A week passed in the blink of an eye, and Xia's parents, who were far away in Shanghai, had already received the letter.

"Do you think Jiaojiao is dating someone else?"

Xia's mother looked at Meng Donglai, whom she mentioned in the letter, with some worry.

Mr. Xia was reading the latest newspaper: "It's alright, my wife. Jiaojiao is still young; she doesn't understand love..."

"I hope so," Xia's mother rolled her eyes at him. "This guy is too slow."

This is the first time my daughter has written another man's name in a letter since she left home so long ago.

"No, she needs to write back to her daughter right away."

Inside the threshing ground in Jianshui Village.

"Teacher Xia, why are you wearing gloves?" the child asked curiously, pointing to her hands.

"Because there are splinters on this wooden handle."

The midday sun in August was extremely scorching, and she was drenched in sweat after turning the rice stalks just a few times.

In the afternoon, she will also be shelling corn kernels.

She still had a large patch of unturned grains left, and she was working hard, huffing and puffing…

"Jiaojiao, come quickly with the chilled mung bean soup and the roasted rabbit leg."

Meng Donglai brought her lunch, which included soup, water, meat, and rice.

The threshing ground is very large; there are four threshing grounds in the village, and each person is responsible for one. The one that Li Jiaojiao is responsible for is not very big.

There was no one else around at noon, so Meng Donglai took the shovel from her and helped her turn over the rice.

"Go eat quickly, I'll be there in a bit."

Li Jiaojiao kissed his cheek: "You're so thoughtful, this is a reward for you."

Meng Donglai looked at her with a smile. "Where's your left cheek?"

She reluctantly kissed him again.

Meng Donglai works quickly and energetically, finishing the flipping in less than ten minutes.

"Everyone's busy harvesting, how do you still have time to prepare so many vegetables?"

"The mung bean soup was made by the old Party Secretary, and I just grabbed two bowls," Meng Donglai said as he shredded the rabbit meat for her.

The harvest season in the village will be over in a couple of days.

Everyone gathered at the threshing ground to dry their grain and peel corn kernels.

Li Jiaojiao and Meng Donglai sat in the most secluded spot.

"Xiuniang, your family is having a wedding banquet the day after tomorrow, right?"

Mother Quan smiled and nodded, "Yes, there was a slight problem last time, but it's fine this time."

Everyone tacitly refrained from asking what the problem was.

But Li Jiaojiao suddenly remembered that Li Miaohong hadn't appeared for many days and had been staying at the family home.

"Meng Donglai, do you know anything about their situation?"

He nodded. He was leaving for Bao'an County the day after tomorrow, to prevent Quan Lanxi from having any bad intentions.

"I took some time to go into the family home and broke Quan Lanxi's right hand," Meng Donglai said casually.

If it gets better, it will take at least a month to get it working properly.

He had already returned by then.

The family's wedding banquet was coming up soon, but Li Jiaojiao didn't go; she went to see Meng Dong off.

Here's four hundred yuan for you.

Meng Donglai divided all his money and tickets in half.

He gave half to Li Jiaojiao, and he took the other half to go out and make his way in the world.

"I don't want it, I don't need it," Li Jiaojiao pushed it back, thinking, "Even a poor family can afford to travel extravagantly."

"Take it. I won't feel at ease if you don't take it."

Meng Donglai thought that if he lost money, he could still leave some money for her to make up for it.

"I can accept it, but write back when you arrive." At least I know where he is.

Meng Donglai nodded in agreement.

The train whistle sounded, urging people to hurry on. She only left after seeing him onto the train.

She brought money with her today; she was going to pick up her car.

After her last bout of motion sickness, Li Jiaojiao decided to buy a car. Luckily, she had a receipt, and after paying the deposit, she went to the supply and marketing cooperative to pick it up today.

The original owner of this body could ride a bicycle, and after a few wobbles, Li Jiaojiao was able to ride normally.

When she returned to the village, it was only afternoon. There was no one at the educated youth settlement; everyone had gone to a family wedding to congratulate Li Miaohong on her marriage.

She declined Li Miaohong's invitation by saying she had a meeting at the school.

I don't know what got into her, but she specifically asked Xia Jiaojiao to come to her banquet, insisting that she come.

Li Jiaojiao got annoyed, found a piece of red cloth, stuffed four eggs inside, and said it was a wedding gift to express her apology for not being able to come. She asked Zhao Shuqin to take it to her.

Why not include one? Because it's a wedding gift and also an apology gift for the other person.

Wouldn't it be a double blessing for her to have good fortune? Li Jiaojiao was not willing.

She thought of the word "亖" in the dictionary, which is the same as "四" and also means "death".

The red cloth was a square handkerchief, and she wrote the number "two" on each opposite corner.

If you stack them together and align them, it forms the character "亖".

Li Jiaojiao felt she had gone to great lengths to come up with a good insult.

When Zhao Shuqin learned about this, she also tried to do it.

The mother was overjoyed to receive the four eggs wrapped in red cloth as a gift.

"Is the new car at the door yours?" Zhao Shuqin ran back and collapsed onto the bed.

"Yes, I just arrived today," Li Jiaojiao said, studying the newly arrived textbooks. "Why did you come back without attending the banquet?"

"Because there was no food available," Zhao Shuqin counted the dishes on the table at noon.

"There are only eight dishes, one of which is meat: cucumber stir-fried with eggs."

She felt helpless just thinking about it; she never imagined that she could take down a strong man with her bare fists.

At the dinner table, her fists were no match for an eighty-year-old woman.

"I couldn't get any food at all," Zhao Shuqin said, suspecting it was a problem with herself and also with her eyes: "For a moment, I thought that the empty plates in front of me were real, and the food was fake."

She didn't exaggerate, saying, "Whoosh—the food's gone!"

"I can only watch helplessly as we eat the fixed amount of two roasted sweet potatoes per person."

The old lady at the table took pity on her and gave her two sweet potatoes, which caused her to eat too many sweet potatoes and keep hiccuping.

"Hahaha," Li Jiaojiao chuckled.

"We just got our new car today, let's go to a restaurant to celebrate!"

Without hesitation, Zhao Shuqin drove her out of the village.

At the wedding banquet, Li Miaohong wore a new dress, which was paid for by her whole family.

She had to help Quan Lanxi toast each table.

He found it awkward to hold the glass with his left hand, and in his discomfort, he leaned half his body weight on Li Miaohong.

She forced herself to stay composed while smiling and toasting him.

The spicy liquor went down her throat, causing her eyes to redden.

She endured all this hardship hoping that her family could borrow some money to help her go to school.

Late at night, Li Miaohong tried to change Quan Lanxi's clothes, but he slapped her to the ground and yelled, "Get the hell away from me!"

No one in the family told Li Miaohong that Quan Lanxi's leg could not be reattached, and he himself did not want anyone to know.

You'll sleep on the floor tonight.

Ever since his leg was broken and couldn't be reattached, he felt that everyone looked at him with pity and sympathy. He hated that other people had good legs while his own was bad.

Suddenly, he understood why Li Miaohong had harmed Xia Jiaojiao.

It's all because of jealousy and hatred.

If he had the ability, he would also like to cut off the legs of all those normal people, and their right hands as well.

All of this was caused by Li Miaohong. He had clearly knocked Meng Donglai unconscious in the first place. It would have been so much better if he had just given him poison then.

But he fed her the aphrodisiac that Li Miaohong had bought!

Since he's already in such a miserable state, there has to be someone to take his place.

He was determined to drag Li Miaohong down with him; she couldn't possibly escape by taking advantage of going to university!

Quan Lanxi didn't like Li Miaohong at all. The reason he agreed to Quan's mother's request was because he heard that Li Miaohong could fly out of this small village and enter a big city.

Why should he?! His life is ruined.

Li Miaohong must not go out.

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