Chapter Eighteen
However, Lei Tingjun had just taken all the money from everyone and scraped together fifty yuan to give to Ji Wanmei to buy something.
Now all the brothers are penniless, where would they get any money?
When asked about paying, everyone looked at each other in silence.
Zhou Peng said, "Boss, we're all out of money right now."
Lei Tingjun scratched his head in exasperation, touching his thick, stiff short hair. His eyes were deep. He threw down his cigarette butt and stomped on it hard with the sole of his shoe. After a long while, he said, "Let's go find Lao Xiao first. He should still have some money."
Lao Xiao was the bookworm in Lei Tingjun's four-person dormitory.
Xiao doesn't usually get involved in eating, drinking, playing, fighting, or playing with birds. He's a quiet and well-behaved person. When he's not working, he just goes back to the dormitory to help everyone clean, fetch hot water, and read books.
Everyone in his dorm knew that he had been saving money to enroll in night school and prepare for the college entrance exam.
Right now, I guess only Lao Xiao can come up with a hundred or so yuan at once.
However, that money was, after all, what Lao Xiao used to pay for night school classes.
Everyone was a little hesitant; they had used Lao Xiao's money, and they didn't know when they could repay it.
At that time, everyone's monthly salary, including miscellaneous subsidies and overtime pay, was only about seventy or eighty yuan. The more diligent and hardworking ones could earn around a hundred yuan.
But apart from Lei Tingjun, all of these people have families, and the first thing they do after receiving their salary is to send money home.
Outsiders might think these hooligans are just idle loafers, but for the others, who are all young people from poor families earning a living through hard work, life isn't easy for anyone.
If you receive 80, you'll usually send 34 home and keep half for yourself.
After all, as long as the factory stays afloat and there are canteen subsidies, as long as it doesn't suffer too much of a blow, thirty or forty yuan is more than enough.
After all, prices were low in the 1980s, and the wages paid to low-level workers at the Dongfang Factory were already considered relatively high.
Of course, if you reach the level of Director Wang, you'd earn at least two or three hundred yuan.
Lei Tingjun said, "It's alright, let Lao Xiao take out some money to help the brothers out first. I'll work harder this month and pay him back next month when I get my salary. And add yours to the list too!"
Lei Tingjun is a straightforward and righteous man who treats his brothers like family.
It's precisely because of his personality that everyone is willing to follow him, calling him Boss Lei and taking his word for him.
If Lei Tingjun says he will repay, then he will definitely repay.
So everyone stopped talking and sent Sun Xiaojun, who was fast on his feet, back to the dormitory to find Lao Xiao.
But at this moment, Lei Tingjun, who was leaning against the wall and pillar silently smoking, had a deeper thought in his mind.
Working at the Dongfang factory was an easy life, filled with friends and acquaintances who could command a large following.
Just get through each day as it comes.
But he likes Ji Wanmei, wants to date her, and even wants to marry her in the future.
Although this matter is still far from being settled, Lei Tingjun, as a man, would naturally think in that direction.
He's already twenty-four this year. If he continues to drift along in the factory, earning only a hundred or eighty yuan a month, how will he support Ji Wanmei in the future?
Ji Wanmei is the apple of Director Ji's eye. Not only would his father not agree, but even Lei Tingjun himself would not agree to let Ji Wanmei suffer with him in the future.
If you love a woman, you should give her the best, let her enjoy happiness and live a good life with you.
Besides, Ji Wanmei was born into such a privileged family, so why should she lower herself to suffer with this poor boy, Lei Tingjun?
After the initial excitement subsided, Lei Tingjun couldn't help but start thinking about these practical issues.
She said she wanted him to get into university, but actually she also hoped that he could take his career to the next level.
In the Dongfang Factory, life was predictable and monotonous.
Take Director Wang, for example. He's in his early forties and has worked his way up to the position of director after more than a decade. But he only earns a salary of two or three hundred yuan a month, just enough to make ends meet.
To truly live the life of the wealthy, you're still a long way off.
A few years ago, before Lei Tingjun joined Dongfang Factory, he had worked in the coastal areas.
At that time, he met many people who traveled all over the country to do business.
They used cell phones, drove Santanas, and had stacks of cash in their wallets, buying whatever pretty clothes and jewelry they wanted for their women.
As a man, Lei Tingjun naturally wanted to give Ji Wanmei the same kind of life.
Even though he was only sixteen or seventeen years old at the time, he was still young, and he made some money by doing business with people in Guangzhou and Shenzhen.
However, his grandmother suddenly passed away, so he returned to his hometown from Guangzhou and Shenzhen to arrange her funeral.
Because of the indifference of Lei Tingjun's uncle's family, who completely neglected his grandmother, Lei Tingjun spent almost all of the several thousand yuan he had earned on his grandmother's funeral.
At the time, the villagers all privately praised Lei Tingjun, saying that he was a filial and sensible boy.
He lost his parents at a young age, which is really pitiful.
After losing his last remaining relative, Lei Tingjun was depressed for a while and stopped contacting his friends.
Later, Lei Tingjun joined the Dongfang Factory and lived a stable life for two or three years, thinking that he could continue to live like this.
But he happened to fall in love with Ji Wanmei.
At first, his liking for her was just a crush; he would silently glance at her a few more times when Ji Wanmei passed by.
He knew that Ji Wanmei would never be interested in a poor boy like him.
But now, Ji Wanmei is willing to give him a chance!
The opportunity she gave him was like a spell, awakening a sleeping lion and igniting his fighting spirit and desire to battle.
So, because of Ji Wanmei, he had the idea of going out to make money again.
But if he goes out to make his way in the world, will Ji Wanmei wait for him?
This has become another problem.
If he follows Ji Wanmei's request and seriously takes the college entrance exam, what will happen after he gets in?
If he goes back to university for another four years, he'll be at least twenty-eight or twenty-nine by then. Can Ji Wanmei afford to wait that long?
No one knew that the seemingly rough and unruly Lei Tingjun actually had so many thoughts in his mind.
Today's money issue suddenly made him realize that he could no longer just coast along in the factory.
Perhaps he should take some other action.
Lei Tingjun looked up with deep eyes, staring into the distance, and exhaled a white smoke ring.
A short while later, Sun Xiaojun returned with the money: "Boss, Lao Xiao gave me sixty yuan, is that enough?"
Lei Tingjun snapped out of his reverie and nodded: "That's about right. You two go buy the things, and when you go to apologize, be polite and don't provoke them. Just repeat what I said to Director Wang earlier."
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