Chapter 2 Chapter One

The end of autumn in one day, the end of autumn in the evening.The sunset in the evening, on the plain in the east of Henan, because of the evening, it was bloody, and the sky was red.When the shop is red, there will be autumn dusk.Autumn is deep and the cold is thick.Because of the cold, the streets and villages of the village were cut off from pedestrians. The dog has returned to its den.Chicken is on the shelves The cows in the cowshed also lie down in advance to keep warm. The stillness in the village, the strong stillness, is absolutely silent.Ding Zhuang is alive as if he is dead.Because of the silence, the depth of autumn, and the dusk, the villages withered, and so did the people.Withered, the days withered, like a corpse buried in the ground.

Days are like corpses. grass on the plains, it withers. trees on the plains, it dries up. The sandy land and crops on the plain, after the blood turns red, it withers. For the people in Dingzhuang, he stayed at home and never went out again. Grandpa Ding Shuiyang, when he came back from the city, dusk had already spread on the plain.Pulled his long-distance car, drove over from Wei County, and then drove towards Tokyo in the distance, leaving him on the side of the road, like leaving leaves on the side of the road in autumn.The road leading to Dingzhuang is a cement road built ten years ago when every family in Dingzhuang sold blood.Grandpa stood by the roadside, looking at the Dingzhuang Village in front of him. When the wind blew, his mind, which had been blurred along the way, became somewhat clear.The mess that I didn't understand all the way has a clue.I understood that he left the village early in the morning and went to the city by car to hear vague things from the people above for a long time. On the road leading to Dingzhuang, he woke up like a sunny day.

When the spirit wakes up, when there are clouds, there will be rain. When the spirit wakes up, Qiu Shen is going to be cold. A person who sold blood ten years ago will surely suffer from fever today.If you get a fever, you will die, and you will go to the world like leaves falling. Fever is hidden in the blood.Grandpa is hiding in a dream. Fever is in love with blood, and grandpa is in love with dreams. Grandpa dreams every day.For three days, my grandfather had the same dream every day. He dreamed that in the Weixian town and Tokyo city he had been to before, the underground pipes looked like cobwebs, and blood was flowing from each pipe.From the seams of the unconnected pipes, and the bends of the pipes, blood sprayed out like water, splashing in the air, like dark red rain falling, and the bloody smell choked the nose.But on the plain, Grandpa saw that the water in the wells and rivers was all red and bloody.All the doctors in the city and the country were crying loudly over the fever, but every day there was a doctor sitting on the street in Dingzhuang laughing.The sun is golden, Dingzhuang is quiet and quiet, and the people in the village close their doors, but the middle-aged doctor, wearing a white coat, puts his medicine box at his feet, and then, then he sits on the old pagoda tree on Zhuang Street. laugh below.Sitting on a rock under a locust tree and laughing.Laugh.lol.The laughter was golden and resounding, shaking the yellow leaves in the village to fall one after another, like the autumn wind blowing non-stop in the village.

After finishing the dream, the higher-ups called grandpa to the county for a meeting.There is no village head in Dingzhuang, so grandpa will hold the meeting instead.This time, when he came back, Grandpa understood a series of things. I understand that firstly, fever is not actually called fever, its scientific name is AIDS; secondly, as long as people who sold blood in those days had a fever for ten days and a half at that time, they must be AIDS today; When I got AIDS, the first symptoms were the same as ten or eight years ago, like a cold and fever. I took some antipyretics, and the fever subsided, and the person returned to the original state. After half a year, maybe three to five months, When the disease broke out, my whole body lost strength, sores arose on my body, my tongue was festered, and my days were so dry that there was no water.People are suffering, from three months to half a year, maybe you can last eight months, but it is difficult for you to last a whole year.And then, you die.

Dead like a leaf falling. When the lights go out, people are no longer in this world. The fourth thing grandpa understood was that in less than two years, people in Dingzhuang died every month.Almost every family is dead.More than forty people died in a row. Zhuangtou's grave is like dense sheaves lying on the field.Some of the sick people thought it was hepatitis, some said it was a shadow on the lungs, and some had both liver and lungs in good condition, but they just couldn't take a bite of food.After half a month, the person was so hungry that he would vomit blood, or half a basin of blood, and he would pass away.Dead like leaves falling, no longer in this world like lights off.At that time, it was said that he or she had a stomach problem, liver disease, or lung disease. In fact, it was all a fever.It's all AIDS.The fifth thing I understand is that fever is the disease of foreigners, the disease of urbanites, and the disease that people with unrighteous conduct are willing to suffer from. Now China has it, and it also has it in the countryside. Those who are sick are decent people. .And there is a large area at a time, like locusts flying over a crop field, flying a large area at a time.Sixth, if you have this disease, you will die. It is a new incurable disease in the world, and you can't cure it no matter how much you spend.Seventh, the disease has only just begun, and the major outbreak will not come until next year or the year after.At that time, a dead person is like a sparrow, a moth, or an ant.A dead man is like a dead dog now.Dogs are much more valuable in the world than moths and sparrows.Eighth, I was buried under the wall behind my grandfather’s house. I died just after I was twelve years old and studied for five years.Eat a tomato and I'll die.If I pick up a tomato in Zhuangtou and eat it, I will die.Poisoned.Half a year ago, our chickens were poisoned to death.Another month later, my mother's pig ate a piece of radish thrown by someone on Zhuang Street and died.In a few months, I ate a tomato on the village head and died.Who put that tomato on the stone on the roadside when I was leaving school? It was a poisonous tomato. As soon as I ate it, my intestines seemed to be cut with scissors. After walking a few steps, I fell down on Zhuang Street. They ran and took me home, and when I was put on the bed, I foamed at the mouth and died.

I died, but I didn't die of fever or AIDS.I died from a massive blood collection by my father in Dingzhuang ten years ago.Buying blood and selling blood.He died because he was the biggest bloody head of ten villages and eight villages including Dingzhuang, Liuzhuang, Huangshui and Lierzhuang.Is a blood king.On the day I died, my father didn't cry, he sat beside me and smoked a cigarette, and with my second uncle, one of them took a sharp shovel, and the other took a shiny big Machete.The two stood at the crossroads in the middle of Dingzhuang, shouting and cursing at the top of their voices:

My uncle called: "Come out if you have the guts, don't fucking hide in the dark and inject poison, come out and see that I, Ding Liang, will slash you." My father pointed a sharp iron shovel and scolded: "Is Ding Hui jealous when I am rich and healthy? Is it jealous? I, Ding Hui, have been your ancestors for eight lifetimes. You poisoned my chickens and pigs to death. I dare to give it to you." Poison my baby!" Calling out loudly, cursing loudly, from noon to dark, no one came out to answer my father's words.Take my uncle's words. In the end, they buried me.

Also buried. Because I was only twelve years old and not yet an adult, according to the rules, I could not be buried in the ancestral grave, so my father hugged my small body and buried me behind the house of Dingzhuang Primary School where he lived, in the narrow white wood In the coffin, there are textbooks, homework and pens for homework. Grandpa had studied and rings the bell at school. He has a good language. Everyone in the village called him Mr. Ding, so he put story books for me in the coffin.Story selection.There are also several books of myths and legends.There are also dictionaries and dictionaries.

Then, when my grandfather was fine, he would stand in front of my grave and wonder, would the people in the village poison the Ding family again? Would they poison his granddaughter and my sister Yingzi again? Poison his remaining grandson and my uncle's Xiaojun? I just want my father and my uncle to kowtow to every household in the village, and beg them not to poison the Ding family again. up.Don't let the Ding family lose their children and grandchildren.As he was thinking about it, the second uncle also had a fever, so he knew that his uncle's fever was actually retribution, and he got it by buying and selling blood for my father, so he didn't think about my uncle going to kowtow to Dingzhuang's family , I only thought about asking my father to kowtow to each house.

And nine.Ninth, grandpa understood that a year or two later, fever would break out on the plains.In Dingzhuang, Liuzhuang, Huangshui, Lierzhuang, and other thousand villages and hundreds of households, there will be a big eruption like a flood, and the Yellow River will burst through hundreds of villages and thousands of villages. At that time, dead people are like dead ants , A dead person is like falling a leaf.Once the lights are extinguished, people are no longer in this world, dead like leaves falling from a tree.At that time, the people of Dingzhuang were almost dead.Ding Zhuang is about to disappear from this world.The people of Dingzhuang are like the leaves on an old tree, first wilting and then turning yellow, and finally all fall down. After a gust of wind, the leaves did not know where to go like Dingzhuang.

Ding Zhuang and Ye Yang didn't know where to go. Ten more.Tenth, the higher-ups asked all the sick patients in the village to live together immediately, fearing that the fever would spread to those who had never sold blood.Said: "Mr. Ding, when you sold blood back then, your boss was the king of blood. Today, you should do something to gather all the patients in Dingzhuang to live in the school." After hearing this, the grandfather was silent for a long time. , until now my heart is still full of indescribable taste.Up to now, when I think of my death and my father is the blood king on the plain, my grandfather wants my father to kowtow from house to house in the village, and wants him to die after kowtowing. He can throw himself into a well, take poison, or hang himself. . Immediately die. Just die in front of the Zhuang people. Grandpa was startled when he thought of letting my father kowtow in front of the whole village and then die.Surprised, my grandfather went to the village. Just walked to our house. really gone. He is going to tell my father what he wants my father to kowtow to death. A big accident happened in Dingzhuang, a small village with less than 800 people and less than 200 families, in less than two years, more than 40 people died.Calculated, in the past years and months, one person died in Dingzhuang every ten days and a half months, and about three people died every month.Moreover, the season of the dead has just arrived. By next year, there will be as many dead people as there are autumn grains.There will be as many graves as summer sheaves.The older ones were in their fifties, and the younger ones were three or five years old.Everyone regularly has a fever for ten days or half a month before the onset of the disease, so the disease is called febrile disease.The febrile disease had spread, and it had already strangled Dingzhuang's throat, causing Dingzhuang to die and cry continuously.The carpenters who make coffins in the village have changed three or four sets of saws and axes. Death, like a dark night, literally covers Dingzhuang Village, and also covers the surrounding Lincun and Linzhuangzi.Every day, the news coming and going on Zhuang Street is all in black, either someone from someone's family has a fever again, or someone from someone's family died in the middle of the night last night.Whose family is so, the man has passed away, and the daughter-in-law is preparing to remarry. She wants to marry to the far, far away mountains, away from this ghost place where fever spreads on the plains. The days are unbearable.Death, shaking at the door of each house every day, like mosquitoes flying around, turning a corner to someone's house, that person's house will be infected with fever, and within three to several months, someone will die in bed . There were so many dead people, the owner cried for a day or a long time, and spent a handful of money to bury them in a black wooden coffin; the West's family might not cry, but just sat around the dead body for a long time, sighing. With a little anger, people will be buried. All the paulownia trees that can be used as coffins in the village have been cut down. Three old carpenters, because of making coffins every day, two of them suffered from backaches from exhaustion. A person surnamed Wang who can tie paper flowers to make wreaths, tied too many flowers, scissors and knives, first rubbed a dozen large blisters on his hands, and then the blisters burst, and the skin dried up. More than a dozen yellow calluses from scissors appeared on his hands. The living have come to dead idleness.They just guarded the door, no one was too lazy to plant the land, and they didn't go out to work to earn money. They just stayed at home, closed the door and closed the house every day, for fear of fever coming in from outside the door.In fact, I was also waiting for the fever to break in.Waiting day by day, guarding day by day.Some people say that if someone has a fever, the government will send military trucks to take the sick person to the desert in Gansu and bury him alive, just like the legendary plague that was buried alive.Knowing that the news is a rumor, but I still believe it in my heart.Just stay at home and wait, close the door and wait, as soon as you wait for a while, the fever will come and you will die. Many people died, and the village also died. The land is barren, so don't hoe it. The field is dry, so don't water it. In some families, when someone died, they still ate every meal, but they stopped washing the pots and bowls.From the last meal to the next meal, I still use the unwashed rice cooker to cook, and I also use the unwashed bowls and chopsticks to eat. There was a man who hadn't seen him on Zhuang Street for ten days and a half, so there was no need to ask him where he was, thinking he must be dead. He must be dead too. But suddenly when you are going to fetch water from the well, and you meet him fetching water from the well, both of you will be startled, staring at each other for a long time, and one will ask, "God, are you still alive?" The other will answer: "Having a headache for a few days, I thought it was a fever, but it turned out not to be." They all smiled happily, and one carried a load of water, and the other carried a pair of empty wooden buckets, and passed by the well platform. This is Dingzhuang Village. This is the fever and days that Ding Zhuang has been waiting for. Grandpa went back to the village from the side of the road, and when he arrived at the entrance of the village, he met Ma Xianglin, who had a fever and loved rap and singing pendants all his life.Ma Xianglin sat under the eaves of his house in the setting sun, tidying up his beard that had not been used for several years and whose paint peeled off.He sold his blood to build the three red brick and tile houses in his family. Now he is sitting under the eaves, tidying his beard and singing with his bark voice: The sun rises in the East China Sea and sets in the West Mountain, a day of sorrow and joy; Sell ​​food to earn some pocket money, one day more, one day less... She looks like she's not sick.But the master saw death on his face, the blue light floating on his withered face one by one, and the moldy and dried sores with thick bubbles, dark red like Like a shriveled pea on the face.Seeing the master, he closed his beard, with a yellow smile on his face, his eyes were hungry and wanted to eat, and there was a hint of singing in his voice: "Mr. Ding, are you going to a meeting above?" My grandfather looked at him: "Xiang Lin——are you so thin?" He said: "I'm not thin, I can eat two steamed buns for one meal... Does it say that this disease can be cured?" My grandfather thinks for a while: "Yes—people say that the new medicine will arrive soon. As soon as the new medicine arrives, just give it a shot." His face was polished: "When will the new medicine arrive?" "It won't be long, though." "But how long is how long?" "But how long is not how many days." "How many days?" My grandfather said, "I'll go up and ask again in a few days." After speaking, my grandfather left. My grandfather walked along the alley, and on the door frames of every house on both sides of the alley, every household was pasted with white couplets, new and old, so white that it hurts the eyes, walking past, like walking through a white alley full of snow .He walked along the alley and saw on the gate of a brother's family who had not yet issued five talismans, the son of the family who was less than thirty years old had a fever and died. The white gate couplet on the gate read "People The house is empty and the three autumn plays are empty, and the lights are off and the sun is setting. "There is also a family named Li who died of his newly married daughter-in-law. The daughter-in-law's fever was brought from her natal family and infected her. He became a man, gave birth to a baby and contracted a baby again. In order to improve the fever of his children and grandchildren, the door couplet wrote "The moon is falling and the stars are sparse, and the family is dark. I hope the sun will shine." There is also the door of the next family. , except for two white door couplets on the door, there are no ink characters on the paper.Master didn't understand that the white door couplet was pasted, but he didn't write, so he went over to have a look, touched it, and found that there were actually two layers of white door couplets under the white door couplet.I knew that only three people died of fever in his family, and I was already afraid of posting the white couplets, and I was tired of posting them, so I simply pasted the door couplets and did not write ink characters. Grandpa was standing in front of the door, when he heard Ma Xianglin chasing after him and shouting: "Mr. Ding, the new medicine is coming soon, let's celebrate. You organize everyone to go to school and let me sing Zhuizi for everyone. I can sing very well—now the people in the village are almost suffocating at home." Grandpa turned to look at him.Ma Xianglin walked a few steps forward and said: "The school is a good place to sing Zhuizi. You just need to say hello. When Dingzhuang sold blood, you just said hello and sold them all. They were all sold to your boss Ding. Bright. At that time, one cotton swab collected by him could wipe the arms of three people nine times... Now I don’t say anything, and I sold it to him every time I wiped it nine times. I sold it all to him. I sold it to him— ——When I meet him on the street now, he doesn’t bother to talk to me... I don’t say anything now, everything is over, I just want you to invite the villagers to the school and let me sing to them A few books." Said: "Mr. Ding, don't say anything, I just want to sing Yuzhuizi a few times. Let me sing Zhuizi and wait for the new medicine. passed away." After finishing speaking, Ma Xianglin stood a few steps away in front of my grandfather, his face full of hunger begging for food and thirsty begging for drink.My grandfather looked at him, turned his eyes over his shoulders, and saw a few people standing behind him. They were Li Sanren, Zhao Xiuqin and Zhao Dequan who had a fever in the village, and their faces and eyes were full of questions. son of light. Master knew that they were all going to ask about the new medicine, so he said loudly: "The new medicine will be here soon. Xianglin——when do you want to sing?" Ma Xianglin's face immediately turned bright red: "If it's too late tonight, I'll sing tomorrow night, and the people in the village will love to hear me sing every day." After breaking up with Ma Xianglin and the others, my grandfather agreed and walked towards my house. My family lives on Xinjie in Zhuangnan. New Street is New Street after all.Xinjie is a new street established after Dingzhuang got rich.Your family has money and is going to build a new house, so your family will move from the village to Xinjie, and build a two-story building according to the government's regulations.One mu of land, with buildings on the top and walls on three sides. The buildings are all pasted with white tiles, and the walls are all red machine bricks.Ceramic tiles smell white all year round, and machine tiles smell red all year round.When the smells come together, they become red, red, white and white, with a golden sulfur smell. A street full of new bricks and new tiles smells of sulfur. All year round is the sulfur smell of new bricks and new tiles. The whole world is full of the sulfur smell of new bricks and new tiles. My house stands in the smell of sulfur.The smell of sulfur touches the nose, ears and eyes day and night, but it attracts people's hearts.Many families in the village live in the smell of sulfur.Many people want to live in the smell of sulfur, so they all sell blood. So there is a fever. There are a total of more than 20 families living in Xinjie, and the owners of more than 20 families were all bloody.Bloodhead makes a lot of money, so he built a house in Xinjie.They all live in Xinjie.There is a new street.My father was the first bloody boy back then, and later the biggest bloody head.It's the blood king.So my family lives in the center of Xinjie, not a two-story building, but a three-story building.The government stipulates that each house can only be built with two floors, but my house was built with three floors. When other people build three floors, the government will intervene, but no one cares when my house builds three floors. The house was not built into three floors from the beginning.It was when other people lived in thatched houses and adobe tile houses, my father built pure bricks and tiles. When others built pure bricks and tiles, my father took off the pure bricks and tiles and built a two-story building.When others wanted to build a two-story building, he added another floor to make it three.When others want to add one floor or directly build three floors, the government intervenes, saying that the model villages in the county are all two-story buildings, not three-story buildings. My house is three floors.The third floor is one floor higher than the second floor. In the courtyard of our house, unlike the building, there are pig and chicken coops in the courtyard of the foreign-style building, and there are pigeon coops under the eaves.When building the building, my father aimed at the style of western-style buildings in Tokyo. The floor of the building was paved with large pink and red tiles, and the courtyard floor was paved with a one-meter-square concrete floor.The squatting pit used for open-air toilets for thousands of years was changed into a seat in the house, but my father and mother could not poop when they sat on the pot, so they had to sit in the open air behind the building Dig a pit. There is a washing machine in the washroom of the first floor, but my mother likes to take the laundry tub to the yard and wash it by hand. In this way, the seat becomes a decoration. The washing machine has also become a display. There is a refrigerator, and the refrigerator is also a decoration. The dining room and dining table are all set up. When my grandfather came to my house, the family was having dinner in the courtyard with the door closed.White steamed bun, rice soup, stewed cabbage with vermicelli and radish.The peppers floating on the cabbage leaves are as red as the torn New Year pictures.Father and mother were sitting on small stools, and a small table was set up in the middle of the courtyard. The family gathered around the small table to have dinner, and my grandfather knocked on the door.After my sister opened the door, my mother brought soup to my grandfather and set down the stool, but when I was about to eat, my grandfather stared at my father with chopsticks, as if he was looking at a stranger coldly. My father also looked at my grandfather coldly, as if looking at a stranger. At the end, my dad said: "Dad, you eat." My grandfather said, "Boss, after much deliberation, I have to tell you something." My dad said: "Needless to say, you can eat." My grandfather said: "Don't say I can't eat, and I can't sleep at night." My father put the bowl in his hand on the dining table, put the chopsticks on top of the bowl, glanced at my father and said, "You tell me." My grandfather said, "I'm going up to have a meeting today." "Does it mean that fever is AIDS? AIDS is the new terminal disease in this world?" My father said, "Dad, let's eat. I will know these things if you don't tell them. Two-thirds of the people in the village know it. Only those Those who have a fever don’t know. Those who have a fever know and they pretend not to know.” Then, my father glanced at Grandpa again, with a look of indifference and disdain, like a student glancing at the teacher’s hand, which he would have known long ago. It's like a paper.When it was over, Dad picked up the bowl, picked up the chopsticks, and ate on his own. My grandfather is a teacher. In fact, he has been ringing the bell all his life in school, and he still rings the bell until he turns sixty this year.Sometimes I take care of the children for the sick teacher, and teach the first-grade Chinese class for half a day: "up, middle, down, left and right." Write chalk characters as big as a bowl. My father was also taught by my grandfather, but now he doesn't respect my grandfather like he used to respect his teacher.My grandfather saw the disrespect in my father's eyes.Seeing that my father was holding the bowl and eating, he lightly knocked his rice bowl on the dining table. Finally said: "Boss, I don't want you to die in front of the whole village, but you always have to kowtow in front of the whole village." My father stared at Grandpa: "Why should I?" "You're bloody." "This new street is full of bloodheads." "They all learned from you. None of them earn as much blood money as you." Dad slammed the bowl down on the dining table again, and the soup in the bowl splashed out and fell on the table; he threw the chopsticks on the dining table, and the chopsticks rolled down and landed on the ground. "Father," my father stared at my grandfather and said, "From now on, if you mention the matter of asking me to kowtow in Dingzhuang, then you are not my father, and you don't even think about asking me to take care of you when you die." The master just stood there, with the chopsticks frozen in his hands, and said softly, "Is it okay if your father begs you? Please go and kneel down and kowtow to the village man, don't you want to?" My father said loudly: "Dad, you can go. If you say one more word, you are really not my father." My grandfather said: "Hui, just kowtow, and the matter will be over after kowtow." My father said: "You go. From now on, you are not my father. You are not my father. I will send you to the grave after you die." My grandfather stayed for a while, slowly put the chopsticks on top of the bowl, stood up and said: "More than 40 people died in the village, and your family kowtows, and there are only more than 40 heads. This will tire you, won't it?" Are you tired?" When I asked, my grandfather seemed to be tired too, exhausted his strength, glanced at my mother, then fell on Yingzi's face, and said, "Yingzi, tomorrow you Go to school, I will make up your Chinese lessons for you. Your teacher will never come again, and we will all take Chinese lessons from now on." After speaking, Grandpa got up and went out. When I went out, my father didn't go out to see me off, nor did my mother see me off, so my father slowly left.With his back arched and his head hooked, he walked slowly, like an old goat who had been walking for a day.