preface
As the New Year draws to a close, the number of wedding receptions increases. A few days ago and back to the banquet, the old in the village butcher ears deaf, he stalls haven’t sold pork pork, row full mark in table covered with white hairs, but a group of LaoSou still like stretching his legs, sitting in a mill shine with bench, listen to his deep hatred jedi tapping his fingers on the table: “now kid ah, good or bad cough up! Just point a hand index, there are twenty or thirty young people not married, you say, how bad! They can’t find their wives! What do you suggest we do? Bad or bad.” Now, my first 20 or so students have scattered all over the country, the girls have basically married to other places, at the wedding of those who have not met for a long time, or once heard nothing of the male students, unexpectedly many have become single fathers. This really surprised me.
The stubborn teenager who died in the night was the first to get married in his class
Lin Rui, born in 1992, is small and thin with a strong personality. My father was addicted to gambling and was away from home for years. Lin Rui hour result is good, mathematics achievement holds the first place in the class for a long time, often can see his two hands put in a pocket, glance at the girl behind the table yi Way: “this all won’t, true wood!” The schoolgirl cover book: “pass you shit matter!” Lin Rui again hey hey smile: “wood wood cough up, still afraid of a person speak?”
Our junior high school is in the town, and the students whose families are in the village can only board. When the freshmen start school, the boys of the whole grade are arranged in a large dormitory. The bungalow is divided into three bungalows. To prevent old bed frames from collapsing, the beds of the students in the same class were all tightly packed together and turned into full beds. As the students moved in, the dark corners smelled of urine.
At the beginning of the school year, seniors would sneak into the dorms in the middle of the night, fumble around the beds, and many would wake up without a week’s worth of food. Once, the person that commit a crime starts heavy, touch a person carelessly to wake up, new student asks: “why?” The man in the darkness shouted savagely, “Hush!” The freshman had to turn around and pretend to go back to sleep.
Lin Rui sleeps an upper berth, one day, touch the person of money touched his bed, he two words do not say, a foot will kick that person down. There was a big bang and the whole dormitory woke up. Everyone heard the man’s crying moan on the floor. From then on, no one came to the dormitory to touch his pockets at night.
Lin Rui’s foot established his position in the school, in the words of everyone at the time, “drag to walk.”
A few months later, the new building was built and we moved into the small eight-room dormitory, where Lin Rui and I shared a room. One morning at two o ‘clock, such as the last street lamp in the campus also went out, I was a few clear slap sound woke up, turned around to see Lin Rui bed around a few dark shadows, in the shadow, I recognized a senior fat tall, is the legendary “school bully”.
“Aren’t you a drag?” A curly-haired boy stood bolt upright in front of the bed with his hands in his pockets, looking straight at Lin Rui sitting on the bed.
Through the dim light of the window, I saw Lin Rui looking up at the circle of shadows before him. Finally, his eyes stopped on Curly and he called out, “What if it is, what if it isn’t?”
Curly reached out his hand and slapped Lin Rui hard in the face. Lin Rui remembered to fight back and was pushed by the school bully next to him. “Bang” he sat down on the bed. The door of the dormitory was open, and I dimly saw the corridor outside standing dark, red cigarette butts glinting in the darkness.
The people in the dormitory all woke up, some peeped, some pretended to sleep, my palm slightly sweating, but can not muster up the courage to make a sound, the next bed of the village boy leaned over whispered way: “don’t make a sound, pretend not to see.
Lin Rui eyes red, cursing at curly, was pushed back by the school bully, is a “bang”, hit the bed board. The person next to go up to hold him down together, curly hair begins to draw a bow left and right, side dozen side scold: “return pull not pull?” Lin Rui in the struggle, but the hand was around the shadow tightly hold, the school bully also mercilessly whipped Lin Rui two slap, low drink: “don’t move!
Except for the cursing of Curly, the room was strangely quiet, and the clapping without a break was harsh.
After a long time, the group left. The incessant chirping of crickets outside the window was gradually mixed with the intermittent sobbing of Lin Rui, the first time I had ever seen him cry.
The next morning, I found That Lin Rui was smoking. There was also a Brother of Lin Rui’s in the dormitory. He was pretending to sleep last night. I don’t know. I was so dead asleep, why didn’t you wake me up?” Lin Rui said nothing but slowly puffed the smoke.
Two weeks later, Mr. Lin dropped out. The morning sun was just shining on the second step of the door when Lin Rui said goodbye to us. “I’m going to work.”
“To what?”
“Molds.”
The bell on the school clock was beating fast on the cast iron, and the bell was ringing in a line. We hurried back to class without anyone to see him off.
No one ever thought that Lin Rui would be the first guy to get married in our class, just like no one ever thought that he would leave campus so early.
At the end of the year, Lin Rui with a provincial girl back, no wine. The old people in the village all laughed and said that you were not as severe as Lin Rui and that the others had brought their wives back. Lin Rui didn’t come to play with us that year and left on the third day of the New Year.
The following year, Lin Rui’s wife gave birth to a daughter for him, but most of his classmates had only just heard the news, so the provincial girl left the child behind. Lin Rui became the first single father in his class. Some people said that the girl went away because she could not live with poverty, while others said that the girl herself was not decent and had several feet on the ground when she was in the factory.
For many years, I went from place to place, while Lin worked as a migrant worker. It wasn’t until two years after I graduated from college and started working that An old classmate got married. I asked him to go with me and then we met again. Everything in his family has not changed much since junior high school.
Someone at home was teasing his daughter, “Who is your father?” The little girl’s cheek was red and cracked with cold, and shyly pointed to Lin Rui, who put his hands in his pockets and said without expression, “Go back quickly!” Then he turned to the house and shouted, “Bring her back!”
Lin Rui’s cousin coax the little girl beside: “ignore him! Come on, I’ll take you back to Grandma.” Then he turned to us and said with a smile, “He is like this. He never cares about the children. It’s always taken care of by grandma.”
Lin Rui some moldering, yellow hair like a nest of grass, bowed his head looks like some rickets. We sunbathe together in the doorway, Lin Rui’s eyes have been a little dull, the only time lit up, is to ask me with a smile: “introduce two female students to know next ah?”
Later I learned that Lin Rui always asked each other to introduce a girl to him. Lin Rui has been trying to find girlfriends for years, but when the girls heard he had a daughter, they all blew it.
On the wedding, Lin Rui has been pulling the sisters group of people to drink, drink three rounds, I looked at the back of Lin Rui, always feel that it is another person. I stubbornly think, that stubborn and strong boy, died in the night many years ago that frightened.
Three wives can’t stay, with five children for the wedding
Long pole, born in 1992, tall and thin figure, always ranked last when doing exercises, always laugh first when anything happens. My father was sent to prison for theft and grew up with my grandmother.
Once long pole in class to speak small words by the math teacher caught out, math teacher behind his back hand he also back hand. When the teacher asked him to memorize the multiplication table, he chuckled and said, “No.”
“Now that you’re in the fifth grade and can’t recite your multiplication tables, do you think you eat rice? What’s the use of growing taller? Lung!”
Long pole and chuckled, provoked the class all burst into laughter, so the math teacher let the whole class one by one to the door back, the results only five students can complete back out.
Chang Ge did not become a father much later than Lin Rui. Junior two, he said reading no taste, procedures are not done directly back home. After dropping out of school, he went to work in a woolen knitwear factory. When he returned home for the Spring Festival that year, he brought back not only a pile of sweaters and hats with famous trademarks, but also a girl from other provinces. People in the village said that Changge’s wife’s hometown must be in the north, and only snowy places are so white.
It was a cold winter, and the pole changed his hat almost every day. His face was square, and the cap made his cheekbones stand out. One day I met him and his wife at the grocery store to buy salt. On the road two people have been speaking Mandarin, the village silly gu listen to fresh, all the way follow walk, smile happily ground learns his wife to talk. Long rod did not like other people scold silly gu, occasionally with silly gu build two words. Silly girl has been saying: “the top hat is very beautiful, the top hat is very beautiful!”
It was a pair of red-and-white couple’s ski caps, their spikes swaying in the wind.
After the New Year, Long pole did not go out to work, but in the village opened a small shop. Soon, long Pole’s first child was born. People in the village often see Long Pole riding a 125 motorcycle out at noon — that is to go to his wife to play fast food, there is no restaurant in the village, only three kilometers away in the town. There were not enough chickens in confinement. The mother with a long pole said to the outside people when she was looking for a chicken in the village, “It’s too delicate. It takes two to buy a bag of salt.
Long pole but never complain, every time to go to eat always smile, see the road of the child will also shake the accelerator pick chin smile: “go! Do you want to go across the street? Take a ride with you!”
After the year, the young people in the village all left, and the pool tables and mahjong tables in the canteen were abandoned. Most of the time, except for pupils coming to buy snacks, the shop was quiet except for the sound of the pendulum. Soon it was too long to make ends meet. Even the children had to borrow money from their relatives for milk powder.
When I was in high school, I got a call from him one night. I was surprised because we were not close and had not talked to each other for a long time. He said, “Where is it developed? The boss.” I say: “your boss, in the school cough up, what situation?” “Nothing, nothing, why can’t I talk to you? Ha ha ha……”
We chatted awkwardly that day. I guessed that he might want to borrow some money, but he hesitated and hesitated. Later I heard that at that time, except for a few of our classmates in high school, other students out of work were all borrowed by him.
Long pole decided to stay at home with children, let his wife go out to work. Once the girl went out, she never came back. Long pole holding the child to chase the wife’s home, the wife came back, but not long after the girl left again.
Someone deliberately asked him: “Long rod, your wife this year and not return to the year?”
The long pole said, “Go! There’s no going back.”
“Secession?”
“Take off what leave, did not dozen card.”
“Want to get back, thin guy elder brother important person take.”
“Look, there is no way to get someone back.”
The next year, I heard that Chang Gan took another girl home, but still no wine. By the time I heard the news again, the second wife had given birth to two children and was gone again. One summer vacation, I saw the long pole by the pond in my hometown. He was tanned, and he was floating with two little children. When he squatted there motionless, he looked like a statue, and only the little ones got up slowly to follow him when they were far away.
When the child was older, He closed the shop and went out to work again. After a few years, The long Pole took another girl home. This time, the village people are a sensation, someone pointed to his son scold: “you look at others, with one after another, you can not find one! The outside world is so nice, there’s one coming back!”
The third wife also had two children for Chang Rod. During the period, the father of the long pole out of prison, the father and son again opened a snack shop, also opened a gambling file in the store, life has finally improved.
By 2016, most of the primary school students had started to work, and when we met occasionally at the end of the year, someone mentioned Changge, saying that changge had married so many times that it would be impossible for him not to congratulate, and it would be difficult for him to attend the wedding of other students, so he proposed to let Changge hold a banquet.
When I met my father at the banquet for the first time, I expected him to be a little bit watery, but I didn’t expect him to look so ordinary, a little old man in a vinyl apron, looking even a little shriveled.
That day, long pole with five children, like with a group of soldiers, chirp to play in the doorway to see the fireworks. Fireworks rang through the sky, the pole tilted its head back, its mouth open and smiling, revealing a row of neat front teeth. The little girl beat on the leg of the pole and said, “I will hold it too, I will hold it too!” The pole took the little boy aside in its arms, crouched down and picked up the little girl with the other hand, laughing and saying, “How nice is it? Does it look good?”
The soup of banquet is ox whip soup, long pole’s father a table to send smoke, smile red face: “young, not afraid of oh, soup, not afraid of!”
Later, I heard that chang’s third wife had gone, but every time he saw Chang’s third wife, he was still smiling.
One day I found a long pole in a small group of WeChat, his WeChat name is “struggle”, personality signature said “hard to powerless, struggle to move their own. Strong, independent, the only one you can rely on yourself.”
The fat man, who had always been steady, was defeated by poverty
Fat Mountain, born in 1992, the second oldest, is a steady man. In the fourth grade, my father died in a mine.
I like riding fat Mountain’s motorcycle. When he drives, he does not hold the handlebars like a normal person. Instead, he puts his whole hand on the handlebars and puts his wrist on.
On the court, Fat Mountain is a flexible fat man who likes to circle the ball above his head with his forefinger raised when he wants it. His game was as steady as a man’s, and he liked to push himself in step by step. At times, even when the crowd cheered and teammates roared, he simply lifted his collar and ran briskly toward the middle, rubbing his face. He has a pair of blue sneakers. Every time before and after he plays ball, he pours water with his hand into the vamp in the water room next to him. Then he crouches down to wipe the shoes carefully.
After the third grade graduation fat mountain failed to enter the key high school, and do not want to go to the vocational school, followed the people in the village to learn to work in the factory model, “day and night jingling like iron”. Most of the young villagers who had just left the village spent years fooling around and changing jobs before settling down, but he had never changed jobs since he entered the factory.
The road to his house was too narrow for a tractor, and he barreled all the cement and sand back in. It has been built intermittently for two years, from knocking stones and dredging sand to digging foundations and laying walls. The year after the house was built, we went to his house to visit the new house, everyone was delighted to praise his new house beautiful, he only smiled and held up his strong wine and said: “Drink!
new house built soon, fat mountain took a provincial girl back, the students heard the news after all asked him with a smile: “Ha! I heard you brought your wife back? Le!” Fat mountain one face serious ground say: “have no, girl friend, come back to let family see next.”
For the next two years, his girlfriend would return to Pangshan’s home for Chinese New Year. But every year when I come back, I stay at home and seldom go out. Our one class classmate often go to line road together in the night, every time somebody lets Fat mountain take a wife to come out, but every time fat mountain just smile, female classmate say: “you are not afraid a sister-in-law a person at home bored ah?” Fat Mountain said, “It’s all right. There’s a TV.” His classmates laughed and said that he had hidden a treasure at home.
One year before Fat Mountain married his girlfriend, the only brother in the family said he wanted to go out to make a lot of money and went to the north. During a few calls with family for money, and then we know that his brother is to do MLM to go. Fat Mountain’s mother was a woman who never spoke loudly and only cried silently to relatives. Fat mountain came back to collect money several times, went to Hebei with relatives, and went to Beijing, finally very hard to find the brother back, but not long before the brother secretly ran.
“It comes back and goes. It’s been brainwashed. Do you have any way to find it?” Fat Hill spread out his hands to the passersby.
“I think about money, but I can’t get my head around it. I’ll come back when I turn it around.” “Someone consoled.
Fat Mountain’s wedding was arranged in his hometown in the middle of the year, except for the long pole and a few classmates who often stayed with Fat Mountain, most of the students could not go back. We agreed to wait for the New Year, then go together to congratulate.
The students go to congratulate that day, fat mountain said gift money all buy fireworks, hit, hit a little more prosperous! That night, the whole village stood at the door looking up at the fat Mountain fireworks.
Then fat Mountain’s daughter was born. That year several male classmates played mahjong together, Fat mountain always received a phone call, either wife or mother, fat mountain hung up the phone and said: “I won’t play this, children with people.”
Every year when a group of people go to Fat Mountain’s house to play, Fat Mountain’s wife stays in her room, with the door facing the living room, but she never comes out to greet them. When a classmate went in to tease the child, she just smiled. two people’s communication is very subtle, fat mountain wife will close the door, soon fat mountain will go into the room, and then come out of the hands will be holding a bottle of milk powder, the door also conveniently opened, the door closed again, fat mountain will go in. I had never heard her call fat Mountain by her name, but the conversation was always soft.
I thought they would never quarrel with each other, until one day, I was playing computer games with a mutual friend in an Internet cafe. My friend got a phone call and mentioned me, and I asked who it was, and he said, “Fat Mountain, would you like to say hello?” and he just handed me the phone.
I answered the phone, and fat Mountain on the other side of the line, apparently not expecting this, sounded as if someone had broken into something on the sly, full of embarrassment. My friend kept gesturing to me to hang up. I polite a few words, then in order to play the game for hanging, ask a friend how to return a responsibility, “how return a responsibility, borrow money again!”
“Fat Mountain, I remember he was okay.”
“Can what! Call every month or two to borrow money, you don’t know! A poor wife will quarrel, a quarrel to call me, I still eat zhai!”
“No, I remember his wife was pretty good…”
“To show you a quarrel? Or not where to go, has been so ah, a lack of money on noisy death Lao…… Be such, you turn born thin guy elder brother also can be such.” My friend lit a cigarette and asked me for a lighter with a smile.
“Like you were born. No, it depends on the people.”
“Can’t? The next day you will know.”
Some time ago, because back to the city to handle affairs, I again about a friend in the Internet bar. “Mrs. Fat Hill’s gone, you know?” “My friend asked me.
“No! Really?” I was surprised.
“They’ve all gone, only he won’t tell.”
“Why are you leaving after all these years?”
“What else can because of, don’t have money, fat mountain again bet, want to leave what you have to do.”
“Fat mountain? I don’t remember him gambling very much?”
Single dads born in the 1990s
“Hey! There are few young people over there who don’t gamble. All of them are about the same. They dream of making money day and night.
Although my friend assured me, but I still do not believe, after all, the impression of fat Mountain has always been very “stable”. Internet cafes crackle in the keyboard sound, mixed with chaos and rapid tear shout, “open open open! Pick up the gun… Lick me! Lick me! Fuck!” My friend held the cigarette between his hands on the keyboard, and the ash was constantly shaken into the keyboard.
But I still can’t figure out about Fat Hill. ‘When did it happen?
“It’s been a long time.”
“Fine guy elder brother?”
“Throw it to the fat Mountain.”
The child was dumped by his wife to his parents and smuggled to Myanmar to gamble
Blind, born in 1995, addicted to gambling.
Blinding home is in the middle of the village, similar to the long pole home, the home of the small shop is also a gambling file, usually in the village regardless of men and women old and young will be in the shop “punting”, “gambling three public”, “treasure treasure”, under the influence, Blinding has mastered a variety of gambling games.
When Blind Ming dropped out of junior high school, his boxy face was covered with zits. Blindy dropped out of school, followed by the first boss is Mr. Ma, Mr. Ma asked him why he did not go to class, he only smiled and said: it is not interesting, not to read.
His eldest son is two years older than Ming Ming, but Mr Ma has banned his son from gambling. Mr. Ma traveled from village to village, doing “harmony” for him, responsible for the role of receiving money and losing money.
Cigarettes worth between $100 and $2 burned in the stalls, wreathed in smoke that reddened everyone’s eyes, and the crowd folded in circles like rings on a tree, elbow to elbow, barely letting in air. Blindy did not speak much at the card table, except when he opened it, and with a solemn face cried, Don’t move! The gamblers then watched the next move with glee and chagrin.
Blind said, “four points to kill”, hand to the pile of money on the table by a press, dial back to the table corner, also do not count, and then look at the next group of cards. “Eight o ‘clock have, this fold hundred son whose?” Blindy asked, pointing to the money. The gambler next to him straightened up, put his hands in his pockets, stared at the money on the stage and said, “My my.” Blindy turned a large pile of banknotes neatly arranged according to face value and sang: “One, two, three… Eight! Leave you.”
The peak season for gambling is around The New Year, when young migrant workers return home to spend the year briefly with their families and then join the betting shops every night. Sometimes, early in the morning there is news from the pork stall: so-and-so youth last night gambling hot, a year’s wages are lost, also borrowed forty thousand and fifty thousand high interest, still is not turned over, but also the year, returned to Dongguan that night, the debt is enough for him to return a few years.
The youths gambled and gambled, some taking years to pay off their debts, often leaving the casino with another long count the year they were cleared. There was a lender who said to a young man, you know what? You raised my kid. You put him through the sixth grade.
A few years later, Mr. Ma died of a brain tumor, and blinding joined the team to work in the south.
Before the New Year, Blindy came back wearing pink tights and a flowery shirt, and he was accompanied by a little girl who also had her hair permed. Blind came back the same day with the family for money, his mother asked with a smile, all the year round did not do a penny? Blindy cried, “Give it to me first! I’ll pay you back at the worst!” His mother afraid of the man came back to know to freak out, gave blinding two hundred dollars.
Get the money, blind left the girl at home, his own person to the town’s Internet cafe, every night before coming back at one or two. The girl said that he did the same thing outside. He didn’t have a proper job and he spent all day in the Internet bar. One night, his father deliberately locked the door of the courtyard, came back blind, did not call anyone, is to kick against the iron door, his father listened to the banging, afraid of losing face, cursed and let his mother to open the door.
Blinming didn’t go out looking for a job until February 2, lunar calendar. When his father beat him with a broom, he challenged him with a stick. His mother advised him that it was almost time for him to go out and get something to do, so he said crossly, “People have been playing at home for years.”
People say Blindy and his wife are made for each other because even though Blindy is, his wife is still willing to be with him. Sometimes Blindy took her to the Internet, sometimes just left her alone at home. The little girl did not mind, still laughing as she watched TV.
The first son was born at eighteen, still without a job. Blindy’s wife had dyed her hair black and looked more and more like an ordinary mother, but Blindy still played cards for money and went to Internet cafes. In the kitchen-garden on one of those smoky evenings, his mother cursed, “Muscovite duck! Be born and forget it! Night and day, I’ll take it for you! One day you will die!” .
Blinming was introduced into a packing factory downtown. He walked from the second floor to the end with his hands behind his back, then went up to the third floor and walked around again. Elongated asked him which station he wanted to go to, and he said: “You go back!” Then he turned and went downstairs. People in his village laughed at him for setting the record for the fastest quitting job in the factory, but blindness was very proud of him.
Blind in the city to buy a mobile phone, with friends can not borrow money, home and not to give, they went to borrow two thousand pieces of usury. After borrowing it, he didn’t care about it any more. When someone called, he hung up and finally changed his phone card. When the debt collector found Blinding’s house, the interest of more than 2,000 yuan had rolled into more than 20,000 yuan. In the end, his father returned it.
His father felt that he had raised a black sheep, and the relationship between him and his son was getting worse and worse. They often quarreled in the gambling archives. More noise may be blind also feel boring, with his wife to go out to work together, the children left to their parents.
After the birth of her second son, Blindy did not stop behaving, but went home even less often. Sometimes, said his wife, we never see each other for a month.
At the end of 2016, Blindy’s wife left without a word. The two children were left to their blind parents.
Two months ago, I heard that Blindy’s father received a phone call from Myanmar, saying that Blindy had lost a lot of money gambling in Myanmar and would kill the ticket if he didn’t remit the money. Then the other side also sent a video, the video is dark, can not see the figure, only to hear blinding voice. Blind parents quickly transferred to the past 50, 000, and then called the police, the police investigation, said gambling in Myanmar is legal, it will be more difficult to deal with.
My blind cousin searched for relevant information on the Internet and found a piece of news that the police rescued hundreds of young people from there every year, all of whom were tied up by gambling.
Blind Ming is still uncertain about his life and death, close to his friend said that he read gambling information on the Internet to smuggle himself to Myanmar to gamble. Another said he wore his belt the night Blinding left.
After the incident, his father called his relatives one by one, saying that his son had been bound abroad, if there is a phone call from Myanmar, don’t pay attention to it, the money has been given more than 50,000, dedicated, the rest, let him die.
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