Chapter 654: Beef Stew with Potatoes

ding ding ding ~~

The dusk spreads like rust on the top of the factory building

As the pleasant bell for the end of get off work rang, Lin Lu stuffed the oil-stained canvas gloves into the pocket of her uniform and quickly walked towards the factory gate with the crowd.

Leather shoes stepped on the cold and hard asphalt road. Opposite the factory building, there were still charred bullet holes on the outer wall of Baihua Foot Path, and now there was a metal sign for the office of Factory 004.

"Sister Lu, wait for me!"

Hearing this, Lin Lu turned around and found that a young girl in the same grey work clothes was running towards her. The high ponytail behind her head rose and fell as she ran, dispersing the lingering smell of class in the air.

"Run slower, Xiao Xu!"

Seeing the girl, Lin Lu smiled out of habit, the bloodstains on her chapped lower lip faintly visible in the oil stains.

"You have to run faster, you actually want to leave me and go back alone!"

The girl called Xiao Xu ran up to Lin Lu and, while complaining, deftly untangling the copper wire tangled in her hair with her calloused fingertips.

Under the eyelashes stained with black smoke, the pupils were as clear as the first snow, and he stared straight at Lin Lu, as if the other party had committed an unforgivable mistake.

"Okay, okay, I was wrong, I was wrong!" Lin Lu was defeated by Xu Chuxia's eyes and quickly admitted her mistake.

"Your nephew is on holiday today, Saturday, so I want to go home and make him a good meal."

"Eat a big meal??!"

Hearing this, Xu Chuxia's eyes instantly lit up and sparkled!

"Yes, let's have a big meal. Come to my house for dinner tonight!" Lin Lu invited with a somewhat doting expression.

"I bought the two pounds of beef ribs with my points, and paired them with the new potatoes that were just shipped from the prime minister's gathering place. I'll make a whole pot of potato stewed with beef for you two greedy little cats!"

"These potatoes are really fresh. I bought them yesterday when I was at the supermarket after get off work. The mud on the potatoes is still fresh."

Hearing Lin Lu's words, Xu Chuxia couldn't help but drooling, and quickly agreed: "I want to go! I want to go!"

His expression was so anxious that he almost jumped up and raised his hand like a primary school student!

"I was originally planning to go to the cafeteria. I heard that there will be cold-mixed pork head and old hen soup for dinner."

"But under Sister Lu's skills, all of this has to stand aside!"

"Additional meal?"

Hearing this, Lin Lu was a little surprised. She was a survivor of the night university gathering place period.

According to her understanding, although the food in the canteens of their factories has been getting better and better, it is still just enough to barely fill the stomach.

As for the extra meals, when we are at the night school gathering place, there is such a benefit whenever there is a big victory celebration or some event, but the problem is that there hasn't been anything big happening recently?

If we talk about big things, it can only be the "Ye Qi" cooperation, right?

Is it because of this?

Seeing Lin Lu's puzzled expression, Lin Chuxia suddenly burst into laughter:

"Sister Lu, everyone in the workshop would say you're a workaholic. This is the latest welfare policy!"

"The provincial standing committee just issued a notice at noon that from today until the Lantern Festival after the Spring Festival, each unit canteen must add a meat dish every afternoon."

"I heard that there are gift packages for New Year's Eve! I heard from my friends at the 012 Canning Factory that the army brought several trainloads of oranges from Yucheng these days."

"Some of them are being processed into cans now, and the other part is being transported to Minghua Cold Storage for storage. I guess we can still have free fresh fruit to eat during the Chinese New Year!"

Fresh oranges?

Hearing this, Lin Lu instinctively felt her cheeks getting sore and her saliva was drooling...

Speaking of fresh fruits, we have hardly eaten them since the end of the world.

It was still okay when the apocalypse just broke out. The fruits in supermarkets and shopping malls had not yet gone bad, and the army would sometimes distribute some in small quantities.

But now, Lin Lu really hasn't eaten fresh fruit for several months. Occasionally, she would grit her teeth and use her points to exchange for canned fruit, but she would save it for her son to eat when he came home from school, or she would just try it for herself.

"Wait, you said free fruit, does that mean there's fruit that costs money now?" Lin Lu seemed to have grasped the point.

"Yes," Xu Chuxia said as if it was a matter of course.

"I just heard that the army brought back a lot of oranges from Yucheng, so I went to the supermarket at noon today to check, and there really were some, but they were quite expensive."

"With my current salary, I can only afford one kilogram in three days!" When Lin Chuxia mentioned this, she couldn't help but look bitter.

"So I only bought ten kilograms..."

"Scarcity makes things valuable. These are all taken back by the army from the mountains of corpses and seas of blood. If they are expensive, then... then?? What? You bought ten kilograms?"

Lin Lu's eyes widened instantly, and she looked Xu Chuxia up and down repeatedly, with an expression that seemed to say, "You don't usually get along with me as an ordinary person, do you?"

A month’s worth of points can be used to buy anything?? Just for these ten kilograms of oranges??!

Hehe ~

Seeing this, Lin Chuxia playfully stuck out her tongue.

"Sister Lu, you know me. Because of the end of the world, all my family members are gone. Now I am the only one who can feed the whole family."

"Points are something you can earn again if you lose them. Who knows which will come first, tomorrow or an accident?"

"Just like half a year ago, who would have thought that on such an ordinary day, the whole world would change..."

"So now I just enjoy the present moment, eat whatever I want, and if I don't have points, I'll just go to the cafeteria."

When Lin Chuxia said this, the innocence on her face was gone.

The strong sense of vicissitudes revealed in his eyes carries a heavy sense of death, but also a kind of free and easy optimism of seeing through the world.

Lin Lu didn't know how to describe this feeling of conflict and tearing, and the words of comfort stuck on her lips felt futile.

In the end, Lin Lu could only touch Lin Chuxia's head with eyes full of heartache:

"What nonsense! What do you mean by one person's fullness means the whole family is not hungry? You little girl, it turns out that Sister Lu and Sister Lu were just playing around with me, right?"

"You don't treat me as your sister, you're not a family member, right? I always let Ziyu call you aunt!"

"I'm angry. You are only allowed to eat one bowl of rice today!" After saying that, Lin Lu pretended to be angry and walked forward.

"Beef stew with potatoes sister! My dear sister! I said something wrong! Forgive me! Please, I can't live without beef stew with potatoes!!"

Just like that, the two of them chased each other and made a fuss, and the sad atmosphere just now was instantly dispersed.

Under the setting sun, such a vibrant scene also attracted the attention of many survivors who were off work, and their expressions were different.

There is color, there is envy, there are memories, there is yearning..

Looking at the two energetic young women on the street, they seemed to see the summer half a year ago...

Everything that used to happen all the time can now only be recalled through nostalgia...

“We were so happy once…”

...

"Stop, stop, stop, there's something going on ahead!!" Lin Lu, who was jogging in front, suddenly stopped and waved to Lin Chuxia behind her with a serious look.