After stepping on the boat for an hour, Lin Xiaobin's stomach was completely digested. Wu Yuan looked at the time and said, "Come on shore, it's been an hour."
After five o'clock, the sun was slightly lower.
The four went ashore, and Wu Yuan answered the phone and said, "It's right here at the ticket office of Nanhu Cruise."
"Anyone coming?" Gu Qinan asked.
Wu Yuan winked at Lin Xiaobin and said, "No, I'll get something, you can find a place to sit down and wait for me. Buy me a drink and ask for Ice Vitamin C!"
The three walked a few dozen meters forward, bought drinks from the drinks vending machine in the park, and found a small pavilion to sit down.
Nanhu Park has a long history and has been renovated in recent years, so the boats and pavilions in the park are quite new and fairly clean. Lin Xiaobin sat down as soon as he walked in.
The pavilion is next to a big banyan tree, which just covers the sun, and it is very cool inside.
After a few minutes, Lin Xiaobin suddenly said seriously, "Xiao Nanzai, I suggest you close your eyes at this moment."
Gu Qinan was stunned.
Unexpectedly, Zhan Ming also said: "Close it, just a while."
Gu Qinan obediently closed his eyes and heard Lin Xiaobin meditating.
"Hey, what's the matter with you, I told you to close your eyes and you won't listen, as soon as Brother Zhan says you listen..."
Suddenly there was no sound.
"Happy birthday to Xiao Nanzai! I just sang it in Chinese, now I'll do it again in English~"
Gu Qinan opened his eyes and saw Wu Yuan holding a birthday cake with a "16" candle on it. Lin Xiaobin and Zhan Ming stood around him, and the three of them began to sing a happy birthday song in English.
“Happy birthday to you~Happy birthday to you~”
In the midst of his busy schedule, Lin Xiaobin had to take out his phone to continue shooting videos.
"Okay, let's make a wish." Wu Yuan put the cake on the stone table of the pavilion, "Blow out the candle after making a promise."
Gu Qinan was surprised and was still in a stunned state, but he hurriedly made a wish and blew out the candle.
Lin Xiaobin sighed: "Fuck! Holding a birthday cake and singing in broad daylight is so silly!"
Zhan Ming made a move to close the zipper of his mouth: "Shut up."
Lin Xiaobin saluted: "Okay!"
Gu Qinan was very moved. Looking at the three of Zhan Ming, he had many, many feelings.
He once thought that he was the most failed person in the world without a single friend. Don't talk about friends, there is not even a good classmate who can stand up and speak for him. Is he really a failure as a person that so many people hate him
Zhan Ming saw that his eyes were moist, and panicked: "Don't cry."
Lin Xiaobin also panicked: "You're crying, passersby should think that the three of us are bullying you little sheep! Have you seen the security guard in the park under the banyan tree? I suspect he is going to call the police!"
Gu Qinan was amused.
Wu Yuan said, "Cut the cake, cut a big piece for Lin Xiaobin and plug his mouth."
Wu Yuan handed the cake knife to Gu Qinan.
Gu Qinan didn't pick it up, first took out a wet tissue from his bag, divided one for each person, and wiped his hands twice before taking the cake knife and cutting the cake.
Zhan Ming was used to it, and consciously wiped his hands.
Wu Yuan and Lin Xiaobin were dazed, Gu Qinan said, "Quickly wipe your hands."
Lin Xiaobin sighed while wiping: "Xiao Nanzai is really virtuous, and he also talks about hygiene. Brother Zhan likes your hygienic deskmate."
Then Lin Xiaobin began to tell how Brother Zhan's previous unhygienic deskmate was punched out by Brother Zhan and threw the entire desk.
Zhan Ming: "...don't talk about it."
Gu Qinan's eyes widened: "Really? Brother Zhan would be so angry?"
Lin Xiaobin: "...What misunderstanding do you have about your brother Zhan's temper?"
Gu Qinan took a bite of the cake with a fork and said naturally, "Brother Zhan has a good temper!"
Zhanming three people: "..."
Lin Xiaobin: "Serve!"
Four people finished a six-inch mango mousse cake, sweet and fragrant with mango jam. This birthday full of creamy aroma, together with the golden sunset of Nanhu Park, stayed in Gu Qinan's memory.
After packing up the cake boxes and other garbage, the four of them waved goodbye, made an appointment to play together during the summer vacation, and went home separately.
Zhan Ming accompanied Gu Qinan to take the bus.
Just after leaving the park, Zhan Ming's cell phone rang.
Zhanming's mobile phone is a very cheap ordinary model with serious sound leakage. He had turned down the volume of the call, but the person on the other side kept yelling, and the tree-lined road outside the park was quiet, Gu Qinan could hear it clearly.
"Your teacher called me to ask me, where did you go, did you go to work? You missed school because of the part-time job? Are you so short on this money? Does our family not give you food?!"
Zhan Ming pulled the phone slightly away and frowned.
Before he could speak, the bombardment began again.
"What did you tell the teacher at school?! Last time you came to ask me why you have been working part-time. What do you mean, I took your money? I forced you to make money?"
Gu Qinan was stunned by such a straightforward and embarrassing question.
Zhan Ming replied coldly, "I didn't say anything."
Unexpectedly, the other side was even more furious.
"You didn't say anything?! You didn't say anything, so why are everyone asking about your part-time job? The neighbors upstairs and downstairs are asking, your teacher is asking, and the third uncle also called to ask, and they all look like me. I bullied you and squeezed you! I don't want to say it too harshly! Only you know how much your grandma left you!"
Zhan Ming stopped, the expression on his face disappeared, looking particularly scary. Gu Qinan could feel that Zhan Ming's mood became very bad.
"Don't you know how much money was left? You took the card and the money." Zhan Ming said.
Gu Qinan suspected that he had heard it wrong.
"Did your grandma leave you a card? Who knows? An old man has nothing to spend, and he has saved more than 20,000 yuan for so long? I don't believe it! You don't have any sister or brother, so why keep it? For you alone? The old man has passed away, and I don't want to talk about this. Don't go outside to talk nonsense, and don't go out to work and let others blame our family! "
Zhan Ming asked, "If you don't work part-time, will you pay me college tuition?"
The opposite roared: "What university do you study? What school can you get into with that score?!"
After he finished speaking, he hung up the phone.
Zhan Ming stood on the side of the road for a long time, until Gu Qinan wondered if he could cry.
But no, Zhan Ming just kept expressionless, kept silent, and kept holding on to the phone.
Gu Qinan was a little scared, he stretched out his hand and pulled at the corner of Zhanming's clothes.
Zhan Ming did not respond.
Gu Qinan whispered, "Brother Zhan..."
Zhan Ming came back to his senses, looked at Gu Qinan, and seemed to realize where he was. He looked at his mobile phone, remembered that it had serious sound leakage, and asked, "Did you hear it?"
Gu Qinan nodded first, then realized that this was Zhan Ming's privacy, and quickly shook his head.
Zhan Ming touched his head and said, "Let's go."
Gu Qinan followed behind Zhan Ming, walking, he grabbed the corner of Zhan Ming's clothes and said, "Brother Zhan, come to my house! Come and live in my old house, it's empty now, I'll go with my parents Say, they'll definitely agree! It's just a bit far from the school..."
Not a little far, but very far. There is no direct access to the subway, and you need to transfer to the bus.
Gu Qinan said more quietly, and suddenly thought of something else, and said loudly: "You can rent a house near the school, don't live with them, it's too annoying!"
Zhan Ming suddenly sat down beside the sidewalk against the wall, put his head in his hands, bent his knees and buried his head in it.
Gu Qinan was startled, squatted down and asked him, "What's the matter? Brother Zhan, what's wrong with you?!" As he asked, he reached out to touch his head and forehead.
Zhan Ming grabbed his hand, leaned against his head, and said in a muffled voice, "I'm fine, calm down."
"Calm down?" Gu Qinan wondered.
"Don't calm down, I'm afraid I'll rush out to destroy public property and beat people." Zhan Ming said in a muffled voice, his head still buried between his knees.
But Gu Qinan couldn't feel his anger, only a deep sense of sadness and depression.
Gu Qinan's hand was always on Zhan Ming's head, gently.
After a while, Zhan Ming said, "You go home first."
"don't want."
Zhan Ming was silent for a while, but still didn't look up, and said, "I'll take it easy for a while, you go home first."
"don't want."
"Have a good time today, don't be upset by me." Zhan Ming said.
Gu Qinan didn't know what was going on, and his heart was sour and soft.
Brother Zhan is like a big homeless dog, squatting on the street with nowhere to go.
For the first time, Gu Qinan felt that if he had a house, he could take Brother Zhan home. No matter how low his EQ is, he knows that Brother Zhan can't go back to his parents' house with him.
"Come and stay at my house for two days." Gu Qinan finally said.
Zhan Ming didn't answer.
Gu Qinan gently hugged his head, ignoring the eyes of passers-by, and put his face on it.
"Your hair is so short and thorny." Gu Qinan said.
Gu Qinan's cell phone rang, and he could only pick it up. It was his parents who asked him where he went and urged him to go home. He went home immediately and hung up the phone.
It was six o'clock, but it was still bright.
Summer days are long.
The evening wind blew a leaf of a banyan tree and fell on Zhan Ming's head.
Gu Qinan picked up the leaf and touched Zhanming's head.
Zhan Ming touched his head countless times. This was the first time he touched Zhan Ming's head. After all, he couldn't touch it at ordinary times.
"It's thorny," he said. "It's my birthday today. You have to listen to me. Come home with me for two days, brother."
Zhan Ming let him touch his head and whispered, "My uncle is the one who called."
Gu Qinan guessed it.
"When grandma was dying, she gave the house to my uncle and asked him to take care of me. She told me in private that I was a child, and I couldn't keep the house. She took me with her all these years, and the only thing she could do was to retire. All the money was spent on me, and she didn't take care of my cousins. Before I left, I couldn't let my uncle's family complain, so I gave them the house. Anyway, it's an old house, and it's not worth a lot of money. "
Gu Qinan felt that it was the first time that Brother Zhan said such a long sentence.
However, he would rather Brother Zhan not say such long words, and still be that cool Brother Zhan.
"Grandma secretly gave me a card with 25,000 yuan in it. She was afraid that my uncle would not pay me college tuition, so she secretly gave me the money. She asked me to go to college and eat more. , don't save money."
Zhan Ming was a little choked up, but soon disappeared again, returning to a calm tone.
"My aunt found the card. My uncle took the account book and took it to the bank in the name of the guardian. But they suspected that my grandmother gave me more than one card."
Gu Qinan murmured, "How can this be..."
Zhan Ming raised his head, his eyes were full of disappointment.
"I don't understand, when my grandma passed away, everything changed. My dad died when I was two years old, and I have no memory of him. I don't know where my mom is. After my dad died, she left. , never came back. Grandma, my uncle, is my closest relative. My uncle was not like this before... "
Zhanming's uncle, when Zhanming was young, often bought him toys. The cousin has some, and the uncle will buy him a copy. During the Chinese New Year and festivals, his aunt would buy him clothes, saying that the old man did not know how to buy children's clothes, so she would buy them.
Toys and clothes only cost a few dollars, and Zhanming didn't understand it at that time.
Without touching the deepest interests, everyone can live in peace.
When grandma died, the uncle's family suddenly began to settle accounts. How much did grandma spend in hospital when she was sick, how much did the old house sell, how much did it cost for an extra zhanming, and how much was left.
More and more complaints.
Why is the old man's pension all spent on Zhan Ming alone? Their two children are also the grandchildren of the old man, and the old man has never cared about it.
When my aunt found Zhan Ming's bank card, her emotions exploded.
My cousin and cousin have nothing, and the old man secretly left money for Zhan Ming! She has been married to Zhan Guoqiang for more than ten years, and she has never had an easy day. Pulling two children by herself, her mother-in-law never helped, she only took Zhanming's grandson. She bears it, because Zhan Ming has no father or mother, can she care about him? But now that the old man is gone, he entrusted Zhan Ming to them, asking them to feed him, clothe him, go to school, and secretly leave him money!
Even Zhan Ming felt that Auntie had a point.
But they took the money away, doubted him, didn't trust him, and asked him to hand over the rest of the money.
"Xiao Nanzai, today is your birthday. After you hear this, forget about it, don't affect your mood." Zhan Ming rubbed his face and stood up, "I'm no longer the same person I was in my first year of high school, I was very angry and fought everywhere. , want to vent. Not now, I have accepted the reality. No one is particularly hateful, this is life."
"And I can only accept it, because they are the only family members I have left." Zhan Ming said, looking at the street lights gradually turning on, "I have to go back."
Because other than that, there is nowhere to go.
Zhan Ming left, turned his back to Gu Qinan, and waved his hand, it seemed that he was still the tall and cool brother Zhan.
But Gu Qinan had an urge to organize Brother Zhan into a small group, put it in his schoolbag and take it away. Bring it home, give him a warm lamp, a soft bed, and a happy home.