Cui Lijuan was still wearing that flowery cotton-padded jacket. The fabric looked brand new, but it was filthy, with several dark yellow stains on the front of her coat. There was barely any color in her face, which was deathly pale, and the cold wind had left red, chapped streaks across her cheekbones. White frost even clung to her eyelashes — no one knew how long she had been standing out in that frigid draft.
She was propping herself up against the doorframe with one hand, while the other was pressed to her stomach, her waist slightly hunched. The whole of her looked as if something had hollowed her out completely.
The second she laid eyes on Xiaoli, tears burst forth from Cui Lijuan's eyes. Her lips trembled as she spoke, her voice hoarse and rough:
"Xiaoli... Mom has nowhere else to go. The hospital took back our house. I brought your grandma to your uncle's place... but... they only kept your grandma there to save face, and wouldn't let me step through the door. They think a woman who just had a miscarriage is bad luck. Mom only has you and your brother left now..."
Xiaoli's heart tightened in that moment, but not with pity — with hatred.
"Cui Lijuan, now you suddenly remember you have a pair of children? Where were you all those years ago? When you abandoned your husband and your kids for twenty years, when you refused to recognize us, when you forced us to move back to the village, when you looked the other way while Tang Jing drugged my brother, when you stood by and watched Tang Guanshan beat me... did any part of you ever stop to think you had children who were waiting for you?"
Xiaoli's throat felt tight, but there was not a flicker of mercy in her eyes.
"We already cut ties with you. Just leave!" She moved to shut the door, but Cui Lijuan jammed her weight against it and held it firmly in place.
"Shi Xiaoli, are you really that cruel? I'm your mother! Don't you care anything about your own reputation? I'm the one who got you your job. It's only right that you take care of me!"
Cui Lijuan ground her back teeth, staring straight at Shi Xiaoli. She had almost died giving birth to this stubborn girl all those years ago in the delivery room. If she didn't make a scene now, she never would have ended up in this miserable situation. This ungrateful girl was nothing but a curse on her life.
Shi Xiaoli pried Cui Lijuan's fingers off the doorframe one by one, enunciating every word clearly.
"My mother... died. She died the day my brother came down with a high fever..."
The front door slammed shut. Cui Lijuan shrieked at the top of her lungs from outside.
"Shi Xiaoli, if you refuse to support me, you'll regret this for the rest of your life! You never found out the secret your grandmother took to her grave, did you? I'll make sure you go your whole life not even knowing what your real last name is!"
She stood there, glaring daggers at the closed door for a long while, then wiped the tears off her face. She knew this hard-hearted girl would never give in easily. She gritted her teeth, muttering to herself. "Don't think cutting off our family ties lets you get out of your responsibility as my child. I'm going down to the hospital to sue you..."
Her shouts of rage faded further and further away down the road.
Shi Xiaoli wiped the tears off her own cheeks. She had no idea what Cui Lijuan meant by those last words, and decided not to waste her time dwelling on it. She walked over to Xiao Mandong, and took her hand.
"Sister Mandong, there's something I need to tell you,"
Xiao Mandong looked up at her. Shi Xiaoli bit down on her lower lip, a flicker of struggle crossing her face before a helpless little smile tugged at her mouth.
"Back then, when Cui Lijuan left us completely on our own, I went to make a fuss at the hospital. Tang Guanshan had no choice but to bring my brother and me back home. Later on... I noticed my brother was getting way too drowsy all the time. I watched carefully, and realized Tang Jing was slipping him sleeping pills, and Cui Lijuan was letting her do it. I didn't stop them. Because I knew even if I put a stop to it once, they'd just find another way to hurt him. Even if I stopped them from drugging him, they'd come up with some other cruel trick. So I decided to turn their own plan against them..."
Xiaoli spoke as she wiped the tears rolling down her cheeks.
"I looked up the safe dosage for sleeping pills first. After they slipped my brother the drugs that day... I secretly added more to the dose. Then I picked a fight with Tang Jing on purpose, so I could use what they'd done to threaten Tang Guanshan. But I never imagined people could be that wicked. My little clever plan almost backfired and got me killed. If you hadn't stepped in... I... Sister Mandong, I'm so sorry. Do you think I'm a terrible person? I really had no other choice. I heard even if you got your local hukou settled, if you didn't have a steady job, you'd be sent down to the countryside for re-education. I'm not scared of hard work out in the villages. But if I got sent away, I couldn't even bear to think about what Cui Lijuan would do to my brother."
Xiao Mandong listened to the whole story with a calm, neutral expression on her face, and just patted Xiaoli on the shoulder.
"Next time you plan to do something like that, you need to think through all the consequences first. Make sure you can get out of it safe and sound."
She didn't think Xiaoli had done anything wrong. A girl with no power or connections, she really had no other options left to her but to take that desperate measure.
Xiaoli was crying so hard her snot and tears were all smudged across her face.
"I promise I'll never do something that stupid again."
Xiao Mandong looked down at the stack of money in her hand, counted it, and saw it came out to exactly six hundred yuan. "Where did all this money come from?"
Xiaoli sniffled, wiping her nose.
"Dashan was sentenced by the court. The police recovered the compensation money that was owed to my dad. They brought three hundred yuan over to me just yesterday. I kept two hundred of it to buy things for the winter..."
Xiao Mandong pulled a stack of ration tickets out of her pocket: meat tickets, sugar tickets, non-staple food tickets, grain tickets, and more.
"Take all these tickets to use. If you run out, I've got more. You don't need to pay this money back to me. I'll hold onto it for you for now, and you can come get it whenever you need to spend it..."
"Wait no," Xiaoli cut her off before she could finish.
"I can't let you do that. That money was supposed to pay you back. My brother has already taken so much of your medicine..."
Xiao Mandong waved her hand dismissively. "Think of it as wages for Bowen. I've got a job coming up in a few days that I need Bowen to help me with."
In a couple of days, she was going to deliver grain to Dong Feng's warehouse. She'd ask Bowen to help with the deliveries. No one would need to find out about it, and she could pay him a generous wage, so the two siblings would have a little more breathing room to get by.
Shi Xiaoli clutched the grain tickets Xiao Mandong had given her tight in her hand. Her palm was all sweaty even in that cold, drafty room. She suddenly threw her arms around Xiao Mandong.
"Sister Mandong, my life is yours from now on."
Xiao Mandong pushed her away playfully, pretending to be grossed out.
"You got snot all over my jacket. Go wash your face right now. This afternoon, I'll come with you to the hospital logistics office to pick up your coal purchase permit. I'll also call the village, and ask the production team leader to bring you a whole cart of firewood when he comes into town tomorrow."
Xiaoli nodded so hard more tears spilled down her face.
"Thank you so much, Sister Mandong!"
Xiao Mandong sat for a little while longer before heading home. She had just stepped up to her own front door when she bumped right into someone. She looked up, and saw it was Gu Shaoting.
"Hey, Xiao Mandong! You're never home these days. I've stopped by several times waiting for you," Gu Shaoting said. His face was bright red from the cold, and he was stamping his feet to keep warm, clearly having stood there waiting for a very long time.
"Come in quickly. I was out in the village for a bit. What are you doing here? Is there something you need?" Xiao Mandong said as she unlocked the door and let them both in. She rushed to start a fire in the stove right away — the house felt even colder than the air outside.
They sat down next to the stove. Gu Shaoting rubbed his red, cold hands over his face a few times before he started speaking slowly.
"My brother had to go out of town for something. He said he didn't want you to worry, so he asked me to come tell you..."
Xiao Mandong gave an awkward little smile. She realized she hadn't even thought about him at all in the past few days.
Gu Shaoting sat there a little longer, drank a few sips of hot water, then stood up.
"Alright, I delivered the message. I'm heading out now."
