Shuizhen wangshi

The reason why a water town is called a water town is because there is a big reservoir, and there are many lakes and rivers, large and small, which has the charm of a water town in the south of the Yangtze River, hence the name.

Summer in Shuicheng is long and hard. It starts to get hot in mid-April every year and doesn't get cold until mid-November. The local people think that there are actually only two seasons in a year-summer and winter.

Fancun is located in the northwest corner of Shuizhen, only two kilometers away from Shuizhen.

In the 1980s, Fancun was still poor and backward. No electric fan is installed in every household. It was dog days in July, and it was so hot that they couldn't sleep at night. Every household moved out of the wooden bed and slept outside, with mosquito-repellent incense lit next to it. In this way, they can fall asleep with the hum of mosquitoes.

People with wooden beds are in good shape. For example, the Agui family can only take out two bamboo mats, and the family of four sleeps in the alley in front of their house.

Pell and A Xiang are a couple. Pell is a native of Fancun, and A Xiang lives in the neighboring village.

Pell married A Xiang in her thirties because her family was really poor. Of the four brothers, Pell is the youngest.

Long before Pell and A Xiang got married, her parents died. After getting married, Pell's brothers each built another house in the village. Before marrying A Xiang, Pell lived alone in a shabby old house. The wooden tile house that has lived for generations has only one window, and the window is small, so even in broad daylight, the room is dark and not bright enough.

If it weren't for A Xiang's mental retardation and strabismus, Pell might not even marry a woman like A Xiang.

A Xiang's eyes were born squint. When he looks at people, his eyes are always looking elsewhere. Plus A Xiang is thin and small, pale and always looks malnourished.

Husband and wife have no other source of income except a few acres of thin land.

Pell is really lazy, and even these acres of barren land are unwilling to do this job. Every day, he either drinks with the idle youth in the same village or plays cards.

A Xiang has to take care of the children and do housework. Besides, he was born with some mental defects. Crops are always badly planted. Every autumn harvest season, his family's food is only enough to eat, and there is no market at all.

Pell and his two sons, the older is Xiang, two or three years old, and the younger is Ah Fu, who is less than half a year old.

It may be years of malnutrition. The two children are as thin as their parents and their faces are always sallow.

The sun is long in summer, and it's seven or eight o'clock in the evening, and it's not dark yet. Every dinner, Pell and A Xiang sit in the alley with a bowl of rice. It was too dark in the room for them to turn on the light. Eating out is cool and energy-saving.

A Xiang grew up, holding a small bowl and licking the rice in his mouth. Sometimes it is scattered on the floor. A Xiang raised his chopsticks and knocked him on the head. "Look, you didn't eat well and spilled it."

A Xiang doesn't cry, but she always smiles foolishly and continues to put rice in her mouth. Everyone in the village says that A Xiang's brain is not smart enough. He may have inherited A Xiang's defects.

When Alfred was a child, A Xiang held him and fed him spoonfuls.

This summer, A Xiang is four years old and A Fu is two years old. On the hottest day, the villagers didn't see the Agui family sleeping outside at night.

I heard that Ah Fu is ill.

Alfred just had diarrhea at first. A Xiang thought he had a cold in his stomach and didn't go to see a doctor. According to the local rural method, he fried the coarse salt in a pot, sewed a cloth bag, put the salt in it and covered the child's stomach. It is said that if he warms his stomach like this, the child will not pull again. After being covered for several days, the child's stomach became red, and the symptoms of diarrhea not only did not improve, but also had a high fever.

When the couple were in a hurry, they took their children to the barefoot doctor in the village to see a doctor. The barefoot doctor prescribed some medicine and took it for a few days, but it was still not good. Let them take it to the health center in the town.

The doctor in the town health clinic saw that the child was hot and diarrhea was not stopped. The little face lost its color.

"Children are sick like this, how to go to the hospital? Hurry to the big hospital in the provincial capital, it will be too late if it is late. " The doctor saw that the child was in poor condition and even dared not prescribe medicine, urging them to send the child to the provincial capital quickly.

"Provincial capital hospital? How much will that cost? " Hearing this, Pell turned pale.

"At least there are hundreds of dollars. Get ready first. I don't know. Saving children is very important. "

A few hundred dollars? ! Pell was blindsided when he heard it. At that time, there was no rural cooperative medical care, and he couldn't sell so much money by selling all the grain he planted in a year. Pell hesitated. He looked at Alfred in A Xiang's arms again, sleeping soundly, thinking that the child just had loose bowels, and it was nothing serious. He said to A Xiang, "Go home first and let the barefoot doctor prescribe medicine for a few more days. It is common for children to get sick. Doctors love to scare people. "

A Xiang with mental retardation has never been to the provincial capital since she was so big. She is a little timid at the thought of taking her children to the provincial capital to see a doctor. Besides, everything at home usually follows Pell's advice. Pell said to go home, and she went home with the baby in her arms.

On the same day, the couple returned to Fancun with their children.

A few days after returning home, Ah Fu disappeared.

The child is missing, and A Xiang's family wants to take A Xiang back.

The day I picked up A Xiang, the weather was unusually hot, but it was only nine o'clock in the morning and the temperature was over thirty degrees. The sun is fierce and there is no wind. A Xiang's father took A Xiang's brother to see A Xiang.

Pell knelt on the ground and begged her father-in-law and several brothers-in-law not to take A Xiang away. My father-in-law not only disagreed, but also scolded Pell.

"Look at yourself. You can't even feed a child. If A Xiang can't eat and drink with you, he will die here one day. "

A Xiang was picked up after all.

From then on, only Gui Hexiang was left in this dark room.

Less than half a year after A Xiang was taken back, she remarried and married an old man in his 60s in another village. It is said that less than a year after marriage, she gave birth to another son.

When A Xiang left, Pell just smashed the jar and stopped planting the land, leaving them fallow. The old house no longer lived, so he took A Xiang to the town to sell coal.

During the day, Aguilar brought a load of coal and A Xiang to sell in the streets of Shuizhen. Gamble at night with the money earned by selling coal during the day.

Father and son never eat. If they win money by gambling, they will have a full meal in a small restaurant in town. If you lose money, you will be hungry, sometimes for days. Xiang, the child doesn't seem to know that he is hungry. He hasn't eaten for days and hasn't said a word. Wherever Pell takes him, he follows him.

Later, Pell simply stopped selling coal and begged with A Xiang during the day. At night, the father and son found a bridge opening to sleep in the town.

This kind of life will last for two years.

Two years later, in the summer, Xiang was six years old and Gui was over forty years old.

A Xiang is thinner than before, and his whole face is as thin as a pair of big eyes. He hasn't grown up. A six-year-old child seems to be only three or four years old.

Agui is old, with gray hair and messy clothes, just like an old beggar.

It was mid-July, dog days, a hot afternoon, and everyone who took a nap got up.

Someone went swimming in the inverted river in the town and saw a ragged man lying in bridge opening, sitting next to a thin child, who kept shaking the man and shouting "Daddy, Daddy".

The swimmer felt something was wrong, so he went over and patted the lying man, but nothing happened.

He shook the man hard and shouted, "Hey, wake up".

Still nothing happened.

He leaned down and tried the man's breath with his hand.

I can't breathe.

He's dead.

The man lying down is Gui.

Gui starved to death.

That night, Agui's three brothers and the village cadres in Fancun carried Agui's body back to Fancun.

Three days later, Gui lay in a coffin transformed from his wardrobe and was buried in the grave hill of Fan Village.

Not long after Pell's death, A Xiang adopted by Pell's eldest brother's family disappeared.

Later, I heard that some villagers had seen A Xiang once in Shuizhen. Since then, no one has seen A Xiang again. "Maybe they have starved to death or frozen to death outside." That's what everyone in Fancun said.

This is the case.