"Bang, bang, bang—"
"What time do you think it is? Still hiding in there?"
"You lazy, useless girl! All day long you don't cook, don't work. Think you've grown wings now? Open this door right now!"
Outside, the old woman kept pounding on the wooden door like she meant to break it down.
Inside, Evelyn Stanton felt like her skull was splitting in two.
Half-awake, she frowned and thought, Who the hell is smashing the door this early?
It's barely morning. Are people not allowed to sleep anymore?
"Get lost! Quit bugging me, I'm sleeping!"
By instinct, she reached for her phone, wanting to check the time.
The second her hand touched the bedding, she woke up for real.
Where had her soft memory pillow gone?
And what was this torn cotton cover under her hand?
She jerked upright at once.
The walls around her were peeling and mottled. Bare wooden beams crossed overhead, and a basket hung from one of them.
The window was pasted over with old newspaper.
Under her wasn't a bed at all, but a brick kang.
She'd slept on that hard slab all night, and now her whole body felt stiff.
The mat had pressed red lines all over her skin, itchy and numb at the same time.
What was going on?
What era was this? Who still washed their face with an enamel basin?
And that wooden washstand too...
"Bang, bang, bang—"
The knocking started again.
"You lazy good-for-nothing, get up already! What, did you die in there?"
That shrill voice made her headache worse. She clutched her head and shook it.
Then, all at once, a flood of memories forced its way into her mind.
She had transmigrated.
Straight into the 1970s.
The original owner of this body was also called Evelyn Stanton, a sent-down educated youth.
The day the new youths arrived, the production team had put together a little welcome gathering. Someone brought homemade rice wine, and after just one cup, the original Evelyn got dead drunk.
In the middle of the night, she got up to go to the latrine, but went the wrong way and happened to run into a man who wasn't in his right mind either.
That man was Vincent Caldwell, the only truly promising young man in Ping'an Brigade.
He joined the army right after finishing high school at eighteen, and by twenty-four he'd already made it to deputy regiment commander.
This time, his mother had lied and said she was sick, sending a telegram to trick him back from the army for a family visit.
She wanted him to marry Chen Chunxia, the niece of her sister-in-law from her maiden family.
The girl taught at the commune school and made twenty-five yuan a month. Once she married in, that salary would go straight into his mother's hands.
As for what Chen Chunxia looked like...
Her face was broad and round, and her eyes were so narrow they were nearly a line.
Vincent Caldwell wasn't the type to fuss too much over looks, but at the very least, he'd have to be able to stand looking at her.
He was already furious enough about being drugged in the first place, and he truly couldn't bring himself to want that woman.
He forced himself up, kicked the door open, and rushed outside—right into the drunken Evelyn Stanton, who had wandered the wrong way.
The original Evelyn had neat, pretty features, and after drinking, her eyes were hazy and soft.
Vincent's heart thudded hard, like something had struck him right in the chest.
The drug was taking hold. He couldn't hold out any longer.