Back to 1979: Sending the Educated Youth’s Wife Back to the City

Chapter 15 Father-in-law Refuses
It is definitely impossible for the family to celebrate the New Year by relying solely on the New Year goods sent by my third uncle's family.

So the next day, the whole family went to the supply and marketing cooperative of the commune to buy New Year's goods.

On the way there, Fang Minghua pushed his youngest son Fang Kang in a cart.

Fang Mingche pushed Yanyan up on his bicycle.

Seeing his five-and-a-half-year-old niece also walking with the adults, he said, "Fang Fang, come here and sit in the back."

Fang Fang was carried by Fang Mingche to sit on the back of the bicycle.

Fang Jian immediately became unhappy. He was just a child walking.

But he didn't dare to make trouble with his father and uncle, because they would not tolerate him.

So he went to his grandfather and said, "Grandpa, I want to ride in a car, too."

It can actually fit on the trolley if you squeeze a little.

Mr. Fang asked his eldest son to push his eldest grandson up as well. He was only eight years old, so he could still sit.

When they arrived at the supply and marketing cooperative, Father Fang looked at the situation, took out the money and bills, and assigned tasks to everyone.

You need to queue up to buy things at the supply and marketing cooperative. Once you are in line, you need to have the corresponding daily necessities ticket to buy things.

In rural areas, only the party branch secretary and others issue bills every month.

Fortunately, Fang Mingche and Lin Yan are registered residents, and they receive receipts every month.

Father Fang then tried to find someone who had the bills and exchange them for money or other things.

This is enough for the whole family to have a relatively prosperous year in the countryside.

Father Fang really enjoys the feeling of allocating resources and arranging work as the head of the family.

If Fang Mingche could be more filial and hand over all his income, he would be able to enjoy it more.

Last night, the two elders were talking in bed about how Fang Mingche would have been much more generous towards his family if Lin Yan hadn't stopped him.

Fang Mingche accepted the task and took the two girls to queue up at the cloth shop.

Yanyan is holding him, Fangfang is holding him. There are many people here today, so we need to take good care of him.

After buying things, I put some of them on the cart and some of them in the bamboo basket hanging on the bicycle.

"Dad, Mom, you guys go back first. I'm going to make a phone call."

Father Fang said, "Why don't you be more successful? If you go back to the big city as a girl, will people still miss you? If it weren't for the special times, would they marry a country girl like us? Will their parents like you?"

Fang Mingche smiled and said, "Dad, four questions in a row. You are so good at using parallelism, you should teach Chinese!"

He said hello, put his daughter back in the front seat, and moved his niece to sit in the back.

It's just that Fang Fang's legs are not in the frame like before, so they are a little bit bent. But it's better than walking back.

Then he pushed the cart straight to the post office.

Father Fang was a little angry as he looked at his back. Since his youngest son started working, he had become more and more undisciplined.

I went to the post office and waited in line for a while before it was my turn.

Fang Mingche parked the bike within sight and asked the two sisters to stand guarding the bikes.

The person watching over the stall at the pay phone had already gone to call Lin Yan.

"Hello?" After waiting for a while, a middle-aged man's voice came from the other end of the phone.

Fang Mingche recognized it: Yanyan’s grandpa.

He thought for a moment and shouted with his daughter, "Grandpa, long time no see."

"Well, is Yanyan here?"

"It's a bit far, she can't hear it."

Since his granddaughter couldn't hear, Father Lin didn't hold back.

"Mingche, Grandma Yanyan and I are very grateful to you for letting Ayan return to Beijing. But since we're already divorced, please don't contact her too often. We can't do anything about the child for now, so you have to take care of her first. In the future, please don't call me casually. Our Ayan is going to find someone else, so it's not good for you to keep calling me."

"I know what you mean. I'll let Yanyan come over and say hello to you."

Fang Mingche waved to Yanyan and called her over.

"That's grandpa over there, say hello to him."

Yanyan said into the microphone: "Hello, Grandpa. I wish you a happy new year."

The voice on the other end softened, "Good, Yanyan is so good!" "Grandpa, where is my mom?"

"Your mother isn't home."

"Is grandma feeling better?"

In fact, Fang Mingche knew that his mother-in-law was not sick at all. Although Ayan did not divorce in her previous life, she took leave to return to the city to visit her sick mother.

She came back and said that her mother-in-law was not sick at all, it was just that her father-in-law wanted her to divorce and return to the city.

"Well, grandma is in good health."

After hanging up the phone, Yanyan said, "Grandpa stuttered when he spoke."

Fang Mingche smiled. He was embarrassed to lie to a little kid like you.

The father-in-law's attitude is not surprising. It seems that he really wants to hurry up!
I guess if I call again later, it’s impossible for Ayan to answer the phone herself.

Fang Mingche had a good time during the New Year holidays. He just ignored the gossip from others.

But my father and mother had heard a lot in the village that "the educated youth can return to the city, and they will definitely leave the peasant men and women behind! We can't keep people from the big cities here."

Or, 'I thought the daughter-in-law of the Fang family was a good person. She kept saying that she would not divorce and return to the city. But in the end, she ran away!'

As a result, neither of them wanted to go out and visit each other anymore.

When I came back and saw Fang Mingche, I remembered that he was the one who was dumped, and he also had a New Year's gift from the Great Unity Bank.

The two of them endured it and didn't get angry with him.

Fang Mingche stayed at home until January 1st, enjoying good food and drink, and then set off again with his cousin.

But before leaving, my cousin reminded me, "Don't think that this time you go out it's especially safe and nothing will happen. It's just that the probability is smaller than last time. In fact, sometimes I only report good news and not bad news, so my family thinks that I have only encountered one or two accidents. So, should you be more cautious?"

But Fang Mingche thought it over again and again, and finally took out all 1600 yuan and took it with him.

He has only two opportunities to substitute in class, so he must make good use of them.

Moreover, as long as you don't stop the car, there is still some security.

For this purpose, he even went to the hunter's house in the village to borrow a bird gun. He put it at his feet and kicked it under the seat.

Last time, he thought the problem was simple and almost got into trouble.

This time, he will fight to the death with anyone who dares to steal his money and belongings.

The cousin looked at him and asked, "Why is it such a big deal?"

"Just in case."

My cousin asked, "Why would Hunter Wang be willing to lend it to you?"

He also asked, but the other party said it was the murder weapon and refused to lend it to him.

"I once gave his son some special treatment as a student's parent."

It was the fourth day of the first lunar month when we went there, which was still during the Spring Festival.

It is true that the road is much safer now, and the few incidents that occur are minor ones, which can be easily resolved with my cousin's experience.

But there is a problem with traveling during the first month of the year: most restaurants on the road are closed.

My cousin said, "The boss said that we will give you an extra two dollars a day for this trip."

"Yeah." Anyway, I have brought enough dry food.

The journey was peaceful and we arrived there.

This time, Fang Mingche was determined to buy so many watches after the New Year to occupy his cash flow, but the other party was only willing to save one dollar per watch in the end.

Fang Mingche thought about Xu Sheng saying that the purchase price would be reduced by two yuan, and he still felt that he was losing out.

"Give me one more!"

The other party thought about it and decided that giving one away was more cost-effective than lowering the price by one dollar.

"Okay, okay."

27 yuan each, he had exactly 1620 yuan on his person, so he bought 61 of them.

When my cousin found out, he couldn’t help but ask, “Are you such a strong gambler?” I really didn’t realize that.

Before you had a formal job, didn't you just live from day to day?
Fang Mingche said: "I have brought all the bird guns. If you really want to steal them, you have to pay a price."

(End of this chapter)