“Lin Lijuan, stop jumping around! You’re splashing mud all over me!”
With someone constantly hopping around in the water beside her, stirring up the mud until the planting grids were impossible to see, it was easy to transplant the rice seedlings crookedly. If the brigade officials inspecting the work noticed, they would be criticized.
Lin Lijuan kept jumping around and had already trampled quite a few of the marked grids.
When the girl who had spoken straightened up, Bai Su finally saw her face. To her surprise, it was Zhao Qingrou, the young woman her nephew Lu Dajun was supposedly dating.
Fair skin could make up for a multitude of flaws!
Zhao Qingrou had a fair complexion, two braided pigtails, delicately arched eyebrows, almond-shaped eyes, a high nose bridge, and a pretty little rosebud mouth. Her figure was slender too.
No wonder Lu Dajun was so infatuated with her. This girl really was beautiful.
Even standing there separating bundles of rice seedlings, she looked like a figure in a painting. Her voice was soft and gentle as well.
But Lin Lijuan, who stood beside her, showed none of the humility one might expect from a newly arrived educated youth. While Bai Su was still observing Zhao Qingrou, Lin Lijuan had already started shouting at her.
“What’s it to you if I jump around? Can’t you see those bugs are biting me?”
“The brigade officials asked you to show us how to work, not to tell me whether I can jump around!”
“Zhao Qingrou, just because I’m a newly arrived educated youth, you think you can use your position to bully me?”
“Don’t think I don’t know what’s going on! You resent my aunt and cousin for stealing your father away, so you’re taking revenge on me! I’m going to report you to the brigade officials!”
Zhao Qingrou wasn’t particularly skilled at farmwork to begin with. Since she had stopped allowing Lu Dajun to help her, she had struggled to finish her assigned tasks. Being paired with a newly arrived educated youth only made matters worse, especially when that educated youth was a troublemaker like Lin Lijuan.
She had eaten only half a bowl of sweet potato porridge that morning, and now she was feeling dizzy and lightheaded. Zhao Qingrou simply didn’t have the strength to argue with her.
Worried that she wouldn’t finish the work assigned to her by the brigade, she decided to ignore Lin Lijuan’s unreasonable accusations. She moved farther away and continued transplanting rice seedlings.
“Why aren’t you answering me? Did I hit a nerve? Are you too embarrassed and angry to respond?”
“You unwanted jinx!”
When Zhao Qingrou ignored her, Lin Lijuan became even more aggressive. She hurried up behind Zhao Qingrou and gave her a hard shove just as she was straightening up.
Zhao Qingrou lost her balance and fell headfirst onto the paddy ridge.
Then she didn’t get up!
The educated youths working alongside her realized something was wrong. They hurriedly abandoned their work and rushed over to help her.
“Qingrou! Qingrou, what’s wrong?”
“Oh, stop pretending! She’s just playing dead.”
The two educated youths supporting Zhao Qingrou glared at Lin Lijuan.
But Lin Lijuan stubbornly refused to admit any wrongdoing. “I barely pushed her! She’s pretending to be hurt so she can blame me.”
Bai Su, who had just finished washing her feet in the irrigation ditch, originally had no intention of interfering in the educated youths’ quarrel.
After all, the person who had fainted was Zhao Qingrou, the young woman her nephew was supposedly dating.
However, she really couldn’t stand Lin Lijuan’s arrogance. The woman’s nasty remarks on the tractor yesterday had already been thoroughly unpleasant. Now she had pushed someone over and was accusing the victim of pretending to be unconscious to extort her.
“If she were pretending to faint, she could have fallen a little closer to the ridge. That way, half her trouser legs wouldn’t be soaking in muddy water.”
Glancing at Zhao Qingrou’s pale face and colorless lips as the others supported her, Bai Su offered a warning.
“She looks anemic. She’s probably exhausted, and the push caused her to faint. You should hurry and take her to the brigade’s medical station.”
Who was this busybody daring to interfere?
Lin Lijuan turned around, ready to lash out, but when she saw He Yan standing behind Bai Su, glaring at her with a vicious expression, she immediately fell silent.
It wasn’t as though Auntie Bai or Lihua had fainted. He Yan had no desire to get involved in someone else’s business.
But then he remembered the position at the brigade’s medical station.
This was an excellent opportunity.
A calculating gleam flashed through He Yan’s eyes as he stepped forward.
“Auntie, Educated Youth Zhao suddenly fainted. Will there be enough time to get her to the brigade’s medical station?”
Bai Su was momentarily stunned.
He Yan had feelings for Lihua, yet Lu Dajun’s desire to marry Zhao Qingrou had nearly resulted in Lihua being sold off to Liu Laizi.
Given He Yan’s tendency to hold grudges and repay every slight, he shouldn’t have wanted to help Zhao Qingrou!
What was this brat plotting now?
Bai Su knew that He Yan wouldn’t interfere without a reason. Some of the educated youths had already gone to call for help so they could carry Zhao Qingrou to the medical station, but Bai Su quickly crouched beside her.
“Let me examine her!”
Bai Su placed her fingers on Zhao Qingrou’s pulse. After confirming that she had indeed fainted from anemia, she asked the educated youths supporting her to help move her onto an open patch of ground beside the irrigation ditch.
She had them lay Zhao Qingrou flat, with her head lower than her feet, intending to support her breathing and circulation.
Once that was done, Bai Su began pressing on her chest.
When Zhao Qingrou slowly regained consciousness, Bai Su supported her head and massaged several acupoints on her head and the back of her neck.
As Bai Su continued, Zhao Qingrou felt her dizziness gradually disappear, and her body became much more comfortable. She looked at Bai Su with mixed emotions.
In truth, she and Lu Dajun had only recently begun getting to know each other. Their relationship was nowhere near the stage of discussing marriage.
Lu Dajun kept coming over to help her with her work, and no matter how often she tried to send him away, he refused to leave. As a result, the brigade members and the educated youths around them had assumed they were dating.
Zhao Qingrou thought Lu Dajun seemed honest and straightforward, and he was reasonably good-looking too. She had developed a favorable impression of him and intended to observe him for a while before deciding whether he was suitable as a romantic partner.
But then rumors suddenly began spreading throughout the brigade.
Only then did she discover that, before she had even agreed to a relationship, the Lu family was already preparing her bride price.
To raise the money for that bride price, Lu Dajun’s grandmother and mother had planned to sell his younger cousin, Lu Lihua, to that lecherous Liu Laizi as a wife.
Originally, Zhao Qingrou had intended to explain everything clearly to Lihua and Bai Su. But after being dragged into the scandal through no fault of her own, she had spent the past few days enduring the brigade members’ pointing fingers and the educated youths’ gossip behind her back.
She felt that her reputation had been ruined!
As a result, she had begun to resent Bai Su for making the matter known to everyone.
Yet after Lin Lijuan had caused trouble, pushed her, and made her faint, it was Bai Su who had revived her.
That was why Zhao Qingrou’s feelings were so complicated.
“Auntie…”
Zhao Qingrou was about to thank her when the brigade leader, having heard that she had fainted, arrived with Educated Youth Zhou, who was carrying a medical kit.
Seeing that Zhao Qingrou had already gotten up from the ground, the brigade leader looked surprised.
“Oh? She’s all right now?”
“She’s fine. Auntie Bai revived her.”
He Yan, who had remained silent until the brigade leader and Educated Youth Zhou arrived, finally spoke.
“Auntie checked Educated Youth Zhao’s pulse and said she had fainted because of anemia. Then she massaged her head and the back of her neck, and Educated Youth Zhao stopped feeling dizzy.”
“Educated Youth Zhou, why don’t you check her pulse and see whether Auntie’s diagnosis was correct?”
Educated Youth Zhou examined Zhao Qingrou’s pulse and quickly nodded.
“It really was a fainting episode caused by anemia. Auntie Bai’s diagnosis was correct. Educated Youth Zhao is quite severely anemic. She needs to eat more red dates, brown sugar, and pork liver to nourish her body.”
As he spoke, Educated Youth Zhou glanced at Bai Su with shining eyes.
He Yan immediately launched into an enthusiastic speech.
“My auntie is always willing to help others. It doesn’t matter who faints; she’ll step forward and save them. She truly has the compassion of a healer and the noblest character. She’s just like Old Mr. Bai back in the day.”
“My auntie doesn’t hold grudges. Some people really ought to keep their eyes open when choosing someone to date!”
“Oh, Auntie Bai really is such a wonderful person…”
Zhao Qingrou: “…”
Would you please just shut up!