Mei Xiangcao looked at her eldest son, then at her youngest son and daughter, and then at her daughter-in-law and mother-in-law.
"Well, since we're not outsiders, I'll tell you what I'm saying." Soon, she was immersed in memories of the past, a smile on her face. "That was more than twenty years ago, a time of turmoil. There were wars everywhere in the country, but there was also a quiet and peaceful corner.
My family has been in the spice business for generations. We have our own land to grow spices. Those lands suffered a lot of damage during the war years, but because of our family background, our family is still relatively prosperous.
That day, I went to the fields to pick flowers with some female workers from my family. When we passed by the river, we saw a man lying on the river bank as if he was dead.
The female workers thought he was dead and were very scared. I plucked up the courage to go over and found that he had a wound on his forehead. I felt his nose and found that he was not dead yet, so I wanted to save him.
He was breathing very weakly at the time, and if he hadn't received emergency treatment, he would have died soon. When I was in school, I heard from my teacher that in this situation, cardiopulmonary resuscitation and even artificial respiration should be performed on the drowning person.
I followed the teacher's instructions and pressed on his heart with my hand for a while, but it didn't work, so I had to give him artificial respiration.
The female workers were watching from the side and saw it all. I finally rescued the man, and he was very grateful to me and said thank you right away.
Several female workers joked that since I had kissed him, they wanted him to take responsibility for me. He was confused for a moment and looked at me with guilt. I told him that he didn't need to take responsibility, that I was just saving someone, and that he didn't need to risk his life for this.
I asked him where he was from, but he said he couldn't remember anything. He didn't know where he was from, what his name was, or why he was washed here by the river.
I looked at the wound on his forehead and thought he must have suffered a temporary amnesia from the blow to his head. Since he was still injured and didn't know where his home was, I took him home.
He stayed in our house for a while and recovered quickly, but he still couldn't remember who he was or where he was from.
My father and I took him to a nearby village to inquire, hoping to help him find his family. We also asked acquaintances to help look for him, but unfortunately his home was not near Qingping Bay at all.
We even took him to the county police station, but it was a mess with few people there, and they couldn't help him either. He had no choice but to go home with us and continue living with the Mei family. He didn't have a name because he was washed across the river. The ring he wore had the Chinese character "Jiang" engraved on it, so my father named him Jiang Dahe.
He didn't live and eat for free in our house. Every day he was either working around the house or in the fields. He was big and strong, and could do the work of two people. He was also a good cook and knew a lot.
It was a very chaotic time, and bandits often came down the mountain to rob things. That time, the bandit leader came down and brought people to break into my house, wanting to take me up the mountain to be his concubine. I didn't want to, so he fought hard to drive away the bandits, and the bandits never came down again. He was seriously injured that time and almost died.
As soon as he recovered from his injuries, rumors spread throughout the village. I kissed him when I rescued him, and he had been living in our house the entire time. He was handsome and capable, so he must have been having an affair with me.
After the rumor spread, he mustered up the courage to tell me and my father that if we didn't despise him, he would be willing to marry into our family. No matter whether he could find his own relatives in the future, he would always be the son-in-law of the Mei family.
He also told me privately that he actually fell in love with me, and I also had a secret crush on him, so it was natural for us to get married.
At the beginning, our life was sweet and happy. Less than a year after we got married, we had our first child, A-ye, and named him Mei Ye after the Mei family's surname.
Business was not good in those days, and our family was gradually declining. My father's health was gradually broken due to overwork. He was the only one who took care of everything at home and outside. He was busy every day, but he always found time to take good care of me and my father.
My father sighed that he had found a good son-in-law, and I also felt that it was our fate to meet him.
Later, the situation changed, our family's property was confiscated, and we were labeled as such. The higher-ups said my father was the head of the family, and they wanted to arrest him and me and take us out to be publicly criticized.
My father is old and in poor health, and I am a woman. He couldn't bear to see us suffer, so he discussed with us to change the name of the Mei family to the Jiang family, let his children take his surname, and make him the nominal head of the family, and the one who would bear the risks. If those people caused trouble, they could just go to him.
After that, he was the one who was dragged out for criticism every time, and every time he came back, his body was covered with scars, but he never complained at all. He said that he would stay in Qingping Bay for the rest of his life and protect us forever.
If it weren't for him, my father wouldn't have survived that winter.
Two or three years later, my father died of illness. I gave birth to Xiaoyang and Tingting. Our family of five lived a hard life, but we also had a warm little happiness.
Until one day, the weather was too cold, and Dahe went to the county town to buy cloth and cotton for us to make clothes. After he left, he never returned to Qingping Bay. I tried hard to inquire about him but could not get any news about him. It was as if he had evaporated from the earth.
Some people in the village said that he was dead, and some said that he was a stranger who abandoned us and returned to his hometown.
I don't want to believe any of it. I don't want to believe that he's dead. If he returns to his hometown, he will come back to find us. He made a vow, and there's no way he wouldn't keep it."
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