"I'm already pregnant with your child, so why can't you marry me? Levirate marriage isn't unheard of in our village, and now you're going to meet someone else for an arranged match—what am I supposed to do? You heard that woman too. She said her only condition was to have me sent away. You know full well my stepmother runs my parents' household. If you send me back, do I even have a chance to survive?"
As Xiao Mandong and Xiao Manxue passed by the ward on the corner, they overheard a woman speaking with a choked voice from inside. The voice was familiar—it was Wang Xiumei.
"Didn't I try to fight for you? My parents flat-out refused. What was I supposed to do? And besides, aren't they thinking about the family's reputation? Our affair is already the talk of the village. If I marry you now, it'll confirm the whole 'older brother dies, younger brother takes his place' business. People will point fingers at us for sure, and the child will suffer for it too. I already told you—just go back for a while. After I marry that woman, or when you're about to give birth, I'll bring you back under the pretense of taking care of my nephew. Isn't that better? Why can't you understand my side of things?"
Lu Jianguo's tone was distinctly hostile. He'd never realized before how selfish Wang Xiumei could be. His parents had made it crystal clear—the whole point was to shut people up. They wanted him to marry a wife first, then, once she was in the family, find an excuse to bring Wang Xiumei back to have the baby. After she gave birth, the child would still be raised by them. What more could she possibly want?
"You think I can keep this baby if I go back to my parents' house? My stepmother will marry me off to someone else. You promised you'd take care of me for the rest of my life, but yesterday you actually hit me and nearly made me miscarry. Do you just not want this child? Were you trying to make me lose it on purpose?"
"Don't bring that up again. If you hadn't cursed at my mother, would I have laid a hand on you? And didn't I send you to the hospital the moment it happened? If I didn't want this child, why would I bother bringing you here?"
Xiao Mandong listened for a few more moments, found it uninteresting, and quickly walked away with her younger sister. So Lu Jianguo had actually gone to meet another woman. But knowing Wang Xiumei as well as she did, the woman would fight tooth and nail to marry Lu Jianguo. In her previous life, Wang Xiumei had kept stirring the pot endlessly—she only gave up later because, after the divorce, she realized neither of them had the means to raise the two children properly.
When they entered the internal medicine ward, the young nurse on duty greeted Xiao Mandong warmly. Word had spread that day about how skilled this new intern was—she'd pulled a soldier back from the brink of death.
When Xiao Mandong asked if there was an empty ward where she could rest for a while, the nurse didn't hesitate and arranged one for her right away.
Xiao Manxue was exhausted from the day and fell asleep as soon as she lay down on the bed. Xiao Mandong, meanwhile, slipped into her space for a soak in the bath before returning to sleep. Maybe it was the few drops of spirit spring water she'd added to the bath, but she found herself refreshed, with no trace of drowsiness at all.
Looking out at the pale light of early dawn, she thought of the ripe fruits and vegetables in her space, then of her family who had been sent down to the countryside. In about two months, it would start snowing. She needed to prepare cotton well in advance. She did have cotton ration tickets, sure, but the supply and marketing cooperative strictly rationed cotton by headcount—each person could only buy about a kilogram per year using their ration book and household registration. Exceeding that, no matter how much money or how many tickets you had, it was impossible. With so many people in her family, they'd need a lot of cotton. She'd have to make early preparations. This was just about the time the black market opened, so she figured she might as well take a trip to check it out.
Of course, going to the black market carried its own risks. She left a note for her sister, stepped out of the hospital, found a secluded spot, and entered her space. There she changed into a shabby outfit, wrapped her face with a kerchief so only her eyes showed, slung a bamboo basket on her back, and grabbed a flashlight. Following her memory from her previous life, she headed straight for the black market.
In her past life, after giving up her job and having no income, she'd struggled to feed her twins well. She used to come to the black market regularly to sell off her dowry items in exchange for fine grain and malted milk powder to nourish the children. She'd even been chased by the Red Guard patrols back then—even now, just thinking about it gave her the shivers.
The black market was hidden in a small grove of trees. If there was a raid, the woods made it easy to hide and escape.
In the distance, she could see scattered beams of flashlight light, which told her she'd arrived. She'd just transferred some apples and tomatoes from her space into her bamboo basket when a man stepped out from behind a nearby tree, chewing on a piece of straw, looking thoroughly casual and mischievous.
"Selling or buying?" The sudden voice startled Xiao Mandong.
"Selling. And buying too."
The man walked over, lifted the cloth covering the basket, and saw the fresh apples and tomatoes inside. He raised an eyebrow. "Plenty of good stuff here. How much are you asking?"
Fresh fruit was rare these days. Tomatoes could be found at the supply cooperative, but none with produce this good.
"Apples are six mao per jin. Tomatoes are three mao." Xiao Mandong had already settled on her prices on the way over. The cooperative sold tomatoes for one mao a jin, so hers were three mao. The cooperative's Red Banana apples went for three mao and four fen a jin, but hers were Red Fuji—a variety that didn't even exist in this era, so of course she wouldn't name it. Charging six mao was perfectly fair.
Fruit this good was practically a once-in-a-lifetime find. And more importantly, hers came from her space, so eating it was actually good for you.
The man heard the price and pursed his lips, as if to say there was no way she'd sell anything at those prices.
Xiao Mandong knew this fellow was one of the black market's fee collectors. The fee collectors were all trusted men of the black market boss, so it was wise to keep on good terms with them. Anyway, her space had plenty of produce, so a couple of pieces of fruit cost her nothing.
Before the man could say anything else, Xiao Mandong pulled out a tomato and an apple from the basket and handed them to him.
The man hadn't expected such a generous gesture, but he didn't hesitate to accept. He rubbed the apple against his shirt, took a big bite—it was sweet and crisp, bursting with juice, cool and refreshing as it went down. Absolutely delicious.
He pocketed the tomato, nodded at Xiao Mandong, and said, "Taste's good. Go on in. I'm Xia Mingyuan. From now on, you don't pay the entry fee here."
"Thanks, Brother Xia. Quick question—do they sell cotton inside?"
"How much do you need?"
Xiao Mandong thought for a moment. "Can you get me fifty jin?"
Xia Mingyuan pondered. "That much? It can be arranged, but it'll take a few days. Let me get you ten jin today. Come back next Wednesday and I'll have more for you. Do you want to pay with cash or ration tickets? If you're using tickets, fifteen jin worth of tickets for ten jin of cotton. If the tickets are close to expiring, I'll need twenty jin's worth. If it's cash, thirty yuan for ten jin of cotton. And mind you, that's the summer price—in winter, ten jin would cost you at least fifty or sixty."
