Chapter 544: Gossip-for-Survival System (43)

Consequently, Widow Guo began asking a matchmaker to scout for potential partners in the surrounding households.

Zheng Guangrong and his wife were also somewhat envious; they only had this one daughter, and during the years when her health was not very good, they had even entertained the idea of taking in a live-in son-in-law.

But how many good live-in sons-in-law could there be? It was always either because the family was too poor and their circumstances were too dire, or the person himself was a good-for-nothing whom his own family no longer wanted to deal with. Among those with good circumstances and promising prospects, who would be willing to marry into a wife's family?

Now, seeing that Xie Yang had married a good partner—a man who not only had good circumstances but also lived nearby, making visits to her maiden home as easy as dropping by a neighbor's—they could not help but feel a bit moved.

However, they were not as anxious as Widow Guo.

After all, their daughter was still young, so they could scout around in secret first.

Xie Yang was very satisfied with her married life.

Aside from the change in where she slept, her life during the day had not really changed at all.

Even at night, she slept at the Xie Family on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, and returned to the marital home on Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays.

This was to avoid the old lady being too exhausted from looking after her grandson alone.

Additionally, she needed time to make clothes for the whole family.

Especially for her little cousin, who had grown like a weed since his first birthday; the clothes she finished would be too short in less than two months.

Fortunately, she had left a bit of extra fabric when making them, so by letting out the seams, they could be worn for another two or three months.

In this way, she stayed overnight at the Xie Family at least three days a week.

It could be considered a small vacation for herself. Otherwise, with a world for two every single day, he might be satisfied, but she could not handle it.

Other than that, there really was no change.

On the contrary, there was now someone to help her share the household chores.

To say nothing else, once autumn arrived, before she even thought about preparing coal and firewood for the winter, he had already borrowed a three-wheeled flatbed cart, hauled them to the Dazayuan trip by trip, and stacked them neatly into the cellar.

This year, with his share of Coal Coupons added in, the Dazayuan cellar could not hold it all, so he even hired a professional craftsman to dig a small cellar under their own storage room, separate from the communal large cellar, with the entrance installed inside the storage room.

In this way, besides Coal Balls and firewood, they could also store other miscellaneous supplies.

Seeing a dignified Bureau Chief either rolling up his sleeves to move Coal Balls in and out, pressing honeycomb briquettes, or sitting in the Courtyard chopping firewood with a loud "Clang! Clang!", not to mention Widow Guo and the others looking for sons-in-law, even the elderly couple Grandpa Feng, whose children had long since married and established their own families, were green with envy.

Even their own biological children were not as filial as Gu Yu'an, the son-in-law.

It was fine not to compare, but once compared, those unfilial sons and daughters of the Feng family were truly an eyesore.

……

Before winter set in, Xie Yang once again improved the existing lathes at the factory and helped the factory secure another foreign exchange order.

The Factory Director did not hesitate and gave her a recommendation form for the senior Engineer examination; once she passed, she could receive a position salary of 128 yuan.

Her allowances and bonuses would also rise accordingly.

Xie Yang was quite satisfied with this.

It was not in vain that she had gone into debt for points to buy a set of interstellar Engineer self-study tutorials and studied them in her spare time; she saw the return on her investment.

"Xiao Xie," Factory Director Yang said, busy pouring tea and instructing his secretary to cut fruit, as he invited Xie Yang to sit down. "Originally, we leaders discussed allocating a house to you as a benefit, but I heard that your spouse's unit has already started a project for collective housing construction?"

"Yes," Xie Yang replied after taking a sip of tea. "They started building three months ago; if things go fast, we can move in before next summer."

There was no such thing as private developers yet; the construction of Family Buildings by various units was carried out by construction teams under the Municipal Construction Bureau. They were fast and efficient, completing one building a month, and a residential compound of six or seven buildings would be finished in half a year.

Spending another month or two on interior wall painting and landscaping, they could move in within eight months. This efficiency was faster than a woman from pregnancy to childbirth.

Factory Director Yang rubbed his hands together: "I see. Then, would you like to exchange the reward for something else?"

Xie Yang caught the unspoken meaning in his words: "Factory Director, please feel free to speak plainly."

Factory Director Yang chuckled twice: "It's like this: I have a nephew who just transferred to our factory not long ago, but he's not young anymore. His family found him a match, and the woman's family requires the 'three rounds and one sound' plus an independent public apartment. You know how tight housing is in the factory; the one originally intended to be awarded to you was actually given up by Secretary Liang. If you don't have much need for the house, look..."

Xie Yang understood immediately.

However, she was indeed not very interested in the housing allocated by the Mechanical Factory.

The Tube Building built in the early sixties was not only old, but the toilets and kitchens were at the ends of the hallway, making daily life quite inconvenient.

There was no need for her to occupy a public apartment and wrong herself by moving into a Tube Building when she had a spacious courtyard to live in.

She immediately stated that she did not want the house and was willing to give it to someone who needed it more.

As for the reward, she had no specific requests; the factory could give whatever they saw fit.

"Factory Director, I didn't improve the lathes for the sake of a reward; it is what I should do as an Engineer."

Upon hearing this, Factory Director Yang was so moved that his eyes grew moist.

How high the consciousness of Comrade Xiao Xie was!

If every worker in the factory were as selfless and great as Comrade Xiao Xie, the Mechanical Factory would be built into an even better place!

But even if Comrade Xiao Xie did not care about the reward, the factory could not treat her unfairly.

A few days later, the factory administration held another commendation meeting for Xie Yang, awarding her a certificate, a bonus, and prizes, while simultaneously appointing her as Deputy Director of the Technical Department.

Those who did not know the inside story looked at Xie Yang with envy and jealousy.

Only a few insiders knew: this was a position rank exchanged for the housing benefit; it was hard to say whether she had gained or lost.

Only the person involved, Xie Yang, did not care.

As long as her salary could support a relatively comfortable life, she would just treat it as retirement in this plane.

……

On the day she received her senior Engineer certificate, the public apartment built by Gu Yu'an's unit through collective funding was also allocated.

Gu Yu'an's rank, as expected, earned him a three-bedroom apartment of over eighty square meters.

One had received a promotion and a salary raise, and the other had been allocated a house.

It was truly a double blessing!

Although they had paid for the house out of their own pockets, how much was the construction cost anyway?

Once it could be freely traded in a few years, this apartment could be resold for a profit.

If they waited a few more years for demolition and relocation, given this location, exchanging it for three or four commercial apartments of the same size would be a conservative estimate.

In short, it is absolutely a deal where one gains without losing.

The apartment Gu Yu'an was allocated is located on the third floor of the building with the best view in the residential complex.

In front is a small park for children to play in, featuring parallel bars, a seesaw, and a slide shaped like an elephant carved from stone.

Standing on the south balcony, one can have an unobstructed view of the children playing in the park.

The north balcony is connected to the kitchen and the bathroom.

The bathroom has a squat toilet and is too small for a bathtub, but a shower can be installed.

Taking a shower is certainly more satisfying than in the old house.

Xie Yang and Gu Yu'an discussed renovating both south-facing rooms into bedrooms; one would be their master bedroom, and the other would be a guest room reserved for Grandma Xie and Xiao Shitou.

The guest room is not very large and cannot fit two beds, so they ordered a custom bunk bed, with a 1.5-meter wide bed on the bottom and a 1.1-meter wide bed on the top.

For the next few years, Xiao Shitou will sleep on the bottom bunk with Grandma Xie, and he will move to the top bunk once he starts elementary school.

The north-facing room is set up as a study, with two desks pushed together to form one large office table; after dinner, Gu Yu'an reads documents at one end, and Xie Yang reads books or draws blueprints at the other, with two desk lamps in the middle, undisturbed by each other yet incredibly cozy.