Chapter 36: New Neighbors

The City, with its bustling streets, dazzling neon lights, and towering skyscrapers, is part of its essence.

Beyond the glamour, the city also has overflowing trash in the sewers, scurrying cockroaches and rats, homeless people living under bridges, workers crammed into slums, all of which are also part of the City.

Eighteen-year-old Wang Jiexiang left her hometown and came to the big city to work.

The only person she knew here was her childhood friend, Jiang Bingbing. With a torn piece of paper in hand, Wang Jiexiang finally found the barbershop where Jiang Bingbing worked after a few twists and turns. The two hadn’t seen each other in years. Wang Jiexiang immediately recognized Jiang Bingbing, but Jiang Bingbing didn’t quite recognize her.

Wang Jiexiang sat outside the barbershop until closing time. After work, Jiang Bingbing went with her to a food stall.

After a few drinks, Jiang Bingbing complained: she washed people’s hair every day, her hands were wrinkled from the water, and she barely earned any wages. She lived with eight people in a small apartment, and the place stank of sweat and rotten smells. Others took up her space, and it was a struggle just to find a place to sleep.

As she listened, Wang Jiexiang caught the underlying message.

She was struggling too, and couldn’t help her.

After dinner, Jiang Bingbing handed her a hundred yuan and suggested she stay in a hotel. Wang Jiexiang refused to take it.

With the three hundred yuan she had secretly taken from her grandmother, Wang Jiexiang went to inquire at a hotel.

The hotel cost thirty yuan a day, but she couldn’t bring herself to spend it. That night, she spent the night under a bridge, and the next day, she decided to rent a small room in a village in the city.

The room was shabby and cost two hundred and fifty yuan a month. The landlord took pity on her and didn’t ask for a deposit.

There was no way she could return to her hometown, so Wang Jiexiang began looking for work. After a full week of searching, she finally found a job selling oil at a supermarket.

After settling down, she worked hard, and after each shift, she returned to her small room, finally getting a breather.

Wang Jiexiang’s first impression of the City was that it was too cold in winter.

Her room was just a single room with shared bathrooms and showers. To wash her hair, do laundry, or heat water, she had to rely on a tap outside the room, and even that tap was shared by several people.

The hot water in the shared bathroom was limited, and Wang Jiexiang wasn’t used to going there. Unless she was showering, she usually used the cold water from the tap. In winter, when she came home to wash her hair, she would squat next to the tap, rinsing her hair with cold water while crying out in pain.

Work was equally cold.

The supermarket hired her because a peanut oil producer needed promotion. In the freezing cold, Wang Jiexiang stood by a temporary sales tent outside the supermarket, working all day long.

There were two salespeople selling oil. Besides her, the other was a lady named Xu, who was originally a supermarket employee.

According to the leader’s arrangement, the two of them took turns selling oil in the tent, but Xu, familiar with the supermarket’s inner workings, took charge of sales inside the store, while Wang Jiexiang worked outside.

To help sell more oil, Xu shared some sales tips with her: they could stock up on freebies from the manufacturer, and if customers didn’t ask for them, they didn’t have to give them out. For tough customers, she could give more freebies to build a good relationship.

Wang Jiexiang listened and took it all in.

But every time a customer bought oil, and she thought about hiding a freebie, she felt guilty, like she was taking advantage of them. In the end, even if the customer didn’t know about the freebie, she would give it to them anyway.

As a new salesperson, Wang Jiexiang’s oil sales were pretty good.

She used a small megaphone, making up her own slogans for the peanut oil.

“Don’t miss out, big promotion on peanut oil!”

“Peanut oil, delicious and oily, stir-fry or deep-fry, the more oil, the better the flavor.”

“Peanut oil, buy one, get a big promotion!”

Her Mandarin had a strong accent, and even if passersby didn’t buy oil, they were attracted by her shouting. Some smiled at her, some rolled their eyes, feeling embarrassed for her.

Wang Jiexiang was oblivious to her accent and fearless.

She didn’t care about people’s reactions. She only knew: she could sell oil, she had a job, and she could survive.

Xu, seeing how Wang Jiexiang could still stand outside all day in the cold wind, couldn’t help but sigh.

“Youth is great. I wouldn’t be able to handle this if I were out there all day.”

Upon hearing this, Wang Jiexiang smiled but didn’t say much.

The oil sales lasted for over two weeks. A small incident involving a freebie caused a conflict between her and Xu.

One day, near closing time, Wang Jiexiang was packing up the tent when a male customer came to buy oil.

She followed the usual procedure and gave him a small jar of peanut oil as a freebie.

The man asked her to give him more, saying he was Xu’s relative.

“The freebies are matched with the oil. One big jar of oil comes with one small jar. All customers get the same deal. If I give you more, there won’t be enough for others tomorrow,” Wang Jiexiang explained, somewhat embarrassed.

The man kept insisting, but she still refused.

Looking at the time, Wang Jiexiang said, “If you don’t go pay now, you won’t be able to buy oil today. The cashier is about to close.”

The man had no choice but to leave.

A little later, the man, having paid, came back with Xu to find her.

Xu, furious, confronted Wang Jiexiang.

“He said he’s my relative. Why didn’t you give him more freebies?”

“I really don’t have any more.”

Xu didn’t believe her. “Didn’t I tell you to stock up?”

Wang Jiexiang didn’t respond.

“My relative came all the way here. I specifically asked him to find you, and look at how you handled it.”

“Sorry,” Wang Jiexiang apologized to them.

Xu, still angry, muttered to herself.

“Now, he bought the oil without any discount. Little girl, I’m not saying you, but how come you’re so bad at handling things? You don’t learn the sales techniques I taught you. Do you think you’ll last in this job?”

Wang Jiexiang, feeling frustrated, snapped back.

“If you had stocked up on freebies, why didn’t you let your relative buy from you? Why did he have to find me?”

Xu’s face darkened.

She was in the wrong, so she took her relative and left.

From then on, Xu never spoke to her again. Even the other salespeople who were friendly with Xu treated Wang Jiexiang coldly.

Wang Jiexiang tried several times to make amends with Xu, but every time, she was met with rejection.

Despite this, she didn’t ask to return to the original rotating shifts that had been arranged by the supervisor. She continued to work outside in the small tent.

It wasn’t a big deal, Wang Jiexiang thought optimistically. Maybe one day Xu would get over her anger.

After a month of this work, her throat became sore from the cold wind and constant shouting.

She hadn’t made any new friends, and her only old friend barely kept in touch. After work, she wanted to buy some medicine, but she didn’t even know where the pharmacy was.

She struggled to make her way home.

There were no streetlights near her place, and Wang Jiexiang had night blindness. She couldn’t see clearly at night.

After walking down a hill and around a bend, she was almost home. She walked forward, relying on her weak vision, when she suddenly bumped into someone.

He was squatting on the ground near a water tap, probably brushing his teeth. Wang Jiexiang stumbled a step, and to keep her balance, she stepped forward.

She didn’t step on the ground but on something soft.

In her panic, she took another step forward, the first step still soft, the second step landing on hard concrete.

“Sorry, are you okay?”

Wang Jiexiang steadied herself against the wall and turned to speak to the blurry figure.

The shadow didn’t respond. It got up from the ground and went into the house next to hers.

“Bang—!!”

The sound of the door slamming was deafening.

The lights in that house came on, and Wang Jiexiang could finally see the path.

She stared at the tightly shut door next door for a while, swallowed hard, and slowly came back to her senses.

This neighbor is… kind of weird…