“Da Ni, what’s the plan for your family’s Yanzi? She’s graduating in a month. What’s the arrangement going forward? Is she going to the countryside, or is the family going to find her a job?”
In the narrow hallway of a tenement building, a gaunt woman in her late forties and a slightly plump woman in her twenties sat by their doorways, sewing clothes while chatting. The two families were neighbors and often got together to gossip.
Hearing Auntie Jin’s question, Xu Da Ni first stuck her head out and looked up and down the hallway. Spotting no one around, she then glanced back at the curtained doorway inside. Rolling her eyes, she announced in a loud voice:
“What job? Are jobs that easy to come by? What does a girl need a job for? I’m the eldest daughter-in-law here, and I don’t even have a job. The other day, Yanzi herself agreed—she said she’s ready for a blind date and will get married right after graduation!”
When Auntie Jin heard that the He family was indeed planning to find a match for He Yuyan, her heart raced with excitement. She also had a daughter, who was classmates with He Yuyan. Lately, she’d been worried sick about how to keep her daughter from having to go to the countryside.
Now that the He family was looking for a match for He Yuyan, she had to hitch a ride on this opportunity. After all, even though the old He family didn’t have anyone particularly successful, Old He and his wife were genuinely well-liked by everyone.
“Then you’d better hurry up and find her a match. Good prospects need to be scouted early. If you wait until after graduation, it’ll be too late. Yanzi is such a beautiful girl—she won’t last if she gets sent to the countryside. And if she ends up marrying a rural man, her life will be miserable from then on!”
Xu Da Ni secretly gloated at the thought of her sister-in-law marrying into the countryside. She half-wished the blind date would fail and He Yuyan would suffer through rural life. But out loud, she pretended otherwise: “Well, that’s not something I can meddle in.”
Auntie Jin quickly interjected: “But you’re the eldest daughter-in-law—how can you not care about your husband’s little sister? Let me tell you, if your sister-in-law marries well, you just might benefit from it too!”
Xu Da Ni thought that made sense. If her sister-in-law got married, she wouldn’t have to provide a dowry, and there would be a nice fat bride price. The only downside was that the bride price wouldn’t end up in her own hands.
The two women chatted on with growing enthusiasm, completely failing to notice that behind the curtain shielding the small partitioned room, a sleeping figure had suddenly opened her eyes.
——
It was terribly noisy outside, the kind of noise that made your head ache.
He Yuyan opened her eyes, completely disoriented. One second ago, she had been lying on her comfortable big bed at home, scrolling through her phone. The next, she had suddenly ended up in this bizarre place.
Above her head was a whitewashed ceiling, its corners covered in gray cobwebs. Beneath her was a hard plank bed that creaked with every move. One side of the bed was against the wall, which was plastered with layers of old newspapers.
He Yuyan glanced at them casually, but when she saw the date printed in the corner of one newspaper, she just wanted to close her eyes and go back to sleep. Maybe if she woke up again, she’d be back on her own bed—the one that cost over ten thousand yuan.
Ten minutes later, when the noise from outside became unbearable, He Yuyan had to accept the truth: she wasn’t going back.
By current popular terminology, this was time travel. And not just any time travel—she had landed in the 1970s. Feeling the patches on her clothes and looking around at her surroundings, she concluded that living conditions here were definitely humble.
In modern times, although her parents hadn’t doted on her, her family was very well-off. She never lacked for food or clothing. She had just graduated from university and landed a good position. Before she could even begin to enjoy life, she was transported to this place. Honestly, He Yuyan felt deeply unsettled.
As her unease grew, her head began to ache. At first, she thought it was just the noise from outside causing the pain. But then the headache intensified dramatically. Along with the pain came all the memories of the original owner of this body.
The original owner was also named He Yuyan. She was eighteen years old and looked exactly like the modern-day He Yuyan. She lived in Apartment 206, on the second floor of Building 3, in the family tenement of the Eighth Food Factory in North City. The current date was May 1974—only one month away from He Yuyan’s high school graduation.
In modern times, this would be the critical moment before the college entrance exams. But in this era, graduating from high school meant that unless you were recommended to attend a Worker-Peasant-Soldier University, you faced a major life decision: either find a job or wait for employment.
Finding a job wasn’t easy. And if you waited, unless you were a single child, you’d have to face the prospect of being sent to the countryside.
He Yuyan had arrived right at this pivotal moment.
The He family had four children in total. Her three older brothers had all avoided going to the countryside for various reasons. Now, unless she could find a workplace willing to take her, her only options were to go to the countryside or get married.
After sorting through these facts, He Yuyan could only sigh.
In her memories, jobs were especially hard to come by this time of year. Nearly impossible to find on your own, in fact. Unless you had connections or could pay a large sum to buy a job. Many people who couldn’t bear to send their children to the countryside would start making moves around this time, which only made finding a job even more difficult.
After considering all this, the original He Yuyan had finally relented two days ago and agreed to at least go on a blind date.
——
By now, the voices outside had grown louder and louder. The more He Yuyan listened, the more outrageous the conversation became. She stopped dwelling on other matters, got up, straightened her clothes, pushed aside the curtain, and said directly:
“Sister-in-law, whether I find a job, go to the countryside, or get married—none of that has anything to do with you.”
Before traveling through time, He Yuyan was a somewhat “lazy” person. She didn’t like arguing with people, but she also never allowed anyone to bully her. Since she had ended up here and couldn’t go back, she refused to suffer in silence.
Xu Da Ni, who had been talking animatedly, jumped at the unexpected sound of He Yuyan’s voice.
“Oh, Yanzi, you’re finally awake! Another minute and you wouldn’t need breakfast—you could just wait for lunch.”
He Yuyan didn’t own a watch, but there was a small tin alarm clock on the five-drawer cabinet at home. She had checked it when she came out of her room. It was only a little past eight in the morning. According to her cheap sister-in-law, however, it was almost noon.
“Sister-in-law, I’m still not over my illness. Why can’t I rest?”
The original owner had been running a fever for the past two days. With school being chaotic during that special period, He Yuyan’s mother had simply told her not to go.
“Yanzi, don’t talk to your sister-in-law like that. She’s just worried about you!” Auntie Jin immediately changed her tune as soon as He Yuyan appeared. “She’s concerned that you’ll have to go to the countryside after graduation. Not like my Lili—her father and I would sell everything we own before we let her go to the countryside.”
…
“Quite a lively gathering!”
Auntie Jin had barely finished speaking when a loud voice rang out from the doorway. He Yuyan recognized it immediately—it was the original owner’s mother. Her mother worked as a temporary worker in the factory’s packaging department. Coming home at this hour probably meant there was no work left at the factory.
“Mom, look at what Sister-in-law is saying.”
The relationship between the original owner and her mother was typical of the time—not particularly close, with little meaningful communication. He Yuyan didn’t dare say too much in front of her, afraid of slipping up.
Meanwhile, He’s mother sent Auntie Jin packing with just a few words. Then she turned and said directly, “Da Ni, stay out of Yanzi’s affairs. Her parents aren’t dead yet.”
Xu Da Ni knew right away that her mother-in-law must have overheard the conversation she’d had with Auntie Jin. Instantly cowed, she put on a fawning smile and said, “Mom, I was wrong. I’ll go wash the vegetables.”
With that, she grabbed the greens her mother-in-law had left in the corner when she came in and scurried off to the communal sink at the end of the hallway.
After scolding her eldest daughter-in-law, He’s mother turned and asked, “Yanzi, are you feeling better? If you’re well enough, don’t stay cooped up at home. Ask your classmates what the situation is after graduation. As for the blind date, I’ve already asked your Aunt Wu to keep an eye out.”
With that, she hurried off toward the sink—no doubt to make sure her eldest daughter-in-law wasn’t continuing to gossip.
He Yuyan listened to the sound of her mother’s hurried footsteps fading away and continued sorting through the memories she had absorbed. But the more she organized them, the stranger everything felt.
——
At noon, the family gathered for lunch.
As mentioned earlier, He Yuyan had three older brothers. The eldest two were already married.
Her eldest brother, He Yongbo, was a formal worker in the factory’s packaging workshop. His wife, Xu Da Ni, was a villager from a suburban commune. They had a five-year-old son, nicknamed Dabao, who was already attending preschool.
Her second brother, He Yongtao, worked as a temporary worker at the agricultural and sideline products purchasing station. His wife, Jiang Meiju, didn’t have a job, but her father was the station director. The second brother’s family had a pair of six-year-old twin daughters, Baozhu and Baoling, who also attended preschool.
Her third brother, He Yonghai, was unmarried and serving in the military elsewhere. He rarely came home, but he had the closest relationship with the original owner.
Her father was a worker in the flour processing workshop at the factory, while her mother was a temporary worker in the packaging department.
This all sounded pretty good on the surface. But the reality was that, aside from the third brother, ten people lived in a single thirty-square-meter room. The room had been allocated to their father, a veteran worker, back in the day. Originally, it was just one open space with no partitions.
As the children grew up, the thirty-square-meter space was divided with wooden boards into four sections. One room for the eldest brother’s family, one for the second brother’s family, one that served as a storage and dining area—a so-called living room, where the third brother slept on a mat on the floor when he visited—and the last room belonged to the original owner and her parents.
Yes, at eighteen years old, the original owner still shared a room with her parents. They were separated by nothing more than a cloth curtain. She had her own curtained entrance, but there was absolutely no privacy.
This was what He Yuyan found hardest to accept. After all, who could easily adjust to going from a villa owner to a poor soul with nothing more than a narrow bed?
——
“Yanzi, what are your plans after this?”
Lunch consisted of two-flour steamed buns and mixed vegetable soup. He Yuyan didn’t care for the buns, so she tore them into strips and soaked them in the soup to soften them. Even so, this meal was still much better than what their neighbor Auntie Jin’s family usually ate—mostly cornmeal cakes.
When her second sister-in-law, Jiang Meiju, asked the question, He Yuyan answered without hesitation: “I’m going to check around and see if any other factories are hiring.”
As a modern person, she couldn’t even tell weeds apart from crop seedlings. If she actually went to the countryside, she’d not only cause trouble for the locals but also run herself ragged in the process. Besides, she’d heard that people sent to the countryside didn’t even get two-flour buns to eat—they survived on cornmeal cakes and wild vegetable patties.
If she didn’t want to go to the countryside, she had to try finding a job. And if that didn’t work out, her mother was already asking around to find her a match.
“Finding a job sounds good. I’ll ask my father to look into it too. And if you find a good match through that—well then, you’d have both a job and a husband. How wonderful would that be?”
As soon as Jiang Meiju said this, Xu Da Ni sneered, “With your stingy father? There’s no way he’d help find a job for our little sister.”
Then, turning to He Yuyan with a sycophantic smile, she added, “Little sister, if you ask me, you’re so beautiful that finding a good husband would be easy.”
Thinking back to what she’d heard while washing the vegetables, Xu Da Ni grew even more fawning. “Really, little sister. Getting married is great! Look at me—if I hadn’t gotten married, how could I have become a city person?”
Finding a husband was certainly a backup option. But even if she did end up getting married, He Yuyan had no intention of letting Xu Da Ni have anything to do with it. So she turned her head and looked directly at her mother.
He’s mother was fine with either option—her daughter finding a job or getting married. Her three sons had all avoided going to the countryside for one reason or another, so naturally she didn’t want her only daughter to be sent down either.
“Enough, enough. Whether she marries or not is not something you, as her sister-in-law, should be bringing up to her. Didn’t I tell you this morning to stay out of Yanzi’s affairs?”
Xu Da Ni immediately shrank back at the sound of her mother-in-law’s criticism. She lowered her head and busied herself with taking care of her son.
He Yuyan frowned at the sight of Xu Da Ni’s meek, obedient demeanor.
Finding a job was easier said than done. He Yuyan was still completely in the dark about this era.
So, after lunch, she went back to her room, found a worn-out cloth bag, stuffed her only one yuan and twenty-five cents of private savings into it, and headed out.
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