Chapter 19: No Going to the Black Market in the Future!
The moment he heard about buying grain, Zhang Hongqiang’s eyes lit up.
He followed Lin Wan, eagerly tagging along as they took a public bus to the other side of the city.
There was a black market here, just as the novel had described. Because the black market played an important role in the female lead’s journey to wealth and success, the description in the book was incredibly vivid, with every detail perfectly in place.
Since no issues had cropped up with the black market at this particular point in the timeline, Lin Wan put on a face mask and walked in, feeling confident and bold.
The lookout for the black market was an old woman in her seventies. The sentry post was right at her own front door. She sat there pasting matchboxes, and visitors didn’t even need to give a secret code; they just had to drop two cents into her basket to go inside. Otherwise, the old woman would block them.
Lin Wan told Zhang Hongqiang to wait for her outside the alley, walked up, and with practiced ease, tossed two cents into the basket.
The old woman lifted her eyelids, shot a glance at her, and let her pass.
Unlike the descriptions in other novels where black markets only opened at night, the black market here operated during the day. After all, people loitering outside at night were easily caught, but daytime was different.
Lin Wan walked into the alley. This was a shantytown area close to the city outskirts, featuring dense, crisscrossing alleys that were absolutely perfect for illicit underground trading. If a patrol team came, escaping would be a breeze.
People selling things here didn’t set up stalls. Most of them carried a basket, a bag, or a back-basket. To show what they were selling, they usually held a small sample in their hands, making it obvious to anyone coming in at a glance.
Everyone gathered together like a silent marketplace.
A few young men leaned against the walls with their hands in their pockets, their eyes scanning the area, keeping the tense atmosphere dialed up to the maximum.
Lin Wan walked around for a bit and bought a back-basket and two hand-baskets from a middle-aged man. She then bought three pieces of coarse homespun cloth from a middle-aged woman.
Using the homespun cloth to cover the baskets, she found a secluded, empty spot to secretly transfer items from her storage space into the back-basket: three bundles of dried noodles, twenty jin of rice, twenty jin of flour, two jars of lard, a jar of brown sugar, and a jar of white sugar.
Hiss… It was remarkably heavy!
As for the two hand-baskets, she packed two jin of apples into one and two jin of bananas into the other. After a moment of thought, she also added some dried kelp, dried daylilies, a slab of cured bacon, a string of sausages, and two jin of peanuts…
“Sis!”
The moment Zhang Hongqiang spotted her, he rushed over and took the two hand-baskets from her hands. The moment the baskets landed in his grip, the boy’s posture sank.
“So heavy!”
However, the boy adjusted to the weight and immediately straightened up. He glanced toward the road. “Hurry up, Sis, the bus is coming!”
With that, he swung the baskets and bolted like a rabbit. Lin Wan hurriedly kept up.
Oh my god. She absolutely had to find a plausible excuse soon to bring out a bicycle to ride!
The siblings squeezed onto the public bus, breaking into a heavy sweat. By the time they reached home, Lin Wan felt like her entire body was falling apart. She looked at herself in the mirror—good grief, her hair was a tangled mess, with several damp strands plastered to her face, feeling terribly itchy.
“Oh my goodness!”
“You child, why did you buy so many things?”
“How much did it cost? Mom will give you the money!”
How was Lin Wan supposed to know exactly how much it cost? If she just asked prices without buying anything in the black market, she would be targeted by the black market guards!
“Twenty yuan!” Estimating that these goods would normally cost around ten yuan, Lin Wan opened her mouth wide and doubled the price. “Put it on my tab for now. Save it and give it to me later, otherwise the money will just vanish in a flash if it stays in my hands!”
Huang Guixiang was equally decisive. “Alright, then Mom will credit you thirty yuan!”
Anyone could suffer a loss except her daughter. Lin Wan accepted it with a beaming smile, watching Huang Guixiang organize and put away the items bit by bit.
What needed to be hidden was hidden, and what needed to be locked was locked. Then, she stuffed the fruit into Lin Wan’s wardrobe. “Hide these and eat them yourself. Don’t let those others get them for cheap!”
Lin Wan didn’t refuse either, adopting a strategy of listening to her mother. After all, keeping them in her room wouldn’t stop her from feeding Huang Guixiang anyway!
Zhang Hongqiang attentively brought over water for her to wash her face. Once Lin Wan finished, she made him wash his face too. Then, she peeled a banana and handed it to him. “Don’t go showing it off. Finish it right here in the room!”
Zhang Hongqiang nodded vigorously. As he munched on the banana, his eyes crinkled with sheer bliss. Once he finished eating, Lin Wan had him core an apple and slice it into three pieces, one for each member of the mother-son trio.
“This apple is so crisp and sweet!”
“It tastes way better than the ones distributed by the factory!”
The three of them huddled inside Lin Wan’s room to eat. Huang Guixiang sighed with appreciation as she ate. Lin Wan thought to herself that it naturally tasted better than the factory-distributed ones, given that what she had brought out was a Red Fuji, a variety that wouldn’t even be introduced and grafted until 1980!
“The old uncle who sells the apples comes once a month. Mom, I’ll buy them for you to eat every month from now on!” Lin Wan lied smoothly.
Huang Guixiang shook her head. “No, that won’t do. Now that you have a job, you are absolutely not allowed to go to the black market!”
“If you get caught, everything is completely ruined!”
“The job will be gone!”
With that, she sternly admonished Zhang Hongqiang, “The same goes for you. You are not allowed to go secretly. Today’s matter stays buried in your stomach!”
“From now on, your sister is a glorious employee of the post office, and you are the brother of a post office employee. You are not allowed to stir up trouble outside and bring shame to your sister!”
Zhang Hongqiang immediately puffed out his chest with pride. “Mom, don’t worry. I definitely won’t fool around blindly anymore!”
Lin Wan added a point, “And you must study hard!”
“Make progress every day!”
Ten years from now, this kid would make it just in time for the resumption of the National College Entrance Examination!
“Strive to be recommended to a Workers, Peasants, and Soldiers University in the future!”
“When the time comes and you graduate from university to sit in an office as a leader to back me up, won’t that be a hundred times better than going to the countryside to farm, feed chickens, and tend pigs?”
“If you go to the countryside, whenever someone bullies me, you won’t be able to appear immediately to protect me!”
Lin Wan brainwashed the sister-complex boy.
Zhang Hongqiang’s expression gradually turned solemn, his gaze growing increasingly determined. “Don’t worry, Sis, I will definitely study hard!”
After saying that, he scratched his head. “But the teachers at school barely hold classes anymore.”
Lin Wan: “Don’t you worry about that. There are always textbooks, aren’t there? Study them yourself. If there’s something you don’t understand, come find me, and I’ll explain it to you!”
“Alright, the studying starts right now. Go find your books and start by copying vocabulary words!”
Zhang Hongqiang: “…”
The sky had fallen!!!!
“Sis, school doesn’t even start until tomorrow!”
Lin Wan put on an aggrieved expression. “Are you telling me you’re unwilling to study for my sake? I see… I…”
How could Zhang Hongqiang possibly withstand Lin Wan acting like this? He surrendered instantly. “I’ll go copy them! I’ll copy!”
Sister, please don’t cry! If she cried, their biological mother’s iron palm would beat his buttocks to pieces.
“Little Wan!”
“Is Little Wan home?”
A voice rang out from the doorway. Lin Wan quickly wiped her mouth and went out.
She swung the door open, revealing a young girl standing outside. It was her classmate. Usually, they couldn’t stand each other, but right now, the girl linked her arm through Lin Wan’s with extreme intimacy.
