Chapter 55 Cerebral palsy? Isn't that just being an idiot?!
Half a month is neither a long nor a short time.
This was enough to make Zhao Fei go from initially searching frantically, to later becoming silent and anxious, and now, he has no choice but to accept that cold reality.
She left.
He left cleanly and decisively, without any regrets, taking his two children and unborn child with him.
Like a drop of water, it evaporated into the vast sea of people.
Zhao Fei had lost a lot of weight, his eyes were sunken, and he had an unshaven beard. He often stared blankly at the empty east wing.
The progress of the new pig farm site has slowed down, and Wenbin is the only one holding it up.
Wenbin also looked haggard, but he knew Zhao Fei was suffering even more, so besides working silently, he didn't know how to comfort him.
When Zhao Yidi came home from school and looked at the empty east wing, she would sometimes whisper to Zhou Lanying, "Grandma, where did Second Aunt take my sisters? When are they coming back? My sisters are still so little..."
Zhou Lanying touched her granddaughter's head, her throat tightened, and she couldn't speak.
She didn't say anything, but the few blisters on her lips and tongue clearly betrayed her anxiety and frustration.
That was out of anxiety, and also out of heartache.
On this day, the courtyard house welcomed its "new owner".
Zhao Qingda and Wang Juan moved back home, carrying their chubby-cheeked son.
Li Yugu naturally followed him back.
The once spacious courtyard suddenly felt cramped and had an eerie atmosphere.
When Zhou Lanying saw Li Yugu, her expression was indifferent, and she did not greet him.
Zhao Yidi timidly called out "Grandma" and then hid behind Zhou Lanying.
Looking at his sister-in-law's indifferent face, and then at Wang Juan's smug and critical manner as soon as she entered the yard, Li Yugu felt his face burning with embarrassment and wished he could disappear into a crack in the ground.
Wang Juan didn't care about any of that.
She carried her son and walked around the yard twice, then pointed to the east wing: "Qingda, this room needs to be cleaned thoroughly to get rid of the bad luck, so our son can live here in the future."
He glanced at the main room and the west wing again, "This courtyard will be our family of three from now on... oh no, our family of four, so we'd better tidy it up."
Zhao Qingda grunted in response, then looked at Zhao Fei, who had just returned from the pig farm, with icy eyes filled with undisguised hostility and an arrogant sense of "I've won."
Zhao Fei didn't look at him, nor did he look at Wang Juan.
His gaze swept around the courtyard, finally settling on the main house where he had lived for many years, and the west wing where Zhou Lanying now lived.
Every brick and tile here was once the place where he, Li Rui, his daughter, and... Wen Xiaoxiao and the children lived together.
Now, he is surrounded by a suffocating sense of unfamiliarity.
He said nothing and turned to go into the main room.
A little while later, he came out with his tools and began to lock the doors to the main house and the hall.
"What are you doing?" Zhao Qingda frowned.
"I'm not doing anything." Zhao Fei's voice was calm as his hands continued to move. "This main room and the main house were left by my father, and the property deed is in my name. I'm locking up my own house, and it's none of your business. You can live wherever you want, just don't touch my door."
After saying that, he looked at Zhou Lanying and Zhao Yidi: "Mom, Yidi, pack your things, let's go."
Zhou Lanying had already packed up the essentials, which weren't actually that many.
Zhao Yidi was holding her little schoolbag, which contained her textbooks and the rag doll that Wen Xiaoxiao had made for her.
Zhao Fei took one last look at the courtyard that held half his life's joys and sorrows, his eyes filled with complex emotions, but ultimately settled into a silent resolute silence.
He took his daughter's hand and said to Zhou Lanying, "Mom, get in the car."
The van, carrying three generations of a family, drove away from the courtyard house, away from this place of trouble, and towards their new home in the city.
Li Yugu stood at the gate of the courtyard, watching the car disappear into the distance, feeling a deep emptiness in his heart.
She walked back to the courtyard, where Wang Juan was directing Zhao Qingda to move things into the east wing, complaining that the room was small and old.
Li Yugu walked to the door of the west wing where Zhou Lanying used to live. Remembering what his sister-in-law had said to her before she left, he couldn't help but say, "Yugu, Xiaoxiao has taken two children and disappeared without a trace. How old is she? She's pregnant... If something happens to her, how... how can you live with yourself?"
Li Yugu's heart felt as if it had been squeezed tightly by an invisible hand, causing him unbearable pain.
How can there be peace if there is no peace?
But what can she do now?
When Wang Juan learned that Wen Xiaoxiao had actually run away, she was first surprised, then sneered: "She left? She's got some 'courage'! She gave up such a ready-made backer as Zhao Fei and went begging with her child? She's really stupid! But it's good that she's gone, it's cleaner that way, and she's not an eyesore anymore."
Zhao Qingda snorted and didn't take it to heart at all: "Who cares where she goes, whether she lives or dies, it's none of my business. It's good that she's gone, so I don't have to see her and get annoyed."
Their attention was quickly drawn to something else.
Li Yugu has been taking care of his grandson these past few days and has gradually noticed that something is wrong.
This child should have been crawling by now, but when I put him on the kang (a heated brick bed), he just won't move, or he kicks his limbs uncoordinatedly.
Lately, his eyes seem unable to focus on one point for long; they are often unfocused, and he is slow to react when teased.
"Qingda, Juan'er, look at the child... isn't he a little..." Li Yugu asked cautiously.
"Mom, what nonsense are you talking about!" Zhao Qingda said impatiently. "The child is just lazy, chubby, and doesn't like to move. I think he's perfectly fine!"
Wang Juan had her own doubts, but she wouldn't admit it: "That's right, Mom, don't curse the child. Our son is so strong and healthy!"
But after a few more days, the child's condition did not improve.
Wang Juan herself was also getting worried, and finally agreed to go with Zhao Qingda to take the child to a large hospital in the provincial capital for a check-up.
The day the diagnosis came out, the sky was overcast.
Holding the X-ray films, the doctor spoke calmly yet with unwavering conviction: "We have diagnosed the child with mild cerebral palsy. The main issue is delayed motor development. The impact on intelligence is still difficult to assess at this stage; long-term observation and rehabilitation training are necessary..."
Zhao Qingda and Wang Juan barely heard what was said after that.
Cerebral palsy?!
Isn't that just being an idiot?!
Wang Juan's legs went weak. Her biggest bargaining chip was actually... a child with cerebral palsy?!
Zhao Qingda was also stunned, his mind was buzzing, and even the scar on his face looked distorted.
He took the diagnosis report, and the cold medical terms on it felt like needles pricking his eyes.
Holding their child, they returned to the courtyard house, utterly dejected.
Li Yugu stepped forward and, seeing the ashen and desperate faces of his son and "daughter-in-law," his heart skipped a beat. He asked in a trembling voice, "What...what did the doctor say?"
Zhao Qingda threw the diagnosis report at her, then squatted down on the ground, holding his head in his hands.
Li Yugu picked up the paper. She didn't know many words, but she understood the words "cerebral palsy".
a bolt from the blue!
The paper in his hand fluttered to the ground, Li Yugu's vision went black, and he staggered, grabbing the door frame to keep from falling.
She looked at her grandson, whom Wang Juan had placed on the kang (a heated brick bed), then at her son, who was squatting on the ground in agony, and at Wang Juan, who was slumped to the side with vacant eyes…
Is it retribution?
The thought slithered into her mind like a venomous snake.
She remembered Wen Xiaoxiao's pale face and the kitten-like cries of her twin granddaughters.
A tremendous wave of regret, like an icy tide, instantly overwhelmed her.
She slumped onto the doorstep, covering her face.
The courtyard was deathly silent.
Only that child, oblivious to the ways of the world and cruelly mocked by fate, uttered indistinct, meaningless babbling sounds.
It turns out that all the scheming and scrambling, in the end, what you hold in your hands may not be a treasure, but rather... an irreversible calamity.
What they once discarded like trash may have been the true warmth of humanity that could never be found again once lost.
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