Chapter 139： Afternoon, free~

Chapter 139 Afternoon, free~

The little girl frowned, her eyes alert and curious.

Si Ningning arched her eyebrows, raised her signature smile, and lifted the bucket and waved it around: "I heard from Sanya that you have a well at home. I want to come and get a bucket of water. Can you do that?"

The pressure well is in the courtyard, and Si Ningning saw it just now.

This matter was not too excessive. Zhou Xiaocui opened the door without hesitation.

After that, Si Ningning pressed the water, and she watched from a few steps away.

Seeing that Si Ningning's hands and feet were slow and unable to pressurize the water for a long time, Zhou Xiaocui couldn't help but stepped forward, picked up the water bowl from the wooden manhole cover, poured the water inside into the pressure well, and pressed Si Ningning's hand. I quickly pressed the rocker a few times, and the water soon came up.

Zhou Xiaocui took a few steps back and said dryly with a puffed-up mouth: "We need to divert water from the pressure well."

“That’s it.” Si Ningning pursed her lips and smiled more gently, “Thank you.”

Si Ningning is good-looking. Although the materials and styles of her clothes are common, they are all kept clean. Zhou Xiaocui can clearly feel the difference between herself and Si Ningning.

However, Zhou Xiaocui is not very old and does not quite understand the difference between rural people and city people. However, based on what her mother said to her, "City people are very particular and do not want to interact with villagers." Ning Ning did not feel this feeling.

This educated youth is not only good-looking and well-spoken, he is also very gentle and easy to get along with.

Zhou Xiaocui hesitated for a moment, then finally pursed her lips and shook her head with a smile, saying to the effect that you're welcome.

Si Ningning filled a bucket of water and waved to Zhou Xiaocui with a smile before leaving. When others approached them cautiously, she took out the candy from her pocket and handed it to her just like she did to Sanya and Hegu before.

"No, I don't want it." Zhou Xiaocui stepped back and refused.

"Take it." Si Ningning smiled and pointed to the bucket, "I'm responsible for the work in the pig pen behind. If I can, I may come here to fetch water tomorrow, the day after tomorrow, and every day in the future... If you don't think I'm disturbing you, you can give me this candy Take it and eat it, okay?”

Fetching water is not a big deal. Some people in the team do not have wells at home, and they will fetch water from neighbors who have wells. Zhou Xiaocui hesitated to accept the candy. When Si Ningning left with satisfaction, she called out to the people again: "You, wait a minute!"

Si Ningning paused, Zhou Xiaocui put the candy in his pocket, quickly turned to the well, grabbed two oranges from the adjacent orange tree and handed them to Si Ningning, "My mother won't let me take other people's things for free. , these oranges are for you.”

The little girl looked firm and stubborn. Si Ningning's laughter was stuck in her throat, "Why don't you get this for nothing?" She smiled helplessly and took the two oranges that were as green as avocados, "Then I have to thank you. I haven’t asked my little comrade what your name is yet.”

“Zhou, my name is Zhou Xiaocui.”

“Okay, Comrade Zhou Xiaocui.” Si Ningning put her fist to her lips and laughed softly, then waved for a while and said, “Comrade Zhou Xiaocui, see you tomorrow.”

"Um!"

Children on the team are usually called "girls" and "boys", but no one would ever call these half-grown children "comrades".

Zhou Xiaocui held her face in her hands and laughed twice, full of joy.

She must be the first little comrade in the third team!

Thinking about it, Zhou Xiaocui glanced towards the alley again. The female educated youth had already walked around the corner and was out of sight.

Zhou Xiaocui stood at the door of the courtyard and looked around a few more times. After a while, she turned around and happily entered the courtyard.

On the other side, Si Ningning carried water back to the pig pen, took out some pig grass from the space, and kept a few pigs in a corner to eat without causing trouble.

She took out the hoe, pulled out all the feces, rotten vegetable stems, and vegetable leaves hidden in the corners of the pig pen, pushed them into the ditch, and finally scraped them hard with the broom head.

Although the pig pen is made of mud, it is very firmly stepped on and its cohesion is comparable to solidified cement. When Si Ningning scraped away the dirt, he only brought up a small amount of soil.

After washing with water, layers of black water flowed into the ditch with residue. There were too many things accumulated in the ditch, and it was blocked and could not flow at all.

After flushing a bucket of water, Si Ningning noticed this situation. She immediately pursed her lips and looked around. Seeing no one else, she walked into the space with the bucket. The bucket was more or less stained with feces and mud, so Si Ningning gave up. Enter the house, fill a bucket of water directly in the creek next to the vegetable field, and then step out of the space.

After repeating this process several times, the garbage accumulated in the ditch was finally washed away by the water and flowed all the way to the septic tank.

There is water in space. The reason why Si Ningning went to Zhou's house in a big way was because he considered that a certain situation would happen.

If anyone finds trouble in the future, the Zhou family, or Zhou Xiaocui, will be her "witnesses".

Si Ningning carefully flushed the pig pen several times. During this period, some pigs came over to cause trouble after eating pig grass, but she brushed them aside with a sweep.

After all corners of the pig pen were cleaned up, Si Ningning turned his attention to a few pigs.

Each pig is not only ugly, but its original white and pink skin is so dirty that it has been directly changed into a different breed. It is even more flowery than the flower girl in the movie "Hands Up".

Si Ningning poured water on the pigs. It was a hot day and watering could cool down the pigs. The pigs were quite cooperative. Later, when she rubbed the pigs with the head of the broom dipped in water, they all jumped up and down... After finishing brushing, Si Ningning was already covered in sweat. She was so exhausted that half her life was gone.

But this is just cleaning up the pigs and pig pens. Si Ningning has other things to deal with.

Tightening the space in the bucket, Si Ningning climbed out of the pig pen and headed straight for the manure tank.

The problem of pig manure, which has been a headache for a long time, is finally being solved.

Si Ningning made seven or eight trips in and out of the space, wearing a mask, rubber gloves, and using a household trash can to transport all the pig manure accumulated in the space for three or four days, and pushed it into the manure storage tank.

The space is not without large trash cans, but the septic tank is covered tightly. If she opens it, the smell will be great, and others will definitely notice traces of being disturbed later.

So, we can only rely on "ditches" to push the transported pig manure into the manure storage tank in stages.

In order to remove the traces, Si Ningning flushed half a bucket of water before giving up. After such busy work, she didn’t know if she smelled like pig feces, but the rancid smell was there anyway.

Seeing that it was still early, it was not time to get off work, and no one would come here, Si Ningning casually found a blind spot in his field of vision and squatted down to enter the space.

Since her aunt was not gone, she couldn't take a bubble bath for a thorough SPA treatment, so Si Ningning took a shower, put a mask on her face, put a thick mask on her hands, and put on a pair of thin disposable plastic gloves. Just slumped comfortably on the sofa in the living room of the villa, waiting for the automatic reminder on the phone on the table so that I could find some space to get busy.

The rest of the days were like this.

However, it is worth mentioning that Zhao Hongbing was very efficient in doing things. As he said, he went to the brigade the same day Wu Yong moved into his house. Two days later, the brigade captain Luo Daqing personally came and took Wu Yong away.

There were eight educated youths in the team, and suddenly one was missing. The educated youths knew the cause and effect, but the commune members did not know what was going on.     For a while, the members of the society were talking about it and had different opinions.

Some people said that Wu Yong had committed a crime, and some speculated that Wu Yong had a strong background and that his family in the city had some connections to get him back.

Each one has different opinions. Sometimes when educated youths are walking on the ridge in the fields to and from work, they will be stopped by commune members and asked, what is going on?

Educated youths have long been in trouble and cannot answer any questions related to Wu Yong clearly.

Over time, this matter was submerged in the rush of farming, and no one cared about it since then.

The monthly seasoning distribution was originally divided into one group between Wu Yong and Li Lingyuan. After Wu Yong left, it became a group between Song Shuhan and Li Lingyuan. It can be said that Wu Yong's departure did not bring much change to the educated youth spot.

If we really want to talk about changes, then probably the only change is Si Ningning.

Si Ningning goes to the pig pen twice every day in the morning and afternoon, and her work is leisurely.

Other educated youth have to go to the fields, either to harvest wheat or rice, or to harvest cash crops such as cotton. The workload is heavy and very hard.

Si Ningning couldn't stand it and took the initiative to take over the task of ordering three meals a day for the educated youth, but other than that, she would not interfere in anything else.

Si Ningning doesn’t want to experience that kind of situation where someone gives help out of good intentions but is questioned or even humiliated.

Conflicts and inner intentions collided. Perhaps there was a step or action that had to be done right, or perhaps it was done too much. Everyone noticed Si Ningning's deliberate alienation.

Everyone didn't show off on their faces, but in fact they were hiding this matter in their hearts. It was just that they carried heavy farm work on their shoulders every day, and they really didn't know how to resolve Si Ningning's alienation, so they all chose "I don't know." ".

Over time, the atmosphere in the educated youth spot became increasingly strange, but it did not last long.

Things took a turn for the better on a breezy afternoon one day, when most of the educated youth were resting. Only Si Ningning stayed awake, squatting in the vegetable patch at the door, cleaning the weeds from the tiny radish seedlings with **** together.

"Hey, I'm busy! Si Zhiqing." Chen Lianmi came to visit at this time.

She is carrying a teapot in her left hand, and the edge of a bamboo basket in her right hand, with her right hip pressing against the other side of the basket.

Seeing Si Ningning looking over, Chen Lianmi smiled and said, "You don't have a kettle here yet, right? I picked one up this morning. It's a bit old, so don't dislike it."

As he spoke, Chen Lianmi raised the elephant trunk pot in Si Ningning's direction.

Si Ningning clapped her hands, put a straw hat on her head and quickly stood up to take it, "Thank you, Auntie. When the weather just got hot some time ago, you guys even offered to buy one. If you haven't been busy recently, the matter will be over. ”

The elephant trunk pot is silver-grey and made of aluminum. It is covered with a lot of dust and tea stains, and there are scratches from scratches on it. It should be caused by cleaning it vigorously, but it cannot be washed away.

The top handle has also been damaged and has now been replaced by two strands of twisted iron wire. Perhaps to avoid burning your hands, a rag strip was carefully wrapped around the place where you usually lift and hold it. Judging from the traces, it was newly wrapped.

Si Ningning took a closer look and saw that there were traces of pliers on the twisted wire handle, and there was no rust at all on the edge.

With just these two glances, Si Ningning knew that all the damaged parts of the teapot had been newly repaired.

For a moment, she sighed softly, with more or less emotion in her tone, "Thank you, Auntie. Thank you and the captain for taking care of us. Otherwise, sometimes we really don't know what to do."

"How old are you, why are you so old-fashioned?" Chen Lianmi smiled, arched her hips and let Si Ningning look at the bamboo basket, "The commune provides welfare, and the cadres' families share some lotus roots. My two sons are not at home. , I can’t hold back the lotus root, so I’ll bring some for you to try.”

After saying that, he pretended to squint his eyes and look at Si Ningning in anger, "You've been standing here for a long time, why don't you bring a horse over for me to sit on?"

Si Ningning's "What's wrong with this?" stuck in her throat, and a look of embarrassment flashed across her pretty face that was flushed with heat. She hurriedly entered the room and put down the teapot. She took out two small horses and placed them at the door. She and Chen Lianmi sat down on one each. .

The innermost kitchen does not have a back door, but the windows are wide open. The bamboo forest behind the house is rustling, and the breeze passes through the room. It is cool and comfortable, not to mention very comfortable.

The Chen Lian rice basket contains five sections of lotus roots and some tomatoes of different sizes, all of which have been washed.

Si Ningning never understood before. Sometimes when reading books or novels, people always compared the arms of children and babies to lotus roots. But now that she saw the lotus roots in the basket, she understood.

The lotus roots in this season have not yet condensed into lotus root powder, which is very different from the lotus roots in late autumn and winter. They are plump, white and tender, and just looking at them makes you feel happy.

This is just a lotus root. If it were really a child's arm, white, pink and plump, wouldn't it be more pleasing?

Si Ningning thought about it and felt more and more that this description was very appropriate.

 Chen Lianmi saw that she had been staring at the lotus roots, she lowered her head and glanced twice, then picked out one of the lotus and handed it to Si Ningning, "Try it."

“Ah? Auntie, this…”

“The lotus roots in this season are delicious when eaten raw. Keep the ones in the basket for cooking at night. This is specially given to you by my aunt.” Chen Lianmi smiled kindly, pinched the lotus roots and passed them forward.

Si Ningning was a little embarrassed, but she still took it.

Hearing that Chen Lianmi said it could be eaten raw, Si Ningning didn't peel it, so he took a small tentative bite on the edge. There was a small "click" and a sweet taste hit his mouth.

Si Ningning's eyes suddenly lit up, "It's crunchy and sweet, not like lotus root, but like eating fruit!"

Speaking, he took another bite. This one was much bigger than the last one.

“Young lotus roots are best eaten raw, and old lotus roots are best stewed in soup.” Chen Lianmi happily sat aside to enjoy the cool air, “Is there such a thing in the city?”

Si Ningning thought for a while and said: "There are lotus root sellers in the New Year market. They don't charge for tickets, but the quality is not very good."

"The lotus roots in winter have lotus root starch. You can make soup, but they taste bad when eaten raw." Chen Lianmi said, and then added: "You can't wash the mud on the lotus roots in winter. If you wash them, they will rot... The ones on the market It won’t work if the lotus root is not washed, and the mud will also be weighed.”

“That’s the truth.”

The bamboo forest swayed back and forth, and in front of the Uwa red brick wooden door, a middle-aged woman and a cute girl sat on the left and right.

Occasionally, the girl lowered her head to take a bite of the white and tender lotus root. Until one section of lotus root was eaten, the girl puffed out her chest and burped in an inconspicuous way. Before she could say "I'm full", the middle-aged woman squeezed two more tomatoes. Passed it over...

(End of this chapter)