Chapter 1
When Chen Lanjun woke up, the calendar on the wall was turned to 1979.
In the early morning of midsummer, the sunlight shines through the old-fashioned mosquito net and onto the light blue homespun bed sheet, creating a brilliant scene. In the back hills, an unknown bird is chirping, its sound so light and far away that it seems to be flying into the clouds.
It was like a dream. Before I closed my eyes, I was sleeping in a ward filled with the smell of disinfectant; when I opened my eyes again, I was in an old house in Taozhou Village surrounded by the faint smell of grass.
A voice called out from the kitchen: "Second sister, come out for dinner."
Pushing open the door, in the dusty dust that was illuminated by the sunlight, mother Zheng Mei was putting a pot of porridge on the table; father Chen Zhisheng was sitting on a bamboo chair mending shoes; little sister Chen Zhujun was bending over to take pickles from the jar. In the small main room, pots and pans collided, making tiny noises. It was an ordinary day.
She stood in the dark for a while, watching quietly, feeling a dreamlike melancholy.
"What are you standing there for?" Zheng Mei came over with a few bowls in her arms, looked at Chen Lanjun strangely, and said, "Go wash your face and rinse your mouth."
There was no ceramic basin, only a ditch behind the house, and Chen Lanjun squatted beside the ditch to rinse her mouth. Suddenly, her mother came over, closed the door of the back room, and handed out an enamel cup.
"Drink it quickly, and don't let my little sister see it." Zheng Mei said in a low voice.
In the countryside these days, eggs are a serious nutritional supplement. Take a raw egg, crack it into a bluish-white earthenware bowl, pour boiling water over it, add half a spoonful of sugar, stir vigorously, and you have a luxurious drink.
Unless you are sick during festivals, or you are a child or old, you will not be treated to boiled eggs. After all, in the countryside these days, eggs can be used as currency, and it is not uncommon to pay small sums with eggs.
Chen Lanjun obediently took the enamel cup, blew on it, and drank slowly, but her mind was thinking over and over again in her memory, recalling what day it was today and why there was even sugared eggs to drink.
Come to think of it, this was... the moment when she failed the college entrance examination.
In the hot summer, she ran back and forth from the countryside to the school in the city several times. All the admission letters of her classmates had been distributed, but there was not a single letter with her name on it.
Zheng Mei was anxious and angry, and blurted out "We spent money to support your studies, but what kind of books did you read?" Chen Lanjun was so angry that she refused to say a word to her on the way home.
Both mother and daughter have stubborn personalities. Chen Lanjun doesn't speak, and Zheng Mei doesn't speak either.
However, two days later, this morning, Zheng Mei specially made sweetened eggs for her.
She looked at the bowl of sweetened eggs and laughed. It was indeed her mother's habit to use "I've eaten" instead of apologizing.
The mother and daughter returned to the main room, and the four of them sat down at the four corners of the square table and ate breakfast together.
It's called breakfast, but it's more appropriate to call it "morning porridge", which is usually thin porridge with homemade pickled vegetables. The salty taste of the pickled vegetables is very strong, because this is the only way to make people finish a whole bowl of rice with a few pickled vegetables. Chen Lanjun picked up a pickled vegetable with chopsticks, tasted it, and frowned at the saltiness.
Chewing the pickles she hadn't tasted for a long time, she gradually figured out the current situation. For some reason, the past twenty years seemed like a dream, and she was still young when she woke up.
The meal was extremely quiet; even the usually lively younger sister Chen Zhujun didn't say a word.
After Ji Ran finished the meal and cleared the table, Zheng Mei cleared her throat and said, "Little sister, go play outside."
"Okay, good." Chen Zhujun ran into the bright sunlight outside the house as if she had heard of amnesty.
Only Zheng Mei, Chen Zhisheng and Chen Lanjun were left in the room.
Zheng Mei glanced at Chen Zhisheng.
Chen Zhisheng cleared his throat and said, "Well, second sister, how about we just not go to college?"
"I went to ask around these two days. Our village middle school needs a substitute teacher. The principal said that if you are willing to go, they will definitely welcome you."
Zheng Mei also agreed: "It's good. Being a teacher doesn't require working in the fields. It's not that tiring."
Chen Lanjun folded her arms and listened quietly.
She had walked the path her parents were talking about. After two years of teaching as a substitute teacher, she suddenly received a notice saying that the substitute teachers were to be dismissed for certain reasons. With just a piece of paper, the good job her parents thought was good was shattered.
After being muddle-headed at home for half a year, her family arranged a marriage for her. The family was a good one. The man was handsome, about the same age as her, and his family was well off. He had a city hukou, a bicycle, a watch, and a sewing machine. The man also promised that after the marriage, he would help the new bride find a job in the city. It seemed like a good marriage, but she didn't like it.
During that time, she always loved to go to the back hill. There was a big banyan tree there. No one knew when it had grown there. It was weathered by wind and rain, with deep roots and lush leaves, and it stood alone facing the sky.
She always liked to climb up a tree and look aimlessly into the distance, looking very far away.
In a place beyond her sight, there were some unknown things, as if they existed and not there, half real and half illusory, which made her heart restless.
When she heard that a new factory was built in Pengcheng in the south and was looking for workers, she immediately packed her bags and left her hometown. In 20 years, she started from a worker on the assembly line and became a factory manager. She made money, but she was also very tired. For a period of time, she only slept four or five hours a day. Later, she got sick, and even the doctor guessed that her illness was caused by overwork.
After decades of hard work, we are back to the time before liberation.
But it's not entirely without benefits. At least, some regrets seem to be able to be made up for.
After listening to her parents, Chen Lanjun raised her eyes and said, "I want to repeat a year."
"No, why are you so ignorant?" Zheng Mei's tone suddenly became higher. When she was anxious, her words were a little unpleasant to the ear.
"Amei!" Chen Zhisheng tried to hold her back.
"Don't pull my sleeve. She's grown up now. There are some things that we should clarify with her." Zheng Mei shook off Chen Zhisheng and told him about the family's account in a flurry of words:
"It's not that we don't want to support you for another year, it's just that the conditions don't allow it. Last year it rained and it was dry, the harvest was not good at all, we were lucky to earn enough work points! Your grandmother got sick again, she went to the city to see a doctor, got medicine, none of which was free, but in the end she still died. My little sister is only in junior high school, she also has to pay tuition, I can't let her stop studying before she finishes junior high school!"
"Before, you promised me that you would be admitted to the Normal University without any problem, and that you would not have to pay tuition fees and would even receive subsidies. I was very happy and thought that I could borrow some money and your father and I would grit our teeth and make ends meet. But what happened? What did you get in the exam?"
Zheng Mei became more and more anxious as she spoke, pointing at Chen Zhisheng and saying, "Do you think it's easy to find a substitute teacher position? Your father is naturally shy, and he wouldn't even ask for food even if he was starving to death. He ran around every day, saying nice things to people, smiling, and even wore out one of his shoes! Only then did we get this done. Little ancestor, we really owe you."
Chen Lanjun had never heard her parents tell her about these things. Although she was young at that time and gave up repeating her studies, she still felt a little resentful towards her parents. Later, as she grew older, she guessed that there must be some hidden story behind it, and she gradually let it go.
Now that she had heard her mother's words, she understood the whole story. She was just stunned. The speech she had prepared was stuck at this moment, and she was speechless.
Chen Zhisheng sighed heavily and turned away, not daring to look at Chen Lanjun. His voice trembled slightly as he spoke: "I'm sorry, second sister. It's Dad's fault. I'm sorry."
The room suddenly became quiet.
After a long while, Chen Lanjun stood up, walked around to her parents' side, held Zheng Mei with one hand and Chen Zhisheng with the other, and said, "No, Dad and Mom have never let me down. Look at my hands."
She was born in a poor countryside, but she had a pair of white and clean hands. Apart from the calluses from reading and writing, there were no other calluses, which was unusual for a country girl.
She only realized it later. After working as a substitute teacher for two years, she went to work. The young lady on the same production line saw her hands and exclaimed: "You really grew up in the countryside? But your hands don't look like it at all."
Chen Lanjun held her parents' hands tightly. Their hands were obviously much rougher than her own. Even the knuckles looked rough and big due to years of hard work.
But she thinks it is beautiful. These cocoons are their medals of honor as parents.
Chen Lanjun held her parents' hands tightly and said sincerely, "I know you have done your best for me."
"But--"
She raised her eyes and saw two paths on the left and right outside the house, as if she saw the life she had dreamed of and her new future.
"I still want to repeat a year." Chen Lanjun smiled gently, her pair of autumn eyes sparkling with brilliance, "Don't worry, I will solve the tuition and living expenses before school starts."
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