[Folk Women Are Originally Queens]

In Tofu Alley in the West Market of the capital city, there lived a woman named Aying. She was born with delicate features, but she always wore a coarse cloth skirt that had been washed white. She would go to the street to set up a stall every day before dawn, selling some home-brewed sour plum soup. Neighbors only knew that she came to Beijing three years ago with the refugees, with no relatives, but a temper as tough as a well rope. It snowed heavily last winter, and the stall was demolished by the evil slaves who patrolled the streets. She squatted in the snow to pick up broken pieces of porcelain, and still set up the stall the next day, but with an extra patch on her sleeves. No one knew that the inconspicuous plain silver bracelet on Ah Ying's wrist had a tiny "Zhao" engraved on the inside. No one has ever seen her staring blankly at the half-dead pot of bluegrass on the window sill late at night. When her fingertips brush the leaves, a trace of despair that does not belong to the city will flash in her eyes. Aunt Zhang next door once joked: "A Ying was born so well, she deserves to be married to a rich family." She just lowered her head and wiped the porcelain bowl, and said softly: "As long as I can live a stable life."