After Shi Zhen left, Guan Baiyu paused and opened the door.
There is a dirt road next to his house, and he goes through a vegetable field and arrives at his adoptive father's house.
His adoptive father's house looks like a two-story building from the front, but there is only one story in the back, and the outside has not been painted with limestone. The house was built and ran out of money.
In addition to farming, some people in the village also go to work in factories or do other things, and they also have an income. They can't build a big house, but a small house can be built, but his adoptive father has never been found. Work, although I did some work such as going to town to sell bamboo shoots and fish, but I didn't make much money.
Their source of income is mainly from farming and raising silkworms.
It was still early, and when Guan Baiyu arrived at his adoptive father's house, although the door was closed, there was light shining through.
Guan Baiyu knocked on the door and heard the sound of the door bolt being pulled out, and his adoptive mother opened the door.
Guan Baiyu's adoptive mother's surname is Zhang, and her name is Zhang Xiumei. She was pretty when she was young, but now in her 40s, she is black and thin, with a hunchback, and has long lost her youthful grace.
Seeing Guan Baiyu, Zhang Xiumei was a little unhappy.
She doesn't like Guan Baiyu.
Her father-in-law died a long time ago, and her mother-in-law has always been in charge, but her mother-in-law did not like her from the beginning, thinking that she was thin and small and could not work.
Later, she gave birth to several children, and she couldn't sit still. Her mother-in-law was even more disliked by her and was very critical of her.
She remembered that when her mother-in-law bought a piece of tofu and came back to add vegetables, she would be told if she ate more.
Later, her mother-in-law brought Guan Baiyu back directly.
It wasn't her own child, she really couldn't like it, especially after she had her own child.
When she was pregnant, it was rare for her mother-in-law to have a good face towards her, but seeing that she gave birth to a daughter, her mother-in-law turned around and lay down on the bed, saying that she had a backache and had no time to serve her.
She can only take care of the child by herself.
When her daughter was a few months old, when her mother-in-law turned sixty, her eldest sister-in-law brought her mother-in-law a chicken.
At that time, it was still 80 years, and it was not easy to eat meat. She only ate eggs and not a chicken when she gave birth.
Seeing her mother-in-law stewed chicken, she was so greedy, thinking that she could always eat a few bites, but her mother-in-law didn't give her a single bite.
One by one, there are too many things.
Her mother-in-law's nephew came over, but her mother-in-law prevented her from entering.
Her mother-in-law couldn't find anything, and she stole it when she opened her mouth.
Her mother-in-law bought something to eat, but she didn't let her eat it, and hid it all in her house.
Before Guan Baiyu came to their house, their husband and wife had already done all the work in the fields. Her mother-in-law was raised by their husband and wife, but her mother-in-law was still scolding them all day long.
So whether it was her mother-in-law, or Guan Baiyu, who was raised by her mother-in-law, she didn't have the slightest affection for her.
After giving birth to her daughter, she also thought about giving Guan Baiyu to someone else to raise, but her mother-in-law insisted on keeping Guan Baiyu because she only gave birth to a daughter.
Fortunately, her man, like him, still misses his own daughter.
"What are you doing here?" Zhang Xiumei asked.
Guan Baiyu said: "Mom... I have something to tell you."
Guan Baiyu's adoptive father's house is also muddy. As for the small building above, the floors are all wood, and the stairs are also wood, narrow and small.
At the moment, their family of three is staying downstairs in the main room, his sister is doing her homework, and his adoptive father is making a broom.
Seeing him come in, they both looked over together.
Guan Baiyu's adoptive father was named Guan Guangguo. At that time, their cousins were all called "Country X".
Guan Guangguo was not too late to get married, but he gave birth to a child late. Although his daughter was two years younger than Guan Baiyu, he was already in his early forties and had gray hair.
"What's the matter with you?" Guan Guangguo asked.
Guan Baiyu said, "My cousin has come to find me."
Guan Baiyu told about Shi Zhen.
Shi Zhen came to him several times, but they came at night. Now it's cold and there's no one outside at night, so no one can see him.
Everyone wouldn't say anything when they met, so even if Guan Guangguo and his family were only ten meters away, Guan Guangguo didn't know about it.
Guan Guangguo asked subconsciously, "You want to go back? Then you have to pay back the money you owe me."
Guan Baiyu froze: "I don't want to go back... My cousin is my mother's relative, and my mother is dead..."
Guan Guangguo frowned.
Zhang Xiumei usually chats with her neighbors. She heard Guan Baiyu say that his cousin's name is Shi Zhen, and asked, "Your cousin is the one who rented an apartment in Jianguo? He has to rent an apartment himself, so he really can't control you. Be careful, don't get scammed out of money by him."
When Zhang Xiumei said this, she glanced at Guan Baiyu again.
She didn't like Guan Baiyu, and there was another reason.
Her mother-in-law should have saved some money in the early years, and when she brought Guan Baiyu back, Guan Baiyu's own grandfather was not allowed to give some money
It stands to reason that if she died, there would be hundreds of thousands of people left, but they didn't have a penny, and they had to pay for the funeral.
They had just built a house, where did the money come from? In the end, I had to owe a debt.
Zhang Xiumei felt that the money should have been hidden by Guan Baiyu.
"I have no money." Guan Baiyu said.
Zhang Xiumei didn't take it seriously, and was even a little annoyed: "Okay, you have no money! Your cousin is here, you want to study in the future, ask him for money, don't ask us for money, we don't want you to give us pensions anyway. ."
Her mother-in-law is obviously rich, but Guan Baiyu has been taking money from them all the time for her studies. They have long been unhappy.
In the past two years, her mother-in-law was gone, but they still had to pay Guan Baiyu to study, and she was even more unhappy.
That is, Guan Baiyu gave them an IOU, and they continued to manage.
"I borrowed it from you..."
"Then we don't have any money to lend you any money! Before Xiaohong was sick, I took her to see a doctor in the town, and they all borrowed money from her parents' home!" Zhang Xiumei said.
She is also telling the truth, she really has no money! She and her man went to her mother-in-law's brother's house to borrow money for a funeral for her mother-in-law before. They were all told that they cried and only borrowed fifty dollars.
The two children have to study, and the family has a lot of expenses. Now she has not paid off the money she owes for the construction of the house and the funeral in the past two years.
Guan Baiyu froze.
In fact, he never knew what he was going to do in the future.
His grades were good, but he was a little thin. The villagers said that he was not able to work, so he was asked to go to secondary school, and then he would come back to be a primary school teacher after graduation.
He himself has this plan, but he needs money to study in a technical secondary school. If he does not continue his studies, he may go directly to find a job, it may be better.
But he can't find a job.
Before the winter and summer vacations and weekends, he went to the town and wanted to find a job, but he was too young, not even sixteen years old, and he was thin and thin, so people didn't want him at all.
He settled the accounts and felt that he had better go to study. Although studying requires money, after three years of secondary school, he can always find a decent job. For this reason, he also specifically talked to his adoptive father, saying yes To borrow money to study.
His adoptive father was reluctant to lend him money. In order to reassure his adoptive father, he wrote an IOU of 4,000 yuan, which he would pay in the future. Not so much, but not much.
Now his adoptive father is reluctant to continue lending him money
Guan Baiyu was a little worried, and thought of Shi Zhen again.
Will Shi Zhen be willing to lend him money? Or... he's not in secondary school anymore