Chapter 322: The small ones came and the big ones left
The wind grew stronger and stronger, blowing old dry leaves all over the sky. There was a crack of thunder, followed by a ferocious flash of lightning, as if a crack had been split in the dark sky, letting in light.
Before the afterglow of the lightning faded, raindrops as big as beans began to fall down with a crackling sound.
Several little kids from Hu Xinghong's family and Li Guoan's family next door all ran out, jumping around in the rain, shouting and making noises.
What falls in this rain is hope and life!
Hu Xinghong's wife seemed to call out again, but the sound was drowned out by the sound of rain. Then Li Guangyuan heard what Hu Xinghong's mother was shouting, and Hu Xinghong's sister-in-law walked into the house with hot water.
Li Guangyuan stood at the door, listening to his brother complaining that the shack at the door was damp due to the rain, and stared at the faint light inside the house.
Perhaps because the rain was too loud, the shouting in the house seemed to gradually weaken, and Li Guangyuan felt that he could no longer hear it.
Hu Xinghong's wife gave birth nearby. Several children rushed into the house happily but were driven out by Hu Xinghong's mother. They jumped around happily in the rain, but their wife didn't move at all.
Li Guangyuan felt his eyelids twitching violently, and his heart was beating wildly. He was in his twenties, so he wasn't completely clueless. He'd heard people say that giving birth was incredibly frustrating, like going back and forth through the gates of hell! But others said that wasn't necessarily true, that for some, it was easy, like an old hen laying an egg—a little blood plop and it came out.
But he felt like he had been waiting for a long time, his legs were numb from standing, and the thunder above his head kept coming one after another, but there was still no movement.
Finally, the hysterical screams and thunder in the house could no longer be suppressed. Li Guangyuan no longer cared about his mother and ran into the house.
As soon as I entered the room, I heard Wang Chengying's voice: "It's coming down, it's coming down, Amitabha, the baby is finally born, hurry up and get some hot water."
The child's cries were so weak that they were almost inaudible. Wang Chengying stood there for a long time with blood on her hands without moving.
Until Li Guangyuan brought in water and asked her: "Mom, the water is here, what should I do?"
She finally came to her senses and cut the umbilical cord with a serious face: "I'll wash the baby, and you wash your wife."
Li Guangyuan put down the water and took a look at the red, wrinkled child. "Is it a boy or a girl?"
Wang Chengying's face became even uglier: "A girl." Given the current situation in their family, the two brothers said that it was not easy to find a wife. They finally got one, and she became pregnant, but the first child turned out to be a girl. This was simply...
Never mind, there’s nothing wrong with blooming first and then bearing fruit.
She comforted herself in this way.
Just as she had washed the child and wrapped him in cloth, she heard Li Guangyuan's panicked voice: "Mom, blood, so much blood!"
"Why are you panicking? It's not normal for women to bleed during childbirth."
"No, there's a lot of blood, it's like running water, it can't be stopped."
Wang Chengying turned her head to take a look, her head buzzed, and she stood up in a hurry, almost forgetting that she had a child in her arms.
"Hurry, go call someone, call someone to help tie a slide, we have to go to the brigade."
Li Guangyuan didn't move, he just stood there trembling like he was having the hiccups, his bloody hand still on Song Xiaoqin's nose, even his voice was trembling: "Mom, don't be angry, don't be angry!"
"If it's bullshit, how is that possible? Go call someone, go call someone quickly." Wang Chengying didn't care about the boy or girl at this moment. She reached out her hand tremblingly to touch Song Xiaoqin's nose. Don't be angry anymore, really don't be angry anymore.
She was the one who delivered the baby. She knew that the baby was in an awkward position. The amniotic fluid broke first and then opened at the cervix. After struggling for most of the night, the baby was finally born. But he stopped moving right after he was born. She thought he had fainted from exhaustion and didn't pay much attention to it. Who would have thought that he would actually die?
The rain was pouring down outside. Hu Xinghong's wife had just given birth to a baby girl weighing four pounds. His mother and sister-in-law helped to clean up, and the family went to bed. There was no other sound except the sound of rain.
No one knew that a life would be lost in the same yard at about the same time.
Li Guangyuan sat in the house in a daze for half the night. Just as the sky was getting light, Wang Chengying called him and asked Li Guangwen to help him. He rolled up the man with a torn straw mat and planned to bury him in the mountains.
It's already dead, so it's no use keeping it at home.
It was still raining outside and everything was foggy.
We are used to getting up early, and no one can fall asleep as soon as it gets light.
Li Guangyuan had just rolled up Song Xiaoqin's body and walked out when he was seen by Hu Xinghong's mother Zheng Xiulan.
"Ah! Guangyuan, what are you doing?"
Li Guangyuan said nothing, and Li Guangwen didn't know what to say. Wang Chengying came out of the room, wiping her eyes and saying, "What else can I do? She's unlucky. She had a seizure last night, and the baby wasn't in the right position. She died right after the baby was born."
Zheng Xiulan was stunned for a moment: "Oh, how did this happen? Why did it become so moldy? How could it disappear just like that?" As she said this, she started wiping her eyes.
No matter what the Li family's background is, it is a human life after all.
This person's life is as fragile as paper. It can be gone in an instant. Anyone who thinks about it feels sad.
Brothers Li Guangyuan and Li Guangwen took the man away, and Li Guoping, who had been silent all the time, followed them carrying his family's pickaxe.
Zheng Xiulan called out to her brother Hu Xinghong, "Go and give them a hand. It's raining so hard. Just bury the body quickly and that'll be the end of it."
Hu Xinghong didn't need her to explain. After all, he was the production team leader and he knew all the social customs.
After the people left, Wang Chengying and Zheng Xiulan were still talking.
"This is fate. This is my fate in this life, and it will be the same for my children. If God wants to take me away, he should have taken me away sooner rather than later!"
Zheng Xiulan didn't know how to persuade them. They were from the same team and the same courtyard, but their backgrounds were different. When the Li family hung up the signs, no one hadn't thrown things at people.
This kind of advice is a bit too hypocritical.
"The adults are in that state, and there's still the baby! How's the baby? Is it a boy or a girl?"
Wang Chengying didn't answer her. She reached out and wiped her tears and said, "Hong Wazi's wife has also given birth, a boy or a girl."
"A baby girl, about four pounds. We have three boys, so if we have a girl, we'll be lucky enough to have one."
Wang Chengying felt even more upset.
Hu Xinghong already has three sons, so what does it matter if he has another girl? His family doesn't have any. This is the situation. It's not easy to find a daughter-in-law, and now they finally have one, but she died young, and the child left behind is still a girl.
Oh my God, what sins did this couple commit in their previous life that they will have to die out in this life.
After Wang Chengying felt better, she said, "It's really fate. We also have a girl, but she is not as lucky as you. These days, it's hard to say whether Mo's baby can grow up."
"Pfft, pfft, pfft, don't talk nonsense. There are a whole house of adults, and one person can be fed by saving one mouth."
Wang Chengying didn't say anything else.
This is all about living, and each day is very different from the next.
We are all human beings, but we are divided into different classes.
Living in the same production team, they had to be the last to eat and dared not fight or grab.
The child can't go to school.
For the same work, they only do 80% of the work of others.
They have already lived most of their lives, but the younger generations still have a long way to go, and it is unknown when it will end.
There was blood all over the bed, so she cleaned it out and threw it into the gutter to soak in the rain. The bloody smell spread everywhere but was soon washed away by the rain.
The child in her bed woke up from hunger and let out a weak cry, but no one noticed.
There was no point in noticing it. It was not time for dinner yet and all the edible things in the house had been eaten. There was nothing left, so it was impossible to cook secretly.
She got some hot water for the child.
The child, with a wrinkled, red face and a layer of white fuzz, had not opened his eyes yet, but he knew how to swallow.
But what use can water be? She is hungry and water won’t make her full!
Wang Chengying felt very sad when she heard the faint crying. She put the child on the bed and went to the back room. She rummaged around in the corner for a long time and found two potatoes as big as eggs. She took them to the back room, lit a fire and buried them.
The potatoes in this season have long passed the sprouting period and are wrinkled, but they are still precious. There are not many at home, less than ten pounds in total, and she was careful to hide them bit by bit.
Since she couldn't save the adult's life, she had to try to save the child's life. After all, he was the flesh and blood of the Li family, a living life!
Peel the cooked potatoes and mash them in a broken bowl, then soak them in boiling water and feed them to the child little by little.
As she ate with her little mouth smacking, Wang Chengying's almost numb heart began to beat slightly again.
The rain didn't stop until noon. Every household ran to the team's canteen with their bowls in hand, fearing that if they were too late, there would be no food for them.
There were three pots in the three connected sheds, and several women wearing headscarves began to cook with their hands on their waists and long-handled iron spoons in their hands.
Adults and children were crowding around the pot, afraid that if they were slow they would miss out.
Li Guoping and his family followed behind with their bowls in their hands, not daring to squeeze in. They waited until everyone else had gotten their meals before they took their bowls over.
Wang Chengying held two bowls in her hands. Each of them took a spoonful of the rice, which was so thin that you could see it in the mirror. She slurped it all up in one breath.
"Mrs. Zhou, Guangyuan's wife gave birth last night and can't come. I have to send the meal back."
Only the people in the yard knew that Song Xiaoqin was gone last night, but the other people in the team didn't know yet. Wang Chengying felt that she could definitely get two meals.
Sure enough, no one doubted it, only Li Guangyuan was slightly stunned.
As soon as he left the house, he called out to Wang Chengying, "Mom, are you crazy? Xiaoqin is gone, why are you still giving her food? This is false claiming. What if someone reports you?"
Wang Chengying gritted her teeth and glared at him, "Don't talk nonsense here. If one dies, there will be another. You don't care about your daughter or your offspring? It's useless for anyone to report it. We are still the same family!"
There was almost no grain in the canteen, so people just turned around and poured it into their stomachs. The brave ones squeezed forward, hoping to scoop it a second time.
No one noticed what the mother and daughter were whispering about.
The Li family members didn't dare to do that. They each poured the grits porridge in their bowls and hurried home.
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