“Child? What child?” Jiang Quqi wrapped her arm around Qin Jiao and squatted down slightly, bringing their faces close together. “Are you saying he’s my child?”
Grandma’s train of thought was rather unique, and she didn’t find anything wrong with it at all. Seeing Qin Jiao, she beamed happily and waved for him to come over, her cloudy eyes overflowing with kindness.
“Good boy, come to Great Grandma.”
Qin Jiao hesitated, looking at Jiang Quqi as if seeking help. Jiang Quqi felt like she was about to faint upon hearing Grandma’s words and sighed, holding her forehead.
“Grandma, when would I have the time to give birth to a child? I’m right here in front of you every so often, aren’t I? Besides, a twenty-five-year-old woman can’t give birth to a fifteen-year-old child. Have you ever heard of someone having a baby at age ten?”
Grandma suddenly understood and clapped her hands. “Oh, I see! That’s why he doesn’t look like you!”
Isn’t that obvious?!
Jiang Quqi pouted speechlessly, then held Qin Jiao’s hand and walked to Grandma’s bedside. Grandma stretched out her wrinkled, rough hand to hold Qin Jiao’s and asked, “Child, what is your name?”
“Qin Jiao.”
“Oh? Which ‘Jiao’?”
“The one with the grass radical on top and the number nine below.”
Grandma exclaimed in surprise, “Oh! It’s the name of a Chinese medicinal herb!”
Jiang Quqi touched her head, confused. “Qin Jiao is a herb?” She didn’t know that.
Grandma gave her a disdainful glance. “I told you to read more books, but all you do is stare at your phone all day having fun.” She then said to Qin Jiao, “Don’t be like her, you should read more.”
She asked again, “Child, have you been reading any books lately?”
Qin Jiao thought for a moment, then looked meaningfully at Jiang Quqi, who felt baffled. The next second, Qin Jiao spoke, “Yes, I am reading the Civil Code.”
Grandma: ?
Jiang Quqi: !
“And the Constitution.”
Grandma: ??
Jiang Quqi: !!
“And the Criminal Law.”
Grandma: ???
Jiang Quqi: !!!
Silence, silence, and more silence.
Grandma was stunned. It took her a while to recover, and she forced a dry laugh. “Good, very good.”
Qin Jiao continued with a smile, “Mhm. Sister picked these books specially for me.”
Grandma’s gaze drifted lightly onto Jiang Quqi, filled with confusion and questioning. Jiang Quqi raised both hands high in surrender and explained, “I’m just letting him study the law properly, so he can be a good child who knows, understands, and abides by the law!” After saying that, she fled quickly. “I’ll go get some hot water!” She grabbed the thermos and ran off.
Peeking out to make sure Jiang Quqi was really gone, Grandma turned back to look carefully at Qin Jiao and asked, “Child, are you living with Xiao Jiang now?”
“Mhm.”
“Is she good to you?”
“Yes.” Feeling it wasn’t enough, Qin Jiao added, “Very good.”
Grandma was delighted, her eyes curving into crescents, repeatedly saying “good”. Then she looked out the window with a hint of melancholy. It had rained all night, and the trees outside had shed their leaves, looking bare and somewhat awkwardly ugly.
Grandma pointed at the tree outside and said, “Look, this tree is almost dead, just like this broken body of mine.”
“It will come back to life next spring, just like Grandma’s health will gradually get better.”
Grandma smiled and shook her head, patting the bed. “It won’t get better. You see, I’ve been lying in this bed for six years. Six years, more than two thousand days.”
Grandma began to tell the story of the past, just as she had told many others. “The year I was hospitalized, Yan Bao’er was eighteen. She was in her final year of high school, about to take the college entrance exam. She was smart, hardworking, and all the teachers praised her. But then that good-for-nothing father of hers… it’s all because of that bastard, and because of this useless body of mine…” As she spoke, tears streamed down her face. She covered her face and sobbed, stumbling through the memories.
April 23, 2019.
The wind blew the calendar pages. Jiang Yan tore off the days that had passed, excitedly waiting for the exam to arrive.
Grandma said that the college entrance exam was one of the most important moments in life. As long as she could get into university, she could leave this place and see the world outside.
Grandma said that getting into university was the start of good fortune. While others were anxious about the exam, Jiang Yan was filled with anticipation.
Every morning when she woke up, she would count how many days were left, circling the exam date with a red pen again and again.
Jiang Peng had disappeared somewhere recently. He hadn’t come back to ask for money, nor had he come home drunk.
It seemed like everything was finally going well.
Jiang Yan clasped her hands together and silently made a small wish.
“Yan Bao’er?”
“Grandma!”
Jiang Yan jumped up from her chair and ran over to support her. Grandma’s legs were weak; last time she went out to buy vegetables, she almost fell, but luckily a kind passerby helped her up so nothing happened.
Jiang Yan frowned unhappily. “Grandma, where is your cane?”
Grandma looked guilty. “I don’t need that thing.”
“Grandma!”
“Alright, alright, I promise next time, next time,” she said as she carefully took an orange from her pocket and placed it solemnly in Jiang Yan’s palm. “Uncle Wang next door gave it to me. Eat it, Yan Bao’er, it will keep you healthy.”
Jiang Yan peeled it and split it in half, sharing it with her. After eating, she suddenly slapped her forehead. “Oh no! I have to go tutor someone today!”
“You’re still going even though the exam is coming up?”
“They already paid me. I can’t just not go.” She wiped her hands on her clothes, hurriedly packed her bag, and rushed out the door.
“Goodbye Grandma! Take care and watch your health!”
……
“Grandma…” Qin Jiao handed her a tissue. Grandma kept wiping her tears, struggling to compose herself several times.
“That day, Jiang Peng still came. He ransacked the house like a madman looking for money, but there was no money left at all! He even took the tuition fees I had saved up for Yan Bao’er’s university. I was so anxious I fainted. Someone called an ambulance, and… well, this is how I ended up.”
“The doctors said I had some illness or other, I can’t even remember the name. Now it’s just medicine and tests every day. It can’t be cured. I’m just dragging others down, wasting away in this hospital room.”
“How can you say you’re a burden?” The door opened with a bang, and Jiang Quqi walked in carrying the thermos. “If anyone is a burden, isn’t it me who burdened you? A tiny child, unwanted by mother and abandoned by father, doing nothing but crying, eating, and sleeping all day. Why isn’t *that* being a burden?”
“If anyone is a burden, it was Jiang Yan who burdened you, not the other way around.”
“Besides,” Jiang Quqi sat down next to Grandma and pressed her forehead gently against hers, “Grandma, we were never a burden to each other.”
A woman whose hair turned white in her fifties after being tormented by her son, holding this broken family together alone, raising a newborn child to grow up. She had built a whole world for Jiang Yan; she was Jiang Yan’s guardian angel, the hope that kept her struggling through the mud.
“Grandma, Jiang Yan’s life will get better and better.”
Grandma stroked Jiang Quqi’s cheek. Her eyes seemed to see through Jiang Quqi’s eyes right into her soul. She sighed, choked with sobs, and finally said simply, “Go home.”
“Huh?”
“Huh what? Go on, get out of here, don’t disturb an old woman’s rest.”
“I was just being sentimental and you treat me like this?”
Grandma glanced at her. “What? Does money fall from the sky? You said things would get better, but lately you seem so free, coming here all the time for no reason.”
Jiang Quqi widened her eyes in disbelief. “Are you kicking me out?”
Grandma ignored her, picked up the newspaper beside her, and started reading by herself.
Qin Jiao sat blankly between them, not understanding why they suddenly started bickering. But Jiang Quqi didn’t look angry at all; she just shook Grandma’s hand and said, “Okay, I’m leaving then?”
“Mhm~” Grandma acted rather coyly.
Jiang Quqi smiled and said to Qin Jiao, “Say goodbye to Grandma, we’re leaving.”
Qin Jiao stood up, walked beside Jiang Quqi, and said to Grandma, “Goodbye Grandma.”
Grandma truly liked Qin Jiao. She smiled warmly and replied, “Goodbye Xiao Qin.”
Jiang Quqi asked, “What about me?”
“You just hurry up and leave.”
Jiang Quqi wasn’t upset. After telling Grandma to rest well, she took Qin Jiao and left.
The lively room became quiet again in an instant. Grandma fumbled around until she found her phone, clumsily turning it on. The lock screen wallpaper was a photo of a little girl around seven or eight years old, with beautiful pigtails, holding up a candied hawthorn stick high, missing one of her front teeth.
Grandma’s rough fingers traced the girl’s face little by little, as if trying to engrave her image into her heart.
“Yan Bao’er, my Yan Bao’er.”
She added softly, “Xiao Jiang is a good child.”