Stubborn illness

"Okay, don't cry, be strong, bear with it, it's okay, it will be fine, it's okay!"

The mother caressed the little boy's back, raised her right hand, stroked the wet and fine hair of the little boy, took out a worn square handkerchief from her pocket, and lovingly wiped away the tears from the corners of the little boy's eyes , comforted carefully.

The little boy hiding in his mother's arms was like a skinny cat that fell into the water in the twelfth lunar month. He shivered and curled up, his eyes frightened, wanting to look around, not daring to act recklessly, timidly.

But outside the door of the earthen house, beside the bluestone platform, there was a pool of filthy blood stains, black and red mixed with milky white, bigger than the peeled dog skin plaster, the little boy shook subconsciously, and shrank his little head towards his mother's chest.

Because the crime I suffered just now is replaying in my mind.

Just now, on the edge of the strip-shaped bluestone platform, three or four tall men from their own relatives held the little boy's hands and feet tightly like catching animals, letting the little boy struggle with all his strength, letting the little boy The boy cried heart-piercingly, but they remained indifferent.

The woman standing in the middle, holding a bottle in her left hand and a knife in her right hand, seemed to have completely lost her amiable and respectable appearance, and so did the men not far away, bowing their heads nervously, Mothers with sweat on their faces are all, a bunch of hateful guys, hateful.

Seeing that the little boy didn't twist his body so hard, the woman lowered her head and tilted the bottle slightly towards a part of the little boy's body. "Ah!" The little boy felt like a red-hot iron bar had pierced into his body. The pain was extreme, bursting in pain, and the little boy passed out from the pain.

.......................................

When the little boy grew up, he never dared to be shirtless like other peers in crowded places. Even when he fell asleep in the hot summer, even when he took a shower, he always consciously covered and dodged.

Because of the scars on the body, there are more than one scars.

In the past two years, I have gotten better, relieved, let go, in the factory and at home, I no longer have so much scruples.

"Hey! What a crime!" After taking a shower that evening, in the living room, the aging mother walked over, raised her right hand, and pointed at the right waist of the boy who was no longer young with slightly trembling fingers. The dry moss-like traces like a miniature map of China blamed themselves, like a precious embroidered handkerchief being embroidered.

Negligence, irreparable, made the hidden sadness more palpable when it was exposed, showing in the corners of the eyes.

"You were really good at that time, haha" the little boy laughed, in order to distract his mother's sorrow.

"Who told you to be so sloppy when you were young." The corners of the mother's lips parted slightly.

Sloppy at the moment, in the mother's mouth, means that the skin is not good, the body is weak and sick.Little boys are like this. I heard that when they are three, four, or five years old, every summer, little boys will develop sores, which are as big as chestnuts, and some are as big as walnuts. They are wrapped in pus and grow on the ears. The side grows on the top of the head, and some even hide on the thigh.

At that time, the adults were too young to go out to work. Most of the children in the village were crawling on the ground, like chickens, ducks, cattle and sheep. I remember that when the sores were long, they didn’t feel much. Clear it out, that is to go to the execution ground.

As for the miniature map of China on the right side of the waist, the memory is relatively clear, because it was also older at that time, about six or seven or eight years old, and was tortured for two or three years, not only the little boy himself, but also his family , especially the mother.

At the beginning, there were only one or two pieces, which grew on the bright skin, like ear cakes, circled and circled, redder than normal skin color, textured and thick to the touch.

It will itch, the more you scratch, the more itchy, the more itchy you scratch, the more it will grow and grow, everywhere.

The mother took the little boy to see the barefoot doctor. After the doctor's examination, he said that there was no major problem. He gave two injections and prescribed some medicine, and he will be fine in a few days.alright.Disappeared, and reappeared every few days, scratching my ears and cheeks, itching so much that I couldn't sleep all night.I went to the Barefoot Doctor again, the same method, the same result, those ghost things are like immortal water lilies.

I heard that mixing alum with water is effective for bathing. The next day, my mother walked [-] or [-] miles to the town to buy it. Every night, I put some in the water when I took a bath, and taught him to clean it carefully. I used it for several months. Oral medicine, still the same, no improvement.

I asked many local doctors, from the village, from the village next door, or from the village next door. As long as I had a little time, my mother would visit and inquire. There were also many enthusiastic uncles and aunts who recommended this to my mother, saying that this is good and that is good.

The mother will adopt it, and do it one by one when she comes back. In the little boy's mind, there is one way to force poison most clearly: taking a steam bath.

For a while, my mother finished work early in the afternoon, and brought some herbs that I didn’t know where to find, like thatch roots piled up by the stove, bundled into small pillows, put them into a large pot filled with clean water, and boiled , simmer for half an hour, until the color of the whole pot of water and the herbs themselves are integrated.

The mother brought a large round wooden barrel and placed it in the middle of the hall. There were straw mats around the wooden barrel, and the top was covered with straw mats, like a simple yurt. Lifted the boiling herbal water with a bucket and poured it into a wooden bucket. A wooden board with a width of [-] to [-] centimeters was placed horizontally on top of the wooden bucket. Seeing that the little boy was naked, he was asked to sit on it.

"Be careful, be careful, don't put your feet in the water, don't sit crooked, don't sit on the sides, sit in the middle of the board, don't move around, you know?" Then she surrounded the whole barrel firmly.Don't worry, she just waited outside, telling him over and over again, she was worried that the little boy would fall into the water and get burned.

The water vapor rising from under the wooden plank kept going up, passing through the wooden plank, passing through the little boy's body, rushing to the top, spreading in all directions, forcing it down again, and forcing it into his body. Sweating, breathing seems a little difficult, and even the hair and nails can feel forced.

With that posture, the little boy seemed to have been hit by Xuan Ming's palm and needed to force out the cold poison.

This method goes on and on again and again, but it is finally gone, the toxin is not forced out, and after a few days, those ear cakes hang all over the body again

Seemingly impossible, my mother found a folk remedy, which was mentioned by others but did not dare to use or bothered to try it.The first one is stewed yam with pedantic pig intestines (of course, the little boy didn't know the details at the time), put a few big red dates in it, put it on the table after stewing, and you can smell it from a distance. It smelled very fishy and very pungent. The little boy said no, but the mother hesitated, and then said: "How can I get rid of those itches on your body? Drink it, and eat some white sugar." The mother scooped it up with a small white spoon. Half a spoonful of white sugar was waiting aside, with a bitter expression on his face, as if it was difficult to make a decision.

The little boy was always obedient, he approached the table obediently, pinched his two nostrils with his left hand, lifted the soup bowl with his right hand, tilted his neck, poured it down, trotted all the way after drinking, ran away for a while, let go of his nostrils, Inhale and exhale hard.

There is also a so-called folk prescription, which is more foul-smelling than pig intestines. In order not to make readers feel sick, I won’t go into details.I have used all available medicines and tried all available methods, but those unkillable water lily pads are still constantly emerging from the skin surface, which is really unbearable, and my mother is helpless.

One day, the mother brought a small bottle and a cotton swab and asked the little boy to take off his shirt and stand aside. She put the cotton swab into the bottle to scorch some liquid: "Come on, close your eyes and bear it, it hurts a little." of."

"Hmm." The little boy bit his lower lip lightly, acting extremely mature, with a demeanor that looked deathly at home.

The eight-year-old boy was in pain, but he didn't yell, he didn't yell, he didn't even speak, but when the cotton swab was touched by his mother, his body would twitch violently, like knee jerk reflex.

At first, the mother would ask comfortingly: "Does it hurt? Just bear with it, I'll take it lightly and use less medicine." After a while, she stopped, stopped completely, and sobbed softly , tears were already hanging down her cheeks and dripping down her chin, she said she couldn't do it anymore.

The little boy half-understood, held back the pain, turned his head and face, and some white blisters were still bubbling out of the skin on the right waist, with a thin layer of white gas entrained.After that, I don't care much about it, just care about ear cakes and water lilies, and let them fend for themselves.It's really good, I don't know what kind of medical medicine or ancestral remedies I've been instilling in the past two or three years have had an effect, and those strange things have disappeared since I was nine years old.

"What kind of potion is that?"

"I don't know the specifics. Others said it was useful, tried it myself, and it worked, so I asked him to use it."

It is estimated that it is slightly diluted sulfuric acid or something similar, otherwise how could it leave such a deep mark? The little boy who is no longer young glanced at the miniature map of China, held the rough palm of his aging mother, and looked at it. Looking at the sadness flooding her face.

Looking back on the past, how could my mother be like this at that time!How beautiful, with a round face and white face, two shoulder-length and neat braids, a red flower blue plaid shirt, like a tireless machine all day long, from morning to night, inside and out, full of enthusiasm...

Pain is also a memory, sometimes faded and forgotten, sometimes picked up and cherished.