Chapter 8 Chapter 8 Go to the Red Flag Brigade

Shi Xiangming took the initiative to escort Wang Nian back to the team, but he was called away by the factory broadcast before he even reached the gate.

Work is the most important thing, so Wang Nian was considerate and asked him to get back to work.

Our first meeting ended so hastily, and the next time we met was already hot summer.

Half a month later.

After finishing his instruction, Shi Xiangming hurried back to Factory 431. The first thing he did after putting down his luggage bag was to ride his bicycle to the Red Flag Brigade.

There was not much heavy work to do in the fields after transplanting the rice seedlings, so the team leader Hu Chunsheng called on each production team to take turns sending people to Sanhua Bridge to dig fish ponds.

Shi Xiangming arrived at an unfortunate time, as it was the turn of the entire Sansheng production team to go out.

As the "logistics captain" of the production team, Wang Nian is responsible for preparing three meals a day and delivering them to the fish pond while the team members are working hard.

When Shi Xiangming found Wang Nian with the help of villagers, she and Liu Chunhua were pushing a cart to deliver meals to everyone.

A straw hat covered most of his face, the sleeves of his shirt were rolled up to his arms, his trouser legs were rolled up high, and he was still shouting the slogan "one, two, three".

The wheels of the flatbed truck are made of wood, have no shock absorption and lack stability, making it more difficult to move in the mud.

The two skinny female comrades pushed extremely hard, and Shi Xiangming could even clearly see large beads of sweat rolling down Wang Nian's cheeks.

"Comrade Wang."

Shi Xiangming quickly caught up with him, rolling up his sleeves as he walked.

A clear voice was heard on a country road surrounded by the chirping of cicadas. For a moment, Wang Nian thought he was hallucinating.

I raised my head and looked through my sweaty eyes, and found that it was indeed... Shi Xiangming.

After parting in front of the 431 factory gate half a month ago, the two have had no contact since then.

It was inconvenient to contact him at this time. If Huang Qiuhong hadn't explained that Shi Xiangming was invited by the county machine tool factory to provide guidance, the Wang family would have thought that this blind date had failed.

"Why are you here?" Wang Nian was a little surprised.

"I just got back this morning." Shi Xiangming took the handlebars and lifted the front of the bike: "Go and take a rest over there."

Wang Nian stood aside, took off his straw hat and fanned himself.

As soon as he took off the straw hat, Shi Xiangming realized that Wang Nian had become so thin that his chin had become much sharper after not seeing him for only half a month. He couldn't help but linger on his gaze of distress for a few seconds.

This pause immediately made Liu Chunhua realize something was going on.

"What is your relationship?"

Liu Chunhua shook her hand off, put one hand on her waist and pointed at Wang Nian with the other, questioning him in a fierce manner.

"Hello, I am Comrade Wang Nian's partner, my last name is Shi."

Before Wang Nian could catch his breath, he heard Shi Xiangming take the initiative to introduce himself. The person acknowledged this identity openly and without any embarrassment.

"Partner! Wang Nian, when did you find a partner?" Liu Chunhua was shocked when she heard Wang Nian mention that she was going on a blind date. Later, when there was no news, she thought it was over.

When I thought about how I had been so careful these days and didn't dare to mention the word blind date, I got so angry.

"You're secretly dating someone!"

"How could I be so sneaky?" Wang Nian was helpless. He rushed over and covered Liu Chunhua's mouth with his hands. "Didn't I tell you that I went to Factory 431 to have a look?"

If this loud voice continues to roar a few more times, the news will be heard throughout the whole commune by the afternoon.

Wang Nian only thought of this, but he did not expect how big a sensation it would cause when Shi Xiangming showed up at the fish pond digging site in the name of a target.

The team members who were resting on the edge of the field were sitting in groups of two or three, and countless eyes were secretly looking at Shi Xiangming.

"That's really the second sister's match."

"He looks like a cultured person. Is he from the provincial capital or the county town?"

"I heard he was an engineer from Factory 431."

"Look at her age, she is much older than our second sister! She is still not a good match for our second sister."

“I’m an engineer!”

"So what if he's an engineer? My second sister wants to marry a cadre's son."

Listening to the team members' chattering, Shi Xiangming raised his hand and touched his face, then secretly looked at Wang Nian who was serving food to everyone.

Wang Nian is only twenty years old this year, while I am twenty-nine and the father of two children.

For the first time, he felt guilty about his age and even began to recall what he looked like in the mirror the last time.

Thinking of this, he couldn't help but secretly look at Wang Nian.

Why don't you dare to look at it openly?

A cloud of smoke floated from his side. Wang Heping put down his cigarette and coughed twice.

The elder was sitting next to him. Shi Xiangming didn't dare to move. He was as stiff as a stone statue.

"Why didn't you send a message to my second sister in the past half month? If it were someone else, he would have already found someone new."

"It's my fault." Shi Xiangming didn't explain, but quickly promised: "I will correct it in the future."

Wang Heping didn't really blame Shi Xiangming. The arrangements at the factory required him to leave immediately, so there was no time for him to say goodbye to his family.

Sometimes he would rush to the office overnight when he received a mission from the brigade, and he had no time to think about anything else.

Seeing that Shi Xiangming admitted his mistakes with a good attitude and came to the brigade specially to see Wang Nian, his expression instantly relaxed a lot.

"Last time, your aunt came home and told me about your two children..."

As soon as Wang Nian opened the bucket, the crowd quickly gathered around the cart, leaving only Wang Heping and his wife and Shi Xiangming in the resting space.

When Shi Xiangming heard Wang Heping mention the child, his heart skipped a beat. Before he could say anything, Wang Heping continued, "It won't work if the child is without a mother. Bring the child here before you get married."

That's how it is in the village. Once a relationship is confirmed, people start thinking about marriage.

Shi Xiangming felt relieved at once, and then a faint smile appeared on the corner of his mouth.

Seeing that everyone was too busy eating to care about this, Wu Ying moved forward a little and whispered, "I heard from Director Huang about the situation of the two children..."

Huang Qiuhong left Wu Ying alone on the day of the meeting for two reasons.

1: In fact, Shi Xiangming did not explicitly agree to meet her. If she doesn't show up later, she can only blame herself for doing something stupid, just like Wang Wenfang.

The second thing is to mention Shi Xiangming’s two children.

Most of the women in the factory who asked her to be their matchmaker wanted to leave their two children with their elderly parents, but Shi Xiangming would not agree to this point alone.

Huang Qiuhong meant that the two children must be brought to the factory, and she wanted Wu Ying to do some ideological work with Wang Nian in advance.

Wu Ying didn't think it was a big deal, after all, Wang Heping had raised his niece as his own daughter for more than ten years.

"We definitely have no objection to this." Wang Heping took another puff of his cigarette. Perhaps he felt that the promise he had just made was too rash, so he added, "Talk to Wang Nian and see what she thinks."

The old couple thought it was just a matter of two pairs of chopsticks, but it was Wang Nian who really had to live, so the two of them had to discuss it.

Wu Ying smiled and said, "After delivering the meal in the afternoon, Wang Nian will have nothing to do, so it's a good opportunity for you two to have a good chat."

Digging the fish pond was the men's job, while the women were responsible for piling the mud aside. Wang Nian and a few others in charge of logistics just had to wait and cook dinner.

After everyone finished their meal and collected their bowls, Wang Nian and Liu Chunhua pushed the cart back.

Shi Xiangming took the initiative to take over the steering wheel. The car, which was difficult to control, became particularly obedient in his hands, and he returned much faster.

"Take your time, I'll go to the cafeteria to save some food first."

Liu Chunhua didn't feel comfortable being sandwiched between the two of them and she ran away not far away.

Before leaving, he specifically reminded the two of them to walk slowly, and that the food would be kept warm no matter how long it took.

There were only two of them left, and the atmosphere was a little awkward for a while.

Wang Nian touched the tip of his nose, thinking that his age in both lives combined was almost fifty. After all, his age was there, so he should speak first to break the silence.

Little did I know that the other party had the same idea.

So they both spoke almost at the same time, smiled at each other, and both felt relieved.

"Did you arrive this morning?"

"I arrived at the factory at 8:30 in the morning."

The two sentences that sounded at the same time actually formed a complete question and answer.

Wang Nian then smiled and said, "You haven't had breakfast yet, have you?"

"I came here right after asking for leave from the office. I haven't eaten yet."

"Did you come here by bike or by taxi?"

"Riding a bicycle." When Shi Xiangming said this, he suddenly remembered the car parked at the gate of Wang's house and said hurriedly, "The car is parked at your gate."

I was in such a hurry to find someone that I forgot that the things I bought for Wang Nian were hanging in the car.

"Then park the cart outside the canteen and go home."

The public security in the Red Flag Brigade has always been good. Even though everyone is poor, there are very few cases of petty theft, so Wang Nian is not too worried.

The two of them left the cafeteria with their meals amid the crowd's jeers.

When I got home, I saw that my bicycle was still parked at the door, and the paper bags hanging on the handlebars were also there.

"Sister-in-law."

When I pushed the door open and entered the yard, I didn't expect that my sister-in-law Zhang Lan was also in the room, but she was asleep and didn't hear Shi Xiangming coming just now.

So there was another round of introductions.

Zhang Lan looked at Shi Xiangming with a smile, looking him up and down openly without any shyness at all.

Shi Xiangming did not feel uncomfortable at all when being looked at by Zhang Lan. Instead, he finally understood who Wang Nian's graceful and elegant manner resembled.

From Wu Ying to the daughter-in-law that the Wang family married, every female comrade in the family spoke and behaved very casually.

So from beginning to end, there was not a trace of shyness on Wang Nian's face, and even his smiling face was so frank and bright.

Finally, before the food got cold, the two entered Wang Nian's room.

In order to avoid gossip, the door must be left open, but with three walls around, Wang Nian actually felt a lot more relaxed.

"I'll get some water for you to wash your face."

Wang Nian put the aluminum lunch box on the table and went to the kitchen to get some water.

Shi Xiangming took the opportunity to blatantly observe Wang Nian's bedroom.

In the middle was a simple wooden bed, with the quilt not folded neatly, but rather seemed to be randomly folded and piled at the head of the bed.

The red lacquered double-door wardrobe looked quite old, and the two copper rings on the doors had long lost their luster.

In addition, the large desk next to the bed is particularly eye-catching. It looks like a wooden board placed on a bamboo frame.

Shi Xiangming tilted his head to look at the bookshelf by the wall. The three layers were filled with school textbooks, and there were also some homework books with names written on them mixed in.

There were two ungraded homework books spread out on the desk.

Those several lines of crooked characters were a person's name; the character "Liu" alone was written in several different shapes, large and small.

At the top of these fonts appeared three small, beautiful characters demonstrated with a pen.

Willow-Plum-Show

Although the characters are not big, you can tell that each one was written carefully, stroke by stroke.

The last stroke of the character "秀" is strong and vigorous, and the ending is clean and crisp.

The handwriting reflects the person...

Only these few words flashed through Shi Xiangming's mind.