My era, 1979!

Chapter 30 "The Fitting Mirror"

What do you want to buy?

"I'll take this floral print fabric."

How many?

"Enough to make one jacket, for my sister."
-
The flame of the kerosene lamp suddenly flickered, casting Xu Chengjun's shadow on the earthen wall.

He loosened his grip on the pencil.

The idea that had just popped into his head at the department store entrance made him decide to write it down.

Incidentally, he also broke some rules that he had been following since he came to this world.

Civil servants can't just write work reports every day, can they?
The shop assistant who was secretly touching the floral fabric, the shimmering reflection of the fabric in the mirror, was like a newly sprouted seed, making his heart itch.
-
"Still writing?" Qian Ming squatted opposite him, hugging his knees. "Haven't you had enough?"

He still doesn't understand what's going on with Xu Chengjun.

Didn't you say yesterday that those comments were all despicable and petty?
Doesn't history prove everything?

This army is getting harder and harder to understand!
Xu Chengjun didn't look up: "I've had enough."

He paused for a moment, then added, "You should write more only when you've had enough energy."

Xu Chengjun licked the lead dust from the tip of his pen.

Wait a minute, isn't this a carcinogen?
Pooh!
From his literary perspective 40 years later.

"The Class Teacher" is too deliberate, like cutting flesh with a dull knife, always trying to lean towards the grand principle of "saving the children".

"The Wounded" was too forceful, with tears falling like they were free, which diluted the real pain.

Although both have their own historical and literary characteristics
But he wanted to write something different.

Just write a mirror, a girl, and a floral shirt she wants to wear but dares not.

"What are you writing?" Qian Ming leaned closer, his glasses almost touching the scrap paper. "Are you going to speak up for individual business owners again?"

"No." Xu Chengjun moved the scrap paper aside, revealing the title he had just written, "Write 'Salesperson'."

Fitting Mirror

The three characters are written in a flowing, elegant style.

His most prized possession in his past life was his calligraphy.

The leader saw his talent and thus contracted to write the company's Spring Festival couplets every year.

He tilted his pen and wrote downwards:

"The dressing mirror in the department store had a chipped piece of paint, making it look like a mouth with a missing tooth. Chunlan wiped it three times a day, using a cloth dipped in soapy water to polish the mahogany frame until it shone, but she could never get rid of the crescent-shaped chip in the corner of the mirror."

Some holes can't be hidden or patched up.

Xu Chengjun didn't stop; the pencil scratched across the paper.

"A new batch of floral-patterned polyester fabric arrived at the counter today, with white stars sprinkled on the foundation, just like the rouge she saw under the stage in the commune last year. As soon as the fabric was hung on the shelf, her reflection in the mirror reached out and touched it, her fingertips tracing an arc on the fabric, half a beat faster than her own movements."

"Is this mirror going to come to life?" Qian Ming was a little surprised.

Xu Chengjun looked up and saw that the pupils behind his glasses contracted.

See, the fish has taken the bait, hasn't it?

This reaction was more invigorating for him than the anger he felt upon seeing the critical letter.

A good story should be like this: like a pebble thrown into water, first creating ripples, then slowly sinking to the bottom.

“It’s not that it has become a spirit.” He twirled his pencil and laughed. “It’s just that the thoughts in my heart are too heavy, making even my shadow restless.”

He recalled that when he was writing "The Granary," he always struggled with the concepts of "collective" and "individual." But this time was different. Chunlan's mirror was a revealing mirror, reflecting not ideologies, but the unspoken words in people's hearts.

yes.
I want to wear a floral dress, walk with my head held high, and live a more respectable life.

The pen tip drew a wavy line under the "floral foundation" and suddenly reminded me of Zhai Ying's bold and out-of-fashion outfit.

He wrote down:

"As Director Wang passed by the counter, Chunlan was gesturing in front of the mirror. Suddenly, the floral fabric in the mirror wrapped around her, the collar tied into a bow, while the fabric outside the mirror remained obediently hanging on the shelf. The sound of Director Wang's leather shoes came from behind her, and Chunlan in the mirror hurriedly unbuttoned her clothes, but her fingertips got tangled in the thread, and the more she struggled, the tighter it became, like a butterfly that had been tied up."

"And then?" Qian Ming pressed.

Xu Chengjun tucked the pencil behind his ear and leaned back against the earthen wall.

The plaster was crumbling down the wall, landing on his neck and causing a slight itch.

"And then?" He gazed at the moonlight outside the window. "Later she discovered that she was always bolder in the mirror than in reality. The new clothes she dared not try on, her shadow dared; the words she dared not say, her shadow said for her; even when Director Wang was giving a lecture, she dared to roll her eyes in the mirror."

This writing style is wilder than anything he wrote before, wilder than any work of this era!
With a reckless and disregard-all attitude.

Without metaphors or probing, it simply and bluntly tears open people's hearts, letting those hidden thoughts seep out through the crack.

He knew he was out of place.

But he was determined to give it a try.
-
"This is even more bizarre than 'Libra'," Qian Ming said, stroking his chin and suddenly laughing. "But I like it. Did the shadow finally emerge?"

"What do you think?" Xu Chengjun folded the scrap paper into a square and stuffed it into his shirt pocket. "Maybe it escaped, maybe it didn't. Just like some people, they live their whole lives as shadows, while others, the shadows, become themselves."

He remembered the shop assistant in the department store, whose eyes shone as she clutched the corner of the cloth.

Her shadow must have already put on a floral shirt, twirling in the mirror, the hem of her skirt sweeping across the gap in the mirror, like a bird finally spreading its wings.

Qian Ming suddenly took out two pieces of fruit candy: "Here, moisten your pen. Take a break when you get tired of writing, don't push yourself too hard."

Xu Chengjun peeled a piece of candy and put it in his mouth, the sweet taste spreading out.

That anger had long since transformed into something else.

It's not anger, it's resilience.

It is his greeting to this era.

Hello, 1979!

Smiling.jpg——
He picked up the pencil again.

"Keep writing," he told himself.

This time, I'm going to write about how Chunlan discovered that the floral fabric in the mirror was being moved half an inch closer to her every day;

The image of Director Wang in the mirror always shows him wearing an old cloth shirt, which doesn't match his claims of being "hardworking and simple."

It also describes how the dressing mirrors in the warehouse all have the same notch, like a group of open eyes watching the girls hide their thoughts in the corners of the mirrors.

The flame of the kerosene lamp flickered again, casting the shadows of the two young people on the wall. One was writing with his head down, while the other was looking at it with his chin in his hand, creating a scene that resembled a peaceful painting.

The cicadas outside the window had stopped chirping sometime ago; only the rustling sound of a pencil scratching across scrap paper remained.

Xu Chengjun's pen paused on the line "The reflection in the mirror secretly changed a red button," and he suddenly felt that this story could never be finished.

There were so many mirrors in 1979—in department stores, warehouses, and supply and marketing cooperatives. Each mirror held a shadow that dared not show itself, waiting for the day it could step out and bask in the sun.

"I'll continue writing tomorrow," he said to Qian Ming, and also to himself.

Tomorrow, Chunlan will discover that in the pocket of the floral shirt reflected in the mirror, there's a red hair tie she'd long ago lost.
What ideology?
"Realism with modernist characteristics!"

　The previous chapter hasn't been released yet, so I'll release chapter 30 first. Thank you all for your support! Chapters 29 and 30 are consecutive, as is normal.
　　
　
(End of this chapter)