As a student from the countryside, Xu Changqing now had three long breaks a year: the winter vacation, the summer vacation (which they called the wheat harvest break), and an autumn break.
The winter break was the same in the city as in the countryside, but the wheat and autumn breaks were for the busy farming seasons. Of the three, the autumn break was the longest, lasting for about a month.
Now, with the wheat harvest break about to end, she had to go back to school. To plant a crop of autumn vegetables before then, Xu Changqing had stayed home for two days straight.
But that didn't mean she had cut herself off from the outside world. 'Counting the days,' she thought, 'a telegram from the Fang family—no, from Fang Li—should be arriving any day now.'
"It's going to rain!" a voice shouted. Xu Changqing scrambled to gather the diapers and clothes drying in the courtyard before grabbing a broom and rushing outside.
