Chapter 80 Tied to the Bed Post
Yu Jin'an was not found until three days after being swept away by the water. Her body was already soaked when it was retrieved, but fortunately, her original appearance was still recognizable.
Yu San San went to see Yu Jin An's body, as did her eldest and second eldest sisters. Her mother did not go, nor did her younger brother.
Her mother's reason was that she was afraid her son would be frightened and traumatized, so she wanted to stay home and take care of him.
Her mother and brother did not attend the cremation; her mother only appeared with her son at the burial.
Yu San San's mother's eyes were red and swollen; having lost her husband, she had clearly cried a lot. Her son, on the other hand, had a rosy complexion and seemed to be in good spirits. It wasn't until he saw Yu Jin'an's photo on the tombstone that he burst into tears, as if only then did he understand what had happened.
Almost all the military families had arrived, and Molly stood in the crowd with Mo An and Lu Lu.
Yu Jin'an was not the only one buried today; several other soldiers were also buried on the same day.
Everyone was heavy-hearted, their eyes red, silent, and without a word.
The sky above the camp seemed to have darkened a bit.
For the next few days, Yu San San stayed at home and did not come out. Occasionally, crying and cursing could be heard from the Yu family, which seemed to be no different from before.
Ji Hefeng called back to let him know he was safe and sound, saying he was going to organize post-disaster reconstruction work in a neighboring city and wouldn't be back for about ten days.
That day, Molly was weeding the sweet potatoes and potatoes in the yard when Lu Lu brought a group of children in.
"Sister, please teach us how to fish." Zhu Lezhi knelt down before Molly as soon as she entered the room, startling Molly. "What's this?"
"They went fishing and fished all morning, only to catch two small whitebait the size of a finger." Mo An looked helpless; he didn't understand what had happened either, since his sister had caught fish so easily that day.
Molly: "......."
"Sister, please." Fang Chen also bowed to Molly.
Molly remained silent; she didn't know either.
"Sister, come fishing with us." Cheng Cai reached for Molly's hoe. "We'll help you weed tomorrow."
Molly was surrounded by a group of children as they headed towards the river, with Moan and Molly bringing their family's fishing rods.
The river level has dropped a bit more, the murky yellow has faded, and now it's a clear green.
“I’m not very good at fishing either,” Molly said honestly.
The children didn't believe it, and Zhu Lezhi even said, "Then, sister, teach us what you know. If we learn even a move or two from you, we'll benefit from it for the rest of our lives."
"I'm afraid you won't be able to learn it," Molly thought to herself, but remained calm on the surface. "You can learn it as you see fit, I have nothing to say."
A group of children watched with wide eyes as Molly baited her hook with an earthworm, cast her line, and pulled the fish up. In less than five minutes, Molly caught her first fish, which weighed three or four pounds.
The children stared in disbelief. "That's it? How is it any different from what they did?"
"It's that simple." Molly ruthlessly dismissed the children, changed the worm, and cast the fishhook back into the river.
Could it be luck that I got it the first time?
Zhu Lezhi and the others couldn't see Molly's skill; they assumed that Molly was just lucky the first time, and that she just happened to cast the hook right into the fish's mouth.
However, Molly continued catching fish, one after another, and in less than two hours, their buckets were full. The smallest fish weighed two or three pounds, and the largest weighed about ten pounds.
Zhu Lezhi and the others followed her example, baiting their hooks and casting their lines, but they caught very few fish; the largest one was a crucian carp weighing about eight ounces.
The children were happy that they had caught a lot of fish, but also frustrated that they hadn't caught them.
"Did you learn anything?" Molly asked the children.
The children shook their heads. "We tried fishing like our sister, but we didn't catch anything."
"That's good that you didn't catch anything," Molly said seriously. "The reason I caught anything is because I was lucky, you understand?"
The children nodded. Yes, it was the older sister who was lucky, not the other way around.
There were five buckets full of fish, and the children caused quite a stir when they carried so many fish back to the camp.
"Let's find a place to divide the fish," Fang Chen suggested.
"Let's find a spacious place." Cheng Cai pointed to the playground. "That place is pretty good."
They carried the fish over. A group of onlookers, including military dependents and children, gathered around.
A new problem arises: how to divide the fish?
Zhu Lezhi spoke first, "Sister caught the most, so she should get the most."
No one else objected; Molly had caught almost all of these fish.
“No need,” Molly refused. “It will be split equally among everyone. Also, I have one request: you can’t go to the river without an adult from now on.”
Zhu Lezhi agreed very quickly, "No, no, next time we go fishing we'll ask my sister to come with us."
The other children readily agreed, "Yes, yes, we won't go by ourselves, we'll go with our older sister."
Molly's lips twitched; that wasn't what she meant.
Seeing Molly's speechless expression, the military dependents next to her covered their mouths and chuckled.
Molly didn't stay to watch them divide the fish; she went home first.
That evening, the aroma of fish wafted from almost every household in the military dependents' area.
Molly's family also received six fish. Molly asked Mo An to send two to Uncle Wang, and kept four for herself. One was used to make boiled fish, and the remaining three were chopped into pieces and fried in oil. Mo An was in charge of cooking, and Lu Lu assisted. When it was time to eat, Lu Lu wanted to call Yu San San, but when he got to the door, he didn't dare to call out and slunk back.
Nine days after Yu Jin'an's burial, Yu Duoduo knocked on Molly's door.
Mo An and Lu Lu went to the cafeteria, leaving only Molly at home.
"It's you?" Molly asked, somewhat surprised.
Yu Duoduo clutched the hem of her clothes and said in a low voice, "My mom received the compensation and plans to take my sister, my brother, and me back to my dad's hometown."
Molly frowned, wondering why San San was missing. "Where is San San?"
Yu Duoduo glanced up at Molly, then quickly looked down again. "My mom said to leave San San at the camp. We'll leave first thing tomorrow morning so San San won't find out."
Molly felt a tightness in her chest, and a surge of anger rose to her head, but the angrier she became, the calmer she remained. "Why? Isn't San San your mother's child?"
“My mom said she can’t raise too many children,” Yu Duoduo said with a wry smile. “San San and my brother are less than a year apart in age. After my mom gave birth to San San, she found out that San San was a girl, so she didn’t take care of San San much. After she found out that she was pregnant again, she directly stopped breastfeeding San San. San San was raised by my older sister and me. My mom has held San San a handful of times.”
Molly felt sorry for San San, but then she thought about how she and her two siblings had gone through the same thing, and looking at it this way, she couldn't tell who had it worse.
Why are you telling me all this?
“My mom said you’ll take care of San San.” Yu Duoduo paused and continued, “My mom said that San San can have a good life with you, better than with her.”
A hint of envy flashed in Yu Duoduo's eyes.
"So, you don't want to leave anymore and want me to support you?" Molly found it ridiculous, but she couldn't laugh. How could there be such a thing in the world when a mother doesn't support her own child and lets someone else support her?
“No,” Yu Duoduo shook her head repeatedly. “I didn’t dare to think that way, and my mom wouldn’t agree either. I overheard her telling my brother that my sister and I are both old enough to help with chores around the house, and in a few years we can get married and get some dowry. My sister is in junior high school, and my mom thinks she can get more money from her. As for me, she said I’m the prettiest of her three daughters and can fetch a good price. But San San is too young; she’ll have to wait many years to get married, and it’s not worth taking her back to raise.”
Molly fell silent. Being schemed against to this extent by their own mother, the three Yu sisters were truly pitiful.
“I’ve come to you,” Yu Duoduo clenched her fists, mustered her courage, and looked directly at Molly. “I want to borrow money from you. If my mother wants to sell me, I want to run away.”
Molly's pupils contracted slightly; the determination and resolve in the girl's eyes moved her deeply.
"But you don't have a letter of introduction, where can you escape to?"
"I'm only thirteen. I have a few years to plan slowly. There will always be a way." Yu Duoduo didn't know if she was saying this to Molly or to comfort herself.
Molly didn't know what to say, so she asked, "How much do you want to borrow?"
"Fifty yuan. I can write you an IOU." Yu Duoduo took out paper and pen from her pocket, well-prepared.
“I’ll give you a hundred dollars. But I hope you don’t make an impulsive decision. If you make the wrong choice, the consequences could be disastrous.” Molly didn’t want lending her money to end up harming her.
"Then I accept it." Yu Duoduo smiled with relief.
Molly stopped trying to persuade him, went back and got ten ten-yuan bills for Yu Duoduo, and accepted Yu Duoduo's naive and somewhat laughable IOU.
Molly woke up several times that night. Around four or five o'clock, she heard the sound of the door opening next door, followed by the sound of footsteps fading into the distance.
She neither woke Yu San San up nor stopped Yu San San's mother.
Once the four footsteps faded into the distance, Molly felt a sense of relief. Sleepiness washed over her, and she closed her eyes and drifted off to sleep.
When she woke up again, it was already broad daylight, and Mo An and Lu Lu had already returned from the cafeteria.
"Mom, the door to Sister San San's house is open, but it's quiet inside, and it seems like no one is there," Lu Lu said.
Molly was startled. "Nobody's here?" Where did Yu San San go?
Lu Lu wasn't entirely sure either. "I didn't go in."
The Yu family's gate was wide open, and the inside was in a mess. The vegetables they planted had either been pulled up or destroyed, and there wasn't a single edible plant left.
"San San?" Molly called out.
There was no response.
Molly's heart sank. She continued walking inside. Almost everything had been moved out; even the chairs were gone, not to mention the kitchen utensils—not a single one remained.
The house here was laid out the same as Molly's, with three rooms. Molly searched room by room, but the rooms were empty except for a bed; nothing else was left. There was no sign of Yu San San in the first two rooms, until she finally found her sitting on the floor in the third room.
She opened the door, and Yu San San, who was in the room, suddenly looked up at her. When she saw her face clearly, tears welled up in Yu San San's eyes, and she started to sob.
Molly walked up to her step by step, squatted down beside her, took the rag out of her mouth, and then untied the ropes binding her.
Yu San San's mother seemed afraid that she would chase after her, so she tied her up very tightly, with almost no gap between her back and the pillar, and the hemp rope left deep marks on Yu San San's body.
If she had arrived any later, Yu San San's flesh and blood would probably have rotted.
How ruthless must a mother be to go to this extent?
Molly picked up Yu San San and carried the sobbing Yu San San out of the Yu family home. Instead of going back to her own home, she walked through the family quarters and headed towards the office building.
She encountered many people on the road. When they saw Yu San San crying and noticed the deep marks on her body, they couldn't help but ask her a few words of concern.
“Her mother left with her two older sisters and younger brother, not wanting to take her with her, so she tied her to the headboard,” Molly explained, her tone flat and straightforward, without exaggeration or anger, frighteningly calm.
Yu San San was wearing a pajama top and shorts, and the depth and density of the marks from the straps were clearly visible to everyone around her. Everyone who saw Yu San San's miserable state couldn't help but feel sorry for her, and then, incidentally, curse at Yu San San's mother.
Gradually, more and more people gathered behind Molly.
"Molly, who are you taking San San to see?" someone asked.
Molly replied, "Go find the political commissar of the 2nd Regiment."
“I know where he is, I’ll take you there.” Someone offered to lead the way for Molly.
Before Molly even reached the office of the political commissar of the 2nd Regiment, the commissar, having heard the news, came out of his office.
The political commissar of the 2nd Regiment was surnamed Ye, and he was a man in his forties.
Political Commissar Ye looked at Molly, then at the child in Molly's arms, his brows furrowing deeply.
"I didn't expect this to happen." Political Commissar Ye said helplessly and angrily, "I'll send someone to bring Yu Jin'an's wife back right now."
“She’s probably already on the train,” Molly said.
Political Commissar Ye gritted his teeth, "Even if she goes back to her hometown, I will have her arrested and brought to the military region to give this child an explanation."
Molly shook her head. "No need. You saw the injuries on the child. If she treats the child like this today, the child probably won't survive if she goes back to her hometown with her."
Over time, those marks became increasingly grotesque and terrifying, a truly shocking sight.
Political Commissar Ye knew that Molly's words made sense, and asked her, "So what do you plan to do?"
"I want to adopt this child. Could you please write a certificate?" Molly just wanted a certificate, and she also wanted people to see the pitiful state of Yu San San, so that everyone would feel sorry for the child and say less hurtful things.
The child didn't stay because she wanted to live a good life with Molly; she was abandoned by her own mother, tied to a bedpost, and had no choice but to stay.
After receiving the certificate, Molly took Yu San San to complete the adoption procedures that same day. When filling out the name form, Yu San San suddenly said, "Mom, I want to take your surname."
Molly paused, looking at Yu San San's stubborn little face, unable to bring herself to refuse. "Fine, then you can have my surname. What about your given name? Do you want to change it?"
Without even thinking, Yu Sansan said, "It needs to be changed. Mom, can you help me choose one?"
Molly had a bit of a headache. She racked her brains, thought about it carefully, and said, "How about we name you Chuyang? Mo Chuyang, which means you are welcoming a new life today."
"Mo Chuyang, Mo Chuyang, this name is good, I like it." Mo Chuyang smiled, tears glistening in the corners of her eyes.
That's wonderful, she has a new mother and a new name.
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