A Marriage Scam in the Great Northwest? This 1980s Military Wife Has a Tiny Waist

[Delicate little drama queen with a soft exterior and a strong core, a city girl VS a stoic, battle-hardened military hunk + married first, love later + overwhelmingly sweet pampering + building wealth in the 1980s]

In the late autumn of 1982, Jiang Tian, a pampered city girl, was manipulated by her scheming stepmother, who tricked her onto a green train bound for the wind-swept northwest under the pretext of “supporting the frontier.”

By the time she realized what had happened, she was already the wife of He Zhengyuan, a battalion commander in the great northwestern military region.

Everyone in the residential compound waited for a spectacle. Could a soft-skinned city girl who was afraid of cold and hardship really survive life in a cramped apartment at thirty below? Surely she would be crying to go home within a month!

At first, Jiang Tian thought so too.

But in this cramped, shabby twelve-square-meter room where it was barely possible to turn over, she discovered that the battalion commander, as cold and hard as stone on the outside, was actually a man of action.

On winter nights when it was thirty below, he wrapped his only overcoat around her freezing feet.

Every morning, she woke to find a cup of her favorite hot brown sugar water on the table.

And to protect her, he even declared fiercely in front of everyone, “So what if my wife is delicate? I’m the one who spoils her.”

From sharing a roof to standing by each other through life and death, Jiang Tian gritted her teeth and learned to cook, use a sewing machine, and build a business. She went from a little seamstress to a successful entrepreneur, while getting even with her awful stepmother and reclaiming the family property that belonged to her.

Later, Jiang Tian, who had once vowed to run away, found herself cornered every day by He Zhengyuan at the edge of their little twelve-square-meter bed.

His eyes reddened as he clasped her slender waist with one hand. “Tiantian, now that we’ve moved to a bigger place, you don’t have to hide so far away tonight, do you?”