I remembered the last time I mentioned my father in front of my mother.

It was an early autumn weekend when I was 12 years old, and my mother and I went to the town's granary to pay the year's taxes. Nowadays, young people in the post-modern era may not know what tax food is, if you don't know, you might as well ask your parents, I think they must know.

Mother pulled a flatbed cart with hundreds of catties of freshly harvested rice on it, which was almost half of the total harvest that year! I followed behind, and when I came uphill, I helped my mother push the cart in the back, and although I was only 12 years old and skinny, the child who grew up in the misery had a strength to be reckoned with!

My mother and I set off before dawn, and we traveled more than 20 miles, and we had to walk until noon before we arrived in town!

I will never forget the fat woman in the blue cloth shirt in the public rations, and the reason why I will not forget her is because she has a face that makes the whole world feel that the whole world owes her, and I even viciously wonder if she is a man who just died, and even I can still clearly remember her appearance, her every expression and movement.

After she asked for her mother's name and household address, she instructed her and me to carry the bags of grain to the scale, and after checking the quantities, she took a sharpened steel pipe and plunged it into each bag, and the millet flowed out of the steel pipe, and she took a handful of rice with her hand, and then put it in her mouth and knocked it with her teeth!

After she had eaten every bag of rice, she said to her mother with a gloomy face, frowning, and a little impatiently, "If the rice is not dry, it cannot be handed in!" Then he pointed to the yard and said, "Pour the rice into the yard, bask in the sun, and weigh it again in the evening!" ”

After she finished speaking, she went into her hut without waiting for her mother to speak, and her mother followed a few steps and tried to argue in an innate tone, but before she could finish a sentence, she was reprimanded by the woman: "I said that if I don't do it, I won't do it, and if I can't turn it in, I can't hand it in!" It's useless to talk to anyone, if you don't want to dry it, you can pull it back! Anyway, if you don't turn it in, it won't be under my control, I'll just accept it! ”

The mother stood stunned, and after a while, she finally turned around silently and dragged the rice to the middle of the yard, and reopened the bags and spread them out in the yard to dry.

Although I was angry in my heart, I only dared to scold that woman in my heart, and at that time I knew that civilians in this world could not fight against power!

From time to time, I helped my mother to crisscross the grain with her feet and make beautiful grooves in order to dry the rice more evenly.

It was past noon, and I was thirsty and hungry, and I felt that the water in my body was almost evaporated, and I didn't even sweat. But he didn't dare to tell his mother.

It's just that my mother is still sensitive to me's gradually weakened expression. He took out two steamed buns from a bag he carried with him, and took out a scoop of cold water from the well in the yard.

In this way, I ate one steamed bun with a scoop of cold water, and I handed the other steamed bun to my mother, who smiled and said that she was not hungry, and she said that there was still in the bag and she would eat it later. But in the morning I saw clearly that she only put two steamed buns in the bag, and she said this just so that I could be fed, how could she not be hungry?

I thought that staying up until the rice was dried at night and then weighed again, it was nothing more than a little less weight, and then I would make up for the amount evaporated by this sun!

Who knew that the heavens were not beautiful, and seemed to be intent on doing something with us, but in the evening suddenly a dark cloud floated over, and without warning a rain began to fall. Ironically, the sun was still shining brightly in the sky at this time, and there was no one at all

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Give a sign that a little rain is coming!

Although when the dark cloud drifted over, my mother had a sense and hurriedly beckoned me to gather the grain in the yard! But even though my mother and I were sweating profusely, we didn't have time to put the grain in the bag before the rain fell!

The pile of grain was finally soaked in the rain, and I could barely open my eyes and have to turn my face away as I braved the rain to prop up my bag so that my mother could fill it with a wooden chisel.

At this time, I clearly saw that the woman in the hut was standing in front of the window and quietly watching our embarrassed appearance, and there was even a hint of a smile on her face!

At that moment I felt a great resentment in my heart, I resented this woman who had no sympathy at all, and her cold eyes made me feel as if seeing someone else's calamity was the only thing that pleased her!

I resent God, we have lived so humblely, why does it still play with us like this, does it still think that our suffering is not deep enough and not heavy enough? And punish us in such a way?

I hate the injustice of this world, why is the same food that other people's can do but ours can't! Uncle Wang in the same village has already finished handing it over and gone home, and our mother of millet is afraid that something will go wrong so she and Uncle Wang are drying and harvesting together in the village, but now we are the only ones who are not qualified, aren't we basking in the same sun? Or is it just because Uncle Wang gave the fat black woman a bottle of sesame oil, but the mother didn't know the mystery and didn't prepare anything?

A few bags of millet were finally put away, but the funny thing was that the rain stopped when the millet was harvested!

The fat woman came out of the house, and it seemed that her newly dead man had come back to life, and the gloomy look on her face was swept away, and she said to her mother with a smile: "This is really going to happen, alas! "She gloated and didn't even bother to pretend.

"It seems that you have to pull this grain back, and besides, this grain is afraid that it will become moldy if it is stained with water vapor, don't pull these over next time to hand it in, I can tell it by smelling it casually!"

My mother lowered her head and said nothing, and after the woman finished speaking, she silently beckoned me to reload a few bags of grain onto the cart and pull back with a hunched waist.

I followed behind my mother, angry and sad, angry that we were played by this widowed woman but there was no way to do it, sad that my mother and I had worked hard for the day in vain!

My mother hadn't eaten for a whole day, probably because her strength was gradually overdrawn, and she walked more and more slowly on the way home. My mother and I finally exhausted ourselves on a steep slope, and just halfway up the slope, the wheels of the cart stopped moving no matter how hard my mother and I tried, and then we slid down as fast as we could.

Fortunately, I flashed to the side in time and was not hit by the backward car, but my mother was not so lucky, she was dragged down the slope by the car, and I trembled and ran down the slope with all my body weak when I saw this scene.

Fortunately, the car finally stopped on the road at the bottom of the slope and did not rush into the ditches on both sides. Only then did I realize that my mother did not let go because she wanted to control the direction of the car going backwards, and if the cart of food fell into the ditch, I am afraid that it would be really bad.

Although the mother eventually controlled the direction of the car, there were still two large holes in the knees of her pants, and the skin at the knees was oozing blood.

Seeing this scene, my tears could no longer hold back my tears, and at the same time, I blurted out a sentence that had been depressed for a long time: "Mom, why didn't Dad come back, will he never come back?" ”

My mother looked back at me with a look on her face

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Some confusion and some dodging.

"Who said that? Your dad is just busy with work and can't come back for a while, how can he never come back! Wait until he's not busy......"

"You're a liar!" I angrily interrupted my mother.

"I know everything, everyone in the village is saying, Dad won't come back, he already has another woman outside, he won't come back!" I almost yelled at my mother.

My mother looked at me in astonishment, as if she was not sure that it was coming from my mouth.

Her lips twitched, but she didn't make a sound, and after a long time she turned her head silently.

At this moment, the dark red clouds on the horizon gradually dimmed, like scabbed scars. The smell of dust filled the land after the rain, and the sound of frogs in the fields seemed to have become timid because of the lack of the cover of rice seedlings, and the world seemed to stand still at that moment.

Then I saw my mother, who had turned her back, raised her hand and gently wiped her cheeks, as if she was wiping sweat and tears......

At that moment, I suddenly regretted it, I knew that my words made my mother sad, I knew it, why did I say it? Is it to verify something? So how should I feel when I get the answer? Will I be sad? Or will you be disappointed?

But no, isn't everything the same as before? In that case, why bother to prove a known and inevitable answer? What else could a mother have but to hurt her in the sore spot again?

I can't remember how my mother and I carried the grain home that night, or if my mother told me anything afterward, but the silhouette of my mother raising her hand to wipe her tears with her back to me facing the dark red sunset was deeply engraved in my heart.

Since that night, I seem to have grown up overnight, and in the years that followed, no matter how hard and tired I was, I never complained to my mother again. He never spoke of his father again in front of her until she died......

Ah Wei didn't return overnight, and I don't know where he went that night, but I think he probably didn't have a good time either.

I can see that he really loves Mu Xichun, but Mu Xichun only has me in her head, and she can even stay in the garbage dump for a day because of my words, just to find a small thing I have with me. Mu Xichun, as the eldest lady, loves me so humbly, how can he not feel sad in Ah Wei's eyes?

So he probably wanted to drag Mu Xichun out of my swamp even more.

As it turned out, he did.

Early the next morning, Mu Xichun and I came to the company, and as soon as we entered the company, we saw Ah Wei standing in front of the public office area, holding a bunch of delicate roses that were only bigger than the first time.

His mood has also returned to his previous normal state, still smiling kindly, but the dark blue at the corner of his mouth makes his smile look a little awkward, it seems that the force of my punch yesterday is really strong enough, I can't help but feel a little ashamed.

Before we came, he had been chatting with a few little girls in the office area, it seemed that he was quite pleasing to the girls, a few superficial girls didn't know if they had never seen a handsome guy or never seen such a large bouquet of flowers, their faces showed envious and fascinated expressions, and they were looking like a who was alive and easy.

"Xichun, you're here! Here's my gift for you today, how about it? Do you like it? Seeing Mu Xichun coming, Ah Wei stepped forward and offered the flowers with both hands.

(End of chapter)