Chapter 58 I Just Want to Go Home
"Bai Wei, Bai Wei, wake up."
When Zhou Jie came back from work, she saw Bai Wei sleeping at the door of the educated youth center, with a painful expression on her face, as if she was having a nightmare.
"Ah! Xiaojie, you're back."
Bai Wei realized how she fell asleep, and quickly got up and went in with Zhou Jie.
There are now more than a dozen educated youth living in the educated youth site. Except for those who are responsible for cooking, everyone else goes into the house to find a place to study.
Zhou Jie pulled Bai Wei to find a place to sit down. They were both from Luzhou and had always had a good relationship.
"Why are you back? Did your mother-in-law bully you again?" Seeing her like this, Zhou Jie knew that it was her mother-in-law who was causing trouble again.
Bai Wei poured a glass of water. She warmed her hands with the hot water and said to Zhou Jie, "Ye Yang doesn't want to take the college entrance examination. I asked him for a divorce. He has been treating me like that lately, and my mother-in-law is so angry."
Bai Wei said this aggrievedly while drinking water. Zhou Jie sighed and said, "We are also in the wrong in this matter. You shouldn't have married a villager in the first place. What would happen to Xiaoling if you passed the exam and left?"
Ye Ling is the daughter of Bai Wei and Ye Yang, and is 10 years old.
Bai Wei paused, her expression unnatural and her eyes wandering as she said, "She's a member of the Ye family, so of course she stays with the Ye family. I can't take her away. Besides, Xiaoling grew up in the countryside and doesn't look like a city person at all. Why would I take her back?"
Seeing that Bai Wei was still reluctant to let go, Zhou Jie wanted to persuade her, "You really don't want the child? Xiaoling seems to be a very sensible child. It's okay to take her back. Once your parents are rehabilitated, it will be easy to raise a child. Even if you get married again in the future, just leave the child with your parents."
Recently, many people who were sent down to the countryside have been brought back to the city. As long as Bai Wei's parents are alive, they will be able to return to Shanghai sooner or later.
Bai Wei said, "Forget it. The Ye family won't agree to let me take the child away. This is the only good thing about the Ye family. Although they are from the countryside, they don't have the bad habit of favoring boys over girls. They are very good to their daughters. I will leave Xiaoling to Ye Yang. I must go home."
Seeing that she had made up her mind, Zhou Jie stopped trying to persuade her and started talking about the latest gossip.
"Isn't the second son of the Ye family from Hong Kong? Is he really that poor?"
Bai Wei missed the Ye family's meeting to pretend to be poor. She didn't know that it was all a deliberate act by the Ye family. After thinking about it, she said, "They should be poor, right? I haven't had a good relationship with Ye Yang recently, and I'm too lazy to ask about his family's affairs."
The people at the educated youth camp did have some knowledge of Hong Kong. One of them asked, "But isn't it true that washing dishes in Hong Kong earns two or three hundred yuan a month?"
Although Bai Wei also found it strange, she had been to Hong Kong when she was a child and had seen many poor people. The poverty in Hong Kong was different from that in the mainland.
Bai Wei speculated, "Maybe he earns 300, and rent would cost 100, right? Prices are high over there, so it's normal to have no money left after a month."
Bai Wei was not from the educated youth camp, so there was no bed available here and she had to go back to Ye's house to sleep at night.
Bai Wei lingered at the door of Ye's house and didn't want to go in. Ye Ling hadn't seen her mother all day, and she was waiting in the yard anxiously, so she came out for a walk. As soon as she went out, she saw her mother squatting at the foot of the wall.
"Mom, why are you squatting here?"
When Bai Wei saw her daughter coming out to find her, her heart softened for a moment, but when she heard her daughter speaking the local dialect of Xiahe Village, her motherly love was washed away by anger.
"Mom has told you so many times not to use words like 'zha' when speaking. It sounds so unpleasant!" Bai Wei raised her hand and slapped her daughter's arm.
"Wow! Mom hit me." Ye Ling turned around and ran home to find her father.
Bai Wei kicked the wall angrily.
"Who taught you to cry when something happens?"
Bai Wei taught Ye Ling Mandarin, Shanghainese, and English since she was little, but as soon as the child came back from a trip, she forgot everything and spoke the dialect of Xiahe Village every day. How could her daughter be a country girl!
Seeing his daughter running back crying, Ye Yang quickly picked her up and asked, "Xiaoling, what happened?"
Ye Ling cried and said to her father, "Wow, Dad, Mom is bad, Mom hits me."
Ye Yang knew that the couple had been having a quarrel recently, but how could Bai Wei take her anger out on the child? He turned around and took Ye Ling back to the kitchen, where Zhao Zhaodi was lighting a fire and cooking.
"Mom, please take care of Xiaoling. I'm going out for a while."
Zhao Zhaodi looked at her crying granddaughter, took a small stool and placed it next to the firewood, letting Ye Ling warm herself by the fire.
"Xiaoling, why are you crying like a cat? Stop crying. I'll bake you some bread. Just ignore your crazy mother."
"Wow, mommy is not crazy, grandma is wrong." Ye Ling cried but did not forget to refute her grandma.
"Chengcheng, your mother isn't crazy, but your grandma is. Why am I so unlucky after marrying into the Ye family? They all have crooked elbows."
Although Zhao Zhaodi favors boys over girls, Ye Ling is her beloved son's child after all. She feels a little sorry for her granddaughter, but she was not angry when her granddaughter scolded her.
Ye Yang went out and found Bai Wei crying against the wall. He felt so exhausted. He couldn't understand how such a lively girl could become like this. After they got married, he never let Bai Wei work in the fields again. Her mother cooked and he washed her clothes. Bai Wei said that childbirth was painful, so he didn't let her have any more children. He had been staying with her and their daughter all these years. He didn't know what he had done wrong. Was it because he didn't know what Shanghai was like? Was Shanghai really that good?
"Xiao Wei, let's talk."
Bai Wei looked up at the man. Although he was in his thirties, he was still as handsome and tall as ever. He had not changed much from the young man who helped her hoe the fields more than ten years ago.
Bai Wei straightened her hair, slowly stood up, and rubbed her numb legs. "Ye Yang, we were not on the same page from the beginning. We were wrong from the beginning."
Ye Yang didn't understand. "But we have lived together for more than ten years. Xiaowei, what kind of life do you want to live?"
Bai Wei looked at the man. She couldn't bear to leave him, but Xiahe Village was too poor, so poor that it scared her. Before coming here, she didn't know there was such a poor place in the world.
"I want to go back to Lu City and get our lives back on track. I just want to live the life that belongs to me. Is it so hard for you to understand? My father is the president of Shanghai University of Finance and Economics, my mother is a professor, and my grandparents own a chain of hotels in Shanghai and Guangdong Province. There is an elevator in my villa and a room full of custom-made coats from Country F. I talk to you about cheongsams, elevators, and Country F, but you don't understand a word! You think your family's wheat fields are good, Xiahe Village is good, and you want to stay in Xiahe Village and be a villager for the rest of your life. You're not wrong. So is it wrong for me to think my home is good and I want to go home?"
Bai Wei finally said out what she had been holding in her heart for all these years. Her chest heaved violently, and she looked at the confused Ye Yang breathlessly.
Ye Yang didn't understand what an elevator was, nor did he know where Country F was.
His heart was filled with a fog, and he asked persistently, "What about our relationship over the years?"
Bai Wei looked at him like a fool.
"Feelings? I have feelings for you, but I know what I want. I want to be the Bai Wei of Shanghai, not the Bai Wei of Xiahe Village."
Ye Yang knew that he couldn't keep this person.
"Xiaoling, what are you going to do?"
"I feel bad for leaving the child with you. I will send you child support every year. When the policy is relaxed in the future, I will take Xiaoling in if she is willing."
Ye Yang smiled bitterly and said to Bai Wei, "Bai Wei, you are so cruel. Xiaoling is my daughter. I don't need your child support. Let's get a divorce tomorrow and live the life you want."
After saying that, he turned around and left without waiting for Bai Wei to answer.
Before entering the door, Ye Yang finally couldn't help himself, turned his back to Bai Wei, and asked casually
"If I take the college entrance examination, will you stay?"
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