Chapter 3 03

Recalling it after a long time, how precious my thoughts at that time were, and at the same time how out of control I was.One life turns out to be in most cases powerless to defend another, notwithstanding his strong will. Daqing's death—an abnormal death is also inevitable.For such an ending, I will never touch it.That was not long after... This fall was like any fall before.I followed my grandfather to the woods to pick up dry firewood and mushrooms, and brought back big handfuls of red berries that my grandmother liked.It is the most auspicious time of the year in the forest. Not only are there patches of wild fruits, but also flowers that have not had time to decay and flowers that just need to bloom in autumn.It was really colorful, it was a dazzling world.

Grandpa told me over and over again not to walk away alone, he was afraid that I would get lost.But I always look for every opportunity to run far away.As a result, his calls were always resounding in the woods... I carefully walked around behind him, approached him, and hugged him violently. Those four-hoofed animals were constantly alarmed by us.I saw weasels and badgers more than once, and foxes.They are all very beautiful, and they all allow me to get close to them, but they are all afraid of people without exception.A weasel ran past us with a very large mouse in its mouth, which no longer aroused my surprise; but once I saw with my own eyes a strange animal the size of a yellow badger, with a large mouse in its mouth. The big green fruit walked by, glanced at me without panic, and disappeared into the woods.How interesting!

In autumn, all creatures are busy, happy and tired.Life in our little hut is but a corner, a labor of busy storage in autumn.How pleasant this is, what I look forward to most in a year is the abundant autumn-if it is not for this special autumn, if it is not for this afternoon, how long will I be addicted to it! Father came back this afternoon! It turned out that he had rushed to Mangye very early, but just wandered there for almost a day—maybe he got lost?Anyway, he waited until the sun was about to set and the wilderness was ablaze, and then he moved closer to the small hut. At that time, the grandfather and his Daqing were not there, only my grandmother was playing with dried vegetables in the small courtyard.She heard footsteps, and when she looked up, she saw a thin man with a sallow complexion and a pair of eyes fixed on him—no one could tell whether this man was fifty or sixty years old.It was getting colder, and the man was still wearing patched half-length black cloth shorts, and the part of his leg exposed under the shorts looked like dead wood.Grandma asked him what he was going to do?She probably regarded the visitor as someone who came to the forest to gather medicine and ask for water along the way.But as soon as she swallowed a sentence, she yelled, bowed her waist and slapped her knees.She ran away... After a while she found her mother.

Since then I have a father.Father drove away Qiu.At the appearance of this terrible man, who terrified me, all the berries in the wild fell together, and countless flowers closed together.The whole field has no color and no sound anymore.I escaped from the hut and ran to the depths of the wilderness in one breath. No matter how much my mother yelled, I didn't answer.My father was like a stranger to me, a stranger indeed.I never dreamed that he was such a person.I found that the old man looked at the newcomer tremblingly, and Daqing, who was close to his lap, looked up in confusion, and then lowered his head heavily.

That day I stayed under an oak tree till dark.Daqing called out in the distance, and I had no choice but to come out.I was terrified, afraid to see that man.I approached the hut step by step, and then I found a man with a gun next to the hut, so I stopped.In the night, I could see that it was a middle-aged man with a black gun on his shoulder.He also found me, and immediately "clawed".It sounded like the long sigh of a cow.I shook violently. I was stunned for a while, and seeing that he didn't pay attention to me, he slipped into the courtyard.Oh my God, another man with a gun is standing in the yard, and another man with a black face and a pointed chin is sitting on a piece of wood, staring fiercely at that man—my father...he is just a man squatting there. Total criminal.I couldn't help taking a closer look: his hands were covered with calluses, his wrists were also calluses, and there were scars - I didn't know until a long time later that they were made of iron cuffs and ropes... They said in a low and stern voice Ask him, he answers, and they write down a few words in a small notebook.At this time, the grandmother, mother, and grandfather were all huddled in the house.

From then on, my father was often escorted out by gunmen.Sometimes he would stay away from home for several days, and his mother would go out to look for him when she was in a hurry.More than once, I saw my mother help him walk home, his body was covered with mud, sometimes bruised and bloodstained.The little hut was full of groans, weeping and cursing, and the little hut was full of grief. Grandpa has fallen into inexplicable panic since his father came back.He first vacated his own room, took Daqing to live in a thatched shed on the side, and then made a fire to cook by himself.No matter how his grandmother and mother tried to dissuade him, he would not listen, and then he extinguished the fire in the stove after his grandmother scolded him. "Master's back, sir..." he muttered.

Mother said angrily: "There is no master in our family!..." The old man immediately changed his words and said, "Sir... sir..." The mother shed tears and murmured: "There is no husband in our family!" My father has to go to the nearby village to do work every day. If he is really tired and unable to get out of bed because of the pain, his mother must ask for leave for him.He is not allowed to go far away, as long as he leaves the hut and goes a few kilometers outside, he has to ask the person with the gun for instructions... It turns out that he just moved the place where he was imprisoned, and he will spend his whole life in captivity up.The difference from the past is that he brought the disaster back to the hut, and the hut became a prison cell, and our family was all prisoners... At that time, I felt a kind of despair effortlessly, and I looked at my mother with such eyes ——But mother's eyes are always chasing father, as long as father is in the room, her eyes are fixed on him more than half of the time.

That lifeless body disgusts me.I think the most terrifying thing in the world is the father.The grandmother changed her old habits: how happy she was to talk about the past, and from time to time in those stories, two men would appear—grandfather and father.Their whole lives are connected with legends, and all they do are earth-shattering things.Now she is silent.Because her hero is now curled up in the little hut, sad and humiliated, disheveled. I grieve for my mother and I grieve for myself. I have touched that incredible black and white photo more than once.It was a picture of a middle-aged man: extremely handsome.There are such great men in the world!He wore a suit and tie, and looked at me kindly.Did he know then that he was someone else's father?I have always kept it in one place as a treasure, and kept it a secret.I remembered the image of my father from a very early age, and I only recognized this person as my father, and at this time I absolutely could not connect him with the man curled up in front of me.

There has been no laughter in our house since—as if there really wasn't.When he fell asleep with sweat stains and scars all over his body, it was probably the happiest moment for the family.Because then we no longer have to listen to those groans and scolds, and we don't have to be scared.As long as he was awake and he was walking around the house, I immediately stopped talking.Sometimes he yells at me and I walk over, but he ignores me again.He looked at me with the strangest way in the world, eyes that were often half-closed--closed tightly after a while.He rubbed his eyes hard, and when I tried to move away, he was looking at me again.

Let me chew the stories told by my grandmother alone, and look for my father's dream from them... In a short period of time, the grandfather suddenly aged.He couldn't live without his dog for a moment.I found that he and his father could hardly speak a word, they seemed to avoid each other. What I am most afraid of is that my father will suffer from heartache: he brought back this terrible and strange disease from Nanshan, and he may not necessarily suffer from it at any time.At that time, his face was scorched yellow, and after a while he turned blue again, and his whole body rolled on the ground in pain, curled up into a ball.He couldn't wait to find a ridge, and pressed his stomach against the upper ridge to resist the severe pain.When the heartache passed, the hand had already been deeply inserted into the soil.His mother had asked a doctor for him, and he had taken medicine, but it was of no avail.

Once, when he was working in a small village nearby, he suffered from heartache again, and there was no one around him to help him—he rolled on a wheat field that had just grown an inch high, and his body crushed a piece of wheat.The village head found out, called some men with guns, tied him up, and locked him up in another place.The whole family didn't know where his father was until he was led out of a small dark room three days later.By then my father had fainted three times.In this way, my father led our family into the severe winter. It snowed heavily for three days and three nights in a row, and Mang Ye was wrapped in a thick white curtain.Why is it so cold?I seem to have encountered winter for the first time.The scene of stepping on the snow to the depths of the forest with a white breath in the past is still in front of my eyes. At that time, I laboriously dug out a hole in the snow just to find a dark red frozen date.The whole family looked out the window without saying a word, as if they were waiting for something ominous.The sun was about to come out, and my father started to move.He has been told that he must rush to the nearby village to clear snow in any snowy day.But the thick snow, how did he get into that small village?His mother helped him move forward, and the two moved while shoveling snow. Half an hour passed, and they were still trapped in the snow not far from the hut... There is no more warm and red charcoal fire in our house.The charcoal was buried in the soil behind the house, and the grandfather coughed and dug it out, but was stopped by the grandmother just after putting it into the brazier.We'd rather cling to each other now than start a brazier. My father was probably struggling to clear the snow in that small village at this time. What does he have to do with that small village?What did he owe them?He was perhaps destined to serve a strange village.I dare not go there to take a look, because I am afraid of being discovered by him.Once I went on an adventure, and found that people in that small village were standing at the street corner with a smile on their faces—there was only one emaciated father pushing away the thick snow in the whole street, and his five sense organs were squeezed by the cold Together, it's ugly.He must have suffered so much that he couldn't describe it. How great it would be for the people in the small village to stand up with a shout and sweep the snow off the streets together.But they just looked contented.i hate them. In the winter, people were extremely irritable, and my father's groans became louder.Sometimes he got so angry that he kicked the table over.At this time, the whole family did not dare to say anything, they only exchanged glances quietly.Every time Daqing clings to the old man or me, he keeps staring at that person.Once he was sleeping there, it walked over for some reason, and it was too late for us to stop it-it gently kissed the hand that was hanging down by the father. Father was suddenly tickled, jumped up suddenly, picked up a stick and hit him.Daqing dodged the first blow and ran away roaring.The grandfather yelled angrily: "Master!" The father threw the stick, and his sharp eyes glanced at the grandfather.The old man hid in his house. I can't tell when I'm going to get a beating.His big feet, harder than iron, stepped on my back, arms, and sometimes even on my head.I think the man is dying, or going mad--I'll bear it, but my hatred is multiplied by it. There was my mournful cry in the small hut.But one day the voice suddenly stopped.Probably no one has heard anyone cry like that in the hut since then. ——I cried that day, and I couldn't stop it.Grandmother went out and turned back after a while.She said a few words in my mother's ear, and my mother came over and took my hand.We moved to the door one by one, and turned to the corner along the courtyard wall - both my mother and I saw a man with a gun standing behind the house.What is he listening to. Everywhere I go people recognize me, which has never happened before.They pointed their fingers and said that this was the man's son, who lived in a small hut... I don't know how many people have seen his father tied up with a rope. Nowadays, as long as there is a rally, as long as it is a crowded place, such as a dozen miles away There is a big market outside, and someone must have come to take my father away. Grandpa, grandmother, and mother, as long as they go to crowded places, there must be people talking about them loudly. This winter, my grandfather fell ill.He healed slowly, and then became so weak that he could hardly do anything else.I remember clearly that one morning my grandfather was digging hard under a peach tree in the corner of the courtyard, with Daqing turning around beside him.Both mother and grandmother found out and just watched without saying a word.Father was awakened by something, and he also watched from the window.No one tried to stop him, they all thought it was weird.The soil was still frozen, and the old man digged for a long time, and then bent down to dig out again.I finally couldn't bear it and went to help him.His long, bowed body hid the little pit, and I couldn't see anything. The grandfather digs and digs, and takes out an oilcloth bag.The bag shattered with a slight tug, revealing a crock.Daqing pursed his lips in relief. The old man carried the crock into his room, and I followed him in.The earthen jar was sealed with wax, and when it was opened, there were some colorful coins, including a few coins.I let out a cry of surprise, and the old man covered my mouth. He wrapped up the coins that he had counted and counted, and handed them to his grandmother, saying: These were given to him by the master back then. He knew that he would need them in the future, so he only spent a little bit, and the rest are here... Grandma He was stunned for a long time without making a sound, tears fell into the skirt of his clothes.She said: "How stupid you are, how stupid, this money is useless today, the dynasty has changed...you should always bury it under the peach tree..." The old man opened his eyes wide in confusion: "Why can't you use the new money notes?" After the grandmother cried, she put away the money and said nothing. The old man suddenly said, "I'm leaving—I'm going back to my hometown..." Who ever heard that he still has a hometown?Everyone forgot about it, only knew that he was an orphan with no relatives.Grandma tried to persuade her to stay again and again, but he still said to leave: The man in the family is back, so I should leave, and the fallen leaves return to their roots... Grandmother lost her temper so that he would never say anything about leaving. I saw this scene with my own eyes, and I still remember it vividly today. After that, the old man never mentioned leaving again.I was heartbroken when I heard it, and it was hard to imagine what it would be like to lose my grandfather here.If he leaves, then Daqing will follow, and the life in the hut will become even more terrifying from now on.I pray in my heart: you will never, never leave this poor hut. But one morning, when I got up, I found that the whole family was a little panicked.Grandpa and Daqing are gone!Grandmother and mother were so anxious that their lips turned purple, and even my father was looking for it in a hurry.Mom shouted, but there was no response.I ran to the grandpa's house and found that everything was scrubbed clean, only his miscellaneous things were gone.I cried out.Mom wiped my face. Father led our family to the wilderness. We thought he must have quietly led his dog away in the dead of night. From early in the morning, I found the sun rising into the sky, and then I found the dusk. There was no sign of him anywhere.My mother asked my grandmother: In what direction is the old man's hometown?Grandmother shook her head too.Disappointed, we walked through the vast expanse of wilderness, turning our backs to the direction of the setting sun.Later, my father suddenly heard a wail—we all heard it—was that Daqing’s voice? Everyone ran towards the sound.Getting closer and closer, I really saw Daqing.It also saw us, rushed over madly, jumped and wailed and rushed ahead, leading us to fly away... Then I saw a tragic scene that I will never forget in my life: under a clump of oak trees, the old man was lying there, with a bundle of cloth rolled on his back.He stopped breathing. We lost a grandpa forever. This is the scariest story I've ever had in my mind.Every time I think about this story, a deep wrinkle grows in my heart.But how can I forget? My life at the gardening field primary school was getting more and more difficult.This is the only school in the vicinity, and the children from the forest farm and the village all go to school here, and almost none of them does not recognize my unfortunate partner.My bad luck kept befalling me, the bullying and all kinds of discrimination for no reason made me unbearable.I begged my mother: let me go home, I will learn better than them in my own home... Mom disagrees, and neither does father. For a while, the school imitated the adults outside and treated me like my father.More than once, when I returned home with trauma all over my body, my grandmother would hold me and cry all night... On such nights, I only thought about one question: How can people die early and with less effort? It was during this time that my mother nearly left us—she tried, without success, what I had considered.Don't recall those terrible scenes again, I will forget this incident for the time being... because there are too many misfortunes in the little hut, too many, I believe that as long as I and my grandmother, and even my father--as long as we are alive If we endure, mother will not leave us... Around the late autumn of the second year of my mother's accident, my grandmother passed away. This is another unacceptable fact.Come to think of it, I lost my grandfather and my grandmother. She died of despair and grief.Before this, she had experienced the death of her grandfather, the affairs of her mother, and... She was too tired to wait any longer.Many years ago, she had endured the great pain after her grandfather was killed... When I close my eyes today, I can think of the last time my grandmother lay on the bed—she couldn't breathe at that time... I remember her appearance clearly. How skinny she was then.She was lying on her back quietly, covered with an old plain flowered sheet... I know something is ending.Something here is coming to an end - an irrevocable end.What is it, I don't understand.But I know that the old man fell on the wasteland, and the grandmother left, and what should really end here. I waited secretly, concealing the panic in my heart. I found that my mother often covered her face and cried alone, behind my father and me.This is rarely the case in the past.Some days my father didn't get angry, he just worked hard, or squatted quietly in his corner. A stranger came to our house, he murmured with the family for a while and left; after a few days, that person appeared again. Just a week after the stranger disappeared, my mother stopped me suddenly—I was about to carry my schoolbag to school. "You don't want to go." Mom's face looked at the window.I felt my heart tighten. "Mom!" I yelled and froze. Mom turned her face, and at a glance, I found that most of the hair around her ears was white.That's strange, I didn't see anything yesterday - was it white overnight? "Child, come here, listen to what mother tells you..." She said this, but she came over by herself, hugged me with one hand, and stroked my hair with the other. This action of hers immediately reminded me of my grandmother.I started to cry, the louder I cried.I suddenly realized that since my grandmother passed away, I haven't cried well.This time my mother didn't stop me, she made me cry..."Mom! Mommy!" "You go to Nanshan, the family found a father for you there - you will have a new father from now on... You can no longer stay in the thatched hut, you are growing up, you should find a way out..." I broke free and stared at her. "Don't look at me like that..." This is real.OMG, I knew it was true at a glance.There was no father at home, either because he was afraid, or he got up early to work in a nearby small village. Anyway, there were only us mother and son at home.I feel that the skin on my face is a little tight, like a person on a cold winter night, his tongue is so cold that he can't use it: "I want to...stay in..." "Go kid, anywhere is better than home... You're about to graduate from your kid's school, and then you'll get a case, or go somewhere else. It's hard to find such a good family for you, and he's alone, When I am old, I will treat you well, just like my own son...Today, when it is dark, someone will come to pick you up..." "I don't I don't I don't!" Mom's face was pressed against mine.I can't bear to break free again.The white hair around her ear covered my eyes.At this time, the orange-red sunlight came in through the window lattice, and there was silence all around. It seems that just for a moment, I understand something.Yes, I must leave this little hut, although it is attached to my flesh and blood. ... Because Xiaoguer never came back, I had to go to her house.I was really worried that something would happen to her on the way back: Brother Kidnap would give her a ride every time, but her self-esteem was too strong, so she always drove him back early.She considers herself an adult and doesn't need other people's care.She probably didn't know how weak and pitiful she was. She was reluctant to go home, the environment suffocated her.But how strange it was that she missed her parents so much--you won't understand why until you go to such a place and see it for yourself. Fortunately, she only stayed because she was not feeling well.This is the second time I've been to her house, but her family is still a little anxious about my arrival.She looked at her father and mother with complaining eyes, because they called me "the boss" for a while, and "a senior official" for a while.What an old and strange way to call it, it makes me sad.I could hardly look at the two old men. They were just in their fifties, but they looked at least in their sixties. Most people on this plain sleep on earthen kangs, and the thatched huts in our vineyard also have a large earthen kang.Gu Er lives in the east room, and her parents live in the west room; in the middle are two stoves made of adobe, which seem to have been used for several generations.This mud house is very small. Looking up, the sorghum stalks on the roof were scorched black by smoke and fire, and there were strings of dust nets hanging from it—people here are very cautious about cleaning the ashes on the roof of the house, and they put them It is regarded as "money string". There is almost no wooden furniture in the house, only three or two boxes made of mud, which are used to store food, clothes and quilts.I saw a bellows in the middle room - only it was made of wood!Although I am more familiar with this place, I am still surprised by this poverty.This is real poverty. Can you imagine that there are such families in the affluent Cape Terengganu? The entire village street is filled with such small mud houses.I believe life in every cabin is much the same. The mother with a large forehead is not in good health, and there seems to be something wrong with her eyes. She keeps crying, and she rubs them constantly, which makes the eye disease worse and worse.She was sitting on the kang, wearing a thick out-of-season cotton padded coat, which had been covered with putty so that the silk patterns could not be discerned.She was grateful, ashamed, and deeply disturbed because of my arrival, and she almost kept patting her knees, "It's amazing, my boss is here! My hairy kid will be blessed, let the boss feed you a lot of money." The flowers are still blooming, and I still visit the door. I told her father and the hairy boy: In the next life, you can repay me by becoming a donkey or a horse! You can’t find such a good owner in the world!..." I almost shed tears in front of her. What I have always felt ashamed of is not being able to give employees more favorable treatment.Because our garden does not have so much money, it has just recovered...but the old man in front of him is full of gratitude. Bumping the forehead over and over again to stop the mother from speaking, the mother scolded the child: "What does the hairy boy know? Why don't you hurry up and serve a teacup for the high officials?" One sentence reminded the drum forehead, and she began to pour water for me.She washed and washed a porcelain bowl, and finally brought a bowl of white water.There is no tea at home, and no teacup. The father with a large forehead also wore a cotton-padded jacket with a large front and a cloth belt tied around his waist.In my impression, wide-breasted clothes are only worn by women, so I feel strange about this kind of dress.He is very thin, and the dust seems to be deeply embedded in the wrinkles, which cannot be washed away.He always laughs, but also has an unconcealable panic.The panic only disappeared when he turned his face and scolded the forehead. "Boss, let's eat at home. Now it's not like in the past. There's a lot of food. Look at our house...as long as the boss doesn't dislike it... Sigh, the hairy boy's family is young, ignorant, and a burden to others. There are many bosses. Teach me, take more care of me..." His trembling voice expressed indescribable gratitude.He seemed to owe me deeply—what did he owe?Does he know what I'm thinking when I'm standing under this roof? I have decided in my heart more than once: I will never come here again.I thought so the first time I came here.But I can't do it.There is a strange magnetism here that holds me—that is the truth of a plain.I don't want to come because, like everyone else, I'm always afraid of a truth.But I finally understand that the truth cannot be concealed.I strongly feel a naked truth.I belong to this truth... This is mostly the real reason why I left and came back, right? A voice deep within me urges me toward the plains.Here I face it, ashamed.I am a son of the plains, and I am ashamed of it.I am a human being and I am ashamed of it. I took a closer look under his reminder of "a lot of food", only to find some sweet potatoes piled up in the corner, a bunch of sorghum tassels hanging on the wall, and pebble-like potatoes beside the bellows.One fresh scent of autumn drove out another, and the comfort of one season packed into this little mud hut. Gu Er lifted a pocket from the side, opened it, and inside were freshly picked peanuts.The peanuts are still wet, and the shells are white and white.She picked them up and held them in front of me.I peeled the husk... the sweet juice filled my mouth, this is the fruit of the plains I am familiar with. The forehead still had a fever, so I asked her to rest at home.But Gu Er insisted on going back to the vineyard with me.She was so stubborn back then.What puzzled me was that the two parents also said one after another: "Take her!" I had to agree. We hired a carriage for our return.The driver was an elderly man.The horse-drawn carriage travels unhurriedly on the autumn plain, giving people a very special feeling.This horse-drawn carriage is still an important means of transportation here, and it is difficult for motor vehicles to replace it.With a bulging forehead holding a floral cloth bundle in his hand, he sat with his head bowed, his hair combed really neatly.She looks like a shy little daughter-in-law who just came back from her mother's house.I noticed that she was much stronger and plump now than when she first came to the vineyard.Her sun-burned face and big black and round eyes possessed a beauty that never faded.This beauty is intrinsic. The owner of the car doesn't take the passengers in the car seriously at all. It seems that he is very used to this kind of life.He kept humming along the way, because his voice was low and his voice was not clear, so I didn't pay attention to it at first.The next few words drilled into my eardrums and made me vibrate immediately.He's humming an old song about Xu Fu and Qin Shihuang's East Tour! I asked him to sing aloud, and he glanced at me and amplified his voice unhappily. Really that old song.It can be seen that in the Cape of Dengzhou, this ancient song has been mixed into the endless sea breeze.As long as I calm down, as long as I hold my breath, I will hear it playing faintly... I listened motionlessly and froze. The bulging hand was pushing me gently, and when I lowered my head, I saw a handful of white peanuts in her hand. Another long night.It's full of tides here.A cold and fresh breath blows from the boundless area, which makes it more difficult for me to fall asleep.Because of the passage of time, you will not be able to understand how I felt, how I felt during this long night. One has endless, cumbersome pursuits on such nights.I often find that time goes by so fast, ten or twenty years have passed in a blink of an eye. But everything that happened more than ten years ago is just like before my eyes.I couldn't be calm in this hasty welcome and farewell, and some mistakes often made me feel distressed.Negligence - Repeating an embarrassing scene without starting over.One cannot keep precious friendships and loves, and sometimes one watches them age, fade, and deteriorate. At times I want to forcefully restrain it—the hidden force that corrupts and mars life.To capture it, I tensed my heartstrings.How difficult!Do you often feel this way?It is not difficult to discover that power, the difficult thing is to restrain it, watch it, and keep it from getting close to you.Obviously can't do it.Because it's so tiring, and as soon as you relax, the day goes by.And life is assembled day by day, and this is how we lose our lives.I miss those days and moments when life radiated bright flames, chewing and feeling fully and repeatedly.I often endure something in the middle of the night alone...