1999

At the end of the year, Hu Da and Wu Jiusheng counted the store's business accounts together. At the end of the year, Hu Da chanted the last number on the account, and officially locked the door in his heart. .He and Wu Jiusheng ate at the restaurant for the New Year's Eve dinner. They didn't catch up with the Spring Festival travel rush, and the train tickets were bought on the second day of junior high, which coincided with the staggered rush hour.When there is only the other party by your side, this year is very unusual.Wu Jiusheng spent the whole afternoon lighting fireworks and playing in Life Street. Since whipping was banned in Shenzhen, he ran around madly with his hands full of fairy sticks.For a rare moment of relaxation, even Huda stopped making fun of him for being himself.Although the streets and alleys were deserted, Huda's dining table was bustling that night. He took out his long-lost skills and used various complicated methods to toss those chickens, ducks and fishes. It was about to be broken.

When they were full, they watched the Spring Festival Gala on TV. When they were tired, they squeezed into the small bathroom together, laughing and taking a bath, and then jumped to sleep on the bed with newly changed sheets and quilt covers.

Hu Da still maintained the rules of keeping the old age in his hometown when he was a child. He kept a long burning lamp on the first and second floors of the store, and lit the incense of the kitchen king in the kitchen. The two of them slept until dawn the next day. When he woke up naturally after drying his buttocks in the sun, there was already only burnt incense ash left in the stove, a soft mass. Wu Jiusheng picked it up with a wet finger and drew a line on the front of Huda's forehead. bar.

They spent the whole morning leisurely like this. In the afternoon, Hu Da drove a small electric tricycle, took Wu Jiusheng with several large bags of gifts and drove along the road in Pingxiang to the nearest station where there is a public transportation transfer.They didn't forget Ye Hao, and went to visit him in the nursing home on the first day of the new year.

They also went with the latest news from the Criminal Police Brigade.Lin Jianhua's case was finally sentenced years ago. He was originally a police informant.Whether the deadline is long or short, Wu Jiusheng can see that although Ye Hao didn't say anything, his hanging heart seemed to let go all of a sudden.

All that was left for him was to wait.

Waiting is very simple, and life is simply lived like this, which is also very good.

Wu Jiusheng realized that he was a little happy for Ye Hao.When he did that, Hu Da had already taken out the mobile phone bound to the online bank to transfer money to Ye Hao.The business in the second half of the year was good, and he successfully repaid part of the mortgage loan he had borrowed from Xu Chongwen, which would deduct Ye Hao's nursing home expenses for the next quarter, and there was still a balance.

More than every year, more than every year, Hu Da's smile seems to stick to his face.He likes good omens. This year, he is going to do something important that he has never done before. He wants to bring Wu Jiusheng back to Hunan. The better the head is, the happier he is.

Compared with Hu Da's contented happiness, Wu Jiusheng's mood changes much more suddenly.

He was also very excited at the beginning. In the early morning of the second year of junior high school, he followed Huda to the train station with big bags and small bags. They didn't buy any gifts or special products, and they mainly brought winter clothes. Huda made arrangements with him early on. Vaccination, Hunan is not like Shenzhen, it is now a real winter, very cold.

At first Wu Jiusheng sneered. He was born in the north of Huda, so a little cold in winter is nothing.But the train had just entered the border of Hunan, and before it stopped, he regretted it.

Hunan and Shenzhen are really different.Hu Da's hometown is located in the middle reaches of the Xiangjiang River, half at the foot of the Nanyue Mountains and half surrounded by the Xiangshui River. There is a dampness in the cold winter, which is heart-wrenching.Wu Jiusheng has spent a long time in Shenzhen relying on bunts all year round, so he is not familiar with the cold feeling.His hometown in Shandong is also cold, but the kang is burned in the house. Once the doors and curtains are lowered, every household is as warm as spring.Huda’s hometown is different, the wind is filled with water vapor, like moving insects, with life, aiming at every crevice of your clothes, drilling into every pore of yours, freezing Wu Jiusheng thoroughly , After walking three steps, you have to stop for two steps to stomp your feet fiercely.His ankles were itchy, scratching his heart, and he wanted to roll up his trousers and scratch crazily, but Huda stopped him.

Huda took off the scarf around his neck, and wrapped it tightly around his neck, leaving only two nostrils for breathing. Then he grabbed the young man's hand and stuffed it into his purse, covering it with his palm.The two struggled like that and walked a long way before they found a restaurant that was not closed on the side of the road and plunged in.

The owner of the store is a local, and he still operates during the Chinese New Year, so he survives the disaster.

Hu Da ordered two bowls of beef and rice noodles, and as soon as they arrived, he threw all the beef into Wu Jiusheng's bowl, poured another spoonful of red oil, and urged him to eat.

The young man was skeptical, picked up the bowl and took a sip of the soup, his throat and throat were full of smoke, his nose looked like squeezed fruit, and he kept sweating.

Hunan is very cold, and the food is extremely spicy. It is really a magical place.But at least there is one thing, after Wu Jiusheng ate a bowl with a grunt, his vest did return to some warmth, and his whole body no longer trembled like chaff.

Hu Da ordered two more side dishes and piled them in front of the young man.

"Eat."

He said it very simply, it is getting late now, there is no one in his hometown, the original ancestral house has been in disrepair for a long time, and I don’t know if it is usable, maybe it’s okay to stay overnight, don’t count on cooking, all pots and pans are missing , I finally found this store, and I had to eat quickly to survive the middle of the night.When they arrive in the village, there is even less work to do, so they may not be able to have such ready-made food for their next meal.

While he was talking, Wu Jiusheng remembered the situation of his own family that Hu Da had introduced to him.

He knew that Huda lost his mother a long time ago, and his father died after drinking pesticides, which is not a very honorable thing in the countryside.Other relatives rarely heard him mention it, and probably had no contact.I only heard him mention once that he had a grandmother when he left his hometown, but there is nothing to say.

At this time, when Hu Da mentioned that the ancestral house was empty, Wu Jiusheng probably guessed it.

All of Hu Da’s relatives who could be called famous in this life are gone. The so-called hometown on the map is just a small dot with a place name printed on it. Why did Huda bring him back?

Wu Jiusheng took a deep breath.

He is not disgusted.Bitterness, he can afford it, he may have been more delicate before, but since following Huda, he has learned not to care about it.Besides, this is the place where Huda was born and raised. He has always felt that there is a special aura, which flings on your face and penetrates into the pores. He wants to grasp the feeling and taste that special aura. .

But Hu Da's face was always cold. Wu Jiusheng felt that although Hu Da still took care of him meticulously on the surface, the closer they got to the village of his hometown, the more unhappy Hu Da looked. .

That made Wu Jiusheng very worried.He knows only a very limited past about the man.He wanted to ask, but he was afraid of causing any wounds, so he kept his mouth shut all the way, carrying his luggage and following Huda's butt step by step.

The two of them set foot on the land of Zhangmu Township when the sun went down, the evening passed, and it was almost completely dark.

Occasionally, people in twos and threes passed by at the head of the village. When they saw them, they all looked at Hu Da in surprise.

Huda has been away from home for too long. He was still young when he left, but now he has changed too much. In such a huge village, he can't even meet an acquaintance who can call him by his name.

They didn't know him, but they knew that the ancestral house he mentioned when he asked for directions was at the east end of the village. The lock on the door was so rusted that it couldn't be unscrewed, and I didn't know how much cold and heat it had been exposed to in the wind and sun. It only took Hu Da to hit a stone picked up by the roadside a few times, and it was cracked cleanly, and there was no movement. .

That was Huda's home.

He looked at the open door of the house, and stood in front of the threshold for a long time in a daze before he numbly raised his legs and stepped in.

His own heart is also very disturbed.That dark room seemed to be alive, and the whimpering of the wind pouring into the room through all the cracks carried the scene of the past.He suddenly remembered the scene when he was running wildly in the front courtyard when he was a child. His grandmother was sitting on a ponytail holding a small basket and pinching green beans, telling him to run slowly and be careful not to fall.

Going further in, he saw more and more familiar things that evoked memories. The wooden scoop for scooping water that fell on the edge of the stove was rotten into strips, and the pattern of paste could be vaguely seen under the gray-black mold spots. Wallpaper, a bamboo bed for sleeping in summer, and a wall calendar that has completely faded in front of the wardrobe.

They are left here, rotten, dead, abandoned.The suppressed feeling that had been squeezed in Huda's heart for ten years came back, flattening the corners of his mouth and crushing his shoulders.He finally stood still, and the luggage bag in his hand fell to the ground with a plop, kicking up dust several meters high in the air.

"Did I never tell you about my grandmother?" In the dark room where people's faces could hardly be seen clearly, only a dejected silhouette remained, and Hu Da spoke to Wu Jiusheng who entered the room stepping on his footsteps. explain,

"When I left my hometown, she was still alive and well. I promised her that I would come back to pick her up when I became a human being in a big city. I would go to the city, eat well, and live well. Later, I committed a crime and went in. Now, in the era when communications depended on BB machines, she was an old man, and she didn’t know where to go to inquire about my whereabouts. When I finished the transformation and took out my personal image again, she left early. She was always alone, Probably when she left, she was lonely. I don’t even know what year she was or how she left. She was just like a bastard. She didn’t enjoy any blessings. At the end, I didn’t even see her for the last time. , it was never delivered.”