Chapter 7

Chapter 7

An Jiujiu and Shi Tuo never expected that what they had planned for the next time would be endlessly delayed.

It all started when there was trouble at Shi Tuo’s home. His grandmother had been suffering from uremia for many years, and two days ago, they received the notice that her condition had worsened.

Shi Tuo’s grandfather had passed away when Shi Tuo’s mother, Zhang Rou, was very young. His grandmother had only two children—Zhang Rou and an uncle who had immigrated to Singapore. His uncle only came back to China once every two or three years. Usually, it was Zhang Rou who took care of her mother. This time, when his grandmother’s health deteriorated rapidly, Zhang Rou informed her brother.

Zhang Chenglin, Shi Tuo’s uncle, had just returned to China a couple of days ago. As soon as he landed, Shi Tuo’s grandmother seemed to sense it, opening her eyes after having been unconscious for a long time.

Things worsened, and after Zhang Chenglin arrived at the hospital, he didn’t leave again. For the past couple of days, aside from going to school, Shi Tuo had to take meals to the hospital for his mother and uncle, then at night, he would bring his homework to the hospital corridor to stay by their side.

Everyone knew in their hearts that his grandmother’s time was likely very short.

Shi Tuo had a deep affection for his grandmother. His parents were both rather solemn in personality. After the incident with his grandfather, their house felt even emptier, so when he was young, aside from spending time with An Jiujiu, his only joy was going to his grandmother’s house.

His grandmother would save autumn osmanthus flowers to make sweet rice cakes for him, and there were stray cats in the yard that came to beg for food. Each of them had names, with tags his grandmother made for them hanging from their necks. During the summer and winter breaks, his grandmother would ask him to move the table and stools into the yard. He would do his homework while fighting for the pen with the stray cats. The ginkgo tree in the yard bore a foul smell when its fruits ripened, but the ginkgo leaves were beautiful.

The hospital corridor was eerie at night. Zhang Rou told Shi Tuo to go home and sleep, but Shi Tuo refused.

He was afraid of his phone ringing lately, knowing that those inevitable heavy stones were hanging in the air, and he feared the moment when they would drop.

When he was very tired, he would send messages to An Jiujiu.

An Jiujiu would send him photos of the stray cats. She would take a bus to his grandmother’s house on weekends and feed the cats under the ginkgo tree, sending him pictures.

Some comforts were tangible, like a gentle breeze.

His grandmother passed away in the early hours. At that time, he was sitting in the hospital corridor, drowsy, feeling someone lightly touch his head, and then Zhang Rou’s wailing cry echoed from the room.

He had never heard Zhang Rou cry like that before and sat there, frozen, for a long time, not daring to move.

He experienced his first funeral, handling the arrangements and buying funeral supplies with Zhang Chenglin at the dilapidated funeral home in Wangcheng. His father, Shi Dingbang, never showed up once.

The wake lasted for three days. On the third day, Wang Shanshan brought An Jiujiu to the funeral home.

An Jiujiu lit incense for Shi Tuo’s grandmother and sat next to him.

Following the customs, Shi Tuo handed her a piece of candy.

The old woman had lived over eighty years, so it was considered a “joyous death.” The funeral wasn’t too sorrowful, and Buddhist scriptures played throughout the wake. Zhang Rou and Zhang Chenglin sat beside the body, while Shi Tuo sat a little farther away, listening to An Jiujiu quietly unwrap the candy.

They didn’t speak.

The smell of burning paper money and smoke lingered in the air.

An Jiujiu sat silently next to him, accompanying him as they watched the mourners coming and going.

In the next room, the deceased was a young person, and their parents were crying heart-wrenchingly.

Shi Tuo’s eyes began to water.

An Jiujiu gently leaned her head on his shoulder, one of his arms half-wrapped around her, gently patting the other side of his shoulder.

After his grandmother passed away, Shi Tuo didn’t return to school for three days, wearing a black ribbon on his arm.

An Jiujiu wasn’t there. He sent her a message, but she didn’t reply until nearly the end of the school day.An Jiujiu had been going through her own chaos in the past few days. At first, the divorce negotiations were going smoothly, with An Huaiwen being the one at fault. He even pretended to be docile and humble in front of Wang Shanshan’s seventy-year-old uncle.

The main issue in the divorce was the house under the names of An Jiujiu’s grandparents. Selling it at market price and splitting it evenly seemed fair, and An Huaiwen initially agreed.

But then the mistress secretly arranged for a gender test of the unborn child, and it came back showing it was a boy.

The An family immediately turned against them.

Wang Shanshan had never dealt with such matters before. When An Huaiwen had agreed, he hadn’t made her sign any paperwork, but now, An Huaiwen and even An Jiujiu’s grandparents were denying everything. They claimed the house wasn’t An Huaiwen’s but theirs.

They argued that An Huaiwen didn’t have any assets, that whatever he had, he’d already split with Wang Shanshan, and that since An Jiujiu would be an adult in a month, he wouldn’t have to pay child support anymore.

All the conditions they had agreed upon had collapsed, and in the end, An Huaiwen decided to kick Wang Shanshan and An Jiujiu out without giving them a cent.

An Jiujiu’s seventy-year-old uncle had a stroke from the shock, needing two trips to the emergency room. Wang Shanshan, terrified, sent him to the airport in the middle of the night.

An Jiujiu experienced something even more absurd than absurdity itself. Her biological father, who had barely been in her life from the beginning, was now refusing to acknowledge her because of the unborn boy.

During their argument, she even heard An Huaiwen say, “Who knows who your daughter’s father is? Our An family doesn’t have such a seductive face.”

Wang Shanshan went mad, holding a kitchen knife and threatening to take both of them down, causing the neighbors to call the police. By the time An Jiujiu arrived at the police station, Wang Shanshan was wrapped in blood-soaked bandages, while An Huaiwen wasn’t even harmed, crying in the arms of her grandparents and accusing Wang Shanshan of attempted murder.

That night, An Jiujiu truly understood what it felt like to be an orphaned child.

“I went back to my hometown with my mom,” An Jiujiu told Shi Tuo on the phone. “Uncle’s health deteriorated, and we have a relative here who knows a lawyer. My mom has been talking to her these days.”

She still managed to joke, her tone thoughtful: “Now I finally understand the importance of lawyers. You have to become a lawyer in the future!”

In the background, the noise was loud. Shi Tuo remembered An Jiujiu’s descriptions of Wang Shanshan’s hometown—a small fishing village by the sea that got flooded every year. It was poor and isolated, and An Jiujiu hated the place. She said every time they went back, there was a relative’s son who would stare at her, which felt really creepy.

He had a lot to say to An Jiujiu, like how there were good divorce lawyers in Wangcheng. An Huaiwen was in the wrong, having lived with someone for ten years and impregnated that woman. If they went to court, An Huaiwen definitely wouldn’t be able to get away without giving up something.

But that house was under the names of her grandparents, and if An Huaiwen really had no money at all, then the asset division would be a tough deal.

His understanding of law wasn’t systematic, only learned here and there. There was little he could say, and little he could help with.

This sense of helplessness made him uneasy, so all he could do was gently remind her to rest, ask when she would come back, and help her with her homework by preparing outlines.

An Jiujiu stayed for a week. When she returned to Wangcheng, it was already the end of August, and school was about to start.

She returned alone. Wang Shanshan, with the lawyer introduced by their relative, went directly to the city where An Huaiwen was.

Wang Shanshan said that An Huaiwen had a soft spot—his job at the waterworks. Otherwise, he wouldn’t have kept his affair a secret for so many years. She planned to cause a scene at the waterworks.

An Jiujiu didn’t know what to say. While at her hometown, she had heard many stories about her mother and An Huaiwen’s romance. Wang Shanshan had been the phoenix who flew out of the rural mountains. She was beautiful and had a sharp personality, and everyone thought she would achieve great things in the city.

But in the end, her great success became marrying a man with an urban household registration. That man knelt in front of Wang Shanshan’s parents in the fishing village, promising to treat her well.

When the new son-in-law arrived, the whole village came to celebrate, and the man was so drunk that he could hardly stand but still managed to hold Wang Shanshan’s hand and pull her behind him.

The villagers praised Wang Shanshan for marrying well, saying the man seemed like a good one.

But in just eighteen years, the marriage that everyone envied was shattered. An Huaiwen had been cheating for ten years and still thought he had been faithful to the family. When he came home, he either scolded his wife or yelled at his daughter. His affair was exposed, and because the mistress was carrying a boy, he didn’t even care about his face anymore.

The house in Wangcheng, though in a good location, was old and small. The school district was average, and Wangcheng wasn’t a big city. The price for the eighty-something-square-meter three-bedroom apartment was under seven hundred thousand, so each would only get about three hundred thousand after the split.

That man, who seemed decent and had a good reputation, revealed his true face for the sake of thirty thousand yuan.

An Jiujiu’s view of the world was shattered. When she sat down in her usual spot at school, she unexpectedly felt that school was good. Those math problems that she could never understand felt good, and the teacher’s passionate words actually seemed like they truly cared about their future.As the official school start approached, the summer vacation review lessons were winding down. The top three advanced classes had already completed their mock exams, and only the middle-tier class, which included An Jiujiu, had their exams scheduled over the next two days. After a full day of mock exams, the papers from last night's study session were distributed in the evening, and they began analyzing the mistakes.

Busy senior year students could only quickly grab a meal in the school cafeteria.

After dinner, An Jiujiu sat on the playground, looking up at the sky.

Shi Tuo hadn’t come today. Recently, the two of them had become the legendary “unseen” couple, so busy that they had to wait half a day for each other’s replies to messages.

Since Shi Tuo’s grandmother passed away, Zhang Rou’s mental state had been unstable. Zhang Chenglin, who was no longer a Chinese citizen, had many difficulties handling things. Zhang Rou was taking care of all the funeral arrangements, but in the end, her body couldn’t hold up, and she fainted.

The doctor said she had severe anxiety, moderate depression, and malnutrition, and needed to be hospitalized.

When it rains, it pours—Shi Tuo had been staying at the hospital, and his voice on the phone was hoarse.

“It’s nothing serious,” he said. “I was just too tired. The doctor suggested I stay in the hospital for two days and get a check-up.”

An Jiujiu lay on the grass, the wind picking up, and dark clouds gathering in the sky, signaling that it might rain later: “Are you still coming to evening study?”

“I’ll miss it,” Shi Tuo replied. “My mom has another check-up tonight, and the results probably won’t be out until 7 p.m. But the doctor said I don’t need to stay overnight. Once the results come out, I can go back.”

On the playground, energetic senior students ran laps after eating, and some had lost their minds, kicking basketballs like soccer balls. Laughter and shouts echoed back and forth.

“It’s going to rain,” An Jiujiu said. “Did you bring an umbrella?”

Shi Tuo laughed lightly and responded with a simple “Mm.”

Neither of them said anything after that. An Jiujiu didn’t hang up; instead, she put the phone on speaker.

The lively sounds of laughter and wind from the playground reached Shi Tuo’s ears, and for some reason, he breathed a quiet sigh of relief.