Chapter 3

Tanghezi Village is located south of Jiangzhou, twelve kilometers from the city center.

Zhou Andong jumped off the shuttle bus, and a patch of low, dilapidated bungalows appeared before his eyes. The cooking smoke, just as it emerged from the chimneys on the roofs, was torn apart and scattered by the howling north wind, instantly disappearing without a trace.

"Brother!" Suddenly, a girl's shout came.

Zhou Andong looked up and saw two girls, one big and one small, walking over against the cold wind, stepping through the thick snow; they were his two younger sisters.

The older one was named Zhou Anqin, eighteen years old this year, still studying at the Jiangzhou Petrochemical Technical School. Next year, after graduation, she would be assigned to the City Petrochemical Plant No. 2. This was the largest state-owned enterprise in Jiangzhou, one of the best in the entire province; the distillery couldn't compare.

"Brother!" The little girl scurried with her short legs and threw herself onto Zhou Andong.

This little one was already six years old, named Zhou Anning. Because she cried especially loudly when she was born, she was given the name Anning (Peace).

Zhou Andong held the thin little body, looked at the little face frozen red, and covered it with his hands affectionately: "Are you cold?"

"Cold!" The girl's icy little body burrowed into Zhou Andong's arms.

Zhou Andong held the little girl and walked toward home: "On such a cold day, where are you two going?"

Zhou Anqin said: "Mom made dumplings and asked me to bring them to you. Luckily we ran into you here, otherwise it would have been a wasted trip."

The little girl chattered: "The dumplings are sauerkraut filling, and there's meat, so fragrant."

Zhou Andong said: "On such a cold day, running so far just to deliver a few dumplings, you can't do this in the future."

Zhou Anqin suddenly stopped and looked at Zhou Andong with a serious face: "Brother, it will be fine when I graduate and start working next year. You won't have to work so hard anymore, and sister-in-law won't argue with you about divorce anymore."

Zhou Andong's heart felt as if it had been grabbed hard by an invisible giant hand. Looking at his older sister's thin body, then at his younger sister's somewhat yellowish hair due to malnutrition, he held back his tears.

He reached out a hand and hugged his older sister's shoulder: "Silly girl, your sister-in-law divorcing me isn't because of your burden, but because she wants to go abroad."

Zhou Anqin wanted to say something else, but was interrupted by Zhou Andong: "Alright, stop thinking nonsense. Brother will definitely let you live a good life, live in a building, drive a small car, eat whatever you want, go wherever you want to play, and going abroad won't be a problem."

Zhou Anqin lowered her head and chuckled: "Bragging again!"

Zhou Andong said heroically: "Whether I'm bragging or not, just wait and see."

Arriving at the door, Zhou Andong looked at the three adobe houses; the patches of mottled, falling mud on the walls were like the scales of passing time, making the already low and simple houses appear even more dilapidated.

Entering the courtyard, there was a side room on the east side where he and his younger brother Zhou Anbei lived. The main house had rooms on the east and west, with an entrance room in the middle containing a stove—a very typical layout for old houses in the Northeast.

"Creak!" The old wooden entrance door, with its rusty hinges, emitted a teeth-aching friction sound.

"Mom, I'm back."

As soon as Zhou Andong entered the room, he smelled a heavy scent of Chinese medicine.

His mother, Yuan Liying, was holding a small gauze net, filtering the medicine dregs. Hearing Zhou Andong's voice, she looked up: "Why did you come back alone?"

Zhou Andong said: "We divorced."

Yuan Liying's hand paused: "Divorced, huh... divorced then. It wasn't a good match to begin with; when you got married, I thought there would be such a day."

Zhou Andong looked at his mother's thin back, took a deep breath, and then looked at his father, who was paralyzed due to a traffic accident. He wasn't even fifty, yet his hair was already white, and because of malnutrition, plus having no money for treatment, he was tortured by pain until he was no longer human.

Originally weighing over 150 jin and 1.76 meters tall, he now weighed less than 80 jin. Except for the fact that one could still see a little flesh on his face, his body felt like bones wrapped in a layer of skin. Two years later, this man, taking advantage of no one being home, crawled out himself and found pesticide to drink, leaving not a single word.

"Dad!"

For Zhou Andong at this moment, this was a true reunion across lifetimes with his father. Thinking of riding on his father's shoulders when he was little, and his father's hearty laughter, he really wanted to shout "Dad" loudly, but his throat felt blocked by something; this "Dad" came out, and only he himself could hear it.

Zhou Xiao was leaning against the rolled-up quilt, smoking, as if he felt that Zhou Andong's emotions were a bit off: "What's wrong? Is work at the factory not going well?"

Zhou Andong shook his head: "No."

"Smoking, smoking, smoking!" Yuan Liying walked over with a medicine bowl: "Just smoke yourself to death. If you die, we'll all be relieved."

Watching his mother scolding his father, and seeing the silly smile on his father's face, Zhou Andong's eyes moistened. His father was his mother's heaven; as long as his father was alive, even if he lay on the *kang* unable to move, as long as he had a breath, this family was complete.

After his father drank the pesticide, his mother's heaven collapsed, her spirit vanished instantly, and her personality became increasingly strange, making it hard for her to get along with people, to the point that even her own children couldn't tolerate her.

To escape this home, his older sister married a man more than ten years older than her and rarely came back after marriage because coming back would definitely lead to arguments.

His younger brother Zhou Anbei also went south alone to work. In his thirties, he married a divorced woman with two children, and that woman was very strong-willed; she never gave birth to a son or daughter for Zhou Anbei in her whole life.

After his younger sister started junior high, she became a bit rebellious. If he hadn't been suppressing it, this mother and daughter could definitely have lifted the roof off. But it had to be said that although the little girl was rebellious, her academic performance was always very good, and she also got into college.

As for him, the eldest, he was introduced to several objects, all of which were ruined by the old lady. No matter who it was, as long as someone mentioned introducing a girlfriend to Zhou Andong, they would all shake their heads like rattles. Finally, until he was reborn, he hadn't even managed to get a wife.

"Brother, eat the dumplings first, they'll be cold in a while." His older sister unbuttoned her cotton coat and took out an aluminum lunchbox wrapped in cloth from inside, with the words "Jiangzhou Distillery" printed on it.

Opening the lunchbox, the dumplings were steaming hot. Zhou Andong picked one up and took a bite; he could see a few diced fatty meat inside, and tears almost flowed out, but he held them back. He was the pillar of the family and couldn't show weakness in front of his parents, especially his sisters.

"Is it delicious?" The little girl tilted her head, staring at Zhou Andong with big eyes.

Zhou Andong rubbed the little girl's head and said with a smile: "Delicious."

"Hee hee!" The little girl patted her little belly: "I didn't lie to you, I ate a lot of them."

"Mom!" Zhou Andong called out coquettishly: "I'm thirsty!"

Yuan Liying said: "There's a vat of water in the outer room; if you're thirsty, just drink it."

Zhou Andong smacked his lips: "The water is too bland, it has no taste."

Yuan Liying snorted: "There's half a bucket of swill by the door; that has plenty of taste, you can drink that."

Zhou Anqin chuckled, brought a bowl, and more than half a bottle of white liquor that had already been opened. It was Jiangzhou Distillery's big sorghum, 3 degrees, 6 bottles. Actually, this liquor tasted quite good; after all, it had a history of over a hundred years.

But because the management system was rigid, people were idle, there was no sense of competition, and the white liquor market had been sluggish in recent years, major liquor companies had lowered their prices one after another. However, the leaders of Jiangzhou Distillery were very tough and refused to lower prices. In just one year, they were squeezed out of the out-of-town market, dropping from an annual sales of two tons to seven hundred tons.

At this time, the factory leaders finally realized the seriousness of the matter, and the big sorghum also began to lower its price from 8 to 6, but it was too late. Last year's sales were already less than four hundred tons, and staff wages couldn't even be paid in full.

A frontline worker, plus bonuses, had about 230 a month; now it was good if they could get 130. And because he offended the deputy factory director and was transferred to the factory broadcasting station, the salary he got in his hand every month was just over 100. In another two months, it was estimated that even this 100 wouldn't be paid out.