Winter 1980. Pen % fun % Pavilion www.biquge.info

An ordinary city in the southwest of Lu.

The Spring Festival is approaching, and the city and outside are filled with a festive atmosphere.

In a military camp on the outskirts of the city, five-year-old Xiao Haiyang and a few friends are setting off firecrackers. Xiao Haiyang was very envious to see the children who were older than him and called Dongfang to put "two kicks". Dongfang stood in the courtyard with his crossed legs very vigorously, his right arm stretched straight, his right hand pinched the "two kicks", and his left hand held incense, lighting the core of the "two kicks", "Bang! "After that" smack! A cloud of white smoke emitted in the blue sky.

"Well, hooray! Banzai! The little ocean jumped and jumped and ran happily in front of the east. Dongfang looked at Xiao Haiyang with disdain: "Snot has crossed the river!" Xiao Haiyang sucked in nonchalantly, and the two clear snots quickly retreated, and then made a swallowing expression. "Ocean, you swallowed it?" Dongfang asked in surprise. "Well, it's cool, it's a little salty." Xiao Haiyang replied seriously. Dongfang and a few children couldn't help but retch.

Da Li, who was in the cooking class, happened to be pushing a cart of coal and asked curiously, "What are you little guys doing?" Weird looks? Dongfang pointed to Xiao Haiyang and said, "Hello Uncle Li, the ocean swallowed snot just now, it's disgusting." ”

Da Li put down the cart and patted the coal ash on his hand: "What's all the fuss about, oh, who put the second kick just now and scared me?" Dongfang proudly said, "I'll put it!" Da Li patted Dongfang's head approvingly: "Well, it's good, the little guy has courage!" Da Li asked again: "Have you ever seen anyone who set off bullets as firecrackers?" "A few of the friends shook their heads like rattles. Da Li then asked, "Who in your family has bullets?" Bring me one and I'll show it to you. Dongfang said, "I have it at home, I will go and get it." After that, he trotted home and took a bullet and put it in Da Li's hand.

Xiao Haiyang looked at the yellow bullet and asked in surprise: "This bullet is different from what I usually see, why is the bullet so short?" Dongfang said proudly: "Stupid, I don't even know pistol bullets, my father is an officer, only he has this kind of bullet." Da Li said: "Well, this is a bullet from a large-caliber military May Fourth pistol." ”

Da Li found a hammer and an iron nail, asked his friends to lean behind him, carefully lay the bullet flat on the blue brick floor, and gently chiseled a small hole in its side. Then find a firecracker, pull out the core, carefully insert it into the hole of the bullet that has just been chiseled, and then stand the bullet upright. Da Li asked everyone to disperse, covered their ears, and then lit the cannon core. A "snap" of a warhead whistled past and shot straight into the blue sky. Although Xiao Haiyang covered his ears with his hands, his eardrums were still buzzing.

Several friends looked at Da Li with adoring eyes. Da Li looked at everyone with satisfaction: "How?" The little ones have seen it for a long time, right? But you are not allowed to play like me in the future, it's too dangerous! After that, he pushed up the coal cart and hummed the movie interlude "The sun is shining in the ninety-nine, the sky is coming" and left briskly.

Xiao Haiyang's father's unit was an artillery regiment, and the station was formerly a large landowner's manor, and later with the manor as the center, the barracks were expanded several times, and the regimental headquarters was moved to a new location. Xiao Haiyang's father belonged to the automobile company of the artillery regiment and was still stationed in the landlord's old manor.

It was a sunny day, and a few children were playing the game of "Hidden Cats" in the compound. Xiao Haiyang was "caught" by the East several times, and his heart was puffed up, and when he "hid the cat" again this time, he thought of a wonderful hiding place.

Dongfang faced the wall and said loudly: "This time I count, when I count to twenty, if I catch the ocean again, your spinning top must be played with for me until the New Year." Xiao Haiyang shouted: "Dream, you can't find me!" "Xiao Haiyang's wooden spinning top was made by my father, who worked as a carpenter before joining the army. He spent two nights making a beautiful wooden spinning top for Xiao Haiyang, and painted the surface with color, and used a whip to whip up the spinning top, and the color became more beautiful, which was Xiao Haiyang's most cherished treasure.

"One, two, three, four----" When the east faced the wall and counted seriously, several children suddenly scattered, each looking for a hiding place, and Xiao Haiyang confidently trotted around the corner and went straight to the east wing.

The window of the east wing was very low, he stood on tiptoe, opened the window and climbed over and closed it, Xiao Haiyang's eyes were suddenly dark, and it took a while to get used to it.

The house was dimly lit but spacious, filled with stacks of Chinese cabbage. Xiao Haiyang struggled to block the two cabbages in front of the window, and lay down on the cabbage behind him very comfortably, and unconsciously fell asleep in a daze----

In a half-dream, Xiao Haiyang inadvertently glanced up and found a young man hanging on the beam, looking at himself with a strange smile. Xiao Haiyang asked curiously: "Uncle, why have I never seen you, why are you hanging here on a swing?" The skinny man smiled weirdly, stuck out his tongue, and quickly retracted.

"Oh, I've been here for a long time, aren't you scared to see me?" The skinny young man asked.

"No, I just feel weird," Xiao Haiyang scratched his head and said, "Uncle, why were you able to stick your tongue into your stomach just now?" Why are you here? ”

The skinny young man coughed twice in embarrassment and said, "Oh, you see. If you ask me why I'm here, that's a long story."

"It was a long time ago, and my family lived in a village not far from here. I have been an orphan since I was a child, and my neighbors have raised me with a scoop of food and a scoop of food in the west. From the time I was sensible, I herded pigs and sheep for this landlord until I was in my twenties. I remember that it was almost the Chinese New Year, and it was also this season, but the weather was much colder, and the ice cubes hanging under the eaves were more than a foot long. I went to the north slope that morning to graze the sheep, but after a while I lost a sheep, and I couldn't find the lost sheep no matter how I looked for it.

I was also very scared at the time, and then I thought that I had worked for so many years to farm and feed the livestock, and the owner had never paid me, and I had eaten so poorly, and I was hungry and full, and when I worked harder in the future, the owner would spare me this time. But I thought wrong---- the thin young man's expression became solemn: "As soon as I returned, the proprietor did not listen to my pleas for mercy at all, and beckoned his servants to strip me of my clothes and hang them on the beams of this roof, and beat me violently, and said: You poor stick and two dogs' lives are not worth the money of a sheep!"

From the afternoon until late at night, I was cold and hungry with bruises, and then I developed a high fever, and I heard footsteps stop outside the door in a daze. One person whispered to the other: Master, this poor stick makes us afraid that we can't beat it, otherwise let it go? The other snorted: Let him go? Let him hold a grudge in the future and take revenge? He knows our family very well, and he is a bad life, and he must not let the tiger return to the mountain! The man said, "I understand, sir!"

Soon after, several big men came and put me down from the beam, and I lay down on the ground with a weak body, and said with difficulty: Thank you steward for putting me down and leaving me with this cheap life.

The housekeeper sneered: Hehe, you are also guilty of living, so let's send you to the west to enjoy happiness quickly! Several people put hemp rope around my neck and buckled me, and then dragged me to the beam and hung me, I didn't even have the strength to struggle, I only felt breathless, chest tightness. ”

At this point, the thin young man's breathing became rapid, his face was full of pain, and then he said angrily: "I felt so light afterwards that I felt like I had broken free from my body. Then I continued to look at the beam. A man said to the steward, "This boy is dead." The housekeeper said: Find a broken swept away and threw it outside the West City to feed the wild dogs, and came back to tell the government that this kid stole things and hanged himself for fear of crime. ”

At this, the thin young man's hands were clenched tightly, and his expression was full of anger.

Because the young man spoke quickly, and Xiao Haiyang was young, he didn't fully understand, but he was very sympathetic to the misfortune of the adult in front of him.

Xiao Haiyang said, "Uncle, don't be sad, what happened later?" ”

The thin young man softened his expression and continued, "After that? Others can't see me, and I can't disturb others, during the day I am afraid of the sun, so I can't come out of this east wing, and sometimes I go around at night, but if I go too far, I feel chest tightness and discomfort, so I have to come back immediately. Later, when New China was founded, the landlords were suppressed, and my revenge was avenged, but I still wandered like this.

Until late one night more than ten years ago, after a bright light outside the window, two people came into the house, one of whom had a notebook in his hand. Another person said to the person who took the book: "Oh, it is this ghost who hanged himself, and he has not been able to be reincarnated yet. The person who took the book said: Well, this matter is not easy to handle, according to the normal he should be seventy-seven Yang Shou, his short life is purely accidental, and it is not easy to report and criticize, and the leader will hold you and me responsible. In this way, wait for the next national ghost census to report the statistics, and then a piece will be quietly filled. The other is embarrassed: Is this okay? The one who took the book put the book together: That's it!

After saying that, the two of them turned around and left, and I hurriedly asked: When will the next ghost census start? The man with the book turned around and stretched out a hand to shake it, and then immediately left. ”

Xiao Haiyang asked, "Uncle, how many years will it take for you to leave?" The thin young man said depressedly, "I thought it was five years, but more than ten years have passed, and they say maybe fifty or five hundred years!" ”

At this moment, a gecko slouched out of the crack in the wall and lay motionless on the window frame. The young man turned his head, and suddenly, his tongue stretched out more than two meters with lightning speed, and swept the hapless gecko into his mouth and swallowed it. The young man clicked his mouth as if he had tasted a delicious taste.

"I don't want to stay here any longer, baby," said the young man, looking meaningfully at the little ocean, "through which you can take me out of here, and I will tell you a secret, in the northwest corner of the main house where you store your food-----"

"Ocean! Ocean! Just as he heard the little ocean here in a daze, he heard his mother shouting anxiously outside the window, he hurriedly got up and rubbed his eyes, looked up at the roof beam opposite, there was nothing. It turned out that he had a dream.

"Mom, I'm here!" Xiao Haiyang pushed away the cabbage in front of him and jumped out of the window. Mom grabbed Xiao Haiyang's arm at once: "Where did you go in the wilderness all afternoon?" Don't know how to eat dinner? With that, he slapped Xiao Haiyang's ass twice. Xiao Haiyang frowned, opened his mouth, and was about to cry loudly but suddenly stopped, and spread out his little hand: there was an extra copper coin in his palm!

In the blink of an eye, the New Year came to the first month, and Dad was playing in circles with Xiao Haiyang in his arms, and Xiao Haiyang was smiling happily. Suddenly, I vomited with a "wow". Dad put down the little ocean and looked at the vomit: it turned out to be a lively white worm, as thick as a ballpoint pen lead. My mother hurriedly ran over to take a look: "The ocean hasn't taken roundworm medicine for a long time, you go to the barracks clinic to get the medicine!" "After Xiao Haiyang ate the roundworm pills, he pulled out a lot of worms. But since then, Dad has always felt that the body of the ocean feels a little weird.

Xiao Haiyang took the time to carefully observe the copper coin: the surface was somewhat damaged, there were several linear characters on one side, and four Chinese characters on the other, and he only knew the word "light" in it. After playing with the copper coin lost a few times, but it always appeared in front of Xiao Haiyang's eyes inexplicably, and later my mother saw Xiao Haiyang pounding this copper coin every day, so she simply found a red thread to put the copper coin on and put it on Xiao Haiyang's neck.

After the Spring Festival, Xiao Haiyang will leave the army with his mother and return to his home hundreds of miles away. Because Xiao Haiyang's father is a volunteer soldier and not an officer, they can't live in the army all year round like the children of the officers' families like Dongfang. They can only spend a few days a year in the army like migratory birds, and then return to their hometowns. Xiao Haiyang is very nostalgic for the Chinese cabbage stewed pork slices in the army canteen, as well as the fragrant rice, because it is rare to eat it in his hometown hundreds of miles away.

On this day, Xiao Haiyang's family was packing their luggage in the house, and Da Li of the cooking class suddenly ran in and said to Xiao Haiyang's father: "Squad Leader Wang, you go to the company's grain depot to have a look, there is a strange big hole in the northwest corner of the grain depot, and the regiment commander is here." ”