Starting a new chapter in life

"If my niece hadn't mentioned that you're a military dependent, but your husband doesn't qualify for military dependent status, I really wouldn't have recommended this house to you. After all, I also need to ensure the quality of the people in Hongqi Community, right?" Gao Mei's words, though unpleasant, were true.

Jing Yan nodded in agreement: "How do we calculate the rent?"

"Five yuan a month is a very reasonable price. You can plant whatever you want in the yard, and you can use whatever else you have at home. The rent is paid annually. After all, Aunt Chen is old and too lazy to come here to collect rent. If you think it's okay, you and Aunt Chen can go to the street office to sign the lease contract. You can also go there to sign the renewal contract during this period every year. We can act as notaries so that both parties can feel at ease."

If you are not renewing the lease, please give three months' notice. Any overpayment or underpayment will be refunded or charged accordingly. We will inspect the property's facilities before you leave. If any damage is found, the tenant will need to compensate for or repair it. If there is no damage, the contract will be settled. Of course, the tenant is responsible for their own water and electricity bills. Once confirmed, I will bring a meter reader to check the meters on-site. You can move in after settling the water and electricity bills. The same applies to leaving the property.

Jingyan was very satisfied. "Sixty a year, okay. When do we sign the contract? Can we move in tomorrow?"

Gao Mei was pleased to see that she agreed so readily: "Okay, you can stay here for a while. I'll go find Aunt Chen and come back to pick you up later. Once we get everything sorted out at the neighborhood office, I can give you the key. You can move your luggage in tonight, and the rent will start from tomorrow."

"Then thank you, Comrade Gao." Jing Yan said with a smile.

“From now on, we’ll be neighbors. Just call me Sister Gao. There’s no need to be so formal.” Gao Mei said magnanimously.

"Sister Gao."

The three stayed to continue looking at houses. "Should we put a bed in this little house? We also need to buy pots, pans and other kitchenware. It's not cost-effective to mail these things, and they're easy to get damaged. This stove is a bit small, so we'll have to buy new pots for this small stove."

"A steamer is necessary, sometimes to heat up rice or steam buns and mantou. A wok is also essential, about 32 centimeters in diameter is about right. Anything bigger won't be stable. Compared to the big pots and stoves back home, it's too small." Jing Huan shook her head as she looked.

"So what if the house looks nice? The most important thing, the kitchen, is too small and cramped. Can such a small stove really heat the whole house?" Jinghuan wondered.

Jingyan understood perfectly well that the stove in the red brick house allocated to her by the forest farm in her previous life was also of this type. It didn't look big, but when it was lit, the lid turned red-hot and the heat was quite strong. Moreover, the advantage of this kind of stove over the large stove was that if you didn't want to boil water or cook but needed to light a fire for heating, you could just put the lid on and it would be used for heating on its own. Unlike in her hometown, where the large pot had a big hole in it and you had to keep an eye on it to make sure the water didn't boil dry.

"Fourth Sister, small pots have their advantages. I usually live alone, what's the point of having such a big pot? Even if Zhijun comes back, how much can the two of them eat? This smaller one is fine for cooking one meal at a time."

"Besides, although the stove looks small, it's connected to the radiators and the heated wall and kang (a traditional heated brick bed), so it saves coal and is practical. It won't be any worse than the big stove back home. It's just that it won't be as convenient as the one back home for making stews, but otherwise it'll be fine," Jingyan advised.

Jinghuan could only nod: "Well, there's nothing we can do about it since it's inconvenient. Luckily, your cooking skills aren't great to begin with, so it won't have too much of an impact. As long as the house can be heated in winter, it'll be fine. It's too cold here, we can't let you get cold."

Jing Yan… “My cooking should be alright, right?”

Before long, Sister Gao brought in an elderly woman: "Little Zhang, this is the landlady, Aunt Chen."

Jingyan quickly stepped forward to greet her: "Hello, Aunt Chen."

Aunt Chen must have heard Gao Mei's introduction before. She raised her loose eyelids and looked at her: "You're a military dependent? Can you live on your husband's allowance? The cost of living here is not small. If you have children in the future, the expenses will be even greater."

Jing Huan was a little displeased, but Jing Yan didn't seem to mind. She smiled and said, "Auntie, I have a job in the army canteen, but it's not a formal one. I'm just an unofficial employee."

Aunt Chen nodded: "That's fine then. Women, even if a man is willing to support them, still need to have a means of making a living. Otherwise, if something unexpected happens in the future and they can't stand on their own, their lives will be ruined."

Jingyan looked at the frail old woman and felt grateful. This was for her own good, fearing that she would suffer after following a man to this place and end up with nothing. If she didn't have the memories of her past life, her thinking would never be as progressive as this old woman's. Nowadays, people believe in marrying a man for food and clothing, but looking at those housewives in the city who are supported by men, they do a lot of housework, and in the end, the men say that they can't do anything except spend money and eat. She wouldn't let herself live that kind of life.

Seeing that Jing Yan showed only gratitude and no resentment, Aunt Chen felt gratified. The two quickly signed the contract at the neighborhood office, completed the formalities, and the old woman left on her own. Sister Gao watched the old woman's retreating figure with a sigh:

"Xiao Zhang, don't think that what Aunt Chen said today was unpleasant. She really meant well. She is an old revolutionary. After liberation, she had a position in the government. It wasn't very high, but she was able to live a good life. Unfortunately, she only had one son and one daughter. Her son was fine. He had a job and his wife also had a job. Although the family had to live in Aunt Chen's house in the early years, she didn't have to worry about anything else."

On the contrary, it was her daughter. Back then, she helped her daughter get a job as a household registration officer at the police station. Although there was not much room for promotion, it was a comfortable job, suitable for a girl. Later, her daughter started dating someone. Well, apart from his looks and his sweet talk, he was not good at anything else, but her daughter was fooled and insisted on marrying him. Aunt Chen objected back and forth, which made her daughter lose heart, but in the end, she married him.

Not long after getting married, she became pregnant. Her in-laws coaxed and persuaded her to give up her job, and her husband took her place. Later, she stayed at home to serve her parents-in-law and take care of the child. At first, her in-laws flattered her a lot, after all, her parents were old revolutionaries and had a lot of connections in the city. She was also coaxed to come back to her mother to ask her to help her husband get a job transfer and to help her in-laws' younger brother find a job.

Aunt Chen has sharp eyes; she knew her in-laws weren't a good family, so she didn't offer any help. As time went on, her in-laws realized they couldn't get anything out of her, and their attitude turned sour. Aunt Chen advised her daughter to divorce them, saying she could support them herself, but her daughter, for some reason, was determined to live with someone else. Eventually, Aunt Chen stopped interfering, not even bothering to ask about their future, saying it was up to her daughter and she wouldn't interfere anymore. She added, "Seeing you today probably reminded me of my daughter, so I said a few more words."

"How is her daughter now?" Jing Yan couldn't suppress her curiosity.

"She's gone. She died of illness before she was even fifty. They say it was from years of overwork. She passed away even earlier than her mother-in-law. Aunt Chen was in pretty good spirits a couple of years ago, but after her daughter passed away last year, her energy suddenly vanished. She wasn't even this heartbroken when her husband passed away a few years ago. She aged so quickly. Sigh~ Children are all a debt." Sister Gao's tone was full of sighs.

"And what about her husband? Is he raising the child alone, or has he found someone else?"

"Hmph, he does want to find someone else, but our city is big yet small, and everyone knows his family is shady. What good girl would jump into their fire pit? Besides, he has two grown sons who are already working. To be their stepmother would be incredibly foolish. Letting him live a lonely life would be a good thing. That heartless dog of a man." Sister Gao was quite angry.

Sister Gao called the meter reader and went back together. They checked the water and electricity meters and verified the previous payment records. The meter reader smiled and said, "They prepared well in advance. They haven't used any water or electricity since the last payment in June. They can move in directly."

Jingyan checked the meter with the meter reader and found that everything was correct. Sister Gao left the key with her and left with the meter reader.

Jinghuan and Peng Chunhai were tidying up the vegetable garden when they saw that Sister Gao and the others had left. She came over and said, "Jingyan, a lot of the vegetables in this yard have gone bad, but there are still quite a few that are still edible. We've picked them. There are still some that aren't ripe yet. Remember to turn the soil deeper when it's late in the fall. Next year, we can plant enough vegetables for the two of you. By the way, the cellar is over here. We just opened the cellar lid to let it air out. It looks pretty big from above. Remember to close it before it rains, and leave it open the rest of the time so it's good for storing vegetables in the winter."

Jing Yan glanced at the cellar as well. There was a wooden ladder on one side of the cellar, with the ground below. The cellar was surrounded by red bricks with nails embedded in them. "What are those nails on the wall for? This cellar is really quite... high-class?"

Peng Chunhai peeked out and asked, "Isn't that how cabbages are hung on the wall? You thread the cabbage roots through wire, tie loops, and hang them on nails. They can last a long time when hung individually. Isn't that how you store them at home?"

Jingyan...

Jinghuan...

“We always pile our winter vegetables separately by type on the floor of the cellar; we’ve never hung them up separately,” Jinghuan said, expressing her doubt.

"Won't your cabbages rot?" Peng Chunhai asked, equally puzzled.

"Only one or two rotted at the end, I really didn't pay attention. Hey, how did you know? Your sister said you never go into the kitchen at home." Jinghuan suddenly remembered this.

Peng Chunhai scratched his head: "I'm lazy, but I'm not incapable of doing it. Besides, every year when my family stores winter vegetables, my dad, my brother, and I do it together. We have to pass in sack after sack of potatoes, sweet potatoes, radishes, and carrots. We also have to thread each cabbage through wire and hang it in. I can remember all the things we have to do every year. From now on, you can leave the winter vegetables to me. I have the strength."

Jing Yan said helplessly, "We're talking about my cellar right now, you've gone off on a tangent."

Peng Chunhai smiled and said, "Yes, yes, look at your cellar. Leave the lid open for one night to let it air out. I'll go down tomorrow and clean the cellar for you. If there are any vegetables that rotted in there in previous years, you have to clean them out, otherwise they will easily spoil if you put vegetables in there later."

"Do you have brooms or anything? We have hoes for turning the soil, but we need to get things like spittoons, brooms, stove hooks, washbasins, and basin stands first. We also need a bed in the small room, and a wardrobe in this room. Well, let's ask where we can find some used furniture." Jingyan said.

“Yes, we can’t do without furniture, but we don’t need to buy new ones. You won’t be settling here in the future, and new furniture is expensive and hard to take with you. It would be a waste.” Jinghuan agreed.

Peng Chunhai suggested, "Let's go back to the guesthouse first and move our luggage over. There's paper and pen inside. We can take a look at what we need at home, write it down, and buy it all together according to the list. That way, we won't have to run around to different places and go through all that trouble."

Everyone agreed: "Okay, let's move our luggage over. After we've sorted it out, we'll get all the gear ready tomorrow before moving it over. Let's stay at the guesthouse tonight, and we'll decide what to do after we've settled in. Don't skimp on the room rate for the next two days; our own comfort is the most important thing." Jing Yan made the final decision.

The three locked the door and returned to the guesthouse. As they carried their luggage out, the receptionist asked, "Have you booked the room?"

Jing Yan nodded: "It's settled. I've paid a year's rent."

"Are you moving in? Then you need to go through the check-out process for this house. You can't just leave like this," the young woman reminded her.

“We might have to stay for another day or two. The house over there isn’t fully furnished, so we’ll go over and tidy it up first, then see what we need to buy, and move in once we’ve bought everything and cleaned it up.”

"Oh, okay, if you want to buy something but don't know where to buy it, just go to my aunt. She's the most helpful person, and she works for the neighborhood committee, so she knows all the places." The little girl was also very kind.

Jing Yan smiled and said, "Okay, thank you."

After putting their luggage on the kang (heated brick bed) in the rented room, Jinghuan placed the luggage roll on the wall, pulled out a small notebook, found a fountain pen, and the group started from the storeroom. They had bamboo brooms for sweeping the yard, hoes for turning the soil, but no shovels for digging... Then they went to the kitchen, the small house, the main house, and the living room. After taking stock of everything, they filled three pages with their inventory.

"Why do we need to buy so many things for daily life?" Peng Chunhai was also quite worried; how much money would it cost to buy everything?

"Let's see what we can mail from home so we don't have to buy it." Jinghuan went through it again. There was a separate sheet of paper listing items that could be mailed from home, but they were mostly bedding and clothing. Basins and laundry tubs could be mailed from home, but postage wasn't cheap these days. Considering the weight of those items... never mind, I'll just buy them here.

On their way back to the guesthouse, the three of them ran into Gao Mei, who was returning home from get off work. They greeted each other, and Jing Yan asked her, "Sister Gao, my house is missing quite a few things. You know I won't be settling down here in the future, so I don't plan to spend too much on furnishing the house. I'm thinking of buying some old things that can last for a few years. Do you know where I can buy them?"

"What do you want to buy?" Gao Mei asked.