Chapter 1 001: Return
Wang Tianxiao opened his eyes and found himself lying in the snow.
Since he lived in the south with his children, he rarely sees snow, and sometimes it snows in his dreams.
Suddenly seeing the Mountain Dance Silver Snake, I was very happy.
But this place...
He sat up suddenly, shocked.
A dilapidated "Phoenix" brand weighted bicycle fell in the snow next to it. It had been buried for an unknown amount of time, and the snow had buried the front wheel.
A military yellow backpack was hung on the handlebar, and the mouth was broken open, revealing half of a light yellow cornmeal pancake inside, which was also half buried by snow.
He is wearing a light gray burlap Zhongshan suit, which has not been seen in some years, and the big-toed leather shoes on his feet are full of a sense of age.
Because the trousers were too short, the exposed red socks were embroidered with a few bright yellow characters: Happiness Card.
Wang Tianxiao looked at the word happiness stupidly.
Long time.
He murmured: "I thought it was true that all the hardships have come, but why did you go back to thirty years ago in a blink of an eye. Do you want to experience the suffering again?"
The fate of this dog day, how to play with him? !
When you are sad, you will run out of ammunition and food, and you want to get over quickly, but you can’t get through the days like years;
It’s finally getting better, I hope that time will pass slowly and enjoy the happiness, but soon I will reshuffle the cards and start again.
Can you be more shameless?
Wang Tianxiao sat in the snow for another half an hour, picked up his bicycle with a wry smile, looked at the small mountain village shrouded in night, and spit.
"Oh shit."
He has been honest all his life and basically never uttered foul words, but now that he speaks out, he finds it really enjoyable.
**** it!
He howled toward the mountains.
Shouting mixed with wind and snow, being wrapped into the depths of the mountain.
.
Wang Tianxiao pedaled his bicycle quickly in the snow. The snow was thick and slippery, but he had ridden this bicycle from his teens to his forties, and he knew its performance well.
I scolded and scolded, and I couldn't escape what I had to face.
During the ride, he gradually recalled the past, and remembered why he appeared in the snow on this day.
December 12, 1984.
The wife was killed by the villain and gave birth prematurely. The son who was supposed to be born next month will be born in the early morning of tomorrow.
Fortunately, he went home temporarily to handle errands, otherwise the consequences would be disastrous. It was precisely because of this incident that he harbored a bit of resentment towards his indifferent mother for the rest of his life.
Missing about his family, Wang Tianxiao rides fast. He is in his prime at the age of twenty-five. He is full of energy, and his body is not yet disabled.
The bicycle moved quickly in the snow, leaving two black marks.
At one o'clock in the morning, Wang Tianxiao returned to the village.
Wangjia Village is backed by Yangziling. It is a small village at the foot of the mountain. There are about 8,000 to 9,000 people in the village. The villagers farmed the land when they were busy, and went hunting and collecting herbs in the mountains when they were free. They lived a pretty good life.
Wang Tianxiao is a forest ranger at the forest farm in the neighboring county. Because he has a bad relationship with the leader, he has been fixed in other places for a long time.
Although the straight-line distance from home is only a few tens of kilometers, to go back has to go around half a mountain. It is nearly 150 kilometers away, and it is not easy to go home.
Wangjia Village in the early morning was silent, with occasional dogs barking.
He was anxious and didn't have time to rest. He stepped on the edge of the cliff in his pit yard and looked down. The cave that belonged to his house was pitch black.
Pit courtyard is a common living style in Longdong.
Dig a large pit several feet deep in the flat ground, about ten feet in length and width, and more than a dozen cave dwellings were dug out on the side for people to live in. Seen from above, it looks a bit like a huge unearthed cemetery.
Because it is more than ten meters underground, it is warm in winter and cool in summer, which can well avoid the severe weather with great temperature difference in the northwest. There will be a huge seepage pit in the middle of the yard. If there is too much rain in summer, the water will seep into the seepage pit, so as not to flood the cave dwelling.
No matter how many children there are in each family, they all live in the ground kang courtyard before the family is separated.
When I have a daughter, it is really inconvenient to live in the same house with my father, so I will move up and build a courtyard house on the flat ground, which is what is called a family separation.
As long as the family is separated, the pit courtyard basically has nothing to do with the son. In the end, the pit courtyard will be reserved for the youngest son, and the parents will usually live with the youngest son.
It is now 1984, Wang Tianxiao has not yet separated, and lives in the underground pit yard with his four younger brothers and one younger sister.
He has been working outside for a long time, leaving only his wife Li Yali at home.
Three years ago, I had a daughter, Xiao Wang Fang. My daughter is very sensible. Although she is very young, she can already help her mother wash socks, sweep the floor, and do some simple housework.
Thinking of his daughter, Wang Tianxiao's heart tightened, and he knocked **** the dilapidated door.
"Boom boom boom."
The knock on the door was particularly loud in the quiet night, startling more dogs, one after another, and the barking resounded throughout the small mountain village.
"Who is it?" someone shouted in the yard.
"Me!" He heard that the voice was Yu Xiaofeng, the third sister-in-law, and a trace of anger flashed in his eyes, and he said angrily.
It suddenly became quiet inside, and after a while, someone slowly came to open the door.
It is the fourth brother Wang Tianyi.
Wang Tianyi works as a clerk in the village. When his eldest brother is not at home, he always likes to be the head of the family, and he likes to speak in an official tone, as if the clerk is a big official.
"Second brother, why are you back in the middle of the night?" Wang Tianyi looked surprised.
"Yeah." Wang Tianxiao responded nonchalantly, carried the bicycle across the threshold, and walked down to the yard.
For a while, he didn't know how to deal with these deadly relationships in his previous life. He was almost an enemy's brother. When he saw them and heard their voices, he felt disgusted.
Leaning the bicycle against the wall, Wang Tianxiao pushed open the air-leakage door of his house.
It was pitch black inside.
He stood on the ground in the room, closed his eyes tightly for a few seconds, his eyes were slightly moist, and he dared not turn on the lamp for a long time.
There were rustling voices in the darkness, and a crisp and tender voice asked cautiously, "Who?"
Wang Tianxiao took out a match from behind the railing, and wanted to light the kerosene lamp on the railing. After lighting it twice, he found that it couldn't light up. With the faint light of the match, he saw that the kerosene lamp had long run out of kerosene.
But it was just this dim light, but I heard a loud cry of "wow" from the kang, and there was a sound of small footsteps approaching hurriedly, and the soft and tender arms hugged Wang Tianxiao's neck.
"Dad...Dad...my mother is dying."
Daughter Wang Fang just hugged his neck and cried, unable to say anything else.
Wang Tianxiao couldn't help the tears from falling down his face.
Daughter Wang Fang lived too hard when she was a child and was severely undernourished. Although she was very good, she was discriminated against everywhere because of her height. Yu Yu dared not start a family for a long time, and finally suffered from moderate depression, and once had the idea of committing suicide.
As a father, he did not let his children live a good life and left a lifelong regret. After all, it was his dereliction of duty.
"Fang baby, your mother will not die. You sit down first, and Dad will find kerosene to keep the lamp on."
The soft body of his daughter softened Wang Tianxiao's heart. Thinking about his daughter becoming strong and independent in the previous life, but not being very close to him, he blamed himself very much.
In order to make a living, he had to work around for a long time to earn money, but because of this, he missed the good time with his children.
Reasonable…
But it made him helpless.
"My mother said there was no kerosene at home." Wang Fang said bluntly, with her hands still hanging on her father's neck, unwilling to let go.
Wang Tianxiao can only go home once every six months, and every time he comes back, his daughter is so clingy.
"Then... let's go to grandma to get some."
"Grandma said she's gone too."
"Then, let me ask you Wuda."
"Wu Da and Liu Da are not here, but Sanda and Si Da are here."
Wang Tianxiao met in silence, gritted his teeth, and came to the cave dwelling in the north and east. This is the cave dwelling of the old fourth Wang Tianyi's family.
He has just been married for more than four years, and the family has not yet separated.
"Fourth, do you still have kerosene, my lamp is out of oil, give me some."
It took a long time to whisper inside: "Second brother, we don't seem to have many... Wait, let me show you."
Wang Tianxiao waited in the snow with his daughter in his arms for five or six minutes before the door opened. Wang Tianyi was wearing a sheepskin jacket and holding a small bottle in his hand.
"Here, that's all."
Wang Tianxiao saw that there was only a small amount of kerosene in it, secretly gritted his teeth, "Okay, these are enough, I will pay you back when I buy it tomorrow."
"It's okay, it's okay, you can use it. Then I'll go to bed first."
"good."
Watching the door close in front of him, Wang Tianxiao went back to his cave.
He walked all the way through the cave dwellings of the sixth child and the fifth child, stood in front of his mother's cave for a while, and then came to the door of the third child's house, a trace of indifference flashed in his eyes.
Finally returned to the cave.
Lighting the kerosene lamp, he got on the kang, and the corner of the kang was so high that he was unconscious, and his wife who was shivering with cold was in his arms.
This is the second time he has experienced this night.
Just like thirty years ago, he went home temporarily and saw his wife in a coma.
The ice-cold kang, there is no wheat straw for the fire, and some hot water for the wife, and there is no firewood in the pot. There was only the bottom of the tank left, and it was frozen solid, and the steel knife handle could not be broken.
He put down his wife, helped her wrap up all the quilts, and then went to the firewood house. He saw that every firewood pile was full, but his own house was empty.
The wife hasn’t caught up with the land distribution after she got married, and he doesn’t have a rural household registration, so the family doesn’t have any land. If there is no land, there will be no grass for crops to use for heating, and winter is like a year.
Of course, here is the mountain, so there is no shortage of burning things, but my wife is pregnant with a child, and it is inconvenient to move, so it is impossible to go a few kilometers away to collect firewood.
When he left, he entrusted Lao Wu and Lao Liu to help his wife get firewood, but he didn’t know why he didn’t do it.
Wang Tianxiao looked at all the firewood piles for a while, and came to the first pile on the left, which belonged to the third brother Wang Tianren's family. He directly filled a large basket and carried it back to his cave.
They owe more than a basket of firewood to themselves, and they will count on taking some back.
Soon, the kang was heated up.
The kang in the northwest is similar to the one in the northeast. No matter how cold the room is, as long as the kang is heated, it will gradually warm up. Having a wife and children on the kang is also the simplest and most beautiful goal of life for a man in Northwest China.
Wang Tianxiao struggled to smash some ice cubes out of the tank and put them in the pot, boiled them, poured part of them into a thermos bottle, and filled two infusion bottles and stuffed them under his wife's bed.
Wang Fang sensibly talked to him lying on the railing, running over from time to time to put her mother's outstretched hand back into the quilt.
Children from poor families have long been in charge of the family, and she already knows how to love her mother when she is young.
Wang Tianxiao rummaged through the boxes again, found a piece of Analgin, raised his wife's head, and prepared to feed her. After thinking about it, he took half of it off and only fed half.
Although the effect of Analgin is very good, it also has great side effects for special groups of people. My wife is about to give birth now, so be careful.
After finishing this, he leaned against the wall, lay beside his wife, and looked at her frowning in her sleep. She is so young at this time, at the age of twenty-three or fourteen, it is a beautiful time.
Think of her working hard for half of her life with her, working in the fields when she is busy, and doing small labor on the construction site when she is not in the field. She is only in her fifties, her hair is already full of white hair, her lumbar muscles are so strained that she can't straighten her waist, and she is seriously injured. anemia.
Raising three children and growing up, she not only fulfilled the responsibilities of a mother, but also helped her husband share a lot of burdens.
He... didn't give her a stable life, let alone prosperity. He worked very hard, but he still didn't make a good husband.
Because the kang was warming up, Xiao Wang Fang began to feel drowsy. She was close to her father's body, holding his left hand tightly, and kissing the back of his hand with her tender mouth from time to time.
"Dad...dad...dad."
After falling asleep, he still called Dad in a daze.
Wang Tianxiao gently rubbed her little hand, which was as cold as a small steamed bun.
My family was poor and couldn't afford cotton. The child still wore jackets in winter, and his little hands developed habitual frostbite, which didn't get better until high school.
After an unknown period of time, his wife Li Yali slowly opened her eyes. She was a little confused at first, thinking it was a dream, so she held her husband's hand and put it on her face.
But soon, she realized that this was not a dream, and her husband was lying beside her, and then she shouted in surprise: "Shopkeeper, when did you come back?"
The new book is opened, signed, and ready to invest.
(end of this chapter)