Han Songshan spoke tactfully, giving Zheng Xianwen ample space for imagination. He often paused, as if deliberating on more euphemistic words.
"Zheng Xianwen... your mother and I used to be from the same village. I'm not sure if you know about Yuhu Village, but in the 1990s, resources were scarce there. Some people couldn't even solve their daily hunger, and our family was notoriously poor. To gather my college tuition, my father sold almost everything we could sell. The villagers helped a bit too. With scholarships and part-time jobs, I barely managed to complete four years of college."
Zheng Xianwen listened intently, feeling as if Han was confiding in him. He admired Han's frankness about his past struggles. Looking up, he accidentally met Han's gaze and was burned by the fatherly love and gentleness in his eyes, quickly looking away.
Feeling uneasy, he took a sip of coffee, which now tasted less bitter, with a hint of sweetness to savor.
"At first, the villagers thought I'd make something of myself after graduating from a prestigious university. They treated my parents with respect. But after graduation, I became a journalist, earning only two to three thousand during the internship period. Living in City A was tough, and I couldn’t support my family. I often ended up injured and hospitalized." Han Songshan smiled helplessly. "In poor villages, success is judged by money. When they realized I couldn’t make money, the goodwill faded. They said I was worse than the illiterate hooligans in the village."
Zheng Xianwen took a breath, feeling the narrow-mindedness of those around him, wanting to comfort Han Songshan. But seeing the gold watch on Han Songhan's wrist, he found himself unable to speak.
Han Songshan smiled bitterly, the wrinkles on his face spreading as he took a big gulp of coffee, almost like water, hesitating to say more. "Everyone has their plans. I really had no prospects back then. Let’s not dwell on it."
Like any good reader, Zheng Xianwen filled in the blanks.
Zheng Jinmei's family, disliking the poor and favoring the rich, broke them up. In anger, Han Songshan left Yuhu Village, later moving from City A to City D, achieving his current status and wealth.
Zheng Xianwen felt an inexplicable shame, perhaps rooted in his own inferiority.
What a dramatic turn of events. One side was punished, the other rewarded.
Before he could say anything, Han, acting magnanimous, naturally shifted the topic, recounting the dangers of his early work and showing old scars.
"When I first became a journalist, I exposed a local company's illegal factory. The boss's thugs beat me up. If I hadn’t run fast and reached a populated area where someone called the police, I might have died."
Han Songshan's calm tone made him seem even more profound, unflinching in the face of hardship.
"I had three ribs broken, almost piercing my lungs and heart. I also had a skull fracture. I was bedridden for over two months, almost unable to get up. The injuries were so severe that I still have aftereffects; my bones ache on rainy days. But it’s much better now. The doctor told my father I might be paralyzed. Haha, I guess I’m lucky, huh? Not so easy to bring me down."
Zheng Xianwen gasped, feeling heartache for Han Songshan's past sufferings. Looking at Han Songshan again, he seemed like a towering mountain, with scars as his badges of honor. He stood tall and fearless, unafraid of fate, willing to sacrifice for others, embodying a similar stubborn will to survive as Zheng himself.
He thought, this is a person at the forefront of the times, with a grand and magnificent life, just like the heroes in textbooks.
Han Songshan far exceeded his imagination of a father, almost unrealistically perfect.
In contrast, Zheng Jinmei's life seemed so dull and monotonous.
Even if all her life experiences were listed, there might not be a single sentence worthy of a tombstone inscription.
His eyes shone with undisguised admiration. Han Sonshan, seemingly proud, smiled and sighed, "Having been on the brink of death a few times, you realize nothing really matters. Money, honor, power – what are they worth? Living with a clear conscience is what’s important."
Zheng Xianwen nodded. What once seemed like useless platitudes now sounded pleasant and convincing from Han Songshan's mouth.
In the dim interrogation room, Zheng Xianwen's expression was a stark contrast to the nostalgic scene, twisted with self-loathing.
His twitching facial muscles betrayed his hatred for himself. "I didn’t know then, I was under a spell."
After finishing the coffee, Han took him to a nearby mall.
Zheng Xianwen disliked such places. Shopping with Zheng Jinmei often left him feeling unwelcomed. High-end places always treated them with disdain.
Zheng Jinmei would buy him the best clothes she could afford, sometimes spending hundreds, to avoid his classmates looking down on him.
Once, for a school event requiring black clothes, Zheng had nothing suitable. Zheng Jinmei counted out five hundred yuan and took him to the mall.
The shop assistant pointed out the most expensive item, asking if they wanted it, then stood aside, giggling with a colleague. Though no harsh words were spoken, their eyes and smiles were full of mockery, waiting to see their embarrassment, urging them to leave quickly.
Zheng Xianwen didn’t understand their laughter but found their faces unusually ugly.
They weren’t beggars, why tolerate such humiliation?
Zheng Jinmei wanted to bargain, but Zheng Xianwen, with a cold face, pulled her away, leaving the store first.
In silence, they left the mall and bought a simple black T-shirt for thirty yuan from a small shop.
Zheng Jinmei, sensitive, felt guilty. Zheng Xianwen, tired of dealing with her emotions, pretended not to notice.
He was used to it. Happy moments with Zheng Jinmei always turned sour for various reasons.
He grew up twisted with inferiority. But Han Songshan wouldn’t let him face the same problems.
The shop assistant respectfully asked what they needed.
When trying on shoes, a young, pretty employee knelt to change his shoes.
Zheng Xianwen, embarrassed by his holey socks, refused quietly, stepping back. "No need."
Han Songshan, seemingly understanding his discomfort, kindly said, "Just wrap them up."
After shopping, Han bought him the nearest ticket back to City A, urging him to study hard and not disappoint Zheng Jinmei.
"Han Songshan is really good at winning people over," Zheng Xianwen pointed to himself sarcastically. "He bought me with a little over two thousand yuan, two hours, and a few sweet words."
He also sowed discord between him and Zheng Jinmei.
Returning to City A, everything felt different.
He had an extraordinary father who liked him.
He was overwhelmed with joy at having a father again, his mind clouded by emotions, unable to think about the details.
A week later, unable to hold back, he asked Zheng Jinmei one night, "What kind of person was my father?"
Zheng Jinmei's expression changed as she folded clothes. "Didn't I tell you? He died a long time ago."
Zheng Xianwen pressed on, "What's his name? What kind of person was he when he was alive?"
"Not much of a person," Zheng Jinmei's hatred for Han Songshan was so deep that she didn't even want to maintain the image of a dead man, and she was not good at lying. However, she softened her tone in the end and added, "He was good at studying."
"That's not all, is it?" Zheng Xianwen chuckled, rolling around on the bed. "He must have been hard-working and resilient."
Zheng Jinmei sensed something was off. She placed the neatly folded clothes into the wardrobe against the wall, then turned to scrutinize Zheng Xianwen's face.
Zheng Xianwen's features resembled Han Songshan's more, especially his nose and ears. The only feature he inherited from Zheng Jinmei was his eyes.
But Zheng Jinmei's eyes weren't particularly attractive—single eyelids, not too long or short, utterly unremarkable.
She walked over to Zheng Xianwen's side, smoothing out the bed sheet he had wrinkled, and then touched his eyebrows. She was startled to realize that most of his boyishness had faded away, leaving a young man capable of independence.
"How do you know he was hard-working and resilient?" Zheng Jinmei couldn't help but ask. "When you were little, you were so tiny. I carried you to work. You cried all the time, customers complained, and the boss made someone take you to the back to wash dishes, even in the dead of winter..."
Strangely, Zheng Xianwen disliked hearing her recount their hardships. His good mood vanished within a few sentences, and he interrupted her gruffly, "Was it all for me? Is that it?"
Zheng Jinmei defended herself softly, "I didn't mean it that way. I just wanted to tell you..."
Zheng Xianwen sat up abruptly. He couldn't comprehend the hardships and vulnerability of being a woman, and he spoke dismissively, "If you had learned a trade back then and focused on a single job, you should have made something of yourself by now. Our country had so many opportunities a decade ago. Most hard-working people have achieved financial freedom. At the very least, running a stable street stall could earn you over ten thousand a month."
Zheng Jinmei was stunned into silence, taking a long moment before retorting, "I had to take care of you."
"But there are mothers who managed to start businesses while raising kids. There are plenty of successful women out there," Zheng Xianwen replied nonchalantly. "They can handle hardship."
Zheng Jinmei suddenly found herself speechless, a shiver running through her body. She couldn't even understand herself why, after over a decade of struggle, she remained a cheap, low-level laborer.
She had thought that her sacrifices would at least earn her some reward, but it turned out that even this was wishful thinking.