In 1997, when her daughter was over five years old and should have been at the kindergarten, Gong Mingxia had no choice but to send her there so that she could fully devote herself to work.
Fortunately, this was a third-tier small city where the education expenses were affordable for her, with only over one hundred yuan per month for kindergarten.
In this city, where the average salary was eight hundred to nine hundred yuan, kindergartens costing a little over one hundred yuan primarily catered to the children of migrant workers, offering a lower-priced education.
Although the facilities were definitely substandard, at least there was someone to help take care of her child, and that was the bare minimum she required.
Gong Mingxia had fallen ill these past few days, which had given Tangyuan the chance to wear her clothes.
"The original host had two wishes: she wanted to change her name and her appearance so that the scumbag wouldn't be able to find her, but if she changed her name, how would she then uncover the miscarriage of justice created by the person who had taken her place? Thus, she not only couldn't change her name, but she also had to maintain this name and this household registration perpetually. That's the first wish. The second wish is to see her daughter get into a good university and for the scumbag to get what he deserves sooner."
Despite not changing her name, because her daughter's household registration had not yet been transferred to her maternal family's register, it was imperative for mother and daughter to have their own household registration, otherwise, it would be inconvenient for them to handle affairs outside in the future. Therefore, returning to her hometown was necessary.
She took a careful inventory of Gong Mingxia's personal assets and found that she had already saved over one thousand yuan. With these funds, registering the household back home would be manageable.
There was no need to delay this matter; it was best to do it as soon as possible, the quicker the better.
Gong Mingxia mustered her strength to get up, took her fever-reducing medicine once more, drank lots of water, and felt a bit of her strength return, so she started packing her things.
By five in the afternoon, she picked up her daughter and brought her home without mentioning the matter of their imminent departure to the teacher.
The fees had not yet been paid at the beginning of the month, and the money had not been refunded for the days her child had missed due to sickness the previous month, so she did not take advantage of the kindergarten.
The construction site had not yet reached the time for salary settlement, but she, dragging her sick body there to request her wages and with the excuse of having an ill elder family member at home—especially considering her small salary was only six hundred yuan—did not encounter much difficulty.
Three days later, with wages in hand and possessions packed, she was ready.
The urgency of her departure was driven, after all, by the presence of a "boyfriend" on the construction site who she, as her replacement, did not wish to see.
It wasn't that he was somebody she couldn't face, but rather, she felt that with her arrival, their relationship would surely end, so it was better to just leave directly.
First, she bought a bus ticket to the Provincial City, where upon arrival, she purchased a train ticket to their province's city. With no seats available, hard seating was the only option. Fortunately, she brought a small stool, and after three or four hard days, mother and daughter finally reached the city where their hometown was located.
Without any time to catch her breath, she immediately bought another bus ticket to the town. After an entire day of traveling, she arrived at her destination in the evening. Between transportation and meals, she had spent more than two hundred yuan.
She found a hotel in town to stay in, and the very next day, along with her daughter, she went to the Police Station to apply for the household registration. After inquiring, she learned that the process was very complicated.
Wandering around the Police Station for several days and after asking around, she finally managed to expedite the process by greasing some palms with a red envelope of three hundred yuan.
Even so, all of the procedures still took over half a month to complete. She had around two thousand two hundred yuan when she arrived, but by the time all household documents were in order, only one thousand three hundred yuan remained in her hand—the seven hundred yuan difference had been spent on connections.
However, looking at the new household register with Gong Mingxia as the head of the household and her daughter's new name, she breathed a sigh of relief.
Her name was still Gong Mingxia; this name could not be changed. Her daughter was named Gong Xiaoyan because she had two dimples and her smile was indeed lovely. So, on the basis of her nickname, Xiao Xiao, she extended it to Xiaoyan.
Holding the new household register, Gong Mingxia decisively set off for Beijing, because only in a big city could she truly realize her value.
Upon reaching Beijing, she didn't look for other work but went straight to a construction site and applied for a job as a cook.
The reason she didn't become a waitress or pursue other work was that those service industries were not good to work in. In contrast, this job was actually quite decent.
She was only responsible for the three meals a day for the construction workers, and didn't need to worry about buying ingredients—just cook. After finishing cooking and cleaning the kitchen, the rest of the time was hers.
Moreover, having extensive experience working on construction sites and a guarantee of solid cooking skills, Gong Mingxia found that she could manage the work much more easily.
She had been too busy with work before and rarely had the time to cook. In fact, she was quite fond of making delicious food. In her previous life, she had no time to study cooking, but in this life, she felt she could make more time to study Big Pot Dish.
Could a well-made Big Pot Dish not become the foundation on which she would establish herself?
Indeed, because she did it well and it had local characteristics, she was kept on by the person in charge of the site after making only one dish.
Of course, with many migrant workers, she couldn't do it alone. There was also a male chef, likely a relative of the person in charge of the site, responsible for purchasing and cooking as well. Her task was to collaborate with him and ensure the kitchen's work was perfected.
At its core, the job was that of a general laborer, expected to take on any task, particularly the dirty and exhausting ones, as newcomers inevitably had to start from the bottom.
She didn't mind, though, she just wanted to find a stable job to save up some money before considering other options.
When applying for the job, she'd already explained her situation: a single mother needing only a bed for accommodation.
She had wanted to request a single room, but knew that was impossible, so she didn't even bring it up.
Fortunately, there were other female workers on the construction site, some recently married young women who had come out to struggle together, and others in their forties or fifties still striving for their children. Whatever the reason, women who worked on construction sites were surely driven by necessity, as the work was even harder and more grueling than that of a farmer's.
Being a cook was not a job just anyone could step into; Tangyuan was quite fortunate that the previous woman had left just a few days before she arrived. Furthermore, her cooking was well-received, which certainly wasn't the case for other women who'd tried and left dissatisfied.
Gong Mingxia's arrival made those people realize that they probably couldn't compete for the job.
But the farmers of that era were very simple-hearted, and seeing that she was a single mother with a child, having a harder time than they did, they gave up their competitive ambitions.
In reality, even if they hadn't given up, they had to acknowledge that more people would continue to be hired. If any of them had the capability, wouldn't they have filled the position before Gong Mingxia had arrived?
The workers' dormitory on the construction site was divided into two levels; the prefabricated houses were extremely uncomfortable, being cold in winter and hot in summer.
But since falling ill, Tangyuan had realized that life might be harsh, but just being alive was enough.
Moreover, if the task were easy and she were too picky, when would she complete the former host's wish?
With no job experience matching her high school qualifications, what good would a high school diploma do?
Wasn't it still impossible to find a job?
In later years, there were so many college graduates who couldn't find a satisfying job.
Thus, why not take the opportunity to save up some money for her daughter's future?
She had other plans regarding school registration.
Her future goal was to buy a small apartment in Beijing, even if it was only a fifty-square-meter one-bedroom, one-living-room unit. It was better than nothing.
Because her initial placement in the Crossed World was as a worksite cook, she had no other choice but to fit into that role.
This real estate construction site was quite large, so the kitchen wasn't the only one around; they had one at each corner of the site, east, south, west, and north.
The two of them were responsible for eighty to ninety workers, which truly was a significant workload.
The person in charge's wife oversaw the site's storage and logistics; when Tangyuan went to report to her, her accent revealed her hometown.
Hearing that she was a fellow villager, the woman was much friendlier and assigned her a room with fewer people, a room with four bunk beds, currently housing three tenants. Each had taken a lower bunk, and with a child, an upper bunk was inconvenient, so Tangyuan took a lower one for herself.
The daughter, at five years old, was very sensible and rarely caused any trouble. She had been traveling with her mother for two years and had grown accustomed to their lifestyle of moving to a new place every once in a while, so she wasn't uncomfortable in a new environment.
The mother-daughter duo hadn't brought much luggage with them either. Most of the things they had previously acquired had been given away since dragging it all around with a child was inconvenient.
Upon their arrival, they went to the nearby Five Gold hardware store to buy some rough bedding and sheets. The store, functioning like a grocery, had virtually everything a migrant worker needed for livelihood, not just bedding but even sanitary pads.
In such a public area, the more inconspicuous they could be, the better.
With the personnel being so diverse and unfamiliar with each other, it was prudent to be on guard.
Being a woman with a child made her especially vulnerable, so she started off by appearing as financially constrained as possible.
After replacing the bedding, she took her daughter to a nearby public bathhouse for a wash, then changed into clean clothes and bought a basin and toiletries.
Then she washed their dirty clothes and hung them outside to dry. By the time she returned to their room, her daughter had already fallen asleep from exhaustion.
By then, night had fallen. Having just bathed and eaten a bowl of noodles outside, she didn't feel hungry. Since they were starting work officially the next day, they went to bed early that evening.