short hair tucked behind her ears, and a pair of round-framed glasses perched on her nose. Behind the lenses, her eyes held a gentle yet undeniable firmness.

"Hello! Who are you looking for?" Zhan Chunlan looked at the person in front of her. He should be from the neighborhood committee. Judging from the time, he should be here to persuade her second sister to go to the countryside.

"Hello, young man. Are your parents home?" Lin Shuyue looked at the child in front of her and estimated that he was only about 10 years old. He would match the age of the fourth son of the Zhan family. Wasn't the fourth son of the Zhan family a boy?

"Yes, please come in!" he said, stepping aside to let her in.

Lin Shuyue entered the room and looked at the food on the table with some embarrassment: "Hello, I am Lin Shuyue from the Youth Volunteer Office of the Street. Please eat first, I will come back later."

He then walked out, intending to wait a while before coming back.

When Zhan Zhiqiang and Xu Lixia heard that she was from the educated youth office, they understood what was going on and hurriedly stopped her: "We have already finished eating and will clear the dishes soon. Has Comrade Lin had dinner? If not, please have something to eat here."

Hearing that they had finished eating, Lin Shuyue wasn't in a hurry to leave: "I've already eaten. Since you've finished, let's have a good chat."

The three Zhan sisters quickly cleared away the dishes, Zhan Chunhua wiped the table, Zhan Chunyun handed over a stool, and Zhan Chunlan washed the dishes.

"Comrade Zhan and Xu Xiaotong are both employees of the machine factory. I'm sure you both know that educated youth go to the countryside to receive re-education from poor and lower-middle peasants. This is a national policy that no graduate can escape, nor can they avoid." Lin Shuyue sat on the stool, her back straight, speaking slowly and deliberately, yet clearly and forcefully.

"We all know, we'll try to persuade her." Zhan Zhiqiang was somewhat indifferent; after all, she was a girl, so he didn't show the same worried and pleading faces as other families.

Looking at Zhan Chunyun, who seemed somewhat resistant, Lin Shuyue's tone softened slightly: "This must be Comrade Zhan Chunyun."

"Yes, I am Zhan Chunyun." Zhan Chunyun was somewhat panicked. She didn't want to go to the countryside, even though everyone responded with great enthusiasm at first. Her hometown was in the countryside, she knew what rural life was like, and she had experienced it herself. Her family had finally managed to escape from their small mountain village, and now she was going to go back alone. She really didn't want to.

Lin Shuyue gently took off her glasses, wiped the lenses with the corner of her clothes, and put them back on. She looked around the Zhan family's simple living room, her gaze finally settling on the propaganda poster on the wall that read "Learn from Daqing in industry, learn from Dazhai in agriculture."

"I understand," her voice softened, carrying the understanding of someone who's been through it all. "It's normal for everyone to have emotions. Last year, when my child responded to the call to go to the countryside, he also cried in bed." She smiled, a few fine lines appearing at the corners of her eyes.

“But policy is policy, and this is what national development needs.” Her voice was calm and measured, carrying the steadiness that comes with age. “I’ve also learned that your hometown is in the countryside, so you know how tough life is there. But are we going to give up the vast rural areas because of this? You’ve studied for so many years, isn’t it all for the purpose of building our country?”