J, about forty years old, with a head of short, shiny black hair, a slim body, and a shyness in gentleness in his speech.
More than twenty years ago, J and I studied in the same high school. One day near graduation, respectively, eighteen and seventeen years old, two young girls, meet to the school behind a wheat field on the ground to sit and talk, envisioning what our future will be like. I don't remember what I said at the time, but I remember that our faces were a look of fascination and infatuation.
This moment and the past twenty years are the "future" that we envisioned at that time but did not think clearly. I, in these twenty years, especially before 1990, walked through what a blood and tears paved the road of life! Almost ten years ago, I wrote more than ten thousand words about the experience of entering society and marriage in those ten years. Nearly two days finally had the courage to open and more calmly reread the dusty nearly ten years of text, if not determined to write it out, and then after so many years, I really want to forget a lot of details. In recent days, I've been obsessively thinking about how to start my work, what form to take, and whether to write a trilogy of autobiographical novels like Gorky's. J asked me today, "I guess you must be writing something now, right?" I was right about her, she's not like the others after all, and she deserves to be my best friend.
J had a relationship crisis some years ago, but her situation was different from mine. Her husband, "Z, is sometimes grumpy, but he's a good person," J summarized.
"Do you love him or not?" I asked.
She thought for a moment and concluded, "Yes."
The crisis between them is in the past, and they're doing well now; Z is now concerned about her; Z did have an unusual affair with one of his female students, had sex with her and got pregnant, and J couldn't get her head around it and made a big fuss about it, pulling a handful of the girl's hair out. But J now tells the story in an objective and calm tone, she said that the girl was a good student, she admired her teacher's talent, and that they were not just playing games, but had real feelings for each other. The girl said she was willing to be a lover for the rest of her life instead of trying to break up Z and J's family. Of course, J couldn't tolerate her husband having another lover. She doesn't want to share a man's love with someone else.
"What happened then, the schoolgirl?" I asked.
"Alas, Z harmed people, can a girl study when she is in love? Didn't get into college, went back home, what's the situation now I don't know." J sighed and said.
"Is not pregnant, the child in the stomach?" I asked next.
"Aborted, just in our hospital, but I did not do it, it was another gynecologist. You can't have that baby, how complicated it would be to have it, think about it." J was honest, and that's what makes her so lovely, or maybe it's because we've historically had nothing to say to each other. Anyway, in front of me, J always tells me everything about herself, without reservation.
The real reason why J is able to tell the story of her husband's relationship with a student so calmly now is that she has a boyfriend who can "speak his mind", "He's eight years older than me, an old high school student from the 60s and 70s, very knowledgeable, good-looking, and works in a unit as a manager. When a hand." J said. When talking about that "he", I saw J's face glittering, must have been happy.
"Finally found the balance," I thought to myself.
J is now living a happy and contented life. Her daughter finally got the desired grade after a year of tuition and went to a satisfactory university. She has a job, a family, a child's future, and everything is going her way. And there's a talkative boyfriend who makes her so happy that she dances around, so it's really as happy as it gets.
Second, the nurse E's story
That day in the square on the side of the road to the mountain sitting with J chatting, but also saw the E's husband, small G with his son and small daughter to play on the mountain. The old man, G, is now a middle-aged man, and he didn't recognize me, he just looked at me. He didn't recognize me, just a sweeping glance, said hello to D and led his son and daughter up the mountain.
J and I talked about E. J said that E's son had changed his name to K. He seemed to be called something else. No matter what he was called, he was dead last in school. The company's main goal is to provide the best possible service to its customers," he said, adding that the company has been working on a number of projects in the past few years. In fact, that kid is also poor, looks dull, seems to have not inherited his father's beautiful and his mother's shrewd at all. He was born mentally retarded, and no matter how good a teacher is at teaching, it's impossible to teach a kid like that to be good. This is also E's fate. She was originally a woman of moderate to low moral ability and appearance, small eyes, red face, high school cramming for two or three years to get into a health school. But her fate is good, in fact, is to rely on a her "uncle", that the so-called uncle, and her mother does not have a trace of blood relations, is only her an aunt's brother, but E followed her shrewd mother has been that "uncle" recognized than the pro-uncle more pro.
E's "uncle" in the province when a very big official, E health school was directly assigned to the county hospital, and not a few years when the head nurse. Once on the job, she immediately learned to master the dress up skills, but also spend money to cut their own eyelids, the original red face also metamorphosed into white and tender. As will dress, always wear short pants or new skirts, high heels, the original appears to be short legs also give people a long and upright visual effect. Love marriage is even more fortunate, married a younger than her four years, talented and good-looking but also very good at earning money husband, and that small G although I heard that outside the affair constantly, but the family is ultimately responsible for the E has also been very good. A few years ago, they finally gave birth to a look very much like the small G smart and clever little girl, three or four years old, holding her father's brother's hand, jumping and jumping very cute. The son of a half-wit has become a piece of heart disease for G and E. Life is not perfect.
Third, the barbecue stall owner L's story
With J wandering half a day, back to the daughter's hat lost.
Yesterday at noon to go to the cultural center in front of the daughter to buy a new hat to eat barbecue, with the previous barbecue stall owner, two (3) class Li Xiaodong's mother chatting and chatting actually talked out of interest. She wasted no time in inviting me to her home, and I honestly bought a large watermelon and followed her to her home. That is the post office family building on the fifth floor of a set of houses, along the way she said she was the poorest upstairs, I believe it. Because she is a dead man, rely on selling barbecue to make ends meet the bitter woman, I did not expect a foot into the door, showing everything in front of me with the "poor" word does not touch. Flower tiles on the ground, sofa and coffee table are the color of high-grade wood, the walls in front of the landscape paintings, after a large mirror, the ground pots flourish I can not recognize the name of the lush green large flowers and plants, the balcony is also set up a slip of the size of the various colors of the birds chirping bird cages. She gave me a tour of her three bedrooms, the kitchen, and the shady terrace. In a house of one hundred and eight square meters, all the rooms were neatly and elegantly furnished, and it seemed that this woman, who was so large and stout as to frighten those who met her for the first time, was very good at keeping house. She entertained me like an old friend or a close sister, I tried to eat a bowl of cold noodles in soup that she did not allow me to fish out again, I have never liked cold noodles, especially with soup, but also so oily, and two plates of cold dishes, the flavor is not good. She said she got up in the morning and pressed the noodles, cooked and cooled them, and prepared the food, then went out to sell barbecue, and her son came back to eat at noon. She sells until there are no more customers and then rushes home to have a bowl of rice and then goes to sell again. After eating, she cut a small half of the watermelon I bought, and we each ate a few teeth, mainly her fifteen-year-old son, who is nearly five-foot-eight, and my five-and-a-half-year-old daughter, who wears a head of knots and a denim skirt. After the watermelon, her son dutifully went to wash the pots and pans and went to bed afterward. She then sat down and told me her story. Originally, I ran to her house just to listen to stories Well, considering that she is a bitter woman without a husband, there must be stories worth listening to.
"It's been five years since my man died," she said, "Come and see his picture." She led me into her bedroom, where a small picture frame with a black-and-white picture of a young and handsome man sat above her bed. "This was taken when he was thirty-one." She gave me an introduction to the photo, that photo brow is very much like her current son Li Xiaodong, but the eyes than Li Xiaodong have God, see out once a handsome boy.
L is a Tiger, a year older than me. "We brothers and sisters **** six, I am the second oldest. My father couldn't read a word and worked as an automobile driver all his life. In the seventh and eighth years, you don't look at the driver, but actually broader than the governor." She preached. "When I was a child, our dolls ate walnut persimmons and other foodstuffs that came in hemp packages. My mother did not work, but the hand is very clever, needle and thread tea and rice all kinds of proficiency. School classmates, the most number of our siblings dressed beautifully and eat the most extensive. I went from Beiguan Elementary School to Huining First Middle School junior high school graduation."
"Oh, then we count is the same grade, I am also seven or eight years of junior high school graduation." I said.
"All of our siblings look tall, just because of the tall, I started in elementary school as an athlete, playing basketball, often running around to participate in competitions. Every semester, here and there after the competition to participate in back to school, almost has been fast exams, and those textbooks for me, they do not recognize me, I also basically do not recognize them. What kind of test do you think you're going to get?" L asked, staring at me.
"Of course you can't get a few points on a test without studying." I answered with a smile. She went on to tell me, "But I did not become a professional basketball player after all, the reason is that the soles of my feet are flat, can not run. When I graduated from junior high school, I didn't get into high school, so I went to a carpet factory to become a carpet weaver. After learning for a while, I was one of the fastest carpet weavers and one of the highest paid workers." She said.
"Tell me about your search for a date," I enlightened her.
"Looking for a partner, I was not a little bit of opinion, my classmates one by one are talking about the object, no one with me to talk about. There is also a Wang Fang, and I do not talk about the same, for fear that we are ugly. We both watched those students who talked about their objects lead their objects to sell pies on the street, we pointed and scolded: 'Look at that dead dog, find yourself an object, shame do not know. Because our family situation is good, my mother and father to ask the door to the young man picked very fine, come one push one, until my dead man Li just came, only counted on the fancy. As long as my dad and mom are interested, no matter who it is, I agree. Li Gang is the son of a young man who went to the countryside, and was later recruited and assigned to work at the Post and Telecommunications Bureau, with a high salary and a long, lean face. But he was already an alcoholic before we got married. Forty days into the marriage he began to beat me, over and over again, drunk, over and over again. At twenty-two I gave birth to the woman, and at twenty-five I gave birth to my son. Then my man hit hard and didn't want me anymore, forcing me to get a divorce. After the divorce, I lived in my mother's house, but every day I had to run to the family home where we used to live to do laundry and cook for my two children. I cried in front of him one after another, he brought in a woman, I scolded away, and then brought in another, I still scolded and drove away. I was determined to be with my man. That ran for three years, he allowed me to live with him, in order to avoid family planning fines, dismissed him from public service, we did not apply for remarriage. At this time, some bad sun in the community discussed that we were to protect the son of the overbearing fake divorce, some people repeatedly sued us `court of lawsuits, and finally our this Li Xiaodong was fined six thousand dollars, and we also formally remarriage procedures. The year before he died, my mother died, dying she took my man's hand with tears in her eyes and said: `Don't beat L anymore, pull your children well, take care of your mother-in-law, or I can't close my eyes'. After my mom died, he was like a completely different person, treating me so well. Wage folders to me, he himself only spend a bonus, before it has always been even more than a thousand paychecks to eat and drink all the money, but also forced to ask me for money. He said to me: 'Go in style, be as smart as you want to be,' and encouraged me to go to the ballroom. I really went there, and after going there twice I became obsessed with dancing and went crazy, not even caring about my children. My man ran the postal service in a township, and as soon as he entered the house, he finished all the chores, filled my water tank, washed all my clothes and ironed and folded them neatly and put them in the closet. I felt like I was living in front of people all of a sudden. After a year of this, five years ago in the late fall, he suddenly died in the flat, four days before I was notified."
"What kind of disease?" I asked, interrupting L's narrative.
"People said it was a drunken myocardial infarction." She replied.
But I've vaguely heard people say before how the guy died of exhaustion while sleeping with another woman. Because there was another woman in the house when he was found, and in the heat of the moment he put on the wrong underwear, and people told unpleasant stories back then.
She went on to say, "He was so good to me that year that he saved his remorse specifically for me."
I asked her why she didn't find herself another one. She said: "I've been looking for a man my whole life, and I'm afraid that I'll find one and scold me, so I don't want to find one. But the widow's door is a lot of right and wrong ah, you do not know often in the middle of the night, someone called me, said dead dog words, I will be with those who do not know the people on the phone to scold the war."
"Where does your daughter go to school now?" I asked.
"Going to school at Dingxi Health School, a cousin of my aunt's family, who is an official in the province, promised to arrange a job for my daughter." She replied.
Her son Li Xiaodong I give to take the language class, in the class of few words, very obedient. Learning is the bottom of the class, I asked L child is not love to read or can not read, she said it is not intelligence, her husband is an alcoholic, often drunk, not sober, how can give birth to a smart child? Their son had a general anesthesia operation when he was three years old for sudden blindness in his eyes, which also affected his brain. She had no hope for her son's schooling and had no idea what she could make him do in the future. Luckily, she had many relatives in various official positions who could help her. In her house, all the furniture and kitchenware were bought for her by her relatives on both sides of her mother-in-law's and mother-in-law's families. Her two children, the state used to pay eighty yuan per person per month alimony, now rose to one hundred and sixty yuan per person per month, and she used to live in the family home rented to other people to live, the monthly rental fee of eighty yuan, together is four hundred dollars, she sells barbecue can earn four or five hundred dollars a month. She says she can get by now, they mother and son are small meals, a meal each a bowl of rice, and it does not cost anything. She loves her house and is satisfied with it, it is a good house, the future has a daughter-in-law can live under.
Another bitter woman! But her suffering is different from mine. That is a barbecue seller, almost no culture, no personality, only do manual labor, only know how to live the life of a vulgar woman's suffering. When she was a child, she had a rich family background, but did not put a little knowledge into her head, and thus fell into the present situation. And I grew up in that kind of a destitute and miserable family, desperately reading to fill their minds with culture and ideas, and now it is the idea of torture to the bitter.