“Xiao Tian, why are you so late getting to work today? Did something happen at home?”
The moment she walked into the supply and marketing cooperative, Tian Tian was greeted by the voice of Sister Qian from behind the counter. Tian Tian smiled and said, “It’s nothing. The bus was just crowded today, so it ran a bit slow.”
“Sister Qian, you’re asking the wrong way—how could she admit to that? Late is late. No need to make excuses. If it weren’t for A-Fen helping out, the goods wouldn’t even be sorted yet.”
This came from another middle-aged woman at the counter, Sister Liu. Ever since Tian Tian started working at the cooperative, this woman had been targeting her. The reason was simple: Tian Tian had gotten in the way of her daughter’s path.
Last year, a position opened up in the cooperative’s finance department. Sister Liu had been pulling strings left and right to get her daughter hired. But management assigned Tian Tian there instead, completely derailing Sister Liu’s plans.
In her previous life, Tian Tian had been too eager to get ahead. So when Sister Liu targeted her, she always put on a show of being a team player and prioritizing the greater good.
She endured it for three years.
It wasn’t until she realized that the path to advancement had long been blocked that she finally woke up. On the day she took unpaid leave, she had gotten back at Sister Liu in a satisfying way.
Now that she’d been reborn, Tian Tian didn’t want to play the doormat anymore. All that talk about advancement, raises, promotions, becoming a senior cadre—it was all a lie.
“Ha, Sister Liu. Since when is an accountant responsible for sorting goods? Isn’t sorting goods the job of the salesclerks? If you don’t want to sort goods, if you don’t want to do this job, then pack up and leave. I’m sure no one at the cooperative would mind.”
With that, Tian Tian smiled and looked at Xu Lifen, who had been tugging at her sleeve.
“Right, A-Fen?”
Hearing this, Xu Lifen’s lips twitched. She whispered, “Tian Tian, we’re all coworkers. Let’s not be so picky.”
Tian Tian raised an eyebrow. “A-Fen, are you saying I’m petty?”
Xu Lifen’s face turned pale. She waved her hands frantically, looking utterly pitiful.
Ha.
In her previous life, Tian Tian had been fooled by this act. She thought Xu Lifen was a pitiful person, and since they had started at the cooperative around the same time, she felt a sense of camaraderie. Every time Xu Lifen—who worked in inventory—got overwhelmed, Tian Tian went over to help. Although part of her motivation was to show her dedication and pursue advancement, most of it was genuinely wanting to help.
But in the end, the person who blocked her path to advancement was none other than this pitiful-looking Xu Lifen.
In this life, if she didn’t tear off Xu Lifen’s mask, her surname wouldn’t be Tian!
Sister Liu had no idea what was going through Tian Tian’s mind. As soon as she heard Tian Tian telling her to pack up and leave, she threw down the rag she was holding, slapped her hand on the glass counter, pointed at Tian Tian, and started yelling:
“See? I told you you weren’t an honest person. So you’ve been eyeing my position all along? ‘Sorting goods isn’t your job,’ you say? The director told you young people to learn from us veterans—to learn what it means to work hard and work together as colleagues. And this is how you work together? Are you going against the director’s orders?”
This only made Tian Tian laugh—and curse her previous self for being such an idiot.
Salesclerks were supposed to organize the shelves before work. That had nothing to do with her as an accountant. But in her previous life, eager to advance and with no other connections, she had resorted to doing physical labor to prove herself. Plus, the director had repeatedly stressed at meetings that all cooperative employees needed to be united and help each other.
So every morning, organizing the shelves for the salesclerks had become one of Tian Tian’s tasks.
She wasn’t the only one. Several new employees at the cooperative helped out too. As for the veteran salesclerks—who had been there ten or twenty years and had turned into slippery old hands—they were happy to let the young people do the work.
Thinking about it now, it was just stupid. Wasn’t this textbook workplace bullying?
“Going against the director’s orders? That’s hilarious. The director said we should help each other. He didn’t say we should do the salesclerks’ jobs for them. And which work regulation says an accountant has to do a salesclerk’s work?”
“If you’ve got the guts, go find it and show me! Find it, and I’ll apologize on the spot. If you can’t find it—ha! I’ll go straight to the Supply and Marketing Company and ask them: Does a salesclerk have the authority to push all her own work onto an accountant?”
Sister Liu hadn’t expected Tian Tian to suddenly become so assertive. In the past, no matter how nasty Sister Liu’s remarks were, Tian Tian had always been good-natured about it.
Then, when she heard Tian Tian mention going to the Supply and Marketing Company, her face turned the color of pork liver.
The Supply and Marketing Company was their superior unit. Although reform and opening-up had begun, and the kind of reporting culture from the Cultural Revolution era was long out of fashion, Sister Liu knew that if Tian Tian actually went and filed a complaint, she wouldn’t come out unscathed.
At that thought, Sister Liu completely deflated.
The scene immediately froze.
After a long moment, a few of the other veteran salesclerks finally spoke up to smooth things over.
“Oh, come on, we’re all colleagues. Don’t make a fuss over something so trivial.”
“Yeah, yeah. Everyone take a step back. Sister Liu, you need to watch your tone in the future. Xiao Tian has helped us so much since she started working here.”
“Exactly. Sister Liu, you’re older and more experienced. You said something wrong—just apologize.”
At that, the other salesclerks chimed in, egging Sister Liu on to apologize.
Her lips trembled. She wanted to scream, Why should I? But the words got stuck in her throat.
Lately, some state-owned factories had been firing people. Word was that large factories in the north had laid off even more workers. At this critical moment, she was genuinely afraid of being made an example of by the higher-ups.
So, reluctantly, she said, “Xiao Tian, I’m sorry.”
Tian Tian stood with her arms crossed, unmoved.
Sister Liu raised her voice again. “I said I’m sorry, Comrade Tian Tian.”
Only then did Tian Tian nod slightly. “Alright. I won’t hold it against you this time. But don’t make this kind of mistake again. You’re a veteran employee—your ideological awareness should be higher. Otherwise, how can you set an example for us young people?”
——
“Tian Tian, you’re so brave.”
Back in the rear office, two young men came over to praise Tian Tian. They were both new hires from the past two years, with educational backgrounds of at least technical secondary school, and they didn’t get along with the middle-aged and elderly salesclerks. Sister Liu, in particular, loved to mock them.
But they didn’t dare confront Sister Liu directly. As newcomers, no one wanted to stick their neck out and make enemies. Tian Tian had always handled things the same way. So they were surprised she had suddenly stepped up as the one to take a stand.
Tian Tian waved off the praise. “No need to compliment me. I just told the truth. Honestly, I owe the courage to A-Fen.”
With that, Tian Tian put on a grateful expression, grabbed Xu Lifen’s hands, and shook them. “If you want to praise someone, praise A-Fen. She’s the one who told me that Sister Liu often talks about me behind my back. I thought to myself, I’m always helping her organize the counter, and not only do I get no thanks for it, but she’s talking about me like that. Of course I don’t want to put up with it anymore!”
The two young men immediately looked at Xu Lifen.
“I never would have guessed, Comrade Lifen, that you’re so brave!”
“Oh wow, we should really learn from Comrade Lifen in the future!”
Xu Lifen finally snapped out of it and frantically shook her head. “No, no, I didn’t. Really, I didn’t. Tian Tian, I…”
Her hesitant speech, watery eyes, pale face, and quivering shoulders painted the perfect picture of a bullied victim.
But Tian Tian, still holding her wrist, could clearly feel Xu Lifen’s pulse racing. It was obvious she was barely containing her anger.
Having played the victim for so long, she certainly couldn’t lose her temper in front of everyone.
So Tian Tian piled on the praise even more enthusiastically.
Especially when she noticed the other veteran employees in the office watching them. She spoke with even more dramatic emphasis, painting Xu Lifen as a hero who had encouraged an oppressed colleague to stand up for herself.
That completely shut down any chance Xu Lifen had to defend herself.
After all, Xu Lifen was also someone who desperately wanted to advance in her career. Who knew whether this “hero” would end up being retaliated against by Sister Liu?
Watching the young men fawn over Xu Lifen, Tian Tian slipped away to her desk and began dealing with the backlog of work.
…
As an accountant at the supply and marketing cooperative, her job should have been busy. But in reality, this small county-level cooperative had eight people in the finance department alone.
As the youngest employee, Tian Tian was primarily responsible for organizing receipts. Yes, you heard that correctly—organizing various receipts. The cashier handed the receipts to Tian Tian each day, and she was responsible for sorting them and attaching them to vouchers.
This task had essentially been split off from the cashier’s duties. It was mainly because the finance department had too many people, so the work was broken down very finely.
One of the reasons Tian Tian had been so eager to advance in her previous life was that she felt this job offered no real learning opportunities and no room for growth. She wanted to get ahead so she could switch positions—maybe to cashier or to an accounting role that involved bookkeeping.
But now, she absolutely loved this job.
After handling the routine work for half an hour, Tian Tian found herself free. And she wasn’t the only one—quite a few people in the office were either reading newspapers, sewing clothes, or just chatting idly.
Tian Tian didn’t join them. Instead, she got up and headed to the counter.
When the salesclerks saw her approaching, they stopped chatting and stared at her in silence. The scene she had caused that morning had been too shocking.
But Tian Tian waved at them naturally, just as she always did, and walked over to Sister Qian. She reached out and started tidying up the somewhat messy counter.
Sister Qian immediately stopped her. “Hey, hey, hey, Xiao Tian. I can handle this little bit of work. No need to trouble you.”
“Right, right,” the other salesclerks echoed.
Even the sharp-tongued Sister Liu didn’t dare make a peep. She simply turned and walked away from the counter.
Seeing this, Tian Tian’s smile grew even brighter. See? They knew perfectly well how to do the work. They had just been taking advantage of people before.
“Sister Qian, it’s fine. I’m not petty,” Tian Tian said, her voice growing softer until she finally revealed her purpose. “Sister Qian, I have a procurement slip for 100 catties of white sugar. I heard you might be able to get some brown granulated sugar.”
The moment she heard “100 catties of white sugar,” Sister Qian’s expression changed instantly.
“Really?”
“Really. But I want to exchange this slip for 130 catties of brown granulated sugar. That shouldn’t be a problem, right?”
White sugar is a product that goes through multiple stages of processing, while brown granulated sugar is a primary processed product that hasn’t undergone refining. It is about 15% cheaper than white sugar. Of course, years later, this same unrefined brown sugar, marketed with labels like “healthy,” “traditional methods,” and “for women’s health,” would end up costing more than twice as much as white sugar.
But at this time, white sugar was definitely more expensive than brown granulated sugar.
“No problem, no problem.” Sister Qian’s eyes crinkled into crescents as she smiled. She didn’t ask where Tian Tian had gotten the procurement slip.
And Tian Tian, for her part, didn’t ask where Sister Qian’s brown granulated sugar came from. It wasn’t until the 1990s in her previous life that she learned Sister Qian’s in-laws had set up a private sugar-making workshop. Using traditional methods, they could at best produce brown granulated sugar. White sugar was out of the question.
When she decided yesterday to get a white sugar procurement slip from He Xiaoming, Tian Tian had already planned to exchange it for brown granulated sugar with Sister Qian.
As for whether Sister Qian could actually redeem the slip for white sugar—that was the risk Sister Qian would have to bear.
Otherwise, why would Tian Tian willingly trade precious white sugar for cheaper brown sugar?
Both women understood the risks of the transaction, and both were willing to take them on.
After finalizing the details of the exchange, Tian Tian returned to the office in high spirits. On her way, passing by the restroom, she saw Xu Lifen cornered by Sister Liu. That made Tian Tian feel even better.
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