RBI1960 Chapter 14

The older girls were allowed at the table today too. They sat beside Gu Dongmei and Jiang Dazhen, with only the most basic vegetarian dishes in front of them—wild greens they had foraged from the mountain earlier that day. The chicken, fish, and other meat dishes were all placed in front of the men. Jiang Dani and the other girls didn’t dare reach for those; they quietly ate steamed buns with wild greens. Even though they didn’t get any meat, at least there were enough steamed buns to fill their stomachs today.

Sanni stared at the old hen across the table, drooling. Ever since their mom secretly let them taste meat that one time, she hadn’t been able to forget the flavor. But Old Lady Miao kept a hawk-like watch on the girls from across the table, and Sanni didn’t have the guts to sneak even a bite of chicken. All she could do was sniff the aroma of the chicken soup and pretend the bun in her mouth was chicken as she chewed.

Gu Dongmei glanced down at the baby in her arms, then looked at her daughters. Somehow, she summoned a bit of courage. While Old Lady Miao had her head down eating, Dongmei quickly slipped a few slices of cured meat onto Dani’s plate.

Cough cough—
Even though she moved fast, Old Lady Miao still caught her. She let out a few disapproving coughs to show her displeasure.

“A few little girls like them don’t deserve to eat the good stuff. The men in this house work their fingers to the bone to make money outside, and you, as their woman, don’t even think to serve your man some meat first…”

With Zhao Hong and Gu Xiashi present, Old Lady Miao couldn’t go too far with her scolding, so she just muttered angrily under her breath. Though she kept her voice low, everyone in the room could hear her loud and clear.

Gu Dongmei practically buried her face in her bowl. Years of being dominated by Old Lady Miao had left her with a deeply ingrained fear, one not easily erased—even after giving birth to a son.

Jiang Dani had just been about to share the cured meat from her bowl with her younger sisters when her chopsticks froze mid-air. She wasn’t sure if she should put the meat back in her bowl.

“What the hell, Ma? It’s a celebration! Why are you fussing over a few pieces of meat? What’s wrong with girls eating meat? They’re part of the Jiang family too, aren’t they? If you keep talking like this, I won’t be coming back again.”

Jiang Dazhen wasn’t intimidated at all. Her temper flared, and she fired back immediately. Old Lady Miao, mindful that Meng Pingchuan was present and still eyeing the gifts her daughter had brought, had no choice but to shut her mouth. She glared at the girls but didn’t say another word.

“Dani, Erni, have some fish. This is sea fish, you know. We never get to eat this around here. Thanks to your Third Aunt, we can try it today.”

Seeing how timid her nieces were, Jiang Dazhen just reached over and put the food on their plates for them.

“And this too. Come on, Sanni, have a chicken wing.”

Food in the mouth is what counts. The kids couldn’t resist such open temptation. One by one, they gave in. As for their grandmother’s inevitable scolding once their aunt left—that was their future them’s problem.

The more they ate, the darker Old Lady Miao’s face grew, her expression like thunderclouds rolling in.

“Gaa—gaga—”

Jiang Yiliu, watching his grandmother fume, burst out laughing.

“Mom! My brother’s laugh sounds like a little duck!” Meng Xiangxue shouted, as if he’d made a major discovery, pointing at Yiliu while clutching a chicken leg. His lips were greasy, and his eyes were wide with excitement.

“You sounded the same when you were little,” Jiang Dazhen said, taking the opportunity to stuff a bite of fish into his mouth to shut him up.

“Oh, my sweet little treasure,” Old Lady Miao cooed. Her anger from earlier, sparked by her daughter and granddaughters, melted away at the sight of her grandson’s smile. She was all sweetness again.

“Dad, Mom, this is a full-month gift for little Bao from me and Dazhen,” said Meng Pingchuan, pulling a stack of ration vouchers from his pocket and handing them to the old man.

“What’s this?” Old Man Jiang had never seen this kind of ticket before. It had a cow printed on it and a red stamp. Was it for buying a cow? But private livestock ownership had long been restricted. Their village, Qingshan, only had two big oxen left, both community property.

“These are milk coupons. With them, you can go to the farm and exchange them for fresh milk. That way, little Bao won’t have to go hungry.”

Yuchuan County had its dairy farm. Dozens of cows were kept there, and the milk they produced was split between the local food factory and urban residents. As long as you had an urban household registration and a baby at home, you could get one pound of fresh milk a day. But rural households like the Jiangs got nothing.

Meng Pingchuan smiled and explained, “Old Chen from my workshop had a baby recently too, but their grain supply was tight. So, he traded me some of these milk coupons for grain tickets.”

The Meng family had three official workers and Jiang Dazhen as a temp—four income earners supporting just two kids. Life was far more comfortable than most. Plus, both Meng Pingchuan and his father held high work ranks, with better pay and subsidies. They didn’t even use all the ration coupons they received every month. Workers in tighter financial situations often traded luxury items like fine grain or meat stamps in exchange for coarser grains from the Meng family.

Old Chen, like Meng, was a fifth-rank worker. But his whole family held rural registrations. He was the only one working in the city, and he had to send half his monthly pay home to support his aging parents and siblings. On top of that, he had three sons and a daughter. No wonder life was tough.

This was the reality of the time: one successful family member often had to shoulder the livelihood of an entire extended family, scraping by with coarse grains so younger siblings and nieces or nephews could eat better.

Originally, Meng Pingchuan had gotten the milk coupons to nourish his son Xiangxue. But that boy refused to drink milk no matter what, saying it tasted gamey. Every time he was forced to drink it, he screamed like a pig being slaughtered. So, when his nephew’s full-month celebration came up, Meng figured he might as well gift the unused coupons.

When Old Lady Miao heard what the vouchers were, her eyes lit up. “City folks have it good. Every kid gets this kind of thing. Not like us country people—we get nothing.”

It wasn’t like the famine years anymore. Rural folks might not eat well, but with land and mountains, even eating wild roots could get them by. City people had ration tickets but often nowhere to redeem them, and many were eager to move to the countryside.

Nowadays, having an urban household registration is the envy of all. You get food and subsidies from the government every month. If you worked in a factory, that was even better. Factory workers were highly sought-after everywhere.

“I don’t want anything else in this life,” Old Lady Miao said with a dreamy smile. “All I hope is that little Bao studies hard, gets into a vocational school, lands a good job, marries a city girl, and gives me some great-grandkids. Then I’ll die happy.”

No one in the room disagreed. Even Jiang Yiliu understood what his grandma meant—her dream was the same as most Chinese families at the time.

But times change fast. Who would’ve thought that decades later, the once-enviable iron rice bowl of factory workers would be shattered by a wave of mass layoffs?

“Dad, Mom—”

Jiang Yiliu was still lost in thoughts of the future when a few unexpected visitors interrupted.

“What are you doing here? Get out of my house!”
Old Man Jiang slammed his chopsticks down and glared at his second son’s family.

“Mom, we know we were wrong. Aiguo upset you, and the moment we got home, Dachuan gave him a good beating. You can see—his butt’s still swollen,” Fan Xiaojuan cried as she pulled down her son’s pants, revealing red and purple welts all over his chubby backside. Someone had whipped him with a cane.

“Dad, Mom, you know what kind of son I’ve been to you. Aiguo just repeated some nonsense he heard somewhere. Xiaojuan and I had no idea. We didn’t,” Jiang Dachuan sobbed, wiping his face as he peeked through his fingers at the feast on the table, resentment bubbling inside him.

All this good food should’ve been theirs. It was all the eldest son’s fault for having four daughters and then a son.

Fan Xiaojuan thought the same. The moment she saw the table, she nearly exploded with rage. When her son had his full-month celebration, the two old geezers hadn’t prepared nearly this much. So they were biased. All that affection for Aiguo and Aidang had probably been fake. The good stuff had surely gone to the eldest branch.

And Gu Dongmei—always acting like some pitiful pushover. She probably laughed at her behind her back.

Once someone puts themselves in the victim’s seat, it’s nearly impossible to pull them out. Fan Xiaojuan knew how Gu Dongmei and the girls had suffered over the years, but now that she saw herself as the one being wronged, she twisted every memory, turning even the impossible into justification for her resentment. The more she thought, the angrier she got.

“Aiguo, Aidang, kneel and apologize to your grandparents!” she barked, kicking her two sons forward.

The village was about to distribute rations. In Qingshan, food was allocated 40% by headcount and 60% by labor points. That way, households with fewer working members still got enough not to starve.

Jiang Dachuan and Fan Xiaojuan had earned pitifully few labor points in the past six months. Most of their share would be coarse grains like sweet potatoes and corn. Fine grains like wheat and rice were scarce. Before, the old couple helped them out, letting them trade coarse rations for better ones. While others ate husks, they often had white buns and rice porridge. Life had been good.

Now that support was gone, and they couldn’t stand it. Jiang Dachuan had been stewing for days. He figured the old folks must still care about the grandkids. If he apologized during the full-month celebration, maybe his father, who always cared about appearances, would forgive them.

It was a nice plan. But not everyone follows the script. And the first person to ruin it… was his precious son.