"Vivienne, get up now. The food's gone cold." A woman’s slightly hoarse voice came from beside the bed.
So annoying. Vivienne Shelton frowned a little, irritated, and turned over toward the wall. She tugged the quilt up with one hand and buried her head under it.
Mrs. Norwood called her several times. Seeing that this daughter-in-law only rolled over and didn’t even bother to open her eyes, she couldn’t help letting out a sigh.
She set the bowl and chopsticks in her hands on the little stool by the bed, then stepped closer and patted Vivienne lightly on the shoulder.
"Vivienne, the meal’s already set out. Hurry up and eat."
After being urged twice in a row, Vivienne’s morning temper shot up on the spot.
She flung the quilt aside and sat up all at once, wanting to see which fool had no sense at all.
Vivienne forced her heavy eyelids open, her gaze still loose and unfocused.
The first thing she saw was a dingy old quilt, gray and ugly, with two or three patches sewn onto the cover. It looked shabby beyond words.
At the foot of the bed stood an old wooden wardrobe. Against the wall on the right was a desk, and on it sat a few yellowed books and a kerosene lamp. The more she looked, the more wrong it all felt.
What really made her scalp tighten was the strange woman standing by the bed, around fifty years old, dressed in a dark blue old-style jacket and trousers, staring straight at her.
In an instant, all of Vivienne’s sleepiness vanished. She clearly remembered falling asleep last night on a soft six-foot bed, so how had she opened her eyes and ended up here?
"This has to be a dream." Vivienne raised a hand and slapped her own cheek, trying to wake herself up.
Right after that, she reached down and pinched her thigh hard. A sharp pain shot through her. "Ow... that hurts."
Seeing her second daughter-in-law sit there looking dazed and foolish, Mrs. Norwood couldn’t help thinking to herself: Don’t tell me that fall yesterday knocked something loose in her head?
She felt a little uneasy, and even her tone turned careful. "Vivienne, I left your food for you. Remember to eat it while it’s hot. I’ve got to head out to work first."
Only then did Vivienne come back to herself a bit. She hurriedly nodded at her, taking it as an answer.
So her brain probably wasn’t broken after all. Once Mrs. Norwood saw the second daughter-in-law respond, the worry hanging in her chest finally eased. She turned and walked out of the room, pulling the door shut on her way out.
It was the busy farming season now. If she got there late, work points would be deducted. Mrs. Norwood didn’t dare delay and hurried off toward the rice fields.
The moment Mrs. Norwood left, Vivienne sat there dumbly on the edge of the bed, her mind in a complete mess.
She had only gone to sleep for a bit, so how had things turned out like this the moment she opened her eyes? Everything around her was strange, not one thing familiar.
She lifted a hand and thumped her head hard a few times. There was only one thought in her mind: what on earth was going on?
A sharp, drilling pain suddenly ripped through her skull. Right after that, pieces of memory that clearly did not belong to her came flooding into her head in waves, fast and unstoppable.
The pain dragged on for a full ten minutes. By the time it finally eased, Vivienne Shelton had more or less sorted out what had happened.
She had transmigrated, straight into the year 1970 in a parallel world.
This place was called Ningjia Village. The original owner of this body had exactly the same name as hers, Vivienne Shelton, and this year she was twenty-two.
But their fates were nothing alike. The original Vivienne had long since married and even had a son, Leo Norwood, just two years and eight months old.
Thinking of that, Vivienne Shelton could not help pressing a hand to her forehead and letting out a long sigh. Fine, if she had transmigrated, then so be it. But one husband and one child dropped on her head like this? That truly was beyond anything she had expected.
The original owner had been the Shen family’s first daughter, and the only one at that. She had been born pretty as a doll, and her family had doted on her, spoiled her, guarded her like the apple of their eye.
Randall Shelton and Mrs. Shelton had even gritted their teeth and supported her all the way through high school. In all the nearby villages, that was no common thing. Among girls, very few had managed to get a high school diploma.