Seeing Luo Jingyan's stance, Zhuang Feifei, having witnessed Luo Jingyan's prowess, quickly took a few steps back.
Once she's built the house, she'll come back and give Luo Jingyan a good slap in the face.
She snorted coldly and turned to leave.
Zhuang Feifei immediately went to find Grandpa Zhang, who drove the oxcart in the village, hoping that he could drive the oxcart with her to the brick and tile factory in the county town to buy bricks and tiles. Grandpa Zhang said, "I am only responsible for driving the cart. If you want to use the cart, you have to go to the brigade leader and get his approval. In addition, the brigade pays me work points for driving the cart."
It means they won't help Zhuang Feifei for free; she needs to pay them a certain fee first.
After all, who would willingly help a complete stranger for nothing?
So Zhuang Feifei left Grandpa Zhang's house and went to the brigade leader's house, where she told him that he wanted to use the brigade's oxcart to go to the county town to buy bricks and tiles.
The team leader didn't refuse, but considering the weight of the bricks and tiles and the potential wear and tear on the cart and oxen, he explained, "Normally, renting the cart and oxen together would only cost 50 cents a day. But hauling bricks and tiles is a special case. You can use it, but hauling bricks and tiles is the most taxing on the cart and oxen. I'll give you one yuan a day, provided that the oxen and cart are undamaged. If the cart breaks down, you'll be responsible for finding someone to repair it and paying for the repairs. If the oxen are injured, you'll also be responsible depending on the severity of the injury. If an ox is lost, you'll have to compensate the team with one."
The brigade leader explained to Zhuang Feifei all the things she needed to know about renting the oxcart, so that she wouldn't be careless when using it, and it was like taking out insurance for the ox and the cart.
Zhuang Feifei felt that what the captain said were special cases, and that under normal circumstances nothing would happen.
"No problem, Captain, I agree to everything you say. Now that I've borrowed the ox and the cart, I'll take responsibility for them."
"Alright then, you'll need to pay a twenty-dollar deposit first. Let's draw up a contract, and I'll refund the deposit to you once you return the oxcart."
“Okay.” Zhuang Feifei agreed readily, she wasn’t short of twenty yuan.
The captain wrote out a receipt, had her sign it, and left a deposit.
The brigade leader gave her another note, telling her to go to Grandpa Zhang's place to rent an oxcart.
Zhuang Feifei went to Grandpa Zhang's house again and showed him the note issued by the brigade leader. Grandpa Zhang was illiterate, but villagers and educated youth had borrowed your cart before. He recognized the handwriting as that of the brigade leader, nodded, and then asked Zhuang Feifei, "Are you going to drive the oxcart to the county town yourself?"
“I’ve never driven an oxcart before, so of course you’ll need to come with me.”
“I’ll go with you, it’ll be fifty cents a day.” His rent is also very expensive.
“No problem.” Zhuang Feifei readily agreed. Then, Grandpa Zhang led the cow out of the shed, got in the car, and went with Zhuang Feifei to the county town, heading straight for their destination, the brick and tile factory.
That day, Qin Zhenzhen rode her bicycle to find Luo Jingyan again. She went to the educated youth settlement first and found that the door to Luo Jingyan's room was locked. She didn't understand where Luo Jingyan had gone.
There were other educated youths sunbathing in the courtyard. When Jiang Manyue saw that she had come to find Luo Jingyan, she said, "Educated youth Luo is building a new house. Construction has already started. She went to the base to take care of things. I'll tell you the address of her new house."
After learning the address where Luo Jingyan was building her house, Qin Zhenzhen thanked Jiang Manyue. She went to Luo Jingyan's land according to the address Jiang Manyue gave her, and sure enough, she saw several people working hard there.
She pushed her bicycle over, and Zhao Jun, who was making adobe bricks, suddenly looked up and saw her first. He immediately became excited, his eyes shining.
He hurriedly called out to Qin Zhenzhen and raised one hand, his excitement overflowing.
"Comrade Qin, you've arrived!"
He was so excited that his voice naturally became louder, and soon everyone on the construction site heard it. They all turned to look at him, and at the same time, they turned to look at Qin Zhenzhen.
A bricklayer in his forties next to him joked, "Young man, look how enthusiastic you are, is that girl your girlfriend?"
"Young man, you have a great girlfriend," another bricklayer complimented.
Everyone chimed in with their own comments, keeping Zhao Jun all smiles. Qin Zhenzhen, however, became a little embarrassed by the commotion, her face flushing slightly as she glanced at Zhao Jun.
Zhao Jun explained to the bricklayer next to him who had misunderstood his relationship with Qin Zhenzhen: "Uncle, sir, you've got it wrong. She's not my girlfriend. She's Xue Zhiqing's cousin. We just know each other."
"Oh, I see. I saw how happy you were to see that girl, and I thought you two were dating. I misunderstood." The uncle smiled awkwardly.
Everyone else laughed too, but they could all tell that Zhao Jun was interested in Qin Zhenzhen.
Ignoring the little incident from earlier, Qin Zhenzhen walked up to Luo Jingyan and asked, "Sister-in-law, are you building a house?"
“Yes, there are too many people and too much trouble at the educated youth settlement. I want to move out with Xiaotian. It’s so much quieter outside, without so many noisy people and things.”
Qin Zhenzhen glanced at the construction site and said, "You're going to build four rooms."
"Yes, Xiaotian and I will each have a bedroom, one will be used as a living room, and the other will be used as a kitchen. We will also build a courtyard wall with adobe bricks."
"This plan is quite good. There's plenty of space, much better than just living in the educated youth settlement."
"Yes, actually I wanted to build it when I first came here last year, but it happened to be during the autumn harvest. After the harvest, winter came and the ground froze, so I couldn't do any masonry work, which is why it's been delayed until now."
"Now that the weather is warmer, and there's still a long way to go before next winter, we have plenty of time to build the house."
"Um."
Everyone on the construction site was busy working, and Qin Zhenzhen felt bad about being idle, so she asked, "Sister-in-law, what can I do to help you?"
Luo Jingyan spread out her two free hands, "You don't need to do anything. Can't you see I'm just sitting here doing nothing? You don't need to do anything either."
She pointed to a large rock next to her: "We'll sit over there in a bit, and watch them work while we talk."
Qin Zhenzhen smiled and said, "It must be because your cousin doesn't want you to do any work, he feels sorry for you being tired."
Upon hearing this, Xue Yanchen, who was digging the foundation nearby, looked up at them and curled his lips into a smile.
Qin Zhenzhen said, "Sister-in-law, look at how sweetly my cousin is smiling. He's usually a bit aloof and doesn't smile much. This is the first time I've ever seen him make such an expression."
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