Early the next morning, the stove that had been banked all night retained little residual heat. The room had already grown cold, and even the bedding was no longer warm.
Even Wang Yan got up more than half an hour earlier than usual. His body clock had failed him.
He was not afraid of the cold, but the temperature he felt always affected his condition. He had grown accustomed to warmth before, and the sudden change required time to adjust to.
Though the room had heating, he slept in a bed. Without the bed being warm, it simply did not feel as good.
Wang Yan was not one to lie in bed. Once awake, he got up.
He quickly dressed, got the stove going again, and put the kettle on to boil. Then he took out an enamel mug and brewed himself a cup of coarse tea.
"Pah!"
Sitting on a stool with one leg crossed over the other, Wang Yan spat out a mouthful of tea leaves and looked toward the bed.
His room was not large. Two families lived in the west wing; the family next door consisted of two adults, four children, and an elderly person. In fact, everyone in this courtyard had large families. There was even a household of more than ten people in the rear courtyard. Life was not easy for anyone.
The country was poor, development was stalled, diplomacy had suffered setbacks, and the geopolitical situation was precarious. These were difficult times. For ordinary people at the bottom, that simply meant a hard life.
Relatively speaking, Wang Yan was doing quite well. He had a decent amount of living space to himself, a skilled job, and a Level Two wage of thirty-six yuan per month, along with corresponding quotas of grain, oil, meat,