Chapter 455

455 Half a Liquor of Rice

Yu Yan decided to go to the county’s restaurant tomorrow on New Year’s Day and order a bowl of red braised pork.

Ever since the last fight, Xu Ling and Yu Yan’s relationship had been tense. Xu Ling often secretly paid attention to Yu Yan, for fear that she would miss the opportunity to catch the chink in her armor.

When Xu Ling saw Yu Yan’s expression, she mocked, “Yu Yan, why are you snorting?! Don’t forget that a few months ago, when your parents didn’t send you money, we pitied you and our charity allowed you to last for half a month. Otherwise, would you have been able to wait until your parents sent you money? How dare you look down on us for eating these few pieces of meat? You’re so heartless!”

Xu Ling had always remembered how Yu Yan said that she was ungrateful. Because Xu Ling had also given Yu Yan half a handful of rice, she used it to mock Yu Yan whenever she had the chance recently.

!!

In early September, under everyone’s supervision, Yu Yan sold her new cotton clothes and stamps for 26 yuan and paid off her debt.

However, Yu Yan had only been here for half a year last year. Moreover, she often slacked off when Sun Wang was the village chief. Therefore, there wasn’t much food left for her at the end of the year.

Previously, Yu Yan had money, so when she ran out of food, she would take the money to buy rice from the villagers or take food stamps to the food supply shop.

However, when she was urged to pay the debt in September, she happened to be out of rice. The few yuan she had left was used on phone calls. That was her last hope, so she had to keep it no matter what.

In the end, Yu Yan spent 20 cents to buy a large bag of sweet potatoes. She ate them for three meals a day. In order to make them last longer, she only ate one steamed sweet potato per meal.

When she was working, Yu Yan often found an opportunity to slack off and conserve her energy. Although she only ate until she was so hungry that her stomach ached every day, she could still hold on.

In October, the village began harvesting. The team leader knew that Yu Yan liked to slack off, so he kept an eye on her.

During the harvest period, every family would be able to eat better food. Otherwise, their bodies wouldn’t be able to take it and they would collapse from exhaustion sooner or later. Usually, they would eat porridge for lunch, but during this period of time, they would basically eat rice. Some families even cooked meat, and those who went to the fields could get a piece or two.

However, at this moment, Yu Yan only had sweet potatoes left. Even if she ate two at noon, after holding on for a week, she fainted in the field because she was tired and hungry and was sent to the infirmary.

Yu Yan was an intellectual under the team leader Tian Jing. After this incident, she immediately went to visit her to learn more about the situation.

Yu Bing usually only paid attention to the intellectuals. Moreover, she was busy during that period of time. When she found out about the situation from the doctor, Tian Jing could only call for everyone to donate some rice to Yu Yan.

Considering that Yu Yan’s stomach was injured by hunger, Tian Jing didn’t cook hard rice. Instead, she took the rice everyone gave her and cooked a bowl of thick rice porridge. She also sent red dates to help replenish Yu Yan’s blood. She tore them and placed them in the rice porridge. After cooking them, she brought them to the infirmary for Yu Yan to drink.

Tian Jing knew that Yu Yan was stubborn and prideful, so she didn’t tell Yu Yan that this rice was donated by everyone.

In order to prevent Yu Yan from asking him for money and rice, Yao Nian had been pretending to be sick recently and often complained about being poor in front of Yu Yan. Fortunately, Yu Yan believed him.

However, this time was different from the past. Yu Yan was so hungry that she fainted. If he, her boyfriend, didn’t do anything, Yu Yan would definitely be suspicious.

The rice everyone donated helped him out, so Yao Nian wouldn’t tell Yu Yan about this.

Yu Yan had always thought that Tian Jing had given the rice to her. She thought that since Tian Jing was the team leader, she had the responsibility to take care of her, so she took it with a clear conscience and was worried that Tian Jing would want her to pay the rice back.

It wasn’t until a week later that Yu Yan found out how the rice came about after being mocked by Xu Ling.

She couldn’t take it lying down and wanted to return the rice, but Yao Nian kept the rice on the grounds that she already owed everyone a favor anyway.

However, when Yu Yan received the money from her adoptive parents, she bought a few pounds of snacks and biscuits and distributed them to everyone.

Now that she heard Xu Ling mention this again, Yu Yan felt stifled. “Xu Ling, you’re not going to let this matter rest, are you?! Didn’t I buy food for everyone later? Those things are much more expensive than that handful of rice!”