From the moment Gu Shunhua stepped off the train, something felt off. A sharp pain pounded behind her temples, as though something were ramming into her skull. Her temples throbbed, and fragments of imagery flitted through her mind like torn reels from an old black-and-white film. She couldn’t make sense of them, her thoughts a haze of confusion.
She boarded a streetcar headed for Dashilan. As it passed Qudeng Alley, she spotted a stall outside the co-op selling roasted sweet potatoes. The sweet potatoes were misshapen and rough, but since they didn’t require ration tickets—only cost a bit more—she figured she’d pick up a couple.
But just as she stepped forward, more fragments surged into her mind. Her headache worsened.
Then, with a thunderous boom, like a bolt of lightning cracking open the sky, everything snapped into place. The images aligned. A jolt of clarity washed over her—it was as if her soul had been doused in cold water, and suddenly her mind was razor-sharp.
In a daze, her eyes flew open. The world around her came into focus like a special effect in a movie—shifting from blurry shadows to vivid detail.
From the mouth of the alley, she looked toward the street. Right across was a clock repair shop, its heavy wooden sign painted black with red characters. Two 28-bar bicycles stood parked out front.
People bustled past: some in cotton-padded jackets, others in workwear made of coarse labor cloth, walking with proud, confident strides. A few wore hand-knit scarves; others sported Lei Feng hats.
Everything around her felt startlingly real. The dry, biting cold in the air, the faint sweetness of roasted sweet potatoes—it all told her: this was no dream. This was the capital, Dashilan, in the late 1970s.
The street, the sounds, the smells—they were no different from just minutes ago. But she was no longer the same.
In that instant, it was as if her soul had been reborn. Her mind was flooded with knowledge she never knew she had.
Moments earlier she’d been dazed and confused. Now, everything was clear. She saw the world she stood in, saw that it came from a novel—and saw the words of that novel, its characters, its plot, its end.
And when she saw all that, her legs went weak. Her hands trembled. A cold sweat broke across her back.
She clutched the utility pole beside her, trying to steady herself as her mind sorted through the avalanche of information.
At fifteen, she had just graduated middle school when she answered the call to “reclaim and defend the frontier,” joining the Inner Mongolia Production and Construction Corps in the desert lands of Beijiang. At the foot of the Yin Mountains, amidst endless dunes, she endured unimaginable hardship. And there, in those bitter days, she met Ren Jingnian—a soldier a year her senior. At nineteen, she married him. A year later, she gave birth to twins: a boy and a girl, named Manman and Duoduo.
She had thought her life was set. But a few years ago, the Corps was disbanded, and the coal mine where they worked was handed over to local authorities. Corps members and youth workers were reassigned as employees of state-owned enterprises.
In the past two years, educated youth had been steadily returning to the city through hardship or medical retirement. Especially after an incident involving youth from a remote region, the process eased. Local offices relaxed regulations, and even those in good health were able to “retire for illness” and go home.
Everyone was trying to find a way. And Gu Shunhua, too, was tempted.
She heard from other youth that the latest trend was to be diagnosed with “nephritis.” She managed to get a certificate—but she hadn’t considered one thing: she was married. No matter who she married, the moment she had a marriage certificate, she was no longer considered educated youth—she was “rooted.” And rooted meant disqualified from returning.
The news crushed her. She wanted to go back—to the capital, to Dashilan where she had grown up, to Dalihutong, the alleyway that haunted her dreams. It was just marriage! Why did that cancel everything?
Just then, her cousin Chen Lu made a surprise visit, traveling hundreds of miles to see her—bringing with her a box of freshly made Rolling Donkey pastries.
Chen Lu was all concern and sympathy. She offered a solution: divorce. Go back to the city first, then figure out how to bring the husband and kids later.
At first, Gu Shunhua was stunned. Divorce? That was no small thing. Marriage wasn’t a game. Once divorced, who could say what would happen?
They claimed affection could last even after parting—but a long-distance separation? Reunion was uncertain. Everything—household registration, personal files, food rations, planned supplies—was tied to status. You couldn’t just hop on a train and expect things to work out.
Over the years, she had seen too many couples break up after divorce-for-return arrangements. What began as a formality ended as final.
But even her husband had heard the idea—and encouraged her to go through with it. Hearing the word “divorce” from him broke something inside her.
They argued, fell silent, cried, and wrestled with the decision. In the end, he persuaded her.
So, she divorced. With a bright red stamp on her return certificate, she finally came back to the capital. She planned to stay with her family for now and then report to the youth bureau to register her household.
If all went well, she would get her registration and then work on transferring the children’s hukou into the city. Then, maybe, she and her husband could face the reality of their broken marriage.
But now… she saw the truth.
Her life wasn’t her own—it was written in a book. In that book, “Gu Shunhua” was merely the ex-wife of the male lead: insignificant, calculating, a woman who couldn’t endure hardship and married a soldier in the Corps out of desperation, only to throw him and the children aside to return to the city.
The true heroine? Her sweet cousin, Chen Lu.
When Ren Jingnian brought the children to find her in the city and was met with disappointment, it was Chen Lu who comforted him. Chen Lu, who offered warmth, gave him courage and hope.
Ren Jingnian would go on to attend university, and before graduating, start a business. With astounding talent, he would invent the Chinese character input system that broke the 100-characters-per-minute barrier—the first of its kind in the world. He’d earn patents in China, the U.S., and the U.K.
Before even finishing college, he would make a fortune—but stay humble. He’d join the Academy of Sciences, delve into computing, and eventually ride the wave of national development to found his own company, producing high-performance computers. Within twenty years, he would be China’s leading manufacturer in the field.
Honored at the national level, interviewed on television, Ren Jingnian would publicly thank Chen Lu—the one who stood by him when he had nothing. “She is the love of my life,” he’d say.
They would have a son—bright, capable, deeply loved. Ren Jingnian would cherish him above all else.
That was the family the book celebrated.
And “Gu Shunhua”? She never reunited with her ex-husband, never even brought her children back to Beijing. Eventually, someone introduced her to a widowed professor—and she married him instead.
Her children? Her son Manman was swayed by his stepmother, treating her better than his own mother, scorning both Shunhua and his sister. Duoduo became jealous, rebellious, unmotivated.
As for Gu Shunhua, the ex-wife? Eaten alive by jealousy. Abandoned by the professor, falling ill, she snapped. Together with her daughter, she tried to seize control of the company’s assets. Ren Jingnian, heartbroken, had the two arrested.
Gu Shunhua, recalling this part of the story, exploded: To hell with that!
She had returned to the city for her children—nothing more. If they couldn’t return, she’d find another way. Why on earth should she marry some professor?
And why, exactly, hadn’t she reunited with her husband?
She remembered now—how strange things had been. Chen Lu’s sudden appearance. Her husband’s insistence on divorce. His unwavering stance.
Before, she wouldn’t have thought twice. Chen Lu didn’t even know her husband. How could there be anything between them? And Ren Jingnian only wanted her to return, right? Even if they couldn’t remarry, that was just how life was—no one to blame.
But now, with the full story laid bare… Now she knew they did end up together. That she never got her children back. How could she not question everything?
Was it all… a setup?
She recalled another scene from the book.
Her son, devastated, glared at her and said:
“Do you know how much it hurt Mom when she found out what you did to her? She told me she was willing to divorce and give Dad back to you. What more did you want? Do you know how many nights she cried because of you? Her health was already fragile—how could you break her heart like that?”
The “Mom” he spoke of was Chen Lu. And her son believed it—believed that Chen Lu would have given him “back” out of kindness.
After her imprisonment, the author even stepped in with a condescending tone:
“Gu Shunhua wasn’t truly wicked—just a bit selfish, a bit shortsighted. A petty urban woman who’d been traumatized by rural hardship. She craved comfort, ran back to the city, leaving behind her husband and children…”
And later:
“She loved money so much she assumed every woman did. But the love between Ren Jingnian and Chen Lu—that she could never understand.”
Gu Shunhua drew in a deep breath, gathering her strength.
No. No. Absolutely not.
No matter what this ridiculous book was about—Gu Shunhua knew one thing for sure: she had to fight against the fate it laid out for her. She refused to be swept along by the current of someone else’s story.
Calming herself, she quickly assessed the situation. As for Ren Jingnian—whatever he was thinking, whatever his reasons for divorcing her—none of it mattered anymore. She wasn’t going to dwell on it.
What she needed now—was her children.
Her children.
She would fight with everything she had to save them.
This absurd novel, this nonsense fate—she didn’t care how it was supposed to go. She would not let her children be trampled by it. She would raise them herself.
Her own son, standing beside a stepmother, condemning his birth mother—she couldn’t bear it.
Her beloved daughter, driven mad with jealousy of someone else’s affection—unthinkable.
She had to change everything.
She would not allow the words of this book to dictate the course of her life.
Without a second thought, Gu Shunhua grabbed her large suitcase and bolted back the way she came.
As she ran, she nearly collided with someone.
The man wore a plain cotton work uniform and a padded winter hat. Seeing her, he paused—then broke into a grin.
“Well, if it isn’t Shunhua! What a coincidence. Your folks were just thinking about you. You’re back?”
Gu Shunhua recognized him immediately. Yongzi—her childhood friend from the same courtyard. They had grown up in that crowded compound together. Last she heard, he’d been assigned to the charcoal workshop at the lumber processing plant.
She dropped her suitcase, opened it up, and pulled out several bundles of food.
“Yongzi, can you tell my parents I’ve got something urgent—I’ll be delayed a few days. I’m heading back to Inner Mongolia. These are potatoes, sugar beets, and some steel-thread noodles—the potatoes and beets were grown by our Corps, and the noodles are a local specialty. Give these to my parents, share them with the neighbors.”
With that, she slammed the suitcase shut and took off again, leaving Yongzi shouting after her:
“Shunhua! Shunhua, your folks have been waiting for you every day—just hoping you’d finally come home. At least drop by and say something!”
But Gu Shunhua couldn’t afford to stop.
Before her awakening, all she could think about was getting back to the city. Return to the city—return to the city. As if her life would be over otherwise.
But now—now her mind was filled only with her children.
She could accept Ren Jingnian falling in love with someone else. She could even accept a life without happiness of her own.
But why—why—should her children suffer?
Why should they become the forgotten shadows behind someone else’s perfect family?
She couldn’t bear it.
She had to bring them back, raise them herself. If she couldn’t return to the city with them—then she wouldn’t return at all.
No matter what, she would not abandon her children.