Chirp! Chirp-chirp!
Coo—coo—
Birdsong echoed through the valley. The rain had stopped.
“Get up! Why are you sleeping in the office? What is this, some kind of joke?”
The harsh voice jolted Tao Nanfeng awake.
It was Luo Xuan. As the one in charge of distributing food and money, he had always wielded his authority with an arrogant air. The educated youth were all a little afraid of him.
At the sound of his voice, the four girls started, scrambling up from their makeshift “beds.”
Thud! Thud! Someone was pushing against the door.
Screee—
The chairs they had used to barricade the door scraped harshly against the floor.
The girls had slept fully clothed. They jumped off the office desks and shoved their feet into their shoes.
Ye Qin, the youngest daughter of her family, had been pampered by her parents and older brother and sister-in-law.
She was a bit delicate, and she raised her voice in annoyance. “There are female comrades in here! Why are you pushing the door open so recklessly?”
The noise outside stopped abruptly.
Li Huilan had been caught in the rain the night before and hadn’t slept well.
Her nose was stuffed up as she folded her blanket, her voice sounding nasal and congested. “Yelling like a ghost, this early in the morning.”
A rhythmic knock sounded on the door, followed by a polite, gentle voice. “Are you all doing well, educated youth comrades?”
Xiao Aiyun hurriedly gathered the wet clothes she’d changed out of the night before. She looked at the others with a nervous tension. “It’s Farm Director Jiao.”
Jiao Liang, the director of Xiufeng Mountain Farm, was in his forties. He’d just returned the previous week from a political study session in the provincial capital organized by the Land Reclamation Bureau.
His amiable manner and constant smile had generally left a positive impression on the educated youth.
Li Huilan folded her blanket, checking to make sure no private items were left exposed. Only then did she walk to the door, drag away the chairs, and pull it open.
Jiao Liang stood with his hands clasped behind his back, his eyes sweeping across the office with a smile. The faint, sweet fragrance unique to young women wafted through the air, leaving him momentarily dazed.
A strange glint flashed in his eyes before he offered a warm greeting. “The storm came so suddenly last night. The farm headquarters was caught off guard. I’m sorry you all suffered so much, comrades.”
At the memory of pounding on Director Luo’s door for so long without answer, Li Huilan’s anger flared anew. She shot a sharp glare at Luo Xuan, who stood behind Jiao Liang.
“You’re right, Farm Director Jiao. We did suffer,” she snapped.
“We were wet, cold, and exhausted from the walk from the Zhiqing Settlement to the headquarters in that wind and rain. Director Luo, on the other hand, must have slept quite soundly—all that hammering on the door didn’t even wake him.”
Luo Xuan forced a nervous chuckle. “Ah, my age is catching up with me. I’ve been struggling with insomnia lately. I took two sleeping pills last night just to get some rest. They must have been extra strong—I didn’t hear a thing. My deepest apologies.”
Jiao Liang quickly stepped in to soothe the educated youth. “This was indeed Director Luo’s failing. I’ll be delivering a stern reprimand to him later.”
“Director! Director!” Huang Xingwu came rushing toward them, his movements frantic. He leaned in and whispered something into Jiao Liang’s ear.
Tao Nanfeng’s hearing was sharp; she caught every word.
“Director, the building at Educated Youth Post No. 6 is gone! The walls and roof were torn off, one of the main beams snapped, half the roof structure collapsed, and the bunk beds were crushed. Thank goodness I notified the youth to evacuate to the headquarters overnight—there were no casualties…”
Tao Nanfeng shot to her feet and moved to Li Huilan’s side. Her clear, bright eyes fixed on Huang Xingwu, her voice trembling. “What did you just say?”
What I saw in my dream… it actually happened!
Under the intense gaze of those pure, clear eyes, Huang Xingwu’s attempt to steal the credit from Xiang Bei died in his throat.
He swallowed hard, his voice now stammering. “S-say what?”
Tao Nanfeng pressed her lips together, fighting to master her fury. “The building collapsed?”
Her voice was low but carried a piercing clarity.
“What?” Li Huilan shrieked. “The building collapsed?”
Ye Qin and Xiao Aiyun shot to their feet, rushing to the doorway. They seized Tao Nanfeng’s arms from either side, their voices booming. “Our building is gone?”
The two women were known for their loud voices, and their outcry alerted the neighboring office. A dozen male educated youth spilled out into the hall. “What? The settlement collapsed?”
Huang Xingwu shifted nervously, his gaze fixed on Jiao Liang.
The farm director maintained his smile. “As long as we have the green mountains, we have firewood. The important thing is that everyone is safe. We can always rebuild a house.”
Li Huilan yanked Tao Nanfeng to her feet.
“You two stay here and guard our things,” she told Ye Qin and Xiao Aiyun.
“Tao Nanfeng and I are going to see for ourselves.”
Qiao Yadong began calling out names. “Wei Min, Chen Zhilu—you’re with me. The rest of you stay here. Make sure nothing gets lost.”
Huang Xingwu tried to block their path. “Hey! The site is a disaster. Stay here until the Infrastructure Department arrives. We’ll organize a group to go over later.”
Wei Min was a worker’s son from a large family. They had always lived frugally, mending every tear and stretching every resource. When the disaster struck last night, he’d grabbed only two clean changes of clothes and a few essentials.
The heavier items he’d brought from home—his cotton-padded jacket and quilt—were still inside.
The news that the building had collapsed filled him with desperation. He couldn’t stand there a moment longer. With a forceful shove, he pushed past Huang Xingwu.
“Get out of my way! You don’t get to tell me I can’t go to my own home!”
Qiao Yadong’s expression darkened as he turned to Jiao Liang.
“Director,” he said, his voice cold.
“The storm passed, and the farm headquarters’ office building is untouched, yet the thatched cottages at our settlement have completely collapsed. If we report this… at best, it’s a failure of safety awareness by the administration. At worst, it’s a case of substandard construction, proving a total disregard for the well-being of the educated youth from Jiangcheng. That’s a direct violation of the Central Government’s policy on the Down to the Countryside Movement!”
Huang Xingwu had never expected these seventeen- and eighteen-year-old high schoolers to be so fierce. Fine beads of sweat broke out on his forehead as he stammered.
“Don’t… don’t you dare take this to a political level!” Huang Xingwu stammered. “The Infrastructure Department worked tirelessly to build those houses so you could live and work here in peace. Even if there’s no credit to be taken, our hard work was real! This storm was unprecedented—what were we supposed to do about a natural disaster?”
Fury broke Qiao Yadong’s silence. He sneered. “A natural disaster? Then why did it spare you? Your cadres slept soundly through the night, while twenty of us were left homeless and forced to shelter in the office. The Chairman said we must go among the masses, learn from them, solve their problems, and liberate them from suffering. Is this how you party cadres serve the people?”
His words struck like hammer blows, drawing a roar of applause from the other educated youth.
“Yeah! If you won’t serve the people, go back home and sell sweet potatoes!”
“You eat well, sleep well, and live well, while we’re shoved into thatched shacks and fed from communal vats! This is bureaucratic arrogance—it must be denounced!”
“We volunteered to build this farm, not to be your beasts of burden!”
The air crackled with tension, thick with the smell of gunpowder. The young crowd was a powder keg, waiting for a single spark to ignite.
Seeing the situation spiraling out of control, Jiao Liang quickly stepped in with a placating smile.
“Everyone, please, just listen to me!” Jiao Liang interjected. “Our priority right now is to inspect the Zhiqing Settlement. We can discuss the next steps together after that. Rest assured, I personally guarantee we will compensate you for your losses. I will also hold the Infrastructure Department accountable for speeding up the repairs.”
Every eye in the room turned to Qiao Yadong.
His gaze was heavy and somber. “Farm Director Jiao,” he said, “we will see if you keep your word.”
With a sharp nod, he signaled Li Huilan and Tao Nanfeng to follow him. The five of them hurried toward the settlement, while the remaining fifteen educated youth guarded the office as if it were their last stronghold.
As they ran, Tao Nanfeng’s heart hammered against her ribs. If Xiang Bei hadn’t appeared right when he did yesterday, they would have stayed huddled in their thatched shacks, waiting and hoping.
Once the main beams had given way and the rest of the structure collapsed, the consequences would have been disastrous.
Not just the rain and the cold—what if a beam had fallen on someone’s head? What if it had crushed a leg?
Out of breath, Li Huilan wheezed as she struggled to keep up. “Hah… hah! I only grabbed one nylon bag… My sheets, my mattress, my books, my pen, my shoes, my washbasin… everything is still in the room. And my orchid! I don’t know what’s happened to it.”
Because her name contained the character lan, Li Huilan had always held a special fondness for orchids. She had once dug up a cluster of spring orchids from the mountainside, treasuring them as her most prized possession and keeping them in her room.
“Don’t worry,” Qiao Yadong consoled her. “Everything should be fine. Paper is the only thing you can’t save from water, but the rest can be dried out and reused. Let’s just get there and salvage whatever we can.”
When they arrived, they were met with a scene of total devastation.
Sodden thatch lay strewn everywhere—across the ground, in the gutters, scattered over the hillsides and tangled in the treetops. The eastern roof, which sheltered the girls’ dormitory, had completely caved in.
The sleeping platforms, where the girls usually slept, were now buried under a heap of splintered wood.
The muddy ground was a graveyard of debris: dried branches, cracked door panels, chipped washbasins, shards of glass, clothes, and shoes.
Clunk.
A flowerpot rolled to a stop at Li Huilan’s feet. The orchid that had been so vibrant yesterday was now reduced to a single, broken leaf.
Li Huilan sank slowly to her knees.
Her hands trembled as she scooped up the pot, tears streaming down her face. The girl who had always been so resilient, so determined never to give up, now wept silently, her heart shattered.
“Damned bastards!” Wei Min roared, kicking aside a broken door panel. “What kind of garbage construction is this? The whole place collapses with a single breeze!”
Qiao Yadong sighed. “Let’s gather our personal belongings first. We’ll go back and bring the other educated youth here so everyone can collect their own things.”
Tao Nanfeng felt a surge of relief. She had been glad she’d hauled her wicker trunk out the night before.
Inside, she had packed her two favorite books, her money, food coupons, dresses, and a cotton jacket. If she hadn’t been strong enough to carry the whole trunk to the farm headquarters, she would have lost everything.
Aside from the trunk, she still had a few essentials to retrieve. She searched the ruins for her towel, shoes, and a change of clothes, piling the scattered items into her red-and-white enamel washbasin.
The thatched huts of the Zhiqing Settlement were dilapidated, but they had been their only shelter. After more than a dozen days, they had grown accustomed to the place. Now, seeing it collapsed and strewn in ruins, a bitter ache settled in her chest.
Once the educated youth had finished sorting through the debris in the mud and returned to the farm headquarters, Luo Xuan stood before them to deliver the leadership’s address.
“It’s not just your settlement,” he announced. “The other five Zhiqing Settlements have also suffered varying degrees of damage. The farm headquarters has already met and decided to temporarily vacate two offices for you to rest in. You can move back once the Infrastructure Department has repaired the houses.”
He paused, his expression grim. “Landslides have blocked the mountain roads, so we can’t get cement or bricks up here. We’re also short-staffed. For now, we can only carry out basic repairs. We ask for your understanding.”
“The mountains are covered in thatch, and the trees can be felled at will. Every one of you will participate in the reconstruction, reporting to Chief Huang. In the meantime, you’ll be eating at the farm headquarters’ cafeteria. As for the cost…”
“We’ll settle it all together next month.”
The educated youth erupted in fury. Wei Min was the first to spring to his feet.
“You’re the ones who failed to repair the houses properly! Not only are we homeless, but our quilts, clothes, and luggage are all soaked through. And you have the nerve to charge us for food?”
he spat.
“Bah!”
The rest of the group joined the uproar.
Luo Xuan was taken aback; he had never encountered such fierce resistance from this batch of educated youth. He had always been a bully who cowered before strength, so he quickly conceded.
“Alright, alright! We’ll give you ten days. Free room and board for this period. Is that fair?”
Qiao Yadong stood. “Everyone’s bedding is soaked. What are we going to do about that?”
A throbbing headache pulsed behind Luo Xuan’s eyes. He just wanted these twenty youth to stop making trouble.
“Fine! Each of you will be issued a military blanket and a three-yuan material subsidy. Will that satisfy you?”
The crowd finally quieted.
After Luo Xuan departed, a flicker of excitement crossed everyone’s faces. In the face of disaster, they had found common cause, and for the first time, the educated youth felt the strength of their own unity.
“A blanket means we can finally sleep warm,” someone murmured. “That’s a start.”
“Three yuan isn’t much,” someone said, “but it’s something to help cover the losses.”
“We’ve been too passive,” another added. “From now on, we have to stand together—unite against them to fight for what we’re owed.”
Tao Nanfeng remained silent, her gaze fixed on the drab, gray concrete floor as she lost herself in thought.
Thatch from the mountains, trees cut at will…
Winter was coming. At an elevation of 1,500 meters, Xiufeng Mountain Farm would be freezing. If they were forced to rebuild those drafty, leaky thatched huts, how would they ever survive the winter?