At the end of the trip, An'an left the rebirth house and prepared to go to live at his aunt's house.

"I don't want you to go, or you can stay at my house for a few more days." Regeneration said.

"I don't want to leave, but if I don't go back, they should be suspicious. It's been so long since the holidays come true, I can't say it. ”

"But your mother won't come back for the New Year, what should you do alone?"

"I don't know, it's like this, anyway, it's going to be the New Year soon, and I'll go back to school after the New Year."

"If you don't come to my house sooner than the end of the year, I'll send you to school then."

"Then what's the matter, your family is also going to leave relatives, and what will I think if my relatives come to the house as guests, after all, we are not married yet."

"It's okay, our relatives don't think so."

"Alright, I'm really leaving."

"Okay." Regeneration straddled his body in front of him with his luggage, and Anan sat in the back seat of him.

"You just send me to the intersection, and I'll go in by myself, in case I get seen, it's not good."

"Okay."

The cold wind howled along the way, An An looked at the trees on the side of the road that had lost their leaves and retreated, she hoped that it was the opposite road, how much she hoped that the other end of the road now led to the home of regeneration, how much she hoped that the time would go back to when she had just been on vacation, and now she was about to go home with regeneration, and she would go to the airport to Phuket tomorrow, she didn't want to leave him at all, compared to living in someone else's house, she could stay by the side of regeneration, as if she felt at home.

Regeneration stopped at the intersection, picked up his luggage, and pushed it in front of An'an. Anshore pushed his suitcase forward.

"Let's go."

"It's okay, I'm looking at you!"

"You go first, it's not good for others to see it."

"Oh, then I'll go, send a message in the evening."

"Hmm."

An'an watched Regeneration ride away on an electric car, sighed deeply, and slowly walked forward pushing the box, every cell in his body was reluctant.

"An'an is here, did you just have a holiday today?"

"Hmm." An An didn't want to explain anything, and he only told his mother about going out to play.

"It's not cold."

"Sort of."

"You put your luggage upstairs and you'll be ready to eat right away."

"Okay."

An'an carried a heavy suitcase to the room on the second floor.

There are two beds in the room, one is the aunt's, and the other has been empty on weekdays, it was originally the aunt's husband who slept, but now the aunt's husband is a security guard for others, and he basically spent the night in the unit and never came back to sleep, so this bed became a place to temporarily put clothes.

When An An entered the door, he saw that the bed was full of clothes and life, and his heart was broken. She hung the clothes one by one in the cabinet, and folded them on the sofa on the side if she couldn't hang them, the quilt felt like it hadn't been dried for a long time, there was a strong smell of dust, and the bedside table was also covered with dust, and the cement floor under the bed would raise a lot of dust if she stomped her feet hard, and it was obvious that the traces of the owner's activities could clearly be seen.

An'an made the bed and went downstairs, just in time to meet the aunt's daughter-in-law.

"An'an, are you here?"

"Yes, sister."

"I'll have dinner at night at home."

"Nope."

An'an's grandmother gave birth to a lot, so the aunt and An'an's mother are more than ten years apart, she has a son and a daughter, both are married, and now she lives with her son, each with a room, and the son gave her a grandson, only a few years younger than An'an, An'an's grandmother's house is in a house next door to An'an's house, and all the children inevitably have to help take care of him, and in a blink of an eye he has grown into a young man.

"Let's come to our house to eat, your aunt's cooking is not delicious, your brother caught a big fish today." My sister-in-law is a warm-hearted person, with a big grin and a straight voice.

"Sister, no need, my aunt is ready, you can eat."

"Then come to my house tomorrow to eat, your brother's cooked fish is delicious."

"Well, good. Isn't Rongrong on vacation yet? ”

"It's a vacation, I went out to play with his classmates, where does he stay at home."

"Oh, he's pretty dashing."

"Children don't know our suffering, and they spend money like water."

"Don't say that Rongrong is so small, I think my classmates are also very good at spending money."

"Only children are spoiled."

"yes." An'an smiled.

At dinner, there were only two people, An An and Auntie. My aunt still made four or five dishes.

"Auntie, why are the two of us eating?"

"Oh, your uncle-in-law won't come back when he's in the unit."

"Won't you come back at night?"

"I'll come back and wash up before leaving."

"Isn't that usually home when you're alone?"

"Yes, you used to have your grandmother as a companion."

"The two of us can't eat that much."

"It's okay, you eat more, the food in school is definitely not good, the oil is not enough, girls don't always think about losing weight, the body is the most important."

"Hmm." An An responded and thought: Auntie must not know that the food in the school cafeteria is not too good, what kind of food you want to eat, and there is a snack street behind the school, how can you not eat well? It's just that I eat so well that I don't have an appetite for anything.

An'an buried his head in delivering food to his mouth.

"Is your mom coming back for the New Year?"

"Mom said she wouldn't come back."

"Then you're not going to go to Daddy's place either?"

Anan shook his head.

"Silly boy, dad is dad after all."

"I don't dare go."

"Why?"

"I can't stay anywhere, I always have to fight."

"Maybe your dad will regret it one day."

"I don't know, anyway, at least he doesn't admit it now, and he doesn't feel wrong at all."

"Fortunately, your grandmother didn't know about it when she left."

Yes, An'an thought to himself, how could a person like his grandmother stand his daughter being divorced. In their time, divorce was such a horrific thing, it was simply a huge scandal. At that time, as long as there was a divorce in the village, he would be pointed at behind his back for a lifetime, and when her parents were about to divorce, her grandmother had already begun to have Alzheimer's, so in her sober memory, she didn't know that her parents would come to this point.

An An remembered that on the day her grandmother passed away, her aunt called her, and she hung up the phone and began to cry uncontrollably. She wiped away her tears, took a leave of absence and took a taxi to Lake City.

When I entered the door, my grandmother's house was already very lively, full of people inside and out, the hall was propped up with bamboo poles, hung tents, and drove a bed board, my grandmother changed into a shroud, and lay quietly on it, with her hands on her chest, and a small bowl at the bottom of her feet, the bowl was filled with oil, and a cotton thread was soaked in it, and a small flame was lit, and the flame shook gently.

She knelt on the ground and sobbed, the people next to her kept telling her to worship, she didn't understand and didn't want to listen, she didn't understand the rules, and the real sadness was no longer controlled by form.

"Why are you kneeling like this? Kowtow! ”

An'an was like a deaf man, spread on the ground and cried all the time. When he had enough of crying, he got up and walked aside, knelt on the ground and threw fire paper into a blazing iron basin.

The fire was very big, beating wantonly in the iron basin, as if a soul was about to burst out, and the flame was yellow and red, burning her face and burning her eyes, and suddenly she seemed to be able to see her grandmother.

She remembered that every time she worshipped her ancestors during the New Year's Festival, her grandmother wouldn't let her burn the fire paper, and her grandmother would say every time: "An'an, girls don't touch these things, your ancestors can't receive them." Every time, she would think unconvinced in her heart, could the boy definitely receive it if he burned it? Thinking of this, my eyes suddenly became wet.

She stood up and walked up to her aunt's grandson, Rongrong, and handed him a stack of fire paper, "You can burn it!" ”

"Me?"

"That's right, your aunt said that if a girl burns it, she can't get it."

Rongrong looked at An An in confusion, but still obediently knelt on the ground to face the brazier and burned the fire paper.

An'an looked at the flaming bowl at his grandmother's feet, what did this mean? Is it the fear of going to that world without a lamp, all the need for a little flame to light the way? Is this death? Obviously people are still lying here, and the soul is gone?

From beginning to end, An An didn't dare to look at her grandmother's face, she didn't know what she was afraid of, whether she was afraid of death or this loved one who had died.

When she was buried, An'an saw her grandmother being stuffed into a small box that barely fit her body, and at the moment when the lid was closed, An'an held her breath, as if she had been stuffed into that box, as if she couldn't breathe. How stuffy, An'an thought to himself, such a small box, unable to move, straightened and unable to breathe. Yes, this is where the dead sleep, but why did she suddenly feel so scared, her heart was empty, she was so big, she faced death for the first time, although she still didn't quite understand what death meant.

When people were wailing in the crematorium, she couldn't cry anymore, except for the first day when her eyes were swollen with tears, she stayed up all night, kneeling on her bruised and purple knees, she was exhausted, and her tears were dry, at the moment she was calm, even numb, watching her grandmother being pushed into the crematorium, and then in a small window, receiving a pile of ashes, she still didn't understand, a life disappeared like this.

She couldn't understand that life was like this, and it would be so lonely when she left, like a big tree that fell in a strong wind and never got up, like a small flower withering in the frost, like a bird with broken wings hiding in the ice and snow and finally being buried, like everything in nature, silently coming, and then quietly disappearing without a trace.

For a long time, she would think of her grandmother, and she would still talk to her in her dreams at night, and even lie quietly beside her in dreams, but she knew that she was dead, and when she woke up, her face was full of horror and sweat, and she was frightened by the death.

"An'an, An'an! What do you think? Auntie interrupted her thoughts.

"Oh." An'an came back to his senses.

"You can wash in the bathroom here at night, or you can go to the bathroom downstairs with your brother, they have a new water heater."

"Okay."

"You can put hot water directly over there, it's much more convenient than here, you don't need to boil water, it's okay, your sister-in-law told me before, you will go to their side to wash when you come back."

"Okay."

After dinner, An'an went to the next door early with his toiletries. My brother and sister-in-law went outside to play cards, and she cautiously went in, turned on the light, went into the bathroom, and locked the door. Because there are more people coming and going in his house, An'an is still quite cautious, in addition to locking the door for the bathroom, even the door is locked.

This room is empty on weekdays, only used during naps, and sometimes some card players outside will also sleep here, all of this room is like a public space for An'an, and there is no sense of security at all.

Because I don't have my own basin, and I don't want to use what people have used at home, I can only shower, and no matter how cold the weather is, I can only take a bath. After taking a shower, I shivered and put on my clothes, washed and dried my changed clothes on the balcony before it ended.

Every day she waits, waiting for the New Year to come soon, and then she will leave here and go to school after the New Year.