He must have noticed my doubts. Before I could ask any questions, Xuanlin said, "Just listen to me and don't ask anything."
Facing this young boy who only had three months left to live at most, I couldn't disrespect him, so I nodded and said that I would listen to him carefully.
On the coffee table, the green smoke of hot tea curled up. Xuanlin asked me for a cigarette without caring about his lung cancer. As a result, he started coughing violently after taking the first puff, and a sickly look appeared on his pale face. Flushing, he looked at me with a gentle smile without mind, and then began his story.
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"I was born in 1978. My hometown is a place you may have never heard of, and the village I live in is an even more remote place. You can't imagine how poor we are there..." Xuan Lin was a little short of breath, but this did not prevent him from recounting the past in a gentle and calm tone.
During Xuan Lin's narration, a picture scroll unfolded before my eyes. The picture scroll showed a barren village. At that time, I never thought that a story I overheard actually contained a story about my master. important clues.
Let’s call the village where Xuan Lin was born Shi Cun, because the most obvious feature of this village is that there are many stones.
The surrounding mountains are stone mountains, and the surrounding valleys are also hard rocks underneath the flat ground. Because there is not much land that can be cultivated, this village is extremely poor, and it is the poorest among the villages under the jurisdiction of the notoriously poor county. A village.
Xuanlin was born in Shicun, in the summer of 1978.
In a village like this, it is a luxury for children to go to school. Not to mention the issue of money, even the nearest primary school is more than ten kilometers away from Shicun. Moreover, the so-called nearest primary school is only a whole school with only 40 students. A poor primary school for several children.
This is the luxury of going to school in Shicun. Even if parents can send their children to school regardless of labor force and very little textbook money, the children still have to get up at 4 o'clock in the morning and travel over mountains and ridges for several hours to get to school.
Therefore, the children here have no concept of going to school. When they were young, they ran around in the fields one by one. When they reached a certain age, they began to share the work at home. Then they grew up, got married and had children, and then repeated this life... ..
Affected by the environment, Xuanlin believes that his life should be the same. Isn't this the rhythm of life of the people of Shicun? But in fact, this is not the case. When he was 5 years old, Xuanlin was taken out of the mountains by his father. He did not know what kind of price it cost, so that he could live in a man's home in the county town and study. Went to primary school in the county town.
Xuanlin was still young at that time and had no idea what such a gesture meant to the people of Shicun. He only knew that he was far away from his parents at the beginning of his life. He was so far away that he only looked forward to his father to take him home every winter and summer vacation. , back to Shicun!
Why are you so hopeful? It was because the family he was staying in was not related to his family. He was just a person his father had met in the county in his early years. He was not very kind to him, or was almost harsh to him. A child's fragile mind obviously couldn't bear it. These.
He didn't know how much money his father would give this family every year. He only knew that he couldn't escape. He tried several times to escape from that person's home or school, but every time, within a few days at most, he would be arrested. Ishimura's father came and caught him, and then beat him severely.
"Actually, where can I run? A child has no money and doesn't know the road, so he can only wander around in that poor county. I forgot about this past and the hard work in the middle," Xuanlin showed his trademark He smiled politely, and then continued: "I only remember that I lacked warmth and security since I was a child, and this is the result of my extremely sensitive personality."
Yes, such past events can indeed create such a character, and such people are also more extreme. After meeting Nuan, they will take it extra seriously and cannot afford to lose it.
Xuan Lin's last escape occurred in the fourth grade of elementary school. This time, after he was caught by his father, he was not beaten for the first time. His father just remained silent and took him back to Shicun with a livid face.
He thought he was freed, but in fact, as soon as he returned to Shicun, his father hung him from the big tree in front of his house and beat him severely with a hemp rope. That time, his father's attack was particularly cruel. By the end, he could hardly feel the pain anymore, and all he wanted to do was to pass out as soon as possible.
Finally, it was his grandfather who rescued him, took him into the house and told him something.
It was too specific. Xuanlin didn't understand it at the time. At that time, he just ignorantly understood that his family used to be very prosperous, but for special reasons, he could only settle down in this poor mountain village. Many generations had passed. .
The family didn't want to continue like this, so he went to school with the hope of the whole family getting out of Shicun. Without going to school, there was no way to change the fate of poor and boring Shicun, right
Grandpa told him that the family was impatient and hoped that this would be his last escape, otherwise he would face the fate of living on the street and finishing elementary school.
"You know? The last piece of gold hidden in the family is going to be spent on you. You must read this book! Grandpa doesn't know that you have been wronged in that family, but you have to endure it. You are a man. Child, only if you learn to be patient can you soar into the sky." When grandpa said these words, he coughed extremely hard, but the crutch hit the ground again and again, and also hit Xuanlin's young child. Spiritual.
So he stopped running away, so he studied seriously, so even though he was young, he was sensitive and realized for the first time that his home seemed different from ordinary homes in Shicun, and seemed to hide a huge secret.
But Xuanlin didn't ask or tell anyone anything, because he was too young after all, and some things didn't rise to the level that a child would care about.
Time flies and has changed many people and things, but it seems that Shi Cun cannot be changed.
Xuanlin was 16 years old that year and was already a sophomore in a key middle school in the county. He had gotten rid of his host family since junior high school, and used his excellent grades to obtain exemptions from school accommodation fees, tuition and miscellaneous fees, etc. , this is a good change, it makes him believe in the power of struggle.
However, when he returned to Shicun during the summer vacation this year, he found it difficult to see the power of change. This village seemed to be able to shackle people's vitality, creativity and freshness of the world until they died. He felt that it was really difficult to see the power of change. You should take your family and get out of here.
Such thoughts were growing like weeds in his heart. He almost spent all his time planning what he should do and how he should do it to take his family out of here. While planning these things, he finally remembered Past events from fourth grade.
I remembered that my home seemed different, I remembered that my family once took out a piece of gold, and I remembered that I once guessed that there seemed to be a huge secret in my home...
He originally wanted to refrain from asking. He is a sensible child and knows that children should not ask unless adults tell them. But the more carefully he observed the details, the more he felt that everything in his home was full of unique weirdness.
First of all, there are complicated rules. There are fixed rules for eating at home, fixed rules for sleeping, and fixed rules for politeness... And these rules made Xuanlin, who already had some knowledge, realize that this was not a small matter. It is something that villagers and families in mountain villages can care about and insist on. Moreover, these rules are not stupid rules, but are quite common.
In addition, Xuanlin noticed that his father, who had gone through many vicissitudes of life and seemed to have never read a book, was not vulgar in his speech. After Xuanlin's several deliberate temptations, he still felt that his father seemed to have an understanding of history and some ancient times. At that time, I was very good at Confucian thought, and my insights were even deeper than my own.
Finally Xuanlin couldn't bear it anymore. On a sultry summer night, Xuanlin and his father walked to the edge of a creek under the pretext of taking a walk. It was on the edge of this creek that his father confessed to Xuanlin. A family history like a fantasy.
It was on the edge of this stream that my father said that Xuan Lin should inherit the family's craftsmanship.