Reborn in 1977

Chapter 4: Do Not Disturb, I'm in '77

Before long, the girl came over, placed the ceramic bowl emitting a strong medicinal scent on the table, and said softly with her head lowered, "This is your medicine."

Chen Fan looked at her, then at the medicine, and inexplicably had a sense of déjà vu, like, "Brother, it's time for your medicine!"

Seeing Chen Fan didn't move, the girl explained softly, "This was prescribed by Doctor Zhang from the team. He said you have cold in your body and must drink the medicine. You had a high fever last night, and it only broke after drinking this."

Chen Fan reacted and responded, "Oh, thank you."

He picked up the bowl and took a sip. The temperature was just right, obviously cooled in the kitchen before being brought over. She's a thoughtful person.

Then he closed his eyes and gulped it down.

After drinking it, the expression on his face was completely distorted, a stream of bitterness rising straight from his stomach.

Seeing the girl pick up the bowl to leave, he quickly asked, "Hello, may I ask your name?"

The girl stopped, lowered her head, and said, "My name is Jiang Lili, Jiang as in ginger. You can call me Xiao Jiang."

She's quite a pretty girl, although a bit thin, but not to the point of always lowering her head, right?

Chen Fan smiled, enduring the bitterness in his stomach, and put on a kind smile. Then, imitating the tone of old TV dramas, he asked, "Comrade Jiang Lili, hello. May I ask if there's a calendar here? I want to check the date and see if I can remember anything."

Jiang Lili glanced at him, then lowered her head again, "Yes, I'll go get it for you."

Saying that, she walked out.

She returned in less than two minutes, handing him a calendar with some pages torn off, and said with a blushing face, "The previous ones were torn off. The earliest one is today's."

Chen Fan said "Thank you," took it, and his eyes went wide.

January 20, 1977, the second day of the twelfth lunar month, Great Cold.

So, I'm in '77?

What is the concept of '77?

The lively sports meet had just passed, and the great and vigorous era was about to arrive. It was a period of transition, of changing winds.

However, the afterglow of the sports meet remained, and the warm spring breeze had not yet arrived. The living habits and ideological understanding of the broad masses of people were not much different from the previous ten years, so it was also an era where one needed to shrink their neck and try hard to survive.

In terms of life, you needed tickets to buy things, and even with tickets, you couldn't necessarily buy them. You needed a letter of introduction to go out, and even with a letter, you couldn't go anywhere you wanted. You could only go to do what was specified on the letter of introduction... …

Chen Fan sat blankly on the chair, his mind a mess, not even noticing Jiang Lili quietly leaving.

Even when he heard someone calling him, he just replied,

"Leave me alone."

… …

On the other side, Team Leader Yang relayed Zhu Public Security's analysis to the other two leaders in the team, and also shared his own thoughts:

"My guess is similar to what Zhu Public Security said. Although this kid is a bit tall, he looks like he's only 15 or 16 years old. He also looks gentle and kind, and is probably not a bad person. It's fate to run into him. As the old saying goes, 'Help someone to the end, see a Buddha to the West,' so let's arrange for him to stay at the educated youth point first. The food rations will come from the team's account first, and we'll make it up later when we find his family. What do you think?"

Accountant Liu looked at Custodian Huang, "I have no objection."

Custodian Huang glared at him, "Why are you looking at me? It's a matter of life and death, how could I have any objections?"

Accountant Liu scoffed, "With your personality of splitting a penny in half, it's like taking your life to get a cent from you. Now that there's an extra person's food ration, aren't you going to hang yourself?"

Custodian Huang glared, "What 'taking my life'? That's the public's money. There can't be a single cent of error. Everyone trusts me to manage the accounts, so I have to be responsible. But for legitimate expenses, as long as they're reasonable and everyone agrees, have I ever given a cent less?!"

Team Leader Yang knocked on the table with his pipe, playing peacemaker for the Nth time, "Alright, alright, you two argue every time you meet, what's there to argue about?"

After a pause, he added, "Since you both agree, then let's settle it like this. Okay, you two express yourselves a bit."

Accountant Liu and Custodian Huang looked at him together, "Express what?"

Team Leader Yang took out another ball of tobacco and filled his pipe, sighing, "This kid only has three pieces of clothing on him, one of which is shorts. He's wearing Yang Jihong's jacket right now. The cotton quilt on the bed was also taken from my house. It was just renovated two months ago, the lining and cover are new fabric. I'll just give it to him, and I'll find him a new pair of shoes later."

Saying that, he looked up at the two people who were pretending to be dead, "What's wrong, can't you understand what I'm saying?"

There was a reason why he brought these two together. The production team leader receives 300 work points each year, the accountant and custodian each receive 280 work points, and the work recorder receives 200 work points.

Although there was a bumper harvest this year and everyone's life was much better, these things couldn't be taken from the common people. Since they were team cadres, they had to show initiative and contribute when necessary.

Besides, if they could find the person's family, maybe they could even get some money back!

Accountant Liu glanced at Custodian Huang, straightened his back, and cleared his throat, "Well, he's almost 1.8 meters tall, my family doesn't have clothes of that size."

Custodian Huang gritted his teeth, raised his head, and said, "There are still more than two pounds of cotton left over from the summer. I'll take out half of it, and take apart two old clothes to make him a new cotton-padded jacket, cotton-padded pants, and a pair of cotton shoes."

Accountant Liu looked at him in surprise, "Wow, an iron tree is blooming?!"

Custodian Huang rolled his eyes, "I've said it eight hundred times, I'm thrifty, not stingy."

Now that the two giants had invested heavily, Accountant Liu felt like he was being roasted on a fire. After pondering for two seconds, he gritted his teeth and said, "Okay, no matter what, I'll get him two sets of clothes."

Custodian Huang looked at him with a smile that wasn't a smile, "Don't let them be patches on patches."

Accountant Liu glared at him hatefully, "I'll go to the commune to buy fabric and have my wife make him new clothes!"

If this iron rooster hadn't suddenly plucked its feathers, he wouldn't have had to bleed so much. Wouldn't it have been enough to just find some old clothes to fob him off? It's like adding dowry for a daughter getting married, what a loss!

Team Leader Yang continued to smooth things over, "Ahem, there's no need to buy new fabric. See if there are any suitable old clothes at home, take them apart, boil them, and then piece them together. That should work."

Hearing him say that, Accountant Liu's face looked a little better, and he said, "Then make one set, and alter one set, so there's something to change into."

Then he smiled at Team Leader Yang, "It's also thanks to your leadership this year that the team had a bumper harvest. One work point is worth 65 cents, so we have some extra money in hand. If it was like Ganjia Village, where one work point is only worth 18 cents, we wouldn't be able to earn enough for food rations, let alone buy fabric."

Team Leader Yang didn't look proud, and waved his hand, "Ganjia Village also suffered from flooding, which submerged a lot of land. Otherwise, even if it's not much, three or four mao for a workday is still possible. Let's just talk about this behind closed doors, don't mention it outside."

Accountant Liu nodded repeatedly and smiled, "Of course I know that, I'm not stupid."

Custodian Huang smiled mysteriously on the opposite side, You're not stupid? You were provoked by me and wanted to go buy fabric, who's stupid if you're not?

Team Leader Yang stood up and waved his hand, "The matter is settled, let's go talk to the kid."

The three of them came out and walked towards Chen Fan's room. When they entered, they saw the kid looking like he'd lost his soul, not even seeing people come in, just sitting there in a daze.

Team Leader Yang looked around, approached Chen Fan, and called softly, "Chen, Chen Fan?"

Chen Fan's eyes had no focus, not even looking at him, he just said, "Leave me alone."