famine

"Brother, brother, brother! What are you doing!"

The door of the bathroom was suddenly pushed open from the outside, and a small head squeezed in through the crack of the door, with black and white round eyes looking around, and two lumps of soft baby fat on both sides of the pink cheeks.

Little Mantou clasped his hands on the door frame, and was looking at Jiang Xuan curiously.

"Hey," Jiang Xuan in the bathroom was taken aback. After wiping half of his butt, he quickly pulled up his pants and frowned, "Get out!"

The little mantou blinked, and did not run away obediently at the first moment, staring at Jiang Xuan fastening his belt, subconsciously sucking the snot that was about to flow out of his nose, and then wrinkled his face, Suddenly he let out a sad "Ah", "Brother, are you stinking? It's a bit stinky... Let me turn on the exhaust fan for you."

As he spoke, he reached for the button outside the bathroom door.

Jiang Xuan raised his trousers and stepped over, and put the steamed bun aside like a chick, pinched his fleshy face, and wanted to laugh: "Isn't one meter enough for you? Didn't your mother tell you to knock when you enter the house? That means I'm on the bathroom, if I was doing something else..."

"Little Thrush!"

The sound of the cotton slippers knocking on the floor approached, and the aunt who was watching TV in the living room rushed over when she heard the sound, just in time to hear Jiang Xuan talking, so she hurriedly interrupted him, and hurriedly lowered her head to cover Xiao Mantou's ears, feeling a little annoyed He glared at him: "What are you talking about with the child? Smack you!"

Little Mantou didn't understand what mother and brother were talking about, and didn't understand why mother rushed over to cover her ears. She blinked her big innocent eyes, smacked her lips and said in a mysterious way: "It's okay, brother, I don't dislike you. Yes, my mother said that no one pulls stinky smells, so don't be embarrassed..."

The aunt quickly blocked his mouth.

Jiang Xuan didn't know whether to laugh or cry, tilted his head to look at his aunt, touched his nose, and walked back to the bedroom without saying anything, bypassing the mother and son in front of him.

While walking, I heard my aunt behind me teaching Xiao Mantou not to talk nonsense, and listening to Xiao Mantou's painful voice, I guess my ears were being pulled, and I didn't know why to say a hundred thousand whys to my aunt.

Why can't I hold back when I have something to say.

Why are you pulling my ears.

Why can't you have small cumin potatoes for dinner.

The condition of my aunt's house is very good. I live in a three-bedroom flat. It belongs to a middle-class petty bourgeoisie family. The whole family, whether they are wives and children or the elderly who don't want to leave the countryside, all rely on my uncle's salary to support me.My aunt used to be a designer, and she also had her own job, and her salary was not low, but since she got married, her uncle forbade her from getting up early and working late at night, and only let her do something she likes. Last time, she went fishing for three days and posted on the net for two days. If I have nothing to do, I can pick up some work to do. From time to time, I invite my little sisters to go shopping and do beauty treatments, and send little steamed buns to a hobby class. This is the bottom line of my wife's busyness that my uncle can tolerate.

My aunt is probably too busy to panic, and always urges Jiang Xuan not to be bored at school all the time, to come and live at home more, to accompany the preschooler Xiao Mantou, teach him to do oral calculations or help my aunt. It's better than being alone and alone, with a little headache and no one to take care of you.

However, the number of times Jiang Xuan can come to my aunt's house in a year can be counted on dozens of fingers, and every time my aunt calls and reminds me several times before rushing over slowly, and then counting the time After staying for two days, he ran back to school in a hurry as if he was afraid that his tail would be pinched. After a while, his aunt called him again, and he asked him to use all the reasons why he was sick during the exam and participated in activities. I would like to come back for a few days.

Because one of the bedrooms was converted into a study room, every time Jiang Xuan came to my aunt's house, she would live in the same room with Xiao Mantou. For this reason, my aunt specially replaced the children's bed in the house with a bunk bed, and bought a cabinet specially for it. The clothes Jiang Xuan bought, including pajamas, casual clothes, short-sleeved jeans, down jackets, are all available, for fear that he will have nothing to wear when he comes home.

When my aunt finished teaching Xiao Mantou and opened the door to come in, Jiang Xuan was sitting on the upper bunk with his legs hanging down, playing with his mobile phone.

Before the door was pushed open, Jiang Xuan heard footsteps with very sharp ears, and knew it was my aunt.

He looked up at the door. My aunt was already fully dressed. While arranging her scarf, she said, "Aren't you going out? I'm going out to play for a while. Please help me look at the little steamed buns. Let him watch TV in the morning and put the rice in the microwave at noon. Warm it up, teach him to do his homework in the afternoon, and I'll be back later."

I don't know if it's because Xiao Mantou is supposed to be so busy or because he is afraid that Jiang Xuan will be idle and bored. Jiang Xuan watched her arrange Xiao Mantou's day in an orderly manner, his expression moved inexplicably, and his hands on the bedside were clenched. The solid wood under his palm hesitated for two seconds and nodded: "Okay, you pay attention to safety."

My aunt froze for a while as she adjusted her scarf, and she took two seconds to look at it, "Hey, I'm just going to get a manicure... ok, ok, I pay attention to safety, stop at red lights and go at green lights, cross the road and walk on the crosswalk, don't worry about it. Don’t worry about fighting with others for the parking fee.”

Jiang Xuan was stunned, all his polite words were blocked by his aunt, and he turned his head and smiled: "Okay, go quickly, lock the door, my uncle will suffocate you if you are locked up at home."

My aunt also curled her mouth and smiled. She was very young, but after putting on delicate makeup, she looked like a girl in her 20s, more like the mother in the old photos, "No, I have to take advantage of his business trip. Playing wildly... Then I'm leaving, you two have fun, if you don't obey Xiao Mantou, you can just beat him up, but don't let his father see it."

Jiang Xuan suppressed a smile and waved to her: "Let's go."

Hearing the soft slam of the lock at the entrance, Jiang Xuan put the phone aside, stared at his thigh and became dazed.

The door of the bedroom was open, and it was hard to wait until the weekend to have the opportunity to watch TV all morning without doing homework. At this time, Xiao Mantou was hurrying to catch up with the bears that fell for a week, and politely turned down his voice, only from time to time A few bursts of uncontrollable laughter reached Jiang Xuan's ears, as if he had a hamster beside him, making noises from time to time, running a few laps on the running wheel to remind him that there was a live mouse here.

Jiang Xuan yawned after sitting on the bed for a while. Last night, Xiao Mantou insisted on sharing a bed with him, so he climbed up and got into Jiang Xuan's bed, fearing that he might fall out of the bed if he pressed the child. He didn't sleep much all night, holding the child in his arms, staring with his eyes open for a long time, and didn't sleep for a while until dawn.Feeling drowsy now, Jiang Xuan jumped out of bed and walked to the living room, and as expected, he saw Xiao Mantou staring at the TV intently and seriously.

He walked over and lifted his foot and kicked lightly, the stool rubbed back on the smooth floor along with his strength, the sound was not harsh because of the friction pads on the stool legs, it was like a low-pitched muffled hum.

Xiao Mantou slid half a meter back with the stool.

Still engrossed in staring at Xiong Er eating honey on TV, complaining dissatisfiedly: "I can't see it any further, I can't see it..."

"Your mother told you to sit on the sofa and watch," Jiang Xuan said, "I already let you sit on the bench."

Little Mantou was stunned for two seconds, and when he spoke again, his voice was full of gratitude and flattery: "Brother is so kind, brother, let's go play, I'm busy now, I can't accompany you."

Jiang Xuan nodded, sat on the sofa, took off his shoes and put his legs up, and adjusted a comfortable position, "Then I'll sleep for a while, call me when you're hungry."

Little Mantou, who was facing away from him, remained motionless and said nothing, probably agreeing.

In the afternoon, Jiang Xuan watched Xiao Mantou write two pages of calculation cards, and built blocks with him for a while. After six o'clock, as soon as the black shadow came down, my aunt came back from the outside with a cold air.

Little Mantou happily rushed towards the old wheat in the hand of the auntie.

"Where's the Big Mac? Where's the Big Mac? Where's my Big Mac?"

Auntie tapped Xiao Mantou’s forehead with her finger that had already been inlaid with many diamonds, and pushed his head out of the plastic bag. The lipstick on his lips was almost gone: “There is no Big Mac today, only vegetable salad and Mashed potatoes."

Xiao Mantou looked up in shock: "Mom, you went to Lao Mai, so you bought, bought...?"

Jiang Xuan was enjoying himself by the side, grabbed the little steamed bun with one hand, held him on his arm, and turned upside down, "How heavy are you? How about a Big Mac?"

"I'm not sinking!"

Xiao Mantou said angrily, "I'm Xiao Mantou, Xiao--you know what that means, it means it's so light that you can eat a Big Mac."

"Then you can change the name to Big Mantou in the future. You can't eat Big Macs because of Big Mantou, so you can save money." Auntie said.

"I can only be called Big Mantou when I am old."

Jiang Xuan: "You are so old that you are called Lao Mantou."

Little Mantou kicked his legs: "I am called Mantou Gan when I am old, and you are called Old...Old Thrush when you are old?"

My aunt laughed so hard seeing their serious discussion: "He can be called Thrush when he gets old."

Jiang Thrush stayed at his aunt's house for a day and two nights, and he had to pack up and go back to school early on Sunday morning.

In the closet, my aunt bought him a lot of winter clothes. After thinking for a while, he estimated the weather in the next few weeks, and decided to take two sweaters and two trousers.

He changed into the clothes he had before he came here, and put the clothes he wanted to take on the bed. My aunt put a bag of sugar oranges, a bag of kiwis, a bag of apples, and a big bag of snacks on top of him for vitamin supplements. Put it at your feet and lean against the door frame to watch him tidy up.

"Bring that down jacket with you. The one you wore is too thin. It will be minus eight degrees next week. You don't want to wear long johns. You just wear the long one in the closet to keep out the wind."

Jiang Xuan didn't want to take it. He was usually in school and rarely went out. The farthest way was from the classroom to the dormitory, and it took a few steps to get there. It was not convenient to ask for such a long down jacket.But my aunt has been expressing opinions on the sidelines, and there is always a posture that I will keep talking if you don’t nod. Jiang Xuan was afraid that she would talk endlessly, and because she would not get wrinkles before she was 40 years old, she moved the down jacket out of the cabinet in a rude manner. Pulled it out, turned around and threw it on the bed.

Looking back, he saw his aunt's hesitant expression, he looked away blankly, and continued to fold his clothes with his buttocks pouted.

After an unknown amount of time, Jiang Xuan heard his aunt calling him softly from behind: "Little thrush..."

Jiang Xuan paused for a moment, feeling unexplainably irritated, and continued to straighten his clothes after two seconds.

"Recently..." Auntie said softly, her tone was a bit difficult, and it was a bit difficult to say, "Have you returned to your mother?"

Jiang Xuan lowered his eyes, put the folded clothes into the prepared bag, and stacked them neatly one by one.

After waiting for a long time and seeing no answer from him, my aunt became a little anxious: "Are you...going home during the winter vacation? If you don't want you to live here, you can live here. Anyway, Xiao Mantou's father always works overtime, and there is no one at home who can help me. A living person. You can live here, bring the quilt and so on, and I will wash and dry it for you, so you won’t get sick easily. Is the living expenses enough? I’ll forward it to you on WeChat, and you can collect it.”

Hearing my aunt utter a series of words quickly, her tone was uncontrollably full of caution and worry, and she seemed to take it for granted when she said something that she didn't need to do at all. It made him uncomfortable.

Unable to hold back, he blurted out: "Don't worry about it."

As soon as the words came out of his mouth, Jiang thrush regretted it.

Fearing that his aunt would be sad, Jiang Xuan hurriedly added: "Winter vacation is still a long time away...Let's talk about it then, the money is enough."

No matter how bad you are, you can still live on campus. You only need to go through some formalities and pay some money to live for a winter vacation. Besides...

It's not that I haven't lived.

Seeing him let go, my aunt also exhaled softly, her brows relaxed: "Okay, then, if you want to stay here, tell me in advance, and I will ask your little uncle to pick you up, luggage and so on. Quite a lot."

She didn't think about it last year, otherwise she would never let a child live in an empty dormitory for a winter vacation by himself.

Although I'm neither cold nor hungry, but how lonely and... pitiful.

Xiao Mantou had an interest class on Sunday morning, and he went back to school with Jiang Xuan on the way, so he asked his aunt to rest at home, and planned to send Xiao Mantou there before going back to school.

It was freezing outside, and the snow hadn't even melted half. My aunt wanted to take the two of them there by taxi, but Jiang Xuan didn't let her worry about it in order to prove that he was rich.

"Don't worry about it, mom, brother is very reliable."

It was only then that the little steamed bun with Jiang Xuan's thigh wrapped into a ball said.

At this time, they were already standing at the door of their house, saying goodbye to their aunt.

My aunt pinched the tip of Xiao Mantou's nose dumbfounded, and looked at Jiang Xuan with concern. Seeing Jiang Xuan's calm expression, she felt for the first time in a long time that the child had grown up, and she didn't need to worry too much about many things. Jiang Xuan seems to have his own attitude towards things.

In the words of Xiao Mantou, it is reliable.

There is a feeling of being at ease.

She smiled at Jiang Xuan, raised her hand and quickly touched the top of Jiang Xuan's head, then immediately withdrew her hand, "Then you all pay attention to safety."

Before Jiang Xuan could recover from her sudden intimacy, the aunt closed the door and took pictures of one big and one small outside.

I don't know if it was an illusion, but before Jiang Xuan's suddenly dazed thoughts could be withdrawn, he heard a knock on the door of his aunt's neighbor's house behind him.