In the autumn of 1969, a group of urban educated youth bid farewell to the city fireworks and went to Xikou Village in southern Anhui Province to join the queue and settle down. Urban high school student Zhou Jianmin was elected as the captain of the educated youth team because of his calmness and ability. Together with the cheerful and pragmatic Zhang Guiying, the meek and simple Wang Chunyan, the delicate and silent Li Xianghong and others, they started an eight-year rural career among the fields and under the kerosene lamp. Here, they lost their youthfulness in the city, learned to deal with the land, and developed different feelings in their daily interactions: Zhang Guiying was moved by the honesty of local young man Tian Shougen, and Wang Chunyan was taken care of by substitute teacher Liu Changlin. Gradually, Li Xianghong became dependent on Zhou Jianmin, who worked as a record-keeper for educated youth. They met Zhou Jianmin day and night. Under the lamp checking work points late at night and on the grain drying field after the autumn harvest, Li Xianghong quietly hid an ignorant affection and a secret past that he did not dare to say.
In 1977, the news of the return of educated youth to the city spread like a spring breeze throughout Xikou Village. The college entrance examination was resumed and recruitment channels were fully opened, igniting the hope of returning home to the educated youth who had been dormant for many years. However, the policy situation suddenly changed. In the second half of 1978, the surge in the number of educated youth returning to the city across the country led to a sharp reduction in quotas. In the end, the Xikou Village Educated Youth Point only approved one valid return ticket. The multiple-choice question of fate is before everyone: Zhang Guiying and Tian Shougen got married and had a daughter, and Wang Chunyan also married Liu Changlin. They both gave up returning to the city and chose to take root in the countryside; Li Xianghong met the conditions for returning to the city, but became more taciturn because of his unresolved concern for Zhou Jianmin; and Zhou Jianmin became the default candidate for the quota by virtue of his captain status, education and ability. On the one hand, it was a life-changing opportunity to return to the city, and on the other hand, he was guilty of Li Xianghong and that period of moonlight.
