They bought quite a few pastries and brought them back. Seeing that Cheng Ning and Zhou Xiaomei were there too, they took them out and invited everyone to share.
Everyone was cheerful, except Ma Tingting, whose expression was a little strange. She kept glancing at Zhou Xiaomei, wanting to speak but hesitating.
Zhou Xiaomei had already been paying attention to her. Seeing her like this, she naturally sensed something was wrong. She asked, “Comrade Ma, did you meet your classmate today? Did you find out anything?”
Ma Tingting bit her lip.
“Oh, come on, why are you being so coy?” Zhou Xiaomei slapped the table. “Just say it. It’s not such a big deal. I’m definitely not marrying him anyway—I just want to know what’s really going on.”
“Then… should we go outside to talk?” Ma Tingting suggested. After all, it was Zhou Xiaomei’s private matter, and the dorm was full of people.
“No need.” Zhou Xiaomei waved her hand, glanced at the others, and clicked her tongue. “Everyone’s here, so what? If I leave, won’t you end up telling them later anyway? I don’t believe you wouldn’t. Just say it now—it’ll save you the trouble.”
Everyone: “……” She really was straightforward!
So Ma Tingting repeated what her classmate Fang Qiaoru had told her.
When Zhou Xiaomei finished listening, she slammed her palm down on the kang table, fuming. “Few unmarried men with good conditions in the mountains? Even if I’m the secretary’s daughter, marrying an ordinary villager would mean the same backbreaking life in the fields? So my father used his friendship with Zhang Wenshun’s father to arrange the marriage? Ha! Who was it that shamelessly begged and pleaded, saying every sweet word until my family finally agreed? That balding, buck-toothed fake scholar—what’s so ‘good’ about his conditions?!”
Everyone was startled by her fury and her outburst.
Educated youths were usually calmer. Even when they quarreled, it was mostly just sharp words, like Cheng Ning and Jiang Shanshan’s spat earlier. No one had ever slammed tables and cursed like this.
Cheng Ning coughed lightly. “Calm down.”
Zhou Xiaomei snorted heavily. “If he had just told me straight—said he liked a female educated youth and wanted to break off the engagement—I might have kicked him, but I might also have let him go. But to deceive me? Then I’ll cut him down and see how he dares strut around again! Oh, didn’t he say he had to ‘take responsibility’ because he helped a girl change clothes, saw her naked, and had to marry her? Fine, then I’ll strip him and throw him into a crowd of old aunties—let’s see if they’ll take responsibility for him!”
Everyone: “??!!”
Was she serious?!
“Xiaomei…” Ma Tingting called hesitantly. “Don’t get too worked up. This might just be my classmate’s one-sided story—it’s not certain. Besides, with a man like that, we should be glad. Lucky that Li Hongman’s former boyfriend married someone else now. If this had come out after you were already married, and Zhang Wenshun was still entangled with her, wouldn’t that have been unbearable?”
Her words were mostly meant to comfort.
Normally, if they had married, Zhang Wenshun might still have had wandering thoughts, but probably not the courage to act. And even if he did, that female educated youth likely wouldn’t have entertained him.
Still, the thought of marrying such a man was disgusting enough.
Zhou Xiaomei thought about it and agreed. Indeed, it was fortunate this happened now. The idea of marrying someone like that was revolting. She fumed for a while longer, then gradually calmed down.
But Zhou Xiaomei was hot-tempered. With this matter weighing on her mind, she didn’t want to linger in Cheng Ning’s dorm chatting. She said goodbye to Ma Tingting and the others: “Alright, Comrade Ma, thank you for this. Later, I’ll have my second brother catch a rabbit from the back mountain and roast it to treat you all. It’s mealtime now, so I’ll head back first.” With that, she turned to leave.
Cheng Ning quickly grabbed her, handed her the two high school textbooks from the kang table, and said: “Don’t forget these. Read a little every day. If you want someone to supervise your progress, you can ask me.”
Zhou Xiaomei: “……”
Her temple twitched again. Yet the anger that had been clogging her chest seemed to ease a little. She looked at the textbooks, then at Cheng Ning, and finally gripped the books tightly. “Fine. I’ll read them!”
This time, she really left.
The others were a bit baffled.
Wang Xiaojuan asked Cheng Ning, “What books did you give her?”
“High school textbooks,” Cheng Ning explained seriously. “I told her that marrying a man is nothing compared to building a career, so I want her to read every day.”
“She said last time, half in anger, that since her father is the brigade secretary, once we open a primary school, she could just become a teacher. I told her our secretary is fair. If she thinks she can rely on being the secretary’s daughter to get the job, that won’t work. But she can take an exam. If she studies hard, and when the time comes, we hold a selection exam, as long as she scores better than the educated youths, then no one can object to her being a teacher.”
Everyone: “……”
Seeing their stunned and restrained expressions, Cheng Ning smiled. “Don’t underestimate Xiaomei. She has grit. If she really decides to study, when the time comes for a teacher selection exam, even those of us who graduated from high school might not beat her. So I think we should all read more when we have time. Otherwise, if none of us can outscore her, it’ll be embarrassing.”
Cautious by nature, Cheng Ning never told anyone about the future. She certainly didn’t mention that the college entrance exams would be restored in a few years. But living closely with them, she could feel their longing to return to the city, to escape the mountains. So she tried to push them to prepare in other ways for the future.
Of course, the others didn’t know her true intentions. For the moment, they were speechless. They felt Cheng Ning had a stubborn sort of charm—exasperating, yet enviable.
Wang Xiaojuan flopped down on the kang. “Don’t drag me into it. Xiaomei only graduated middle school, and so did I. If she beats me, that’s normal.” She had no desire to study at all.
Then she suddenly turned, her eyes sparkling. “Just now Xiaomei said she’d cut Zhang Wenshun to pieces. Judging by how she stormed off, she definitely won’t let it go. What do you think she’ll do? Hey, do you think she’ll really strip Zhang Wenshun’s clothes off and throw him into a crowd?”
Too fierce!
Min Ran muttered, “If that really happened… I’d kind of want to see it.”
Everyone immediately turned to stare at her. Feeling their gazes, Min Ran stammered, “Y-you don’t want to see? I mean, not Zhang Wenshun himself—I meant the scene… ah, this…”
The more she explained, the more awkward it became.
Cheng Ning burst out laughing. “Actually, I’d want to see it too.” She hadn’t been the type to enjoy crowds before, but after being trapped for decades, she now felt that liveliness was better.
As for Zhang Wenshun being stripped of his clothes—well, with so many people around, what did it matter if they saw?
Since Cheng Ning was so calm about it, Wang Xiaojuan chuckled, flopped back down on the kang, and said with a grin, “Of course I’d want to see.”
“Cough, cough,” Xu Dongmei cleared her throat. “Smashing a rat might break the jade vase. If this gets too big, it won’t look good for a girl. Don’t just treat it like entertainment. And look at how Zhang Wenshun dressed up his excuse so righteously—you can tell he’s scheming. If things blow up, who knows what tricks he’ll pull next?”
“True,” Ma Tingting sighed.
“But Xiaomei isn’t worried—so why are you?” Cheng Ning laughed. “Relax. Xiaomei isn’t alone. She has our brigade secretary and his whole family behind her. Do you really think she’ll suffer a loss? Just look at our secretary—would Zhang Wenshun dare to do anything outrageous?”
Otherwise, he wouldn’t have tried to sneak around, hoping Zhou Xiaomei would tell her family herself.
Everyone thought about it and agreed.
Then Cheng Ning added, “I think we should focus on reading more. Xiaomei too—let her vent her anger, then settle down to study. That would be best.”
Everyone: “……”
Please, none of us are interested.
Cheng Ning kept promoting the benefits of studying, but the others had left at three or four in the morning, spent the whole day wandering the commune, then endured hours of cold wind on the ox cart. At this point, they only wanted to relax, eat sweets, sleep on the warm kang, and rest. Tomorrow, they had to work at the lumberyard again.
Seeing everyone exhausted, Cheng Ning let it go. There was time ahead. But while the others were worn out, she had spent the day sketching at the kang and wasn’t tired at all. So she organized the materials on the table, picked up her finished product drafts, and went to find Han Dongyuan. She was probably even more anxious about the factory’s progress than he was. Only once the factory got on track could she carry out her next plans.
After telling her dormmates, she carried her things and knocked on Han Dongyuan’s door. His dorm was still lively. The table was piled with food.
Unlike the girls’ dorm, where the table was full of sugar cakes and sweet rice dumplings, theirs was mostly scallion pancakes, chili sauce, braised pork offal, and some sunflower seeds and peanuts.
Zhu Xiankai opened the door. Seeing it was Cheng Ning, he greeted her warmly: “Comrade Cheng, you came! We bought some food—come eat with us.”
But Cheng Ning had just eaten her fill in the dorm. She had no appetite, so she smiled, waved her hand, and said politely, “Maybe later. I came to see Brother Dongyuan about something important.”
Zhu Xiankai: “Oh.” He glanced back at Han Dongyuan. At that moment, Han Dongyuan was sitting by the kang table, slowly chewing on a scallion pancake. Even eating a simple pancake, he somehow carried a unique air of authority.
Zhu Xiankai’s eye twitched. He really couldn’t stand it!
“Brother Dongyuan,” he called, “Comrade Cheng is looking for you!”
Only then did Han Dongyuan set down the pancake. With that slightly smug face of his, he looked at Cheng Ning, his gaze sliding from her face to the bundle of papers in her arms. “Is there a problem?”
Cheng Ning pretended not to notice his irritating manner and tone. “No problem. You asked me to organize these product materials before—I’ve finished. I thought I’d bring them for you to look over. Do you want to check them now, or should we go to the main hall to discuss?”
“Let’s stay here,” said Sun Jian, a considerate comrade—perhaps because he already had a girlfriend. “The hall is cold. Comrade Cheng, you stay here with Brother Dongyuan. We’ll go to the hall.”
“No need,” Han Dongyuan stopped him. “It’s about the factory. You can stay and listen too.”
Then he turned to Liao Sheng. “Go call Xu Jianguo. We’ll have a meeting in a bit.”
Liao Sheng agreed and went out. Han Dongyuan then said to Cheng Ning, “Come sit.”
He stood up, gave up his seat, and gestured for her to sit on his kang.
Cheng Ning walked over but didn’t sit. Instead, she placed the materials and drafts on his table, pulled out her design draft, and handed it to him. Standing, she explained: “This is the list of feasible products, and this is the preliminary design draft of the most practical one. Please take a look. If you have suggestions, I’ll revise it. I want to finalize it within two days before the master arrives, so he can train everyone with a clear direction.”
Han Dongyuan, however, sat down on the opposite kang where Liao Sheng usually sat. He took the draft from her, gestured for her to sit, and began flipping through the pages. With a pen in hand, he annotated and corrected page by page.
Cheng Ning no longer stood. After greeting the others, she sat opposite him, waiting as he made notes. Watching him work, she couldn’t help recalling her past life—his later self. She had seen him most often in this state: working. But his current manner was very different from the future.
In later years, his seriousness and authority made everyone within several meters tense and cautious.
Now, he sat casually on the kang, one foot propped on a stool, face expressionless yet relaxed. He was earnest but a little lazy, youthful, spirited, and sharp-edged—the young Han Dongyuan.
Cheng Ning sighed inwardly, leaning on the kang table. She bent forward, pointing at the draft now and then to explain details.
The scene was unexpectedly harmonious.
Sun Jian was very perceptive. Though Han Dongyuan had said they could stay, he quietly signaled Zhu Xiankai and Yang Hongbing, and together they slipped out.
Cheng Ning heard the door close behind them. She looked up, noticing they had even shut the door.
Turning back, she glanced at Han Dongyuan. He gave her a quick look before lowering his eyes again, still expressionless. But perhaps it was her imagination—his ears seemed faintly red. Unfortunately, he was so tanned now that it wasn’t easy to tell. After more than half a year in the countryside, his skin had darkened like charcoal. Luckily, his features and bone structure were good—so even with such dark skin, he still carried a sharp, striking look.
“What’s this hook for?” Han Dongyuan tapped the sketchbook, perhaps to remind her to stop staring at him.
This girl—what was wrong with her? Ever since coming down to the countryside, she kept sneaking glances at him whenever he wasn’t paying attention. And always with that unsettling gaze. What medicine had she taken?
He thought back carefully. She hadn’t been like this before. At most, when he did something to annoy her, she would glare at him in secret, her face full of resentment and suppressed anger.
Cheng Ning snapped out of it, withdrew her gaze, and looked at the sketchbook. “Oh, that? Don’t you think the handle of a big ladle looks nicer if it’s shaped like a hook? And when it’s not in use, it can be hung up.”
“That increases the technical difficulty,” he said. “Divide the products into Phase One and Phase Two. In Phase One, simplify everything to reduce production difficulty. In Phase Two, once the skills are mature, then produce the more complex designs.”
Cheng Ning agreed and quickly jotted it down in her notebook.
The two of them talked for nearly half an hour. By the time they had finished discussing all the drafts and product lists, Liao Sheng and Xu Jianguo still hadn’t returned.
****
Meanwhile, Sun Jian dragged Zhu Xiankai away and signaled Yang Hongbing to follow. On his way out, Zhu Xiankai snatched up a basket of pastries and sunflower seeds from the table.
The group went to the main hall. There was no kang or stove there, and the cold seeped straight into their bones.
Zhu Xiankai stamped his feet and sighed. “Brother Dongyuan gets to warm up with his sweetheart, but why do we have to freeze out here?”
Poor them—up at three in the morning to go to the commune, blown by cold wind all day. Wasn’t it hard enough?
Yang Hongbing, a bit simple-minded, asked, “So is Comrade Cheng really Brother Dongyuan’s girlfriend?”
The others had long given up trying to figure out the truth, but he was still stuck on the question.
“Not yet—but sooner or later she will be,” Zhu Xiankai said, stamping his feet for warmth while stuffing a pastry into his mouth.
Catching sight of Yang Hongbing’s naïve expression, Zhu Xiankai suddenly grew mischievous and teased, “Why don’t you give it a try? Comrade Cheng is wonderful—looks like a fairy, has a good temper, and is capable too. Since Brother Yuan doesn’t admit she’s his girlfriend yet, you could chase her. Who knows, maybe heaven will rain red flowers and she’ll fall for you.”
Yang Hongbing shivered.
Sun Jian smacked Zhu Xiankai on the head. “Why don’t you try it yourself?” Then he turned to Yang Hongbing. “Don’t listen to him. He’s full of bad ideas.”
Yang Hongbing scratched his head and said honestly, “Actually, what he said is true. But relationships aren’t just about looks. Even if Comrade Cheng is great, she’s not my type. So, Brother Zhu, don’t say things like that again. Otherwise, if people misunderstand, it might affect me when I look for a girlfriend later.”
Zhu Xiankai and Sun Jian: “……”
****
At that moment, Cheng Ning was still in Han Dongyuan’s dorm, discussing factory matters. After finishing their discussion of the drafts and the list of producible items, Liao Sheng and Xu Jianguo still hadn’t returned.
Cheng Ning gathered up her papers and said, “I’ll go back and organize these, and try to get them to you within the next two days.”
“Alright,” Han Dongyuan replied. “Do it during the day. If the room is too dark, light a kerosene lamp. I’ll have Liao Sheng bring you a barrel later.”
Cheng Ning agreed. Kerosene was precious at this time—she had been borrowing from her dormmates, but long-term use wasn’t possible. This would count as an official expense. She stood up. “Then I’ll head back?”
“No rush,” Han Dongyuan said again. “Sit for now. Wait until Liao Sheng and Xu Jianguo return so we can hold a meeting. By the way, how’s your math?”
Math? She had just handed Zhou Xiaomei her high school math textbook.
“It’s… alright,” she said, a little guilty. She remembered being a good student, but after decades of death, most of it had been forgotten.
“Try helping the factory with a budget,” Han Dongyuan said. “Since you brought the money, calculate how much we’ll need to invest before we start earning. If you don’t understand something, ask me.”
“Divide it into sections: workers’ work points, raw material costs, tool purchases, and other expenses—like hiring a master craftsman, or travel costs to Beicheng. Give it a try. Oh, and list the tools we’ll need. You’ve been working at the lumberyard for days now, so you should have an idea. Don’t worry about prices—I’ve already contacted the furniture factory. They’ll send us a batch of depreciated tools.”
Before coming down to the countryside, Han Dongyuan had worked at a construction engineering group in Beicheng, coordinating with its furniture factory on installations. That’s how he knew Master Yao, the retired carpenter.
When Han Dongyuan left, Cheng Ning took over his job. The unit thought she couldn’t handle his previous work, but since the furniture factory had an opening, they placed her there.
So Cheng Ning actually knew the furniture factory even better.
This was why Han Dongyuan, though he could make money collecting mountain goods, ultimately decided to start a bamboo and wood products factory.
Collecting mountain goods meant buying from villagers, inspecting, selling through the commune, and constantly worrying about being reported. It was troublesome.
A factory, once running, could delegate tasks below, saving effort. His time would be freer. He said he would cover the initial investment. But really, the main expense was workers’ work points.
Compared to city wages—ten to twenty yuan a month for ordinary workers, dozens for skilled ones—the countryside was poor. Villagers and educated youths earned only one jin of coarse grain per full day’s work—cornmeal or sweet potatoes. A month’s full points meant thirty jin of coarse grain, worth just two or three yuan. Thirty workers cost less than sixty or seventy yuan a month. Even with some fine grain added, it wouldn’t reach a hundred.
Raw materials—wood from the mountains—were free. Tools required a one-time purchase, but he could buy discarded tools from the furniture factory at very low prices, and delivery wasn’t far. So even without Cheng Ning’s money from selling her job, surviving a few months wasn’t a big problem. And in fact, the first few months wouldn’t be entirely unprofitable.
In the past two months, he had villagers shave planks and make simple cutting boards and stools. The designs were plain, but the quality was good. Each sold to the furniture factory for two or three mao, sometimes seven or eight mao. One batch had already earned over a hundred yuan.
So, for Han Dongyuan, starting this factory wasn’t nearly as difficult as others imagined.