Chapter 53, Tidying Up
When Lin Qingqing and Xie Wei went out, it was past lunchtime, but it was still early overall. Most people hadn't rested yet; some were sitting in the courtyard fanning themselves to cool off, others were standing by the roadside talking, and there were children running around playing and laughing. As they walked along, they were surrounded by the atmosphere of daily life.
Occasionally, enthusiastic people would greet them, guessing they were new residents since they didn't recognize them. At these times, Lin Qingqing would stop and chat with them, telling them she hadn't moved in yet and that her assigned apartment was in building eighteen.
By the time Lin Qingqing arrived at the courtyard of her new home, she had already met several neighbors.
The houses in the residential compound are arranged in rows of four, with wide roads between the left and right rows, wide enough for cars to drive in. Each row has a moon gate on both sides for entry. Cement is laid from the moon gate to the door of each house. Between the moon gate and the ditch of the house in front is land, where some people grow flowers and others cultivate it to grow vegetables.
In the courtyard of Building 18, three families grow vegetables and one family grows flowers. The vegetable growers include the families in the house allocated to Lin Qingqing and Xie Wei. It is just unknown whether these vegetables were grown by the previous residents or if the neighbors encroached on the land in front of their houses.
When Lin Qingqing and Xie Wei entered the courtyard, there were people sitting at the doorways of the two middle houses. The second house on the left was occupied by a mother and son. The mother, around thirty years old, was wearing a blue cotton jacket and fanning herself as she watched her son do his homework, occasionally scolding him. The child, around seven or eight years old, was wearing a faded undershirt, his forehead and face covered in sweat. It was unclear whether he had just come back from playing wildly or was troubled by his homework.
The woman in the third household looked to be in her mid-twenties and was feeding her child. As for the first household on the right, the door was tightly shut; it was unclear whether no one lived there or the person was out of work.
The first person to see Lin Qingqing and Xie Wei was the woman tending the second household. After banging on the table and asking, "You can't even do something this simple?" she vigorously fanned herself, afraid she'd faint from anger. While fanning herself, she looked up, paused for a moment when she saw the two enter, and asked, "Who are you?"
"We're moving in right away." Lin Qingqing waved the key in her hand and walked to the first door to unlock it.
Yu Xiuhong from the second household and Yang Li from the third household exchanged a glance, left the dining table, and came over to ask, "You haven't been here before, have you? Is this your first time?"
"Yes, the house just came down today," Lin Qingqing said with a slight smile, unlocking the door and pushing it open to go inside.
The house hadn't been lived in for a long time, and when the door was opened, a cloud of dust rushed out, causing Lin Qingqing to choke. She quickly covered her mouth and nose with one hand and waved the other in front of her as she backed away. Xie Wei, on the other hand, wasn't bothered by the dust.
They went straight into the house, opened all the doors and windows, and came out saying, "It's a bit smoky inside, let's go in later."
“This house hasn’t been lived in for a long time, so people are like this.” Yu Xiuhong smiled and invited Lin Qingqing and Xie Wei to sit at her doorstep. She then brought out two stools from inside the house, poured two glasses of cold water, and handed them to the two, asking, “Are you new to the army?”
"I came over a few days ago," Lin Qingqing said, taking the water glass and thanking them.
"So you've been staying in a guesthouse these past few days?" Yu Xiuhong asked, seeing Lin Qingqing nod, "Staying in a guesthouse is so inconvenient! Are you staying here tonight?"
Lin Qingqing pointed to the room and said, "There's nothing in the room. Even if I wanted to stay, I couldn't. We just wanted to come and take a look, air it out, and then come back tomorrow to clean it up and see if we can move in tomorrow night."
"That's true." Yu Xiuhong nodded, then noticed her son staring at Lin Qingqing instead of doing his homework. She slapped him on the head and said, "What are you looking at? Do your homework!"
Chen Jianbang could only cover his head and continue doing his homework.
Seeing that he had behaved himself, Yu Xiuhong smiled at Lin Qingqing and said, "That's just how this child is. When he goes out to play, he's so focused that he can't hear you when you call him. But when you ask him to do his homework, he'll look around at the slightest sound."
"They're just kids," Lin Qingqing said with a smile.
Xie Wei, a grown man, couldn't get a word in edgewise as they were talking, so he simply said, "I'll go inside and take a look." He got up, went inside, and turned on the lights to look through each room.
Despite her scolding, Yu Xiuhong still loved her son dearly, and was very happy to hear Lin Qingqing say that. Seeing Xie Wei enter the room, she lowered her voice and asked, "You didn't bring your child with you when you came to join the army? Let me tell you, it's better to keep the child with you. When I came to join the army, my mother-in-law asked me to leave my son at home and she would take care of him, but I didn't dare agree." She then pursed her lips.
Lin Qingqing was taken aback for a moment, then explained, "We just got married at the beginning of the month, and we don't have children yet."
"You two just got married?" Yu Xiuhong looked embarrassed, but also a little curious. "How old is your husband?"
"Twenty-eight."
Yu Xiuhong muttered, "So he got married quite late?"
Although Lin Qingqing thought that getting married at twenty-eight was early and far from being considered old and unmarried, people at that age tended to marry young, especially in rural areas, where it was common to get married before the age of twenty, and getting married after twenty-four or twenty-five was considered late.
So Lin Qingqing nodded and said, "He got married relatively late."
Xie Wei went in and didn't come out. Lin Qingqing thought the dust inside had probably settled, so she told Yu Xiuhong and followed him into the house.
The houses allocated by the military were not large. Upon entering, you would find yourself in the living room, with a sofa and a wooden coffee table placed by the window. Further in, a display cabinet extended from the left wall, separating the living room and dining room. Opposite the dining room were the kitchen, toilet, and bathroom. Beyond the kitchen was the second bedroom, which contained a bed and an old desk.
The master bedroom door faces the main entrance. The room is larger than the adjacent secondary bedroom and contains a bed and a large wooden wardrobe.
The bed is a spring mattress, 1.5 meters wide enough for two people, but the length makes Xie Wei feel a bit cramped. Besides the bed, there's a large wardrobe painted yellow. Because it's been used for a while, some parts of the paint are bubbling, and the bottom right corner of the wardrobe isn't joined very well.
Xie Wei was standing by the master bedroom window, looking at the open window, when Lin Qingqing walked over and asked, "What's wrong?"
"The windows need to be repaired."
Lin Qingqing leaned closer and saw that one side of the window that Xie Wei had opened was broken, so it wobbled when he opened it.
Aside from the windows, the master bedroom is fine, but the table in the second bedroom has a broken leg and is barely holding on. Two windows in the kitchen also have problems, and the bathroom has a problem with the drainpipe. Additionally, only the lights in the living room and master bedroom are working; the other lights either have broken filaments or no bulbs.
In short, the house is big, but there are quite a few small issues to deal with before moving in, so Lin Qingqing's list needs to be expanded.
...
After viewing the house the night before, Lin Qingqing and Xie Wei started getting busy after breakfast the next day.
Xie Wei borrowed tools from someone and exchanged tickets to buy nails and other items at the guesthouse, repairing and patching up what needed fixing in the room. Lin Qingqing borrowed brooms and dustpans from her neighbors and used old handkerchiefs as rags to wipe and sweep what needed wiping.
By the time the house was mostly tidied up, it was lunchtime.
When Yu Xiuhong, who lived next door, came back from getting her food from the cafeteria, she saw that their door was open and came over to ask, "Are you still busy?"
Lin Qingqing washed her hands and came out of the house, smiling as she greeted Yu Xiuhong, asking, "You just got back from get off work? You tidied up the house and were just about to go eat."
"Yes, we need to come back and cook for the kids." Yu Xiuhong looked at the clean and tidy house and asked, "Can you move in today?"
"Okay, I'll move things this afternoon," Lin Qingqing replied. When Xie Wei came out, he said, "Let's go eat first, and we'll talk again when we get back."
Yu Xiuhong smiled and agreed, then went back inside to put the food into bowls, waiting for her son to come home from school so they could eat together. While she was busy, Lin Qing...
Qing locked the door and walked out with Xie Wei.
The canteen was closer to the guesthouse than the building 18, only a two or three-minute walk away. Once inside, Lin Qingqing went straight to the window where the lady serving her noodles was and joined the queue. The line was a bit long, so they waited for a while. When it was their turn, Lin Qingqing handed her lunchbox in, first calling out "Sister Fu," and then ordering.
Sister Fu smiled when she saw Lin Qingqing, then looked at Xie Wei and said, "Is your husband off today?"
"Yes, our house is ready, and he's helping us tidy up at home today," Lin Qingqing said with a smile.
"Oh, that's wonderful news! Which building are you staying in?" After a few days, Sister Fu and Lin Qingqing had become quite familiar with each other. She was very happy for her when she heard that the house was ready, and praised Xie Wei, "Your husband is quite diligent."
Xie Wei still remembers the first time Sister Fu looked at him with disdain for his appearance. He was taken aback by the sudden compliment and was about to speak when Lin Qingqing said, "Moving is a big job, I can't do it by myself."
"That's true," Sister Fu nodded and said.
Lin Qingqing glanced at Xie Wei and then said with a smile, "But at home he's just like Qin Kai. I never have to urge him to sweep the floor, wash the dishes, or do the laundry."
Sister Fu's gaze softened considerably as she looked at Xie Wei, saying, "He should be allowed to do it. If we keep spoiling him, he'll become a big shot." She was also a military spouse, and many of the men in her neighborhood could fire guns and cannons outside the camp and sweep the floor and do laundry when they came home, but they were completely different once they got home. They wanted their wives to serve them food.
Sister Fu couldn't stand men like that. Compared to them, Xie Wei was much more pleasing to the eye. This was mainly because after a few days, she was completely convinced that Lin Qingqing had a small appetite, not that the man was stingy and didn't feed her!
As they were talking, Sister Fu finished serving the food. There were still people queuing behind her, so Lin Qingqing didn't linger at the window. She smiled and told them she'd see them that evening, then she and Xie Wei took their lunchboxes and found a place to sit down and eat.
During the meal, Xie Wei said, "You and the lady at the window get along quite well."
"She said I looked only a few years older than her daughter, and she took special care of me," Lin Qingqing said while eating.
"Sister Fu?"
Lin Qingqing nodded and said, "Her name is Fu Aidang, but she said it was a name she changed later. Her original name was Fu Zhaodi. She also came with the army. I heard that her husband is Commander Luo of the 27th Regiment. Do you know him?"
"I know him, but we're not very close."
Commander Luo of the 27th Regiment, Xie Wei, certainly knew him and had heard of Fu Aidang's reputation, but not in a good way. Commander Luo was known throughout the military district as a henpecked husband, and people often joked that he had a tigress at home.
It seems they're not to be trifled with.
It's hard to recognize, but it's genuinely straightforward.
But... Xie Wei looked suspicious: "She said you don't look much older than her daughter?"
"Yes, what's wrong?" Lin Qingqing asked, puzzled.
"...Her daughter is twelve."
Lin Qingqing was stunned. Although she also thought that Sister Fu was not old, people get married young these days, so she always thought that Sister Fu's daughter was sixteen or seventeen. She didn't realize she was so young. But she quickly laughed and said, "This just means I look young."
While that's true, Lin Qingqing, no matter how young she looks, is only in her early twenties but looks like she's eighteen or nineteen. She shouldn't be that young. But perhaps it was just something Sister Fu said casually because she felt a connection with Lin Qingqing. Xie Wei didn't insist on arguing with Lin Qingqing about how young she looked, and simply said, "It's good for you to get to know more people."
It's said that a close neighbor is better than a distant relative. They live hundreds of kilometers away from home, and they need their neighbors to lend a hand when something happens. Besides, he's in the army for long periods and can't come back every day. Lin Qingqing gets bored at home alone, so knowing more neighbors will at least give her someone to talk to.
Lin Qingqing knew what he was worried about as soon as she heard it, and said with a smile, "I've gotten to know a lot of neighbors these past few days." She even counted them on her fingers.
The two ate and talked, and soon finished eating. Before leaving, Lin Qingqing went to the window to say goodbye to Sister Fu and let her know that they were going back.
Sister Fu had already eaten lunch, but she was still sticking to her post. When she saw me coming over, she greeted me with a smile and went back to serving food.
...
When they returned, Yu Xiuhong and her son had already finished eating. Chen Jianbang is in the third grade of elementary school this year, and he has to go back to school after dinner. Yu Xiuhong was talking to him, telling him to come back early in the evening and not to play wildly with the other children.
Chen Jianbang answered absentmindedly, eager to leave as soon as possible. His afternoon nap started at one o'clock, and if he went out now, he could still play with his friends for a while. After nodding about ten times, Yu Xiuhong finally finished speaking and let him leave. Chen Jianbang took off running out, bumping into Lin Qingqing's arm as she came in through the moon gate.
Although Xie Wei pulled fast from behind, Lin Qingqing was still knocked to the side by the impact.
Chen Jianbang looked up, then ran off without saying a word.
Yu Xiuhong saw this from behind and was so angry that she scolded him for being blind. She then came over and asked, "Are you alright? Does it hurt?"
Lin Qingqing's arm hurt a little when she was hit, but the pain was superficial and went away quickly. She replied to Yu Xiuhong, "It's okay, I'm not in pain." But her gaze was fixed on Xie Wei.
His eyes were deep and unfathomable, his lips tightly pressed together. Silently, he grasped her elbow with his right hand, intertwined his fingers with hers with his left, and turned her around twice.
She circled around halfway, and only after that did she finally hum in response, without showing any sign of pain on her face.
Yu Xiuhong patted her chest and said, "It's good that you're alright. That brat doesn't even watch where he's walking. I'll definitely give him a piece of my mind when he gets back!"
"It's time to talk about it," Xie Wei said calmly.
Yu Xiuhong's expression stiffened. Although her words were polite, they were just for show. In her heart, she didn't think there was anything wrong with her son bumping into Lin Qingqing. She said those things to avoid hurting feelings, thinking that since she had said so, Lin Qingqing couldn't possibly hold a grudge against a child, could she?
As a result, the woman didn't mind, but the man did.
Not wanting to say anything in front of the couple, he gave a vague reply. But when he got to work in the afternoon, he couldn't help but mutter to his colleagues, "I really don't understand how a grown man can be so petty. He just bumped into his wife, and she's perfectly fine, yet he still has to hold a grudge against a child."
Yu Xiuhong works at the vegetable market in the family compound, and her colleagues are all military family members. Some people who heard her say that Xie Wei was being petty, but others said, "Maybe he just cares about his wife."
But as soon as these words were spoken, someone else chimed in: "Even if you love your wife dearly, you shouldn't act like this. It's normal to stumble and bump into things while walking. It's just a minor bump, does she expect the child to apologize?"
"Apologizing isn't a big deal," muttered the person speaking up for Xie Wei. "Shouldn't you apologize if you hit someone?"
But no one paid attention to her when she spoke; they only sympathized with Yu Xiuhong: "With someone like that as a neighbor, your courtyard is probably going to be anything but peaceful from now on, right?"
"Who says otherwise?" Yu Xiuhong was also annoyed. There was already one arrogant person in the yard, and now there was another petty person. Life was just unbearable.
After Yu Xiuhong went to work, Lin Qingqing also mentioned this to Xie Wei: "I noticed she seemed a little unhappy just now."
“That’s her problem.” Xie Wei took the mattress he had brought out of the woven bag, spread it on the bed, and glanced at Lin Qingqing. “Do you think I’m wrong?”
Lin Qingqing quickly shook her head: "No."
From Chen Jianbang's perspective, if he hit someone and ran away without anyone taking responsibility, he might not take it seriously and continue to act recklessly next time and the time after that, without ever apologizing. Children need to be taught; good habits come from the little things in life. Indulging him is not the best approach.
From her own perspective, she was indeed bumped into by Chen Jianbang, so asking him to apologize wasn't unreasonable. Moreover, they didn't force the child to apologize; they only made a comment when Yu Xiuhong mentioned it.
"I just feel that we didn't think things through enough before choosing the house." Lin Qingqing hugged from behind.
Zhu Xiewei said.
Yu Xiuhong thought Xie Wei was petty, and Lin Qingqing also thought she was a bit narrow-minded. She spoke beautifully, but who knew what she really thought? They also thought that someone had planted vegetables in their yard, and the house had been uninhabited for a long time... They wondered if the neighbors would get along well in the future.
Xie Wei understood Lin Qingqing's words and felt a little regretful. He should have asked around and found out who the neighbors were before deciding on a house. He asked, "Do you want to change houses?"
"Let's forget it." Lin Qingqing shook her head. The house was already booked and everything was settled. She wasn't willing to switch now. She smiled and said, "Anyway, she doesn't bother me, and I won't bother her. If she causes trouble, I definitely won't let her bully me."
...
After packing their things, Lin Qingqing and Xie Wei went to the supply and marketing cooperative to buy all the items they could.
There were too many items, and they were all small and scattered, so the two of them couldn't carry them all at once. They made two trips to the supply and marketing cooperative, and soon even the sales clerks there knew them.
After buying the items, it took two hours to organize them, and by the time everything was finished, it was already evening.
Lin Qingqing took stock of the house again and found that the main items missing were kitchen supplies. Oil, salt, soy sauce, and vinegar were fine; Xie Wei had some ration coupons, and she received a fixed ration after her household registration was transferred.
But pots are difficult to obtain; they are made of iron and require ration coupons to buy, and these coupons are not easy to come by.
Another option was a gas stove or furnace. The gas stoves common at this time were quite different from those of later generations; they were called cast iron stoves, much more basic than gas stoves and harder to light. However, they were still better than furnaces. Furnaces were difficult to light, but they went out quickly. Adding honeycomb briquettes was fine when you were home and not at work, but it took a lot of time to light a furnace when you came home from work. However, gas was more expensive than honeycomb briquettes, so furnaces were still more common in residential compounds.
However, cast iron stoves require tickets, which are difficult to obtain, while coal stoves do not require tickets and can be purchased with a coal ration certificate. But the coal ration certificate can only be obtained after Lin Qingqing's household registration is transferred, and the police officer at the local police station's household registration office told her to come back in ten days to pick up the results.
Another thing is a kettle; we should try to buy one.
They could still eat at the canteen without an iron pot, which was economical and they had enough food coupons. They could also get food ration books once their household registration was completed. But they didn't have a kettle, so even if they bought a stove, they couldn't boil water. They could barely tolerate taking a cold shower now that the weather was hot, but they wouldn't be able to do it when the weather turned cold.
Even now, Xie Wei didn't want Lin Qingqing to take a cold shower. It didn't matter to him, he was a man, but she was, after all, a girl.
Home. And since Lin Qingqing spends most of her time at home before going to work, she can't even get a sip of cold boiled water all day long…
Thinking of this, Xie Wei felt extremely regretful. He thought he had made all the necessary preparations, so he had Lin Qingqing come to the military base after the wedding. But after the house was allocated and she moved in, he realized that his preparations were far from sufficient, to the point that she couldn't even take a hot shower.
Xie Wei could no longer sit still and said to Lin Qingqing, "Wait for me at home for a while, I'm going out for a bit."
"Going out now? Where are you going?"
Xie Wei didn't say where he was going, but just hummed in agreement and said, "I'll be back soon." He then hurried out.
Lin Qingqing was puzzled by him, but thinking that he would be back soon anyway, and seeing that it was still early, she didn't rush to the cafeteria to finish her meal, so she sat on the sofa and waited.
Xie Wei regretted not being thorough enough, but Lin Qingqing was quite satisfied with the new home. After all, it was her own home, and everything about it looked good.
As for the hot water issue, she had already figured out what to do. The cafeteria usually boils some hot water when cooking, so she would ask Sister Fu to help her inquire whether she could get hot water from the cafeteria.
As for other things, Lin Qingqing felt that they could be taken slowly, since there was still a long way to go!
As Lin Qingqing was thinking, she heard a noise outside. She got up and went out to see Xie Wei pulling a small cart into the yard. On the cart were a kettle, a small coal stove, and some honeycomb briquettes.
"Where did this come from?" Lin Qingqing asked in surprise.
"I borrowed it from a comrade," Xie Wei said casually.
"Don't they need it?"
Xie Wei explained, "This kettle was borrowed from Grandpa Sun's wife. They recently bought a new kettle, so this is the old one. The coal stove was also borrowed; they have a gas stove, so they don't use the coal stove much. We also borrowed the honeycomb briquettes from him. Once you get your coal ration book, we'll buy these and return them to them."
"What about the kettle?"
"Old Sun's wife said there's no rush. I'll go back to the camp tomorrow and ask if I can exchange it for a ticket for a kettle."
Xie Wei had already thought it through, so Lin Qingqing didn't ask any more questions. She didn't mention her original plan either. Since she had already borrowed the stove and kettle, there was no need to trouble Sister Fu any further.
She and Xie Wei moved their things into the kitchen together, and then waited for Xie Wei to return the trailer before going to the cafeteria for lunch with him.
During the meal, Xie Wei said, "Let's have dinner at his house tomorrow after we get married."
His name was Fengzi, and he had a life-or-death friendship with Xie Wei. Lin Qingqing had heard Xie Wei mention this person when she was at home, otherwise she wouldn't have been able to ask someone to borrow both a stove and honeycomb briquettes.
Lin Qingqing thought for a moment and asked, "When?"
"Tomorrow at noon," Xie Wei suddenly said.
Lin Qingqing said okay, and then asked what he liked. Xie Wei thought for a moment and shook his head: "I don't have any particular hobbies, but his son is six years old this year."
Lin Qingqing thought they still had pastry tickets, so she nodded and said, "I understand."
Author's Note: First update
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