While Xiao Jiu was cleaning the side room, she caught a glimpse of Grandma Weng walking in from outside.
Grandpa Weng was tending to his small vegetable patch in the yard. It was dry and cold, and it had snowed a few days ago. He covered the soil with some rotten leaves to strengthen it, and he also went to the outhouse in the back to fetch some manure. He dug hole after hole in the vegetable patch, scooped the manure in, and then covered it with soil.
"Grandma Weng, where have you been?"
"Oh, I went to the hospital up ahead to bring some porridge to your Aunt Cao, and also to ask about her condition."
Thankfully, I brought her some changes of clothes and a lunchbox when I went yesterday.
She's much better now, but she still coughs badly, her voice sounds hoarse, and she has recurring fevers, but she can take care of herself.
I reckon she'll have to stay in the hospital for a few more days before she can come back. I heard that Xiao Wang (Wang Guozhong) even helped her ask for leave this morning.
What a kind old woman! "Do you need my help? Or should I bring her lunch this afternoon?"
"Never mind, your Aunt Cao doesn't want to trouble us. She always asks the nurses for help. Have you eaten?"
"No, my sister hasn't come back yet. Why don't you and Grandpa Weng come over and have something to eat?"
The old man waved his hand at her, "No need, no need, your grandma made some fermented noodle soup."
Tang Cuiju returned at 12:15. Walking to and from get off work like this is so comfortable.
Especially when she got home, she ate the meal her younger sister had made. Tang Cuiju had never eaten such fancy rice before.
"The green peas are soft and fluffy, the corn is chewy, and the rice and millet are soft and sticky. This rice is really fragrant. Paired with these flavorful meatballs and glass noodles, it's pure bliss. Girl, when are you leaving? I feel like I'm living the life of a god while you're here."
Xiao Jiu glared at her, "Old Four Elements, sis? You can't just talk about gods these days!"
Tang Cuiju looked bewildered: "What Four Olds? Can't a deity say that?"
Xiao Jiu was taken aback, then realized that it wouldn't start until 1966.
He immediately put another large meatball on Tang Cuiju's plate and changed the subject.
"Sis, is work tiring? Is anyone giving you a hard time?"
"It's not tiring at all. It's much easier than the farm work I do at home."
I also wrote a letter to our eldest sister, explaining my work in detail.
The article emphasized the difficulties of obtaining residency and the efforts Xiaojiu made behind the scenes.
Sending letters at the post office is much more convenient, if nothing else.
After dinner, I said, "You rest, I'll clean up. I'll also check the homework I did yesterday, and we'll review it later."
Nowadays, Tang Cuiju is strictly following the textbook's schedule and starting to learn from scratch.
Chinese vocabulary, arithmetic calculations, and multiplication tables are all things she practices every day.
They also read the texts and memorized the ancient poems, showing great enthusiasm.
Xiao Jiu was also very responsible, and even took out the exam papers that her older brothers had used and asked them questions.
"Sis, you already have some basic knowledge, so I think you should have no problem with the third-grade material."
You know all these new words and phrases, and you write them very neatly. However, you still need to practice these characters more, especially the strokes.
I wrote two more pieces of calligraphy for you; write two more tonight.
And these arithmetic skills, addition and subtraction within 100, and single-digit multiplication, need to be practiced for a few more days.
We'll start studying fourth and fifth grade material. When we go home, we'll ask the commune primary school how to get a primary school graduation certificate.
When it was time for work, Tang Cuiju left, and Xiao Jiu didn't stay at home either; she went out for a stroll with her schoolbag on her back.
She wandered around the entrance of the supply and marketing cooperative a couple of times and saw several middle-aged women acting suspiciously and walking in the same direction at the same time.
He immediately found a secluded spot, entered the space, changed into patched clothes, smeared soot from the bottom of a pot with his face covered in soot, making his true appearance unrecognizable, and followed with his head down.
She noticed they were very cautious, heads bowed, glancing back every now and then.
She looked young, so I didn't pay attention to her.
After confirming that no one was following them, they made their way through a maze of turns towards the remote shantytown.
Before long, we saw rows of dilapidated shantytowns.
The houses here are low and cramped, with many interconnected alleys, and many of them have collapsed and are uninhabited.
I never expected that a stall would be set up in such a place.
With the year-end approaching, there are still quite a few people here.
These collapsed houses were cleared into a path by these people, who set up stalls there.
It can leave in four directions: front, back, left, and right. If there is a problem, it can dart away to escape. It may seem unsafe, but in fact, it is very convenient to escape.
Because it was placed in an area with many poor people, these elderly women and men, perhaps bribed, were all very wary.
He seemed to be chatting casually at his doorstep, but his eyes were actually scanning her up and down.
If this were an adult, they would have already gone up and started talking to him.
When I went in, I was charged a one-cent entrance fee.
The reason the price is not high is because there is very little food available.
Most of them are reselling items they no longer need at home, such as enamel mugs, thermos flasks, damaged fabrics, damaged socks, secondhand shoes and bedding...
If you approach them and ask, their answers are always the same: "We don't want money, we don't want coupons, we just want grain."
Xiao Jiu finally squatted down in front of a young woman who wasn't much older than her and was also disguised, pointing to the cloth in her bundle.
How much is this fabric?
"Although this is a flawed piece of cloth, it is sturdy enough. Look, it only has a little bit of machine oil on it."
Here are ten feet of grain. If you want them all, could you give me some food? Any kind of food will do.”
A foot of cloth costs four mao at the supply and marketing cooperative, but for this kind of defective workwear cloth, the price is cut in half. Giving her two yuan for ten feet of cloth is already a high price.
What is the price of grain on the black market now? No matter how high the price you set, you can't provide enough grain to meet the demand.
Two yuan? That's not even enough to buy a pound of grain.
Xiao Jiu carefully took the cloth out to examine it and found that there was more than one piece of machine oil on it, and even some places had loose threads and traces of tangled cloth.
But looking at the girl, so thin and bony, with a sallow complexion and sunken eyes, she was truly pitiful.
Xiao Jiu lowered his head and pondered for a moment, then pointed out the flaw.
"Look at this cloth, there's more than one problem. I can only give you one pound of buckwheat, the raw grain!"
Raw grains are grains that still have their husks on and have not been processed or ground into flour.
The young woman was a little disappointed when she heard this, but she had been squatting there for half a day, and those who asked questions all left when they heard that they wanted food.
Only the little girl in front of him could tell him the weight of the grain she wanted. Although he was a little reluctant, he thought about his family's situation.
With gritted teeth, she said, "Fine, one jin it is."
The two found a corner and exchanged the items they were carrying.
The food she brought was wrapped in oil paper and placed in her schoolbag.
After inspecting the goods, the young woman looked at her gratefully and said, "Thank you. Can I have this bag back?"
Xiao Jiu didn't intend to keep the bundle outside the cloth; she simply returned it to her and stuffed the cloth into her schoolbag.
The young woman turned and left. Taking advantage of the fact that no one was paying attention, she moved the fabric to the warehouse and then wandered around for a while.
Finding that it didn't get what it wanted, the chicken immediately left.
Although the gray workwear fabric was unsightly, it was sturdy enough.
She simply wanted to install a curtain to divide the rental room in two, separating the bed from the living area.
She found a roll of thin wire in her spatial storage, intending to use it to make a curtain when she got back.
She had barely left the black market when she heard a sharp whistle coming from the alley.
Then I saw those people who had just set up their stalls grab their things with lightning speed.
They jumped over the low, dilapidated wall and scattered, spewing out nationalistic slang as they ran; it was obvious who they were cursing.
Xiao Jiu watched from the side, first shocked by their reaction speed, then subconsciously followed suit.
Although the contents of her bag had been moved, her appearance strongly suggested a connection to the black market, so she had to run.
Who would have thought that the next second, she would be dragged away by someone who would turn back and curse at her as they ran.
"Are you running so slowly because you're waiting for someone? Judging by your appearance, this is your first time here. You're lucky today. Follow me and don't wander off."
There are still many people blocking the street outside. These people are just bored and have nothing better to do. The people are starving, and they're still checking and checking every day.
"We can't catch them! You bastards, you sons of bitches!"
Hearing his cursing, Xiao Jiu's lips twitched slightly. Thinking about his appearance and what he had just said, she stopped struggling and let him drag her by the clothes on her arm.
After running for an unknown amount of time, just when she was about to run out of energy, he pulled her to hide in a collapsed house and found a corner to crouch down.
Not long after they squatted down, more and more plainclothes officers hurriedly ran out from outside the wall not far from them, panting as they ran.
"Stop right there! You can't run away. You better stop right now, cough cough, you hear me? You can't run away."
Xiao Jiu patted her wildly beating heart, swallowing hard in fear. Oh dear, curiosity really killed the cat.
I originally just wanted to see if there was anything good inside, but I ended up encountering such a huge scene.
Thinking of this, I couldn't help but tilt my head and glance at the boy who was also panting and occasionally looking up outside.
He didn't look much older than her, very thin, and dressed in patched clothes.
Her hair was so long it covered her eyes, and her face was covered in soot, making it look like she had been smeared with soot from the bottom of a pot, but her eyes were especially bright.
He carried a wicker basket on his back, was dressed rather thinly, and even his cotton shoes had two holes poked in them by his big toes.
As if sensing her gaze, he glared at her fiercely.
"What are you looking at?"
Xiao Jiu was startled by him, her lips trembled, and she looked somewhat aggrieved.
"When can we leave this place?"
"Wait, let's talk after dark. I saw you just traded cloth with someone, did you exchange it for grain? You have grain?"
"No, I gave her two yuan."
"Nonsense! She's been here for days, only exchanging grain. Do you think I'm blind or deaf? Would she exchange grain if there wasn't any?"
His voice was a bit loud, and Xiao Jiu couldn't help but mutter, "Why are you shouting so loudly? Aren't you afraid of attracting attention?"
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