Chapter 7 Seven, never again

Shanghai in the late 1930s and early 1940s was the acme of prosperity and the beauty of beauty. In the dance hall night after night, the White Russian dancer, half naked, with her thighs exposed, kicks left and right, each time getting higher and higher, reaching to the sky, making the world of burning fire even more exciting; The thin voice was intermittent, and just after it sank, it rose again, "Lang, we are of the same heart..." I don't know if it is true or fake, but it sounds fascinating, and it is better to be fake than nothing; stock Prices are soaring, so are the contents of the tabloids, which are constantly developing new layouts and creating new newspapers. If you say one thing, I will say two. The debate will only make the market in Shanghai more impressive; War and artillery fire are like fireworks, which will only make the sky over the sea more bright and beautiful.

Everyone staying in Shanghai is full of admiration for the gorgeous beauty of fireworks, and at the same time, everyone under the halo is sighing with emotion for how long this beauty is like fireworks.Because I know that it will not last long, so I have to be famous as soon as possible, and enjoy myself in time, everything is chasing after everything, and if I don’t catch up, it will be too late. Every day is like the end of the world. After tonight, there will be no tomorrow. Of course, we must have a good time, play to our heart's content, play out of style, and jump off the building if we can't afford it.

"Smack" the ground, a bucket of water was poured on it, and there was no trace after an afternoon of drying. There were still people dancing on the roof of the building where the person had just died, and the gramophone was turned on like thunder. The whole world is in turmoil, but these turmoil has nothing to do with Huang Jiaqi. The clock in Huang Erye's house had stopped for several days, and time also stopped.His path has already come to an end, he only missed jumping off a building. Over the years, the life of the Huang family has been short-lived. They first sold houses and land—mostly to their own brothers—and finally got to sell antiques.However, antiques are just like concubines, they only have a buying price, not a selling price. In addition, the second master was originally blind and handy, so he bought a lot of fake antiques.

On the other hand, Young Master Huangdi's illness was good for a while and bad for a while, which corresponds to the saying, "Sickness comes like a mountain, and sickness goes like spinning silk"; Falling down like a mountain", if you say you are defeated, you will be defeated. Huang Erye began to be nostalgic, and always thought of the "Embroidery Building" of the old Beijing house. He was born there, married Zhao Yifan there, and gave birth to Huang Shang and Huang Di's son and daughter there. His life was recorded there The happiest time of the year.But now that the Huang family brothers have all moved to Shanghai, the "Embroidery Building" has become ruins. It is precisely "the carved railings and jade brickwork are still there, but the red face has been changed." "

In the huge garden house, the entire house is shrouded in a withering atmosphere of the beauties who are gone: every corner of the house emits a rotten smell, the grass in the garden grows more than flowers, the tables and chairs are greasy and dirty, and the dishes are mostly chipped Cracks, haven't been updated for a long time, the windows are so dirty that they are opaque, and the picture frames are covered with dust. In the middle of the living room hangs an oil painting called "Never Again". The second time I said that I needed someone to replace it, but I never spared the effort or the mood to do it.

Although the new second grandmother, Sun Peilan, is still as aggressive as before, she likes to nag and swear, but the servants no longer take it seriously, and start to learn to be lazy, because they have not paid their salaries for a long time, and feel that they are creditors, so they can be with her. The boss is on an equal footing, why would he pamper you and be afraid of you? The only thing that remains the same is the everlasting smoke lamp in the smokehouse and the never-ending scent of opium smoke.The second master was lying in the dim light, with hazy smoke and hazy mood.He and opium have already merged into one, and they will never be separated in this life.

The smoke sucked into his lungs little by little, becoming his breath and his blood, and he also cleaned himself up little by little, without the past, the future, right and wrong, property and affection.All he had, what was left, had been traded for opium, even his soul, soaked in opium, became slightly drunk and soft. When he lies in the smoke and thinks intoxicatedly of all the triumphs of the past years, his thoughts will gradually become clear.All the bad and unpleasant past events have been washed away, and what is left are the beautiful scenery and the beautiful scenery of the good times, gradually settling into the most beautiful old dreams in memory.

And in the beautiful scenery, the one who is more prominent day by day and moment by moment is the newly married Zhao Yifan—that was really the happiest time of the second master's life, with fragrant cars and BMWs, as beautiful as a flower, walking on the street , who is not envious? That year Yifan had just turned 20 years old, like a flower that just bloomed, but already had the most brilliance, it was full of brilliance.I like to laugh, talk, and run. When I run, the white scarf around my neck will dance along with it, pulling people's hearts. I want to grab it, but I just can't.

He never caught her. Didn't catch her after all. Even during the years they were together, he felt that she was far away, separated by a mountain. She seems transparent, but her heart is as deep as the sea, and her emotional ups and downs are uncontrollable.If he is willing to be a fish and swim in the sea, how can he know that fish are not happy? But he refuses, he wants to be a fisherman, and catches the sea with one net after another, and every net is empty, and the years are like the sea water in the mesh, leaking out and leaking out, and finally there is nothing left Down, caught nothing.

He is a failure. Total failure. And he couldn't blame anyone. He also refused to blame himself. Then there are only strange things.Who changed the dynasty, caused the wars to continue, made the currency inflate, and made the money drunk? He is just a victim of this era, completely powerless in the face of countless changes, but why can't he be forgiven by people, especially his relatives?At the last moment of his life, he didn't want much, he just wanted to see Yi Fan again, to see his youthful dream again. But never again, really never again? The servant he ordered to send a message to Jiaxiu came back, saying that the third lady said that the second grandmother had gone to France again, and she herself was very busy recently, so she was afraid that she would not have time to see him, so she asked him to take care of herself.

Zhao Yifan has been away from him for more than ten years, but the servants still say that "Second Grandma" is better than "Second Grandma".There was nothing wrong with Huang Jiaqi listening, but the real second grandmother of Huang, Sun Peilan, was terrified when she heard it. She immediately exploded and rushed to the servant to scold: "Who do you call Second Grandma? You don't give me the food you eat inside and out. Get out?" As he said, his hands were not idle, he grabbed a spittoon and threw it over, breaking the servant's head. The servant got angry and didn't care about the master's servants. He covered his head with one hand and jumped back cursing: "Don't put grandma's score in front of me again, and make me say bad things! Do you think it's the past? We still owe us money, what master, I'm yuck!" She wanted to curse again, but she was dragged out by other servants to appease and give medicine, and she kept pulling out the door, and she could still hear the sound of cursing. That night, the servant rolled up some antique silverware and ran away.Sun Peilan clamored to report to the police, but the second master refused to let it go, saying that spreading it would only make people more ridiculous, and besides, those few things were not worth much money, since everyone's property is gone, do you care about that? This incident greatly stimulated Second Mistress, and she no longer dared to lose her temper with her servants, and she also took a closer look at the few valuable things left, for fear that someone would fish for them in troubled waters again.But the one who has always been used to scolding people, now that there is no one to scold, it is lonely, so he saved all his words to settle accounts with the second master, saying that he had lied to himself, and originally boasted about his great family background and ability, but he turned out to be nothing but smoking opium No way, if you lose a family business, you can't even restrain your servants, but you still only know how to smoke, smoke, smoke! When she cursed Sapo like this, she seemed to forget that she was also a cloud-breathing Furong fairy, and she also had a part in this "beaten home". Huang Erye didn't talk back, his temper was much better now than before, and he didn't seem to hear anything.But one night, when he and Sun Peilan were lying on the couch facing each other, he suddenly said: "What did I do wrong, the heavens will send you to punish me?" The person who is about to die is already a half-god, and has seen through everything in the world.Second Mistress was stunned for a moment, suddenly an ominous premonition rose in her heart, and she dared not answer. One day later, the second master moved the oil painting into his smoke room. Looking at it through the dim smoke lamp and hazy smoke, the people and objects in the painting seemed to be moving. It was a woman. , a plump woman, lying in the bright spring light, but the spring light reflected on the woman's face, but there was a kind of helpless sadness.Is it lamenting the loss of spring, or mourning the loss of youth?Or, is the beautiful memory no longer? Never again, never again. The wheel of the times keeps moving forward, who can hold it back? Those days when you sit at a banquet, hold flowers, and drink your wine to drink the moon. The second master died silently on the opium couch in the autumn of this year, with a cigarette in his mouth. Even when he died, he couldn't see his former wife——Zhao Yifan, but he was peaceful after all, because he died in the safest and most comfortable place he thought. Later, the relatives said that this way of death was a relief for the second master.Because if he saw what happened to the Huang family later, perhaps he would not be so easy to rest in peace.He finally died when he was still able to afford the last puff of opium, and escaped the hardships of the years to come, unlike his widow, Sun Peilan, who was impoverished and forced to quit smoking after liberation. After suffering for decades, he died alone at the age of 87.When he died, there was no family member around him to attend the funeral, and everything was handled by the sub-district office. He was cremated hastily, and not even an urn was left behind. Huang Jiaqi died, and the ancestral hall of Huang's family, an old residence in Beijing that had been neglected for more than ten years, finally got a chance to be lively again. It was filled with cigarettes and crowded with people.The barren courtyard was cleaned out, new tablets were placed in, and the old ones were repainted, giving a feeling of a new look, and the whole process was carried out in the process of blowing and beating, not like a funeral, but a wedding. Moreover, Huang Jiafeng's return to Beijing this time can be regarded as a glorious return. Jiaqi's death allowed him to call up the clansmen in a legitimate way, exercise the power of the head of the family, and perform a long-sleeved dance by the way.He directed the Yellow Emperor to put on filial clothing and kneel beside the mourning hall with double curtains, and kowtow to the guests one by one in return. Feeling a little sad? Almost all the old relatives in Beijing have arrived, and they all take this opportunity to reminisce about old times and socialize. Between the salute and the ceremony, they seize every opportunity to whisper, talking about the war, the stock market, the current situation, and even which church has the best style. Okay, which restaurant has a reasonable price, and another small program is to observe Huang Gan-this is a handsome young man with a handsome face, but there is a kind of frivolity between his brows, but overall he is still lively and interesting , but suffered from being unable to show his liveliness during the funeral, so there was always a sense of impatience in his eyes.I heard that his marriage is finally retiring, so in the eyes of the old ladies who have unmarried daughters at home, they have attracted much attention, and they have to hint to their daughters to be smart and find opportunities to get in touch with Huang Gan, and remind them not to go too far Frivolous, leaving a disrespectful reputation.The ladies were so worried about not being able to put on their most decent and pretty clothes today, but with the silver makeup wrapped around them, the corners of their eyebrows and eyes still showed a bit of teasing, like a garden full of spring, a branch of red apricot came out of the wall Come. Huang Chang didn't know anything about this kind of human scheming, she could only see the shaking of the hairpin rings, and hear the chirping sound in her ears, and she kowtowed while thinking in her heart: What's going on?When people are busy, the ancestral hall is cold, and when people die, the ancestral hall loses momentum.In this way, the ancestral hall is actually ominous, because since I can remember, it seems that every time I enter this ancestral hall, it is not for any good deeds.The mother's divorce was carried out here, and the father's funeral was also completed here, whether it was life or death, there were scars all over the place.Just like those wooden tablets, every stroke is engraved on my heart, and what is engraved is the most painful life. What she didn't know was that when her mother got married, she was first carried in a sedan chair to pay homage to her ancestors before she officially became a member of the Huang family.But then she flew out from here again, to the outside of the vast sea and sky, flying higher and higher, farther and farther, reaching far beyond Huang Jiaqi's reach.She left the Huang family's territory freely, but Huang Jiaqi still had to come back here, and stayed here forever from now on, engraving her name into the hardwood tablet, becoming a new scar in the overlapping of the curtains.There is also the great uncle who is already eighty years old, and he will probably come here soon.Huang Chang went to see him in the afternoon when he first arrived in Beijing—he was already old, but he still refused to die. Let the people guarding him feel sorry for him, wishing to breathe a sigh of relief for him, or simply strangle him to death. It took a full week for the funeral to come to an end.On the day of the burial, Huang Chang was accompanied by her aunt and bowed quietly in front of his father's grave for a few times, with a sad face, but without a single tear.Then this page was gently opened. But the page of the Yellow Emperor has just begun. Huang Jiafeng proposed that since the second brother died, and Zhao Yifan had already signed to waive custody rights, Huang Di should naturally take it back by himself.Sun Peilan was taken aback, and immediately burst into tears, and invited her natal family to come forward to reason with Huang Jiafeng. The turmoil suddenly arose, and the clansmen were summoned again. Since Huang Jiaxiu and Huang Chang had the surname "Huang", they had to be forced to listen in. However, they had already stated in advance that no matter what was done in the end, they would not interfere. The family separation meeting was held in the ancestral hall as usual, and Huang and Sun's families invited notaries to sit at the table, but Jiaxiu knew that those people were just decorations, and all actions were based on Huang Jiafeng's wink. Sun Peilan was dressed in hemp and filial piety and was fully armed. As soon as she came up, she burst into tears. First she cried for the second master, and then for the poor Yellow Emperor. Finally, she stated that she was determined to keep the chastity for the second master. We can't let "others" take him there, on the one hand, she is worried as a mother, and on the other hand, I feel sorry for the dead second master. Huang Jiafeng said disdainfully: "Are you her mother? I don't know. I only heard that Zhao was the one who gave birth to him. Now that the second brother has passed away, as long as Zhao doesn't come and talk, no one can stop me This uncle adopted him, after all, he is also the blood of our Huang family." Sun Peilan jumped on her feet, clapped her hands and cried loudly: "Jiaqi, my husband Jiaqi, listen to what they are talking about? You are dead, and they bully my orphans and widows like this. You don't catch your eye. Little Emperor, my son, they want to snatch you away from your mother, this is the heart of your mother, and you should say something for your mother." While talking, he pushed and shoved you. With the Yellow Emperor. Huang Chang couldn't bear to see his younger brother in trouble, so he wanted to stand up and talk, but Jiaxiu pulled his sleeves from underneath and whispered in his ear, "Don't worry about it, let's watch their performance." He had to sit down again. But Huang Di just lowered his head, his big eyes blinked, and he always refused to say a word. Huang Lishi sneered at the side: "At this time, I know that my son is a bitch, and if I regret it at this time, I should fulfill my mother's responsibility earlier. Don't think that we don't know about your harsh treatment of Huang Chang. But at that time, her own father was still there, so we didn't want to talk too much. Now that the second brother is dead, Huang Chang was also driven to the third sister by you, leaving only Xiaodi alone. As an aunt, I can say nothing I can no longer watch you bully our Huang family's children." Sun Peilan rushed over, grabbed Huang Li's arm, pointed at her face, and said "呵" with blood and phlegm all over her face: "Don't ask me to say something bad. You think you are kind enough to want Taking care of the little emperor, you are just looking at the family property left by the second master, and want to swallow it up, and use the little emperor as a cover. Over the years, you don’t know how much you have swallowed us, even the last bit of life-saving Money is not spared, black hearted people, you want me to hang myself?" The Huang family was in a rage, and stood up and pointed at Sun Peilan's face: "You said that I swallowed my second brother's money, did you see it with your left eye or your right eye? You have been smoking and gambling all these years, and that little family fortune has long been taken away." You are all defeated, where is there a half firewood left? I swallow you? I don’t know how much I have spent in the past few years. If it weren’t for me, the second brother would have died so comfortably? He would have packed up and slept on the street.” The relatives of the Sun family couldn't help watching, but after all, this was all about family affairs, so it was inconvenient to say more, so I had to go forward and tear Sun Peilan away, and said to Huang Jiafeng in a discussing tone: "Uncle Huang, the members of your family with the surname Huang We didn't understand the matter. It's just that the second grandma is also the widow of the second master. The grandma of the Huang family who Mingmei is marrying is a member of your Huang family. Now that the second master is gone, she will naturally be entrusted to the uncle to take care of it. You said that your uncle is a good official, but you want your second aunt to beg along the street. It doesn't look good on your uncle Huang, doesn't it? Xiaodi, you want to adopt it for his own good, not for the family property. Of course we understand this. It's just that if you can take care of the little emperor's meal, you should also take care of his mother's meal. It doesn't cost you anything, and it shows that the uncle is kind-hearted and kind, and the uncle thinks carefully to see if we are right?" The family tradition also understands that this matter cannot be completely one-sided, and Sun Peilan must have an explanation.So the two parties agreed to ask Sun Peilan to stay in Beijing to guard the ancestral hall, saying, "Since the second grandma wants to guard the ancestral hall, it is not empty talk. She should meditate in front of the ancestors of the Huang family to recite the Buddha's name and observe the festival. If this is the case, the Huang family will not be able to treat the Huang family badly." But if you want to stay in Shanghai romantically and happily with the Huang family's money, that's absolutely impossible." Sun Peilan was born and raised in Shanghai, so she naturally didn't want to come to Beijing. However, Huang Jiafeng refused to make any concessions. The relatives of the Sun family were afraid that she would come back to join them, so they tried their best to persuade her to accept it. accepted.I just think about how I have tried every means to get relatives with Huang Jiafeng over the years, to reconcile the old relationship, and to entrust the little emperor to recuperate at the uncle's house. After careful calculation, I finally calculated such a bad account that I lost everything. It is really too clever to calculate. Qingqing's life was lost. So the Yellow Emperor was formally adopted by the big house, kowtowed to Huang Jiafeng again, and called the three brothers and sisters of the Huang family "big brother", "second sister" and "third sister". . Huang Chang felt sad for a while when he heard it, and his eyes turned red.I thought that it would be impossible to get close to my sister and brother in the future, but if my cousin forced me to kiss her, would I really be able to kiss? Huangdi's status as a child was doomed to become a child, and he spent his whole life in neither kiss nor indifference, neither cold nor hot, neither death nor life, nor pain nor itching. Huang Er's family seemed to be cursed, his wife and children were separated, and no one could benefit.Even Sun Peilan, who was flamboyant for a while, is now in despair. She walked up to Huang Chang with a "hehe" smile, and said something strange: "It's better for your mother to leave as soon as possible, so that he will remember it until he dies. I The person who guarded him to death..." After speaking half a sentence, he burst into tears. Ever since Huang Chang ran away that year, he had never said a word to Sun Peilan in the past ten years, seeing her like this now, he couldn't help feeling mixed feelings.But Jiaxiu didn't pay any attention to it, she just pulled up Huang Chang and left.The separation meeting was over. Back in Shanghai, Jiaxiu wrote a long letter to Yifan, describing in detail the whole process of the Yellow Emperor adopting the big house.Yi Fan didn't care about it, he just wrote back and said that he hoped that Xiao Di would be in good health, and there was no need to worry about the rest. Since then, Huang Shang has only her aunt in Shanghai, who has taken on all the roles of mother, aunt, sister, friend, and teacher. Although Jiaxiu herself is not happy about it, she always says: "I could have been younger, but because I have someone around me." A person like you is forcing people to grow old for no reason." Huang Chang smiled and said, "Then how about I call your sister?" Jiaxiu really thought about it, and finally shook her head and said, "No, it's even more embarrassing to be exposed." The aunt and nephew hugged and laughed together. The young man's grief over the loss of his father seemed to have no effect on Huang Shang. In fact, in her heart, her father had already died when she was imprisoned. It's just that the news of his death was delayed for nearly ten years before it was announced. She went to see her younger brother once at her uncle's house.He was still so thin and pale, but he no longer looked like porcelain—porcelain was also shiny, while Huangdi, his bloodless face was just a piece of white brick and stone, kind of ashamed. And now that he has learned to torture people, he often sheds tears and loses his temper, because finally there is a person who is willing to be tortured by him——Huang Zhong seems to owe him in the previous life, serving him and taking care of him, and being complained by him picky.For some reason, he was dissatisfied with everything Huang Zhong did, and would criticize him: "Why are you so stupid? I said that the coffee needs to be brewed with just 85 degrees of water, and it boils so much that the aroma is washed away. "Or, "It's so hot, what kind of clothes do you want to send me, do you want to kill me or something?" Even Huang Chang couldn't stand it, so he persuaded Huang Zhong: "You are a sister, if he behaves like this again, you will beat him up, or just ignore him." Huang Zhong shook his head, his eyes were full of love and tenderness: "He is not in good health, he will inevitably lose his temper easily, but it's really nothing." He ran briskly to re-boil water and coffee for Huang Di. At this point, Huang Chang finally had to believe that there is a debt between people. Everyone came to the world to collect and repay the debt. There will be a new round of debt entanglement in the next life.Huang Di is Huang Zhong's creditor.What about yourself?Who do I owe?Who else owes themselves? In the row of huts in the small garden dedicated to the Yellow Emperor, there is a room that Huang Chang paid special attention to. It has a pink-painted door and white gauze curtains on the windows. Miss's boudoir - Miss's room will not live next to Huang Di - ask about Huang Di, only to know that it is specially reserved for Miss Han, who is the "hands are very skillful" and "injections don't hurt at all" in Renxin Hospital The nurse Han Kedi.Because she often came to give Xiaodi injections, when Xiaodi was unwell but not serious enough to be hospitalized, this Miss Han stayed in Huang's residence as a special nurse. Mama Lin told Huang Chang with a smile that Huang Di was obedient to that Miss Han and had no bad temper at all. She even suspected that Huang Di sometimes intentionally made herself sick, so she had a reason to call Miss Han to ask her to Come get yourself a shot.Because she saw several times that Huang Di found fault with Huang Zhong and quarreled with Huang Zhong on a rainy day, and then ran into the rain in a fit of anger to get drenched. Huang Chang was very surprised. In her impression, her younger brother had always been a sick child who didn't grow up and had no opinion. Maybe he pretended to be sick and begged for mercy, and found trouble and quarreled?how is this possible? But then a little thing happened that made it clear to her. At that time, the three of them, Huang Shang, Huang Di and Huang Zhong, sat around the table in the small garden and had afternoon tea. The very "Chinese" uncle Huang's family style was quite Westernized in terms of enjoyment, and everything followed Western rules.The green grass, the exquisite dining table, the table is covered with fine white napkins, fine porcelain dishes, silver spoons, sweet and salty pastries, coffee and black tea are all available, and a bottle of fresh water and fragrant flowers is not forgotten. Huang Chang picked up a piece of cake and said, "This is called 'Acacia Cake', right? The puff pastry is filled with plums, sweet and sour. I remember my mother used to be very good at making it, but she only made it once. I still remember the taste." The Yellow Emperor's eyes turned red, and he said resentfully: "You are spoiled by your mother, and you even make cakes for you to eat. I am not so lucky. I begged you so much in the restaurant back then, but you still refused to take me away." Huang Chang was stunned: "Are you blaming mom?" Huang Di was silent, just lowered his head, but after a while, Dou Da's tears dripped down, and he didn't wipe it off, just let it splash on the tablecloth bit by bit, splashing into irregular spots. Wet dizzy. Huang Zhong immediately felt overwhelmed, busy with fan and handkerchief, and softly persuaded: "Poor little emperor, there is no mother's pain, but you live in our house, we will compensate you, don't You are wronged." Huang Chang looked at him in disbelief, and she understood why her younger brother became so sick and neurotic now, it was all due to Huang Zhong's exaggerated indulgence.It's like a child who doesn't know how to be hungry, who has been hungry for a long time, and suddenly a lot of food is piled up in front of him, but it will eat him up all at once. Now she knew why Huang Di would find trouble and quarrel with Huang Zhong and go to the rainy field to get wet. It was to kill two birds with one stone - to make Huang Zhong sad and anxious, and to trick Han Kedi into caring and loving.Although that Miss Han didn't see it with her own eyes, she could imagine that she must be a warm and kind woman. Huang Di saw her temperament and also understood Huang Zhong's weakness.Tears have become a kind of prop for him, which can be used at any time when he needs it. Maybe he himself doesn't know whether those emotions are true or not. Anyway, they accompany him in acting, and they are so devoted to acting, so he fell headlong. I don't want to come out of the drama.He is his own director, screenwriter, actor, and audience, he hurts himself, he praises himself, he is moved by himself, and gradually he no longer has any real and healthy feelings, but only a pale and faded drama mask . The sun was shining brightly in the sky, but Huang Chang didn't know why, but just felt cold. The pretentious scene in front of her gave her a very dark and unhealthy feeling. She almost didn't know her brother, and she didn't want to know him anymore. .Because she didn't know when he was real and when he was fake, and she didn't know what kind of attitude she should use to respond to him, whether she should also act with him, acting out the normal warmth in the world.She even felt that even his frailty and sickness were fake, in order to hold her own. After that, Huang Chang no longer wished to see the Yellow Emperor, but the Yellow Emperor would always send a servant to Jiaxiu's "Shuiwuyouju" every festival, give some gifts, and send two poignant and sad greetings. On the kind of pink stationery that is specially used for love letters, it is very dramatic. In terms of dramatization, the siblings have reached the same goal by different routes, but the methods are quite different, and the results are also different.