Chapter 3 third episode

The escort of the forest train had just connected the leather pipe to the faucet, and it was flushed away by the water. The water swelled on his bloated cotton jacket, cotton trousers and face. Another heavy slip on the ice. Jiang Man almost laughed out loud. "What? Hold on." Tong Chuan quickly lowered Jiang Man's head.These two Beijing educated youths from the Great Northern Wilderness Construction Corps crawled in the hollow of the full-loaded logs of the small forest train, watching in horror the escort get up from the ice and fiddle with the water pipes, wondering what "monsters" the man was thinking.It was the winter of 1976.The last few dry yellow leaves of the birch tree also fluttered down like a tired bird struggling.The sky is white.Although you can occasionally find patches of green coniferous forest in the forest, the color is so gloomy, melancholy, deep, lonely and ancient, like the embellishments around the tombs.A few crows looking for food croaked "Wah-wah" around the heads of Tong Chuan and Jiang Man, their screams were startling and desolate.Even the dilapidated wooden house and two dilapidated tractors a hundred meters away were stuck in the snow, as if they were being buried. Only a few yellow and white houses in the small forest train station reminded people that there are still some in this world of ice and snow. Get angry, that's all.

The mood is different, and everything is bad. Tong Chuan lifted her onto the log pile of the forest train with his shoulders.From the decision-making to picking up the car, neither of them spoke within a day, as if they were screaming secretly in their hearts. "Or, I won't go. Shall we go down?" "What nonsense?" Jiang Man pursed his lips, and then loosened his twitching lips. "Tong Chuan, I'm a little scared..." Tong Chuan didn't say anything, he was also a little nervous. Who knows what the forest train escort is going to do? The escort dragged the rubber hose with difficulty, like dragging a frozen snake.He dragged the water pipe to a place four or five meters away from the small train, and put it down.I went back and turned on the faucet again, and turned back to lift the water pipe again, doing it very slowly and procrastinated, as if deliberately torturing people's nerves.

Two pairs of panicked eyes in the pile of logs stared at the raised leather pipes. Jiang Man's hand was convulsed, and he secretly went for Tong Chuan's hand, and shrank back timidly. God!The escort is really ruined!He was going to water the log.As long as the logs are frozen, the small train will not fall over as it bumps on the forest railway like briquettes, and there is no need to worry about someone picking up the car or stealing the logs. The water from the faucet will aim at the logs in an instant.The water splashed and the log was about to turn into an iceberg.Tong Chuan and Jiang Man were stunned, holding their heads together and shrinking, trembling all over.Hold on a little longer?Perhaps—no, no, the shooting of the "high-pressure water gun" turned out to be the venting and playfulness of the escort, without any intention of stopping or intermission.The bone-piercing icy water hit the backs of the two regiment soldiers and flowed into the necks, soaking the cotton-padded clothes and trousers little by little.Before long, the forest train will become their "coffin"!

Jiang Man said to himself in despair: "Okay, it's okay this time..." "Be patient a little longer..." Tong Chuan firmly pressed Jiang Man's shoulder with his hand, his mind is not easy to change.He must send Jiang Man away and return to Beijing.He felt that only in this way could he look like a real man.The soldiers of the Corps were shaking, and they were digging their way back to the city.Some people gave up their face, some broke their money, and some gave up their lives... The day before yesterday, their best comrade-in-arms Qi Xiaoyan passed away.When she came to the Great Northern Wilderness, her nose burst into tears, and when she left the Great Northern Wilderness, she still burst into tears and snot.She has always been driven by a passion to be reckless and unscrupulous.She was penniless but traveled all over Tianjin, Shijiazhuang, Wuhan, Jiujiang, Jinggangshan... thousands of miles away; she once resolutely broke with the "capitalist roader" father and wandered away from home; I was accused of sending "I couldn't draw a line." I walked 180 miles to the cadre school to see the "capitalist roader" father.Seven years ago, she wrote a blood book, swore an oath, and worked hard to come to the "North Pole" of the motherland, cultivate and guard the frontier, and decided that this is the destination of life, and would rather be "buried in the snow" here.Now, she has spent half a year in Beijing breaking through checkpoints and running back with all diplomatic means.She came to pick up her luggage, and prepared sorghum wine, sausages, and a few side dishes for a farewell "banquet".She begged Jiang Man desolately: "Sister Man, don't scold me, I'll take a step first..." She sincerely asked Tong Chuan: "Tong Chuan, don't hold back anymore, poke the window paper between you Break it! When two people are together, I would be willing to become a butterfly. I will leave Sister Man to you. You promise me, don’t bully her..." Xiaoyan cried, crying so pitifully, she needs to understand .She was born with a provocative face and figure, and her washbasin is an endlessly changing and moving series.Her phoenix eyes are covered by long and curved eyelashes, and every blink is like a fairy tale.This petite girl is childish like an eight-year-old child, and mature like an eighty-year-old man... She is drunk, comes in a frenzy, and leaves in a frenzy. She will wake up in the familiar but unfamiliar hometown of Beijing and start again... Tong Chuan and Jiang Man helped Xiaoyan onto the tractor, seeing that comrade in arms disappeared without a trace in the snow and smoke, they stood silently for a long time.

Jiang Man asked, "What shall we do?" Tong Chuan: "What 'we'? You can go, I have nowhere to go." "I can stay too." "Don't make 'international jokes'. You are always willful and reckless, stay with me? Your tears will flood the Great Northern Wilderness, I can't bear it." Jiang Man almost cried!She is a flesh and blood made of tears, and she often decides key choices at critical moments in life when she shed tears.That's not what she was waiting for.As long as she has a loving look from Tong Chuan, she is willing to stay in the Great Northern Wilderness for the rest of her life, until the two of them are "buried in the snow" together.However, Tong Chuan is just so awkward!

Love is a monster, and it shows its charm amidst awkwardness and incomprehension.Jiang Man tried his best to understand Tong Chuan—yes, Tong Chuan had no mother when he was two years old, and had a stepmother when he was four years old, but his "flying" father crashed into the mountain with the fighter plane just after his "honeymoon".Tong Chuan's mother then left with another family. Although he grew up in an army boarding school on the pilot's pension, he had enough of his stepmother's eyes.At the age of sixteen, he broke up with his stepmother and came to the Great Northern Wilderness to support himself, becoming a real "rooted tree".Jiang Man knew that when it came to returning to the city, Tong Chuan would have a series of unpleasant associations.He has nowhere to go, at least for now, Jiang Man's family has to allow him to be unemployed for no apparent reason.

That day, they saw the snow on the road being trampled by cars and people, squeezed out of water and frozen into ice... The wayward Jiang Man spoke stubbornly, and the two little brushes stubbornly spun half a circle, saying: "Okay, I'll go back to Beijing." "Go back, Jiang Man, go back! I'll take you on the little forest train. It's fast and saves some money. I'll help your dad see a doctor and get medicine." "That's nothing for you to worry about." Tong Chuan said nothing more.The two of them didn't say anything more.How could Tong Chuan have the heart to force Jiang Man to stay in the Great Northern Wilderness?After an unprecedented ten-year "catastrophe", everything is starting again.Do everything possible to go back, work hard to go back, look for learning opportunities, find a place in life, reunite the broken home, and serve the parents who have gone through the catastrophe, are old, weak, and covered with scars, that's right!Like children weaned prematurely, they also need to find maternal love.What's more, Jiang Man's father was so sick that he passed out, and his mother's neck was buried in soil!Tong Chuan cannot let Jiang Man make "sacrifices" for himself.

They endured the fierce shooting of the ice water.Ice water and tears flowed on Jiang Man's face forever.She trembled, thinking to herself, she must be dying, it would be clean to die together!But why did he die so inexplicably!Tong Chuan, the "wood", seemed to understand nothing. Endured to the limit, Tong Chuan said: "Get up!" Jiang Man didn't move. "Get up!" This man is always so rude! Facing the shooting of the ice water, they staggered up from the log pile.You hold me, I hold you.Although they stood high on the log pile of the little forest train, with a cloud-flying sky in the background, they were not at all heroic, but shivered in a ball.

The escort threw the water pipe with an "Ah!" and was stunned. "Oh my god, fuck me, you're looking for death!" The rude escort was full of swearing, jumping his feet while scolding: "Where can't you fall in love in the deserted meadow? You just got into a pile of logs, looking for death, looking for death! Huh?" At the small station, the station master, the switchman, those waiting for the train, and those giving people away were all called out by him to watch the excitement. Holding the travel bag in one hand and Jiang Man in the other, Tong Chuan trembled off the diving board set by the escort.

The escort came to help Jiang Man, but Tong Chuan shoved him silently.His eyes were fierce, as if desperate. People were taken aback—these educated youths, the "locust disaster", can do anything.The onlookers were dumbfounded, and obediently stepped aside to watch the pair of youths covered in ice armor clatter past.It was discovered that Jiang Man was still carrying a small wooden cage, inside which was a drenched little squirrel jumping around, staring curiously and trembling.Someone tentatively said, "Let's warm up to the fire", but Tong Chuan didn't roll his eyes.Rather than saying that he was helping, it would be better to say that he was dragging Jiang Man like a prisoner, and passed by the platform of the small station with his head held high.The journey was extremely long for him.He straightened his back as if he was going to the execution ground to die heroically.Jiang Man was so shriveled and collapsed that he let Tong Chuan drag the "dead dog", so ashamed that he couldn't lift his head.

The man dragged the woman to an abandoned board house a hundred meters away from the small railway station. Deep and shallow footprints left on the snow... There is a pile of ashes in the center of the board room, some leftover firewood and pine nuts. Tong Chuan lit a fire, and flames danced in his eyes. "Toast the cotton coat." Instead, Jiang Man timidly shrank towards the corner of the room. "Roast the cotton coat, do you listen? Roast it." Tong Chuan looked at Jiang Man who was curled up into a ball, turned around and wanted to leave, avoiding. Jiang Man trembled: "Don't go..." Tong Chuanli ignored him, and opened the broken door with his ice armor rattling.The old north wind whirled into a cloud of ice and snow.The door shut with a bang, and Tong Chuan took the wind and snow away.Jiang Man looked at the flames and at the locked door, feeling empty and frightened, so he hurriedly called out, "Tong Chuan!" Amid the whistling of the north wind outside, there was the sound of tree branches being snapped off. Jiang Man ran out, and the cold wind made her tighten her neck.In this ghostly weather of freezing cows, horses, and people to death, Tong Chuan was like a mad lion. He was climbing and breaking pine branches to make firewood, and he was angry at the same time.He kicked hard at the pine tree as thick as a bowl, and kicked again, making a humming sound in his throat.After kicking enough, he just stood there and let the snow on the tree rustle on his fur hat, face, shoulders, and neck.Suddenly he saw Jiang Man was by his side, he hurriedly clapped his hands to cover up, and went to break the pine branches. What he wanted to break—what exactly? Jiang Man's heart trembled, his eyes were red: "Come in." Tong Chuan was indifferent. "Come in, come in, come in!" Jiang Man pulled the motionless "ice lump" into the board room.Seeing her pitiful eyes, Tong Chuan felt guilty for a while: "Wait, Jiang Man, you have to dry the cotton-padded clothes. If you do this, you will freeze to death on the way. Let's have a good talk with the escort on the next train, and we will definitely be able to do it." Pick you up and let you go. Go in, go in and bake." "Just freeze us all to death. What's the point of living awkwardly?" Tong Chuan shook his head helplessly, so he hugged some pine branches and opened the door of the board room: "Jiang Man, let's bake it. Stay for a while. I can see you off." Jiang Man turned around suddenly: "Wood." What kind of wood? "Wood, idiot, idiot! You still don't understand, don't you understand? Don't go, don't go, don't go!" Jiang Man yelled frantically, and didn't go away - ripped open the travel bag, and pulled out the soy bag that was going to be taken back to Beijing; didn't go away - Soybean jumped into the fire and jumped around.Her weak body, her willful childish temper, once the nerves are touched, will explode with great rebound force.Only a twenty-year-old girl would do this. In order to die for love, let alone the fungus, mushrooms, day lilies in the travel bag, even the cute little squirrel, even her beloved "Jane Eyre" and "Maslova", Even she herself dared to throw herself into the fire and be reduced to ashes. "What are you doing Jiang Man? Are you crazy?" Tong Chuan hugged the girl's shoulders, and the girl turned her head away from him, holding back her tears. "Don't be like this, don't be like this. Don't worry, you can go. Go back—you slowly think about your ideas and find a way. There is hope for returning to Beijing. Don't worry about things here, I'm here. You stay in Beijing. There is no need to come back." Jiang Man finally cried, and hit Tong Chuan's chest hard with his head, as if he wanted to break open the closed "door".After colliding for a while, I don't know who took the initiative, and the two naturally and logically stuck together.Jiang Man's tears told everything.When two hearts collide, tears are the "glue" that binds boys and girls together.They have been close to each other for a long time for this moment of silent "confidance", helped, tried, and felt awkward.This is the result of their search for each other on the road of life.Tong Chuan's blood was rushing, his temples were throbbing, he couldn't control himself, and kissed Jiang Man passionately, resolutely, almost violently.As for the price she will pay for this love and this kiss in the future, she completely ignores it and completely forgets it. Under their feet was a puddle of water that had melted into ice. It took them a long time to calm down, and they sat by the fire, steaming from their bodies. The flames outline the warm atmosphere of the prefabricated house with orange-red color, the fragrance of turpentine permeates, and there are cheerful crackling sounds from the fire from time to time. The squirrel opened its round eyes and looked east and west. Holding a small pine needle in his hand, Tong Chuan suddenly felt guilty, feeling that he had bullied the girl around him, so he remained silent. Jiang Man: "Hey, what are you thinking?" Tong Chuan shook his head. Jiang Man: "Say it, we must be thinking about the same thing - I'll let you talk, talk, talk." The man still shook his head. "People say two people are good, just talk with your heart. You think of this pine needle, don't you? I remember, you said to me—you taught me—a long time ago, hundreds of millions of years ago, the pine tree must be a broadleaf tree , it is in the process of orogeny and crustal changes that hone the tender roots into roots, and turn the tender skin into vigorous wrinkled skin...that's what you think." "..." "You say, that's what you're thinking of. Pine needles." "These silly words—you forget them." "I didn't forget, and I told Xiaoyan. You said—the needle leaves are changed from broad leaves." "Forget it!—or, forget it." No no, how could I forget?The tokens that love relies on, the support that young people rely on in their lives, are sometimes innocent and irrational.And, this is something that will always be cherished in my heart.Jiang Man remembered it so firmly, for so long.However, for some reason, Tong Chuan threw the bunch of small oily needles into the fire.This person is awkward!Jiang Man talked a lot at this moment, like the water that opened the gate, the emotional climax of women must continue.But this man seemed to regret it, he didn't say a word, and there was no expression on his face. Jiang Man will never forget the small train station in the forest, and the warm and quiet small board room that exists in the snow-ravaged world.She likes to live in memories.This evening, and the night after returning to the company, she was reminiscing—reminiscing about Tong Chuan's kiss, she felt sweet and delicious.She forgave Tong Chuan for not bursting out with enthusiasm earlier. Who told him to lose his parents since he was a child and grow up under the eyes of his stepmother?She wanted to be considerate of him and make an amazing sacrifice for him: stay in the Great Northern Wilderness.She felt that this was a sacrifice for love, romantic enough, and great enough.Of course, sometimes when I think of Xiaoyan and Beijing, I also have a bitter taste in my mouth.Bitterness is fleeting—what is lost becomes loveliness, she believed in the line. Why didn't Tong Chuan say a word on the way home? Why did Tong Chuan change after returning to the Corps and ignore her? ——Tong Chuan hitched up the car, ready to go to the regiment headquarters to pull things.Jiang Man came running with cotton gloves in hand, Tong Chuan glanced at her, and hurriedly yelled at the mule to run, sending up puffs of snow smoke; ——In the evening, Jiang Man went to knock on the door of Tong Chuan's dormitory, but the light suddenly went out; ——Tong Chuan was breaking the ice with veteran soldiers to fetch fish. When Jiang Man came, he dropped the net, pulled out his rubber boots from the icy water, turned his back to Jiang Man, and walked away; ——Tong Chuan stood upright in the snow-capped mountain with a borrowed shotgun on his back. Jiang Man stepped on his feet to catch up, and Tong Chuan wanted to dodge again. "You stop!" Standing still, the two distanced themselves. The white hair wind swirls between them, and no one can see whose face clearly. "Don't go. Make it clear, don't pretend to be confused! What do I owe you?" "It's me... that owes you. Leave me alone, you should—go back to Beijing." "Go back as soon as you come back! Go back as soon as you come back!" After all, it was childish, Jiang Man yelled, and stumbled down the mountain... Jiang Man didn't want to go back to Beijing alone, and this time he couldn't help but make a fuss.However, Tong Chuan disappeared.Two days later, Tong Chuan called her: "Jiang Man! Guess where I am?" "Love is where it is, you don't care about me!" "Okay - did I put the phone down?" "Let it go! Hey, tell me where are you?" "I heard that the conscripts came and chased them to the county. They were going to close their stalls, and I begged for nothing—it was done. This time, Beijing Military Region! Long live the People's Liberation Army! If you want... maybe You have to wait for a few years. Take my luggage back to Beijing. I’ll be watching here, and I can’t let others carry it. I’m going to gather in the area in two days. Let’s meet in Beijing.” Jiang Man almost fainted with joy, his voice trembled, and he agreed: "Wait, wait, I'll see you off! Meet me in Beijing—of course! Hey! Wherever you go, you can send me a letter! My family Moved—I just said that I moved, but I don’t know where I moved. The letter was sent to the small grocery store at the entrance of the Hutong—yes, yes. I want you to send a letter a week—you said: one letter a week. I'll give you the envelope and stamps, so you don't forget...Hey, what's wrong with this phone? It's buzzing...Wait, I will definitely send you off, I must! " On the day Tong Chuan joined the army, she hurried up the steps of the overpass.However, the train carrying the soldiers started. Jiang Man stood blankly on the overpass, leaning on the railing and watching.The locomotive spewed out clouds of white smoke.The smoke billowed, covering the overpass, her tearful eyes and her upraised arms. She desperately threw ten envelopes and ten postage stamps under the overpass. Envelopes and stamps were engulfed in white smoke.As the train pulled out of the platform, the white smoke gradually thinned and dispersed.Jiang Man was left alone on the flyover, the envelope and stamps, like little dying butterflies, whirling and falling in the winter wind and smoke; falling, whirling...