Chapter 40: Useless at Everything, But an Expert at Stirring Trouble

From the next day on, Wei Dong stopped dining with the Long and Feng sisters, making do with meals elsewhere. Yet, under cover of night, he did indeed carry over the 125-liter single-door refrigerator for the children’s use. In later years, infant appliances would proliferate to a ludicrous degree, so this was hardly worth mentioning. Since he was already there, he took the opportunity to inspect the appliances after several months; signs of mildew were appearing. He brought back a television and a signal converter for himself, leaving the siblings with no hopes of any electrical devices.

Upon returning, he handed four hundred yuan to Long: “Consider this your wages from September to now. Seven hundred for the refrigerator, seven hundred fifty for the television and converter. If you need anything else, just let me know.” Long, silent as ever, accepted the payment, but the next morning, while delivering breakfast, discreetly hid it behind a brick in Old He’s wall, where the account book was kept.

Feng, on the other hand, was endlessly talkative—following her sister inside, she immediately wanted to watch television, then insisted on going with her brother-in-law to transport oranges. Wei Dong reverted to his taciturn state, ignoring her completely.

At this point, he began to understand the men in the tax bureau compound who, after marriage, complained of the endless bother. In essence, he was still far more accustomed to the life of a bachelor. So after work, he would dine with the factory drivers and leaders, then head to the tea house to play cards. He never gambled, but during the two days of sand and stone transport, he firmly rooted the new entertainment of “Fight the Landlord” in Shangzhou, setting it abuzz.

The excitement was such that Shi Linyan was drawn in. With the secondary school on holiday, English teachers remained a few days to grade final exams and submit scores. In previous years, she’d eagerly anticipate visiting her grandparents in the provincial capital after school, and likewise after university. Now, anxious and unsettled, she wanted only to finish school duties quickly and head to Baifeng Mountain to find someone.

She finally realized that the man was one who would leave at a moment’s notice, without a hint of concern for her. So after two days of Wei Dong playing cards, the tea house opposite the school was packed to the rafters.

Shi Linyan, just finished with schoolwork and exhausted in body and mind, was preoccupied with how to explain her secret departure to her mother. Yet she overheard neighbors crossing the street: “It’s so much fun, he plays cards brilliantly!” “No one’s managed to beat him these last few days.” “Who’d have thought the fellow who saved people and caught the butcher would be so good at cards…” “Quiet, I think that’s the teacher he rescued…”

A shadow darted quickly across to the tea house. Shi Linyan’s delicate frame jolted, hurrying after them.

The roadside tea house that usually held five or six tables was now packed with people craning their necks, some unable to see but all listening for that rascal’s voice: “Alright! Stop fretting. You have a two left, two pairs, but you’ll never beat me. Look, you play your pair first, I’ll let you go. But on the second pair, I’ll definitely kill, and your two is sealed—flip the cards and see if I’m right…”

A roar of approval erupted: “He’s right! Amazing!”

Amid Wei Dong’s playful banter, everyone cheered: “Stick it, stick it—two bombs means eight sticks! Eight!”

“Ha ha ha, hurry, we’ve already torn them for you.” “Boss, you said yourself, loser sticks—honor your bet. This is healthy entertainment, all about keeping promises…” “Ah, I really fell for your trick. Fine, I’ll stick, but if you beat me again, next year I won’t assign you any barges!” “Hey, threatening me? The road is wide, we each go our own way. Barges are none of my concern—at the card table, I never lose my composure!”

The atmosphere was electric, with many transport company employees shouting, never having seen their leaders pushed so far. Wei Dong considered whether he should skillfully let someone else win, when the noisy hubbub outside gradually cooled. The “lions” playing cards, faces covered with strips of paper, turned along with Wei Dong.

They saw the English teacher, wrapped in a wool coat and high-necked sweater, her face grim as she strode in like a wave-splitter, glaring fiercely. Everyone fell silent, recognizing her instantly as the city’s most striking secondary school English teacher—one of the twin heroines of the September butcher case. Wei Dong’s special permission from city leaders to learn driving at the transport company was also common knowledge.

Suddenly, the scene shifted from gambling drama to melodrama; many grabbed sunflower seeds to watch the show. The transport company boss quietly shoved his cards into the pile. Wei Dong caught him, about to call out his cheating, when the teacher’s sharp voice rang out: “You! Have you memorized today’s vocabulary?!”

The crowd was more delighted than when watching cards, laughing as if salt was thrown into boiling oil. The transport boss led the applause: “Right! Little Wei should go do his homework!” The crowd clamored to complain to the teacher: “This kid’s beaten us all these days—look, the paper strips on my face ripped the skin!” “You call that ripped? You’re shameless, secretly peeling it off!” “He spends so much time playing cards, not enough homework—quick, assign more!” “Really, drag him back to do homework!”

Wei Dong cursed silently: “Homework for you, your whole family should do homework.” In these days, homework had no other meaning—driving was driving, learning languages was learning languages. But with the atmosphere so charged, he really felt like a married man dragged off to pay his dues, leaving in dejection as the crowd cheered.

He even raised his middle finger behind his back, eliciting even greater applause. Many followed suit, wondering about its meaning, but the gesture quickly caught on for its infectious energy. In Shangzhou, for years afterward, people would exchange this enthusiastic gesture in conversation.

The teacher, triumphant, hands in pockets, followed him out. Once outside the transport company, she hurried to catch up. “You’ve been playing at the transport company these days? Are you still angry?”

Wei Dong glared at her, barely able to contain his fury. “You haven’t screwed me over enough? Can you stop being so childish? All you see is your own little romance—don’t you realize how your mother humiliates me? This is a class conflict, and you’re still caught up in your naïve ideas of love. Tell your mother to go to hell!”

Shi Linyan, shuffling alongside, was both aggrieved and apologetic, unable to utter a word.

Wei Dong unleashed decades of pent-up resentment: “Get this straight! I saved your life, I saved your dignity. Don’t act as if your family is bestowing favors on me—I paid a pri…”

He nearly let something slip, but just then, as they crossed the street, the girl stumbled on the curb. No matter how rough Wei Dong acted, he reached out to steady her. “Can’t you watch where you’re going? Your whole life, you’ll follow your parents’ arrangements—so just obediently love, marry, and bear children as your mother wishes. Stop messing with me; your mother’s influence is considerable. I’ve already buried my parents—what more do you want?”

Shi Linyan didn’t even manage to fall into his arms, her eyes full of remorse; it seemed if Wei Dong pointed to the river and told her to jump, she wouldn’t hesitate.

Wei Dong was even more infuriated by her look. “Can’t you keep your distance from me? Go around!”

Perhaps, subconsciously, in his previous life, Shi Linyan always kept her distance, and that’s why the old pensioner carried such a deep thorn in his heart—like the behavior of Er Feng’s family. Now that his hand had healed, he could sell cured meat, drive, earn money, and suddenly he was worthy of a different kind of attention?

He wasn’t interested in any of it. “Enough! Cross the street and go back to your parents’ house. Stop pestering me. I can’t even enjoy myself without you disturbing me. Go on, I’ll watch you cross the street—no one will rescue you at midnight again. Take care of yourself!”

A little princess who had always had everything she wanted, cherished by her whole family, finally experienced what it meant to have her heart torn apart. Everything she saw, she adored, but every word he spoke pierced her heart with icy indifference.

Moreover, his impatience and disdain were written plainly across his face for all to see.

It was a feeling she had never known.

She staggered across the street, her steps uneven, and before entering the tax bureau compound, she turned back with difficulty for a final look…

That figure walked into a side alley without a backward glance and vanished.

Faced with her mother’s immediate interrogation, Shi Linyan finally, for the first time, erupted in a quarrel. Early next morning, she went to the transport company tea house to inquire after Wei Dong’s whereabouts.

Her mother, of course, was hardly idle—her efficiency far higher. She was shocked to discover that this “porter” of the new era had, within a week, led a team to move hundreds of thousands of pounds of oranges, pushing the canning factory into overdrive, with everyone working overtime to produce canned sugared oranges.

These more than two hundred tons of oranges were not the end—two hundred-ton cargo barges had hauled hundreds more tons of sand and stone, unloaded on the riverbank, now streaming to the city’s construction sites.

It was a whirlwind of activity.

Sure enough, after some investigation, the city tax bureau had received no records of tax paid on orange or sand and stone transport.

Immediately, the “reporting mode” was activated.

Officials excelled at such things—especially at dealing with those who simply put their heads down and worked.

It was as routine as breathing.