At 3:17 in the morning, Su Xia woke up from her dream again.

The pajamas soaked with cold sweat stuck to her back. She stared at the ceiling and panted. The warmth of the little girl's palm in her dream still remained on her fingertips.

Those were a pair of skinny little hands, with washed yellow soil embedded in the nails. They were desperately pulling at the corner of her clothes, and crying in a childish voice: "Mom, I'm hungry."

This dream has lasted for a week, making Su Xia's eyes tired.

Su Xia lifted the quilt, stepped barefoot on the cold floor, and walked into the small kitchen of the rental house.

There was only half a box of salad left in the refrigerator. She stared at the lettuce leaves in the fresh-keeping box and suddenly felt nauseous.

This is the third time this week. Every time I dream about the little girl, I feel like vomiting when I see green vegetables. The image of "boiled wild vegetable stems mixed with wheat bran" always appears uncontrollably in my mind.

As a senior copywriter in an advertising company, Su Xia relies on coffee and overtime work to survive all year round. Disruption of her biological clock is normal, but this is the first time she has had such a terrifyingly realistic recurring dream.

Three years ago, when she was buying oden at a convenience store, she saw an old lady in a blue cloth shirt carrying her granddaughter to pick rice. She suddenly felt that the little girl's eyes and eyebrows overlapped with the child in her dream.

What's even more strange is that in her dream last night, she clearly felt desolate and numb.

"bite--"

A new message popped up on my phone. It was from my boss: "I'm working overtime tonight. I received a reply."

Su Xia turned off her phone and opened the shopping app.

As if possessed by magic, she typed in "rice, flour, grain, oil, various foods", and paused for two seconds on the search key, just to take a look.

Old yellowed photos popped up on the screen, including an enamel bowl with a missing corner, a coarse cloth shirt, and a canvas printed with "Serve the People", which were exactly the same as the scenes in the dream.

Could it be the 1960s or 1970s? Maybe I’ve been too absorbed in my work lately, and the latest case is related to that era.

At four o'clock in the morning, she squatted in front of the desk and wrote down the key words of her dream in red pen in her notebook:

- Adobe house, kerosene lamp, patched blue shirt

-Enamel bowl with missing corner, girl with tear mole

- Moldy sorghum noodles, the sound of the production team bell, hunger

The tip of the pen left a deep mark on the word "Production Team".

As a history lover, she certainly knew about the three difficult years in the period literature, but why did she dream of becoming a rural woman of that era?

Moreover, the "self" in the dream clearly has two identities: one is the modern Su Xia, observing everything soberly;

The other is "Su Xia", who is called "mother" by the little girl, and her whole body reveals the weakness of malnutrition.

The roar of a sanitation truck came from outside the window. Su Xia rubbed her aching temples, stood up and opened the curtains.

It was chilly in spring, and light snow was falling under the street lights. She suddenly remembered the atmosphere in her dream.

It was always gloomy. The window paper of the adobe house rustled in the wind, and the little girl's cotton shoes had exposed toes, which were red from the cold.

Su Xia took out vitamin B6 from the drawer and took it with cold water.

The reflection in the mirror had dark circles under her eyes and messy hair, just like the dishevelled rural woman in her dream.

She suddenly remembered that she had a physical examination at her company a few months ago, and the doctor said that she was "overly stressed and recommended taking a vacation."

At that time, I was still smiling and saying, "Taking a vacation is like giving me a raise," but now I am eager to escape to a deserted place and sort out these absurd dreams.

At ten o'clock in the afternoon, Su Xia sat in the conference room, listening to the client talking about the "Revival of the National Trend" plan.

The projection flashed old posters from the 1960s, red flags, tractors, and coarse-grain steamed bread. She stared at the steamed bread on the screen, her stomach churning.

"Miss Su, do you have any thoughts on this question?" the customer suddenly asked.

She hurriedly opened her notebook and her eyes fell on the dream notes she had written in the early morning. She said in a mysterious way: "Perhaps we can start with the 'memories of hunger' and restore the food culture of that era from a modern perspective, such as... for example, the refined processing of coarse grains, showing the change from 'eating enough' to 'eating well'."

As soon as I said this, I was stunned.

After the meeting, Su Xia received information from the client. The first picture was an old rural stove, which was exactly the same as the scene in the dream.

The glass door of the supermarket closed behind her with a ding. She stared at the rice and noodles on the shelf and suddenly remembered the bulge in the ribs of the little girl in her dream when her fingertips touched her when she said "Mom, I'm hungry".

"Miss, would you like to buy something?" The clerk's impatient voice startled her.

She forced a stiff smile and said, "I bought some noodles, snacks and drinks."

There were a lot of things, so I went home slowly.

Based on my years of experience reading novels, this is a sign, but according to this setting, the golden finger should also be here.

I have been paying attention to it these few days, but there is no reaction. Could it be that I am overthinking it? But I am really tired.

Is it the subconscious mind at work? But why do I dream of becoming a mother? And what happened in the dream was like a real experience.

Returning to the rental house, Su Xia threw herself onto the sofa. She was currently renting a 60-square-meter house with one bedroom, one living room and one bathroom, which was more than enough for one person to live in.

Su Xia simply washed up and prepared to go to bed.

At 3:17 in the morning, before the alarm went off, Su Xia was awakened by the familiar feeling of hunger.

This time the dream was clearer: she saw "Su Xia" squatting in front of the stove, stirring the wild vegetable soup in the pot with a cracked wooden spoon. The steam blurred her face, but she heard her say to the pot, "How can I be hungry with just this little?"

Su Xia took out her cell phone and wrote in the memo:

"The third time I dreamed of 'Su Xia', her husband's name is 'Jian Guo', he is a long-distance driver, and they have a three-year-old daughter, nicknamed Niuniu, with a teardrop mole at the corner of her eye.

The production team's canteen was out of food, with only half a bowl of wild vegetable soup left in the jar. ”

The tip of the pen was hanging on the line "out of food", and she felt a chill on the back of her neck -

Su Xia opened the calendar. It was Saturday. She had slept in a little, but she was still woken up by this dream. This dream was really confusing.

Check in and search on your phone to see what happened during the three difficult years!

The first one is "A certain commune in Henan Province tried out 'low standards, melons and vegetables as substitutes', and the rural food ration standard was reduced to 0.3 jin of raw grain per person per 100g."

"Bang-"

Carefully drop your phone on the ground.

When I picked it up, the screen was still on the shopping app, and the recommended column was full of "reproduction props from the 1960s and 1970s": old textbooks, work points tables, food coupon models, cloth coupons, coarse cloth shirts...

She suddenly remembered the action of "Su Xia" lifting the kang mat in her dream, and then she lifted her own mattress, revealing only a dusty yoga mat underneath.

But at a certain moment, she seemed to see the sorghum noodles under the kang mat, and the moldy smell penetrated into her nose, which was so real and scary.

At 12 o'clock in the morning, Su Xia sat by the bay window, watching the sky turn pale.

There are already three full pages of dream records in the mobile phone memo, and every detail confirms one fact: these dreams are too real, so real that they seem like memories of another life.

As a staunch materialist, she had never believed in reincarnation, but now she had to admit that the recurring scenes, characters, and even smells were gradually undermining her cognition.

The strangest thing is that every time she wakes up from a dream, she will have a strong urge to stockpile goods - just like "Su Xia" wanted to stockpile food before the famine came.

Opening the memo, she looked at the record written for the review proposal:

- Rice flour, wheat flour, beans, dried sweet potatoes

-Enamel bowls, kerosene lamps, old-fashioned flashlights

-Old textbooks from 1950 to 1970, work points table templates, food stamp simulations

- Children's dolls, literacy cards, baby milk powder (in tin cans)

Looking at the memo, she comforted herself that it was for the purpose of "reviewing the proposal", but her fingers were shaking as she rubbed the screen.

Outside the window, the first ray of sunlight climbed up the glass curtain wall of the office building opposite, but Su Xia felt cold all over.

The little girl in the dream appeared again, and this time she saw the trust in the child's eyes.

It was a look that placed all hopes of survival on the "mother", which made her, a modern person who had been solo since birth, feel tight in the chest.

The phone vibrates and the bank sends a text message reminding you that your balance is sufficient. She smiled bitterly and thought, if her parents knew that she had spent half a year's savings on rice and old textbooks because of a dream, she would probably be sent to a mental hospital.

But there is a voice in my subconscious that says, "Stock up, you must stock up."

"Su Xia", this name that appeared repeatedly in her dreams, made her feel familiar at this moment.

It’s like there are two souls living in the body, one is the 35-year-old Su Xia, and the other is the Su Xia in the dream, overlapping and entangled in the cracks of time and space.

At six o'clock in the morning, Su Xia dozed off against the head of the bed.

She opened her eyes and found her palms were full of sweat. What appeared before her eyes was the little girl's dirty face full of tears.

This day, the front desk of the advertising company was piled with cardboard boxes with "Folk Props" written on them.

When Su Xia opened the first box and saw the enamel bowl with a missing corner, she suddenly remembered the last scene in her dream: Su Xia was lying on the bed, weak and the skinny little girl was crying.