Chapter 17: Calculating Against Her
“Mom, I don’t need this much money,” Sheng Wanyan said, trying to push the five yuan back.
“Just take it,” Mother Sheng insisted, pressing the money into her hand. “Buy yourself some pastries and snacks, and don’t embarrass yourself at the factory.”
Mother Sheng then looked down at her daughter’s outfit. Why was she wearing the simple gray work clothes she usually reserved for house chores instead of a skirt? Didn’t she always love dressing up before?
Seeing her daughter suddenly become so sensible and frugal made Mother Sheng’s heart ache.
Sheng Wanyan caught the flash of heartache in her mother’s eyes, and a warm feeling bloomed in her chest.
“Mom, are you feeling sorry for me?”
“Get lost!” Mother Sheng snapped, her face flushing. She was instantly irritated that her daughter was getting cheeky just because she showed a tiny bit of affection.
“You’re clearly heartbroken, but you’re still acting so stubborn.”
“What did you just say, you brat?”
Sheng Wanyan smiled. Her mother’s hasty attempts to hide her feelings were actually quite endearing. As the fierce matriarch who managed all the affairs inside and outside the home, Mother Sheng rarely let her guard down enough to look so authentically feminine and flustered.
Women in this era truly had it hard.
Embarrassed at being seen through, Mother Sheng turned around and hurried back to her room, her mind a bit chaotic.
When she was a young, cheerful, and energetic girl in her village, she had watched the older women toil day in and day out—serving their husbands, raising the children, and managing the endless housework, all without receiving a single word of gratitude. She had seen wives mercilessly controlled by their mothers-in-law and bullied by their husbands’ families.
Back then, she had sworn she would never become one of them. She vowed to live for herself and find happiness.
But once a woman married, the daily grind of survival inevitably chipped away at her spirit, consuming her youthful energy. After having children, her priorities shifted entirely. She pinched pennies and ate less just so her children could have a bit more meat in their bowls and a solid foundation for their futures.
Sometimes, in the quiet moments of the night, she lamented that she had slowly morphed into the very type of woman she had once pitied.
Yet, she knew she was far luckier than most. She had married a good man who genuinely loved and respected her. Even though they weren’t wealthy, they had built a comfortable, stable life together over the years.
Seeing her daughter’s sudden maturity today had inevitably reminded Mother Sheng of her own youth.
“Wife, come soak your feet,” Father Sheng called gently, walking into the room carrying a basin of steaming hot water.
Seeing him, Mother Sheng let out a soft smile. She was deeply content. She had no regrets.
While Sheng Wanyan was settling comfortably into her new routine, the neighbors in the tube building were busy buzzing around Grandpa and Grandma Sheng.
“Auntie, your Yan’er turned twenty this year, didn’t she?”
Grandma Sheng shot a cool glance at Aunt Chen, who lived on the floor above them. She knew exactly where this conversation was heading.
“Yes, she is twenty.”
“Well, why haven’t you started arranging matches for her? If you wait too long, she’ll become an old maid, and people will start gossiping.”
Grandma Sheng remained silent, focusing on her mending. Seeing that the old woman didn’t want to engage, Aunt Chen easily guessed her thoughts. But Sheng Wanyan’s background was simply too attractive: a household full of state workers, and now the girl herself was earning a coveted monthly salary of twenty yuan.
There were countless families in the building eyeing Sheng Wanyan, all wishing they could snatch her up as a daughter-in-law.
“The country encourages free love these days,” Grandma Sheng replied smoothly, blocking the probing. “It’s best to let the children decide their marriages when they find someone they’re happy with.”
Her tone made it incredibly clear that the Sheng family was in no rush to marry off their granddaughter.
“Oh, Auntie, that sounds nice, but isn’t it true that since ancient times, marriages have always been decided by the parents? The orders of the parents and the words of the matchmaker,” Aunt Chen pressed, inching closer to pitch her own son.
“If your Yan’er stays unmarried much longer, the rumors will ruin her reputation,” Aunt Chen continued smoothly. “You see, my youngest son is a proper factory worker too. For a single young man living in our building, his conditions are excellent…”
If my Yan’er married into your miserable household, she wouldn’t survive a month of that hardship, Grandma Sheng thought, feeling a spike of profound irritation. It was easy for this woman to blow hot air, but the reality of marrying into the Chen family was a nightmare.
“Alright, Daughter-in-law Chen. Like I said, my Yan’er’s marriage is her own business.”
Grandma Sheng thoroughly despised Aunt Chen’s youngest son. He was a state worker on paper, but in reality, he was nothing more than a free ATM for his massive, dysfunctional family.
Aunt Chen’s household was a disaster. She had three sons, all married with children, yet none of them had officially split from the main household. The parents outrageously favored the youngest and eldest sons, entirely neglecting the middle child. Furthermore, to coddle the youngest son, the parents had actually forced the eldest son to give up an employment quota for him.
How could a sprawling family with that kind of blatant favoritism not be constantly at each other’s throats?
Even though the youngest son had the factory job, his entire monthly salary was confiscated by Aunt Chen. The two older sisters-in-law were notoriously petty, squabbling every three days and throwing massive tantrums every five. Once, they had a screaming match over a single roasted sweet potato that the whole building had to listen to.
With multiple grandchildren running around, the entire Chen household was surviving solely on the wages of Father Chen and the youngest son. They had elderly parents to support above and hungry children below, while the two older brothers remained completely unemployed, sitting around the apartment waiting to be fed.
How could two salaries possibly support a dozen mouths? They were barely scraping by, gritting their teeth through every month.
Marrying into that family wasn’t a blessing; it was a life sentence. Aunt Chen clearly wanted Sheng Wanyan purely for her twenty-yuan salary to ease her own family’s financial burden. Grandma Sheng could already predict that once her granddaughter was pregnant, the Chen family would immediately pressure her to surrender her Propaganda Department job to one of the unemployed brothers.
There was no way in hell her precious granddaughter was marrying into that viper’s nest. The Sheng family had the means to support her; there was absolutely no reason to let her suffer.
“But Auntie… how can you let a young girl make the final decision on something as vital as marriage?” Aunt Chen whined.
“Daughter-in-law Chen, your thinking is politically backward,” Grandma Sheng said sharply, playing her trump card. “The Great Chairman himself said that women hold up half the sky. Are you saying the Chairman is wrong?”
Aunt Chen’s jaw snapped shut. If she argued against that, she would literally be opposing the nation’s leader.
“A-Auntie, I never said that,” she stammered, panicking. “Oh, look at the time! It’s already four o’clock. I need to go start dinner.”
Aunt Chen practically fled back upstairs. She would have to think of another angle to trap the girl. Sheng Wanyan was simply the perfect target. Once they got her married to the youngest son and she became pregnant, they could force her to transfer her cushy office job to the eldest son. That would immediately resolve the eldest son’s resentment toward the youngest, and the family’s finances would be completely revitalized.
Sheng Wanyan, blissfully unaware that a neighbor was actively plotting to drain her dry, was currently enjoying her workday.
“Wanyan, do you want to walk over to the Supply and Marketing Cooperative together after work?” Wu Jiaxiu asked across the aisle. She was planning to buy some lightweight fabric to sew two undershirts for her husband before the summer heat set in.
“Sure,” Sheng Wanyan agreed. “I need to buy some pastries for my grandparents anyway.”
The osmanthus cakes at home were nearly gone. Grandpa and Grandma Sheng kept trying to save the last pieces for her, refusing to eat them. Sheng Wanyan had finally figured out how to counter their stubbornness: she purposely left the food sitting out until it was on the verge of spoiling, claiming she had forgotten about it. Only then, terrified of wasting precious food, would the elders finally relent and eat it.
By now, her grandparents were actually a little afraid of her tactics. The girl was completely ruthless about “wasting” food; if they tried to save it for her, she would just stubbornly refuse to touch it until it went bad, feeling no remorse whatsoever.
“Great, let’s head over right after the bell rings,” Wu Jiaxiu smiled.
Sheng Wanyan nodded. This was the perfect opportunity to subtly check the current market prices for bicycles. She still didn’t have the required industrial coupons, meaning she would likely have to rely on the black market to source them.
When the quitting bell finally echoed through the factory, Sheng Wanyan packed her knitting into her canvas bag and walked with Wu Jiaxiu toward the Cooperative.
