Chapter 132

Snowstorm closes the mountain

The two little kids were running towards the car excitedly, one after the other. Because they were eager to show their mother how they looked with powder on their faces, Sandan opened the passenger door.

Then what the child saw was his father roaring with a fierce look on his face.

The door just happened to open. Chen Lina saw him rushing towards her and thought he was going to hit her. She leaned back and half of her body fell out of the car. Even though she held on to the seat belt, she still fell to the ground.

She didn't say anything, she just stood up.

Sandan is the softest, most careful, and most sensitive one, but he is also the one who loves his mother the most.

"Mom, what's wrong with you? Why did you fall down?" Erdan said, and helped Chen Lina up.

Sandan clenched his little fists and watched his mother get on the car. He was always reluctant to get his clothes dirty even with a speck of dirt. Before putting them on, he would sigh for a long time saying they were too expensive. His favorite woolen coat was covered with snow and tears burst out instantly.

Erdan got into the car like a fool.

Sandaner went to the driver's seat, opened the door, clenched his fist, and punched Nie Bozhao on the thigh with all his might. "I told you to hit my mother. I told you to hit my mother."

After he threw two more punches, his father stared at him hatefully. Although the child was small and always the most timid, he didn't seem afraid and kept throwing more punches.

It was Chen Lina who said, "Sandan, your father didn't hit me. Mom fell accidentally. Hurry up and get in the car."

Even though she was angry at the worker for yelling at her, she couldn't let the child misunderstand that he was hitting someone.

Nie Weimin and Liu Xiaohong also got into the car with a smile on their faces. Nie Weimin even asked, "Mom, what's wrong with you?"

"It's okay, I just fell down." Chen Lina said.

After sending Liu Xiaohong to the farm, the family returned home. Chen Lina did not boil water, but just used the water in the thermos to make some water, washed herself, and went to bed.

I guess Nie Weimin had asked Sandan and found out that his father and mother had a fight for the first time ever. One of them locked the door in the small study and couldn't come out, while the other was sleeping in the big bedroom. He immediately boiled water for himself and washed his face and feet obediently.

Chen Lina was really angry, but she didn't know what she was angry about.

After all, she had just remembered the day her leader passed away, and considering Nie Gong's feelings for his leader, he just yelled out of grief.

The main reason was that she felt uncomfortable and nauseous. In short, her whole body ached. Although she was in good health, she always felt like she was sick.

"Mom, is it okay for me to apologize on behalf of my dad?" Nie Weimin sneaked in quietly.

After a while, Sandan also came in and made the child feel wronged. He sat on the edge of the kang and cried, "Mom, I'm sorry."

"Dandan, you have to go to school tomorrow morning. Go to bed now, okay? If you cry, Mom will have a headache, okay?" She must have caught a cold. Her whole body was aching, and she had a severe headache when she fell on her head just now.

As for the laborer yelling at her, she hadn't thought about it carefully because her mind was too confused.

Nie Weimin quietly coaxed Sandan out.

Just as the three children were lying on the kang, the laborer knocked on the door. "Wei Min, I may have to leave now. Can you take good care of my brothers?"

The room was quite dark and Nie Weimin said nothing.

The laborer came in, sat on the kang for a long time, patted his eldest son, and said, "I'm going to Beijing. I should be back in a few days. Tell your mother."

When he yelled, the worker didn't think that Chen Lina might be thrown out of the car. He only heard the sound of her head hitting the concrete floor, and he knew it was painful.

If he goes into the bedroom, there will definitely be a quarrel.

But the worker is in no mood to quarrel.

He only knew that his leader had been calling him, but he had not been to Beijing because he was busy with work.

"Go away and never come back. We can live on our own. I'm grown up now. It's not like I have to live without a dad." Nie Weimin was lying on his stomach with his head buried in the pillow.

"What do you mean I'll never come back? I'm going to report to work and will be back in a few days."

"You also had a fight at that time, and you beat my mother. I remember you slapped her so loudly that her face was swollen. Now you finally have another mother, and you want to beat her away again." Nie Weimin was also furious and pounded the pillow twice.

"I'm not a child anymore. I can definitely help my mother raise them both. If you want to leave, go ahead. Anyway, I won't let my mother go." Seeing that his father didn't say anything, Xiao Nie added.

As a man, this is hard to explain.

Sandan was crying all the time. When the worker touched him, he just rolled away.

Only Erdan seemed to be fine and had already started snoring. To him, the sky in the mining area was the bluest and the snow was the whitest. There was nothing much to do in life except eating and sleeping. He was even smiling in his dreams.

After thinking it over, he didn't dare to just leave like that, so he gritted his teeth and went into the master bedroom.

"Xiao Chen, I'm sorry, I was too impulsive. You can punish me however you want. Or, what do you want? Clothes, shoes, lipstick, I will buy you whatever you want." said Nie Gong.

"Get lost, and get divorced tomorrow." Chen Lina said decisively.

The laborer blocked him and said, "I clearly recognize my mistakes. Don't worry. Wait for me to come back from Beijing. I will cook for you, wash the pots, and take out the feces. You can just be the factory manager at ease. Okay?"

"Nie Bozhao, I am not an international communist. I don't have the grand goal of liberating all mankind. I just want to eat and drink something good every day. I want to be a textile worker earning 30 yuan a month. After work, I can go shopping with my girlfriends and buy some clothes to wear. How happy it is. It has been six years, a full six years. I have earned money to help you raise your children, not because you treat me so well, but because my ex-husband was good to me. Everyone is born, grows old, gets sick and dies. How much can I dominate? How much can I change? You yell at me and ask for a divorce. There is nothing else to say except divorce."

"You want a divorce? That's absolutely impossible."

"My legs are on me. Can you stop me if I want to leave?"

Nie Gong was anxious to go to Beijing, but at the same time he was worried that if he really left, Chen Lina would be like a son who was born in a different family, and there would be no way to get her back.

On one side is the critically ill leader, who may still be waiting to hear his report, and on the other side is his wife lying on the kang, crying.

After sitting for a long time, he turned around and wanted to hold Miss Chen's hand. Well, Miss Chen, who would rush over to him like a rabbit as soon as he touched her, didn't move at all.

"Go ahead, work is more important." Chen Lina finally compromised and said.

"Don't divorce"

"What do you think?"

This rhetorical question threw the burden back to the worker. Of course, it also made him worried along the way. Did she want to leave or not?

The worker sat there for about five more minutes, picked up his canvas travel bag, turned around and left.

In her previous life in Hongyan, Chen Lina had experienced blizzards for more than ten consecutive days. In this life in the mining area, there were more than ten days of blizzards. In fact, Chen Lina heard the news from the radio at about ten o'clock the next morning.

Didn’t Mommy Ham from next door just come back from Tacheng? It was snowing so heavily, but she was still sweeping the snow outside. She was listening to the radio while sweeping the snow, and then she burst into tears, “Xiao Chen, Xiao Chen, did you hear us? Our leader…”

Chen Lina was picking potatoes in the cellar and said, "I heard you, Mom, let's sweep the snow. This snow is heavy and it won't clear up if we don't sweep it away."

"What about your laborer? Does he know anything?" asked Mother Ham.

Chen Lina said, "He left at midnight last night and went to Beijing."

It snowed heavily all day. In previous years, that would have been the happiest time for the three Nie brothers.

Roasted lamb legs, roasted chicken, large chicken legs coated with breadcrumbs, and roasted sweet potatoes, roasted sweet potatoes, and roasted potatoes wrapped in red mud. There is nothing that Chen Lina can't make, except what they can't think of.

She herself didn't like eating much, but she loved cooking. Every Chinese New Year, Nie Weimin would gain three pounds of weight. But for three days in a row, she had done nothing but sleep. She struggled to heat up a few steamed buns, boil some soup, feed the children a little, and then lay down again.

Radio broadcasts were heard every day, urging border residents to stay indoors and to clear snow in a timely manner to prevent roofs from collapsing.

As for the herdsmen in the forest farm, they also have to pay attention to the large number of sheep, cattle and horses. In addition to providing them with fodder, they also have to prevent the sheep from getting separated after the sheepfold is blown over.

At the same time, when the snow was heavy, there was nothing to eat in the mountains, and the wolves came out. Qin Sheng not only had to call on everyone to sweep the snow outside the door all day long, but also had to lead the comrades of the security team to patrol with hunting rifles to prevent wolves from entering the base.

Nie Weimin took it upon himself to take on the task of clearing snow, carrying a large iron shovel every morning.

After sleeping for three consecutive days, Chen Lina finally felt a little better.

"Mom, I'm hungry." Erdan said while rubbing his stomach.

This silly child who is slow to realize things still doesn’t know that his parents are quarreling and getting divorced.

In just three days, Sandan had become thinner due to hunger. He was playing with an abacus in the living room. He shook the abacus and said, "Mom, add the numbers from one to ninety-nine nine times, and then all the numbers will become one. Have you never played this game before?"

With just an abacus, this little guy keeps fiddling with it all day long, can he come up with something fancy?

Chen Lina watched him dial once and smacked his little face. "You are a self-taught person. How about this, in a few days, I will ask who in our base is good at abacus and send you there to learn. Maybe you will be able to help your mother with accounting soon, okay?"

Little Dandan was originally worried that his mother would leave, but when he heard that she was going to find someone to teach him abacus, he knew that she was not going to leave. He jumped up happily and said, "Brother, brother, mom is going to find someone to teach me abacus."

Nie Weimin came in, wearing a woolen hat that workers wore about ten years ago, and a green military coat that workers wore when working overtime. His father was so tall, so his military coat must have been the longest, almost dragging on the ground.

"Mom, are you really going to find someone to teach Dandan how to do abacus? Then I'll learn it, okay?" Xiao Nie immediately began to flatter her like a lackey, so exaggerated that it made people feel sick. "Are you still tired? Is your waist sore? Do you want me to massage it for you?"

Chen Lina opened the kitchen cabinet and saw that the steamed buns had been eaten. She then opened the jar and saw that the rice was also empty.

She got nothing she wanted. She slept all day yesterday and had no idea how Nie Weimin had fooled the two kids.

"I'm fine, and I want you to massage my back? Hurry up and bring me some sorghum flour from the small storehouse. I'm going to make steamed cakes for you today."

Sorghum flour cake with large pieces of oil inside and half a pot of fish stewed in it is so delicious.

As soon as Xiao Nie took off his long military coat, he started shouting, "Lazy Erdan, hurry up and go to the eaves to pick up the fish. Mom is going to cook us some big fat fish."

In the border areas, meat, fish, and chicken are hung up and frozen into large lumps of ice to prevent rats from stealing them.

When Erdan heard that there was fish to eat, he quickly moved his stool and went to pick the fish.

It had been a while since she had cooked something delicious for the children. Today, the milk had arrived, so she took out a can of rice wine, boiled a small pot of cheese, and stewed half a pot of fish. The rice cakes filled the children's stomachs.

It's like there's only rice and no flour. The snow is so thick that we can't drive and can't go to the mining area. We're going to run out of rice soon. What should we do?

"Mom, do you think I washed the dishes cleanly?" Erdan washed a bowl and then brought it in to show Chen Lina.

"Clean, it can't be cleaner." Chen Lina was watering the vegetables in the big bathtub and loosening the soil. She couldn't stand Erdan's annoyance.

"Mom, I love you." Erdan said, and went back into the kitchen with a bowl in his arms.

Well, even if it is a trouble, it is a sweet trouble.

"Mom, we have swept all the snow in the yard. I will sweep it again in the afternoon to prevent the yard from being buried in the snow, okay?" Nie Weimin's hands were frozen red and he leaned against the fire wall, grimacing in pain.

"I know. Don't go out again. Otherwise, you'll get frostbite and it'll be troublesome."

"Okay, Mom!" Nie Weimin had never been so obedient before.

Chen Lina hasn't really had a fight or asked for a divorce yet. If she had, wouldn't the three children be scared to death?

Among these three children, Weimin is as good as his father in physics, Erdan is in good health and has a good temper, and Sandan is so sensitive to mathematics that he is like a genius.

If there really were a new stepmother, would a smart child like Nie Weimin, without anyone to supervise him, go back to his old ways?

You see, she came here originally for the job, and was prepared to discipline these children with a pinch of her nose, but now, for the sake of the children, she is reluctant to leave.

There was someone outside watching the door, so the three children rushed to open it.

"Uncle Yu, why are you here?" Sandan and Erdan were just like puppies. When they saw Yu Donghai coming in, they jumped away.

The mountain was blocked by heavy snow, and even Qian Goudan was locked up at home by his mother and would not be allowed to go out. Everyone was so happy to be able to see him.

"Comrade Xiao Chen, our public security police officers are here to express their condolences to you." Yu Donghai walked in carrying a large bag of rice in his left hand and a large bag of winter wheat flour in his right hand.

"It's snowing so heavily, and the roads are all blocked. How did you get here?"

Yu Donghai is truly a savior to the people at the base, providing timely assistance and noodles when hungry.

However, seeing that he seemed to have trouble walking, Chen Lina asked, "Yu Gongan, what's wrong with your legs? Is it frozen or did you fall?"

"It has been snowing hard for five days. The sheep in the Alimu Forest Farm were attacked by wolves. Our police officers took their guns and walked to the Alimu Forest Farm yesterday to help our herders drive away the wolves." He lowered his voice and said, "Nie Weijiang, I have a wolf tail here. Do you want it?"

"Yes, yes, yes. I want it." Sandan jumped up happily.

The people's police are for the people. Several major bases have now become isolated islands. With bulldozers leading the way, they led the security team and the Oriental Red Trucks carrying rice, flour and oil, braving the snowstorm to deliver food and warmth everywhere.

"You hurt your leg while hiking, right? If that's the case, why don't you take a sick leave? Why are you running out?" Chen Lina asked.

Yu Donghai shook his head. "If we, the people's police, all fall, who can the residents and members of the mining area rely on?"

As he spoke, he hugged Sandaner and said jokingly, "It is said that this blizzard will continue for at least ten days. Nie Weijiang, tell your mother and move to the mining area with me, okay?"

"Okay." Sandan and Erdan shouted at the same time.

Nie Weimin was already worried about his parents' bad relationship, and when he saw that his two younger brothers had become traitors, he immediately said, "Uncle Yu, you should deliver to many more families. Come on, let me help you carry the noodles, okay?"

He thought to himself, what is this?

When mom was very disappointed with dad and faced great difficulties.

Yu Gongan, who has a crush on her, shows up. Shouldn't the dad be the one who's anxious at this time? Why am I the one caught in the middle and feeling embarrassed?

"The leader has passed away, and things are not peaceful in Beijing. There has been no news since Nie Gong went there, and he hasn't called the mining area. The leaders are all very worried. Are you okay here?" Yu Donghai said.

Chen Lina looked back and saw Comrade Xiao Nie with a sneaky look in his eyes and his little ears standing up like an old rabbit, suggesting he was eavesdropping.

"I am also worried, but Nie Gong is a quiet and rational person. I believe he will come back safely," said Chen Lina.

"To be honest, the people have had a very hard time in the past 10 to 20 years. The leader's death is an opportunity. The grief of many people has erupted violently recently. Many of my classmates have advised me to go to Beijing, and I am quite tempted. Xiao Chen, do you think I should go?" Yu Donghai asked.

Chen Lina shook her head decisively. "Comrade Xiao Yu, I think this is the case. You are a public security officer, and the mining area is currently hit by both snowstorms and wolves. The most important thing for you now is to defend the mining area and protect people's property and lives from damage. As for the policy and line, that is a matter for the higher-ups. I believe everything will be fine, okay?"

Yu Donghai thought about it and said, "Okay, I'll listen to you."

Seeing that Chen Lina seemed to be in a bad mood, he said, "Life is too hard, and we have three children. Awarguli, the engineer behind the scenes, is admired by everyone in the mining area."

Chen Lina smiled and didn't answer.

How should I put it? Having lived for two lifetimes, the year that had the greatest impact on Chen Lina was 1976. You see, from the death of a leader in January to the Tangshan earthquake, another leader also died in that year.

She had never told her workers about these things, but she knew that many disasters had happened and was powerless to do anything. This feeling was really uncomfortable.

After seeing Yu Donghai off, Chen Lina was still unhappy.

As a result, as soon as she entered the door, she was stopped by Nie Weimin. "Miss Chen, are you feeling better today?"

"Yes, what's the matter?" Chen Lina asked.

Nie Weimin clapped his hands, and Erdan also ran out of the bedroom, carrying two large iron buckets, dressed like a bear. Sandan also came out and was putting on his fur hat.

"There is no one on guard duty in the lab right now. All the people from the armed forces have withdrawn." Xiao Nie said as he took out a large flowered cotton coat that Chen Lina often wore and threw it to her. He also took out her scarf. "Come on, we'll take you to a good place."

"We can't leave the base in such heavy snow. Nie Weimin, you must have remembered that Liu Xiaohong's mother got lost while leaving the base during a blizzard and froze to death."

"Don't be afraid, we will take you to the office building, let's go quickly." Nie Weimin said.

Chen Lina had no idea what the three kids were up to until Nie Weimin started to pry open the lock of the office building. She felt something was wrong. "Weimin, if you really break into this place, you will be prosecuted. Do you understand? Tell me what you are going to do. If you don't, I'll whip you with a poker."

"Come on, you'll know when you get up there." Nie Weimin shook off Chen Lina's hand, still looking through his eyes.

Chen Lina slapped him on the butt and said, "Hurry up and tell me what you are going to do."

"Mom, Mom, we want to take you to see a movie. Aren't you happy every time you sneak into the laboratory with Dad to watch a movie?" Sandan was shivering with fear, his upper and lower teeth unable to close together, and he said tremblingly.

It turned out that Nie Weimin and Sandan were worried that she was angry and determined to divorce and leave, so they planned to imitate his father and make her happy for once.

"Okay, then let's pry open the lock and go upstairs to watch the movie. Nie Weimin, if you can't show me a movie today, I'll spank your butt." Chen Lina said with a smile.