Chapter 8: Too Hard
September 10, 1994 was Teachers' Day. On this day in previous years, even if Hu Jiao was not at home, he would send or say a few words of blessing to his dear mother, the respected people's teacher Ms. Li Aiju.
But not this year.
It has been three weeks since he moved into the armed police reception center on August 17, and except for the first day when the task force talked to him, no one has paid any attention to him.
Someone delivers meals at a fixed time every day, and besides that, there are two armed police door guards who are always there.
He asked for a guitar, but was not given one; he asked for political reading materials, but was not given one; finally, Hu Jiao requested for something even with words on it, but was still not satisfied.
I asked to see Liu Jie, but she was not there; I asked to see the leader, but was waiting for instructions. I could write down any opinions, situations, or questions I had.
In the entire room, apart from the red words "Armed Police Guesthouse", there was nothing else with words on it, no TV, no telephone.
Apart from the letter paper and ballpoint pen on the table, Hu Jiao's greatest entertainment is to look out the window at the green in the yard, or at the mountains in the distance.
The only thing that enters my room is the gentle breeze; the only thing that accompanies me to sleep is the bright moon.
Hu Jiao, who was extremely bored, simply tried his best to copy down all the theoretical documents in his mind, and then slowly read them to appreciate the wisdom of the great men and philosophers.
Day after day, week after week, there is really a kind of sadness that "this hatred will never end".
Hu Jiao absolutely did not believe that a political persecution campaign would still occur in this day and age. He knew that as the case was investigated, the two sides were wrestling in places he could not see.
I have never felt that time can make people feel so vast.
Daze, constant daze; silence, earth-shattering silence. It takes eight steps from door to window, and eight steps from section clerk to department head.
Whenever Hu Jiao was about to collapse and was about to yell out to the window to vent his anger, he would think of these eight steps.
Then, take one step at a time, each step powerful, solid and resolute.
Finally, Hu Jiao, who was bored to the extreme, began to carefully review the memories of the man named "Gou Rixin" in his mind.
If we use television to describe the memories of the two people, Hu Jiao's memory is a science and education film, then Gou Rixin's memory can definitely be regarded as a variety show blockbuster that transcends time, humanity, and senses.
There are AVs about Japanese women, European and American "piling" forms, blacks and whites, old and young, perverted... There are absurd gun fights, action images, and all kinds of real-life rural characters.
Hu Jiao picked out a few lyrics from those complicated, weird and strange memories. Of course, all the words that Gou Rixin didn't recognize were filled in by Hu Jiao.
For example, in his memory, there was a song called "Twilight" sung by a singer named Zhou Chuanxiong. Gou Rixin remembered the last part in a mess: I still remember the hard iron cock coming out of your mouth, and in the confusion I had the illusion of raping a young girl; the pornographic video played with the word "goodbye", and the man started to go wild.
There are also many that only have the first one or two sentences, and the rest are full of ghost cries such as "clang clanglemee, zhiyazhiyawu".
Fortunately, he remembered the melody, so Hu Jiao could only use his expertise in classical literature to write lyrics based on the mood of the song.
This can make people happy. Humming and singing every day, time begins to flow from the silence.
On September 27th, Hu Jiao had been here for forty days.
I didn't take a shower, cut my hair, or shave for 40 days. Fortunately, I could use the water I used to wash my face and feet to wipe my body every day, so I didn't stink.
Someone washed his clothes, and Hu Jiao guessed that it might be Liu Jie who secretly washed them for him, because every time he sent back the clothes, there was no trace of his mother folding them.
When folding clothes, especially underwear, teacher Li Aiju is used to folding the two sides first. But the clothes that have been delivered recently are all folded at the bottom first.
Every time Hu Jiao puts on, he feels a sense of pride as if someone is caressing him. He imagines Liu Jie's jade-like hands brushing across her panties, and his body becomes slightly numb.
I have used six large notebooks of letter paper, one for each week, and five of them are filled with philosophical theories, the Party's policies and guidelines, and excerpts from various documents since the 14th National Congress of the Communist Party of China.
The other is a collection of poems and songs.
After someone took it up and looked at it, it was returned intact.
After breakfast, I leaned on the bed bored, half closing my eyes, enjoying the slight chill of autumn.
At this moment, a lightning-like fragment flashed through Hu Jiao's mind.
It’s his father Hu Jianguo!
This is not his memory! Hu Jiao is sure of this!
He held his head and searched hard. Just now, that fragment definitely happened in the future, in Gou Rixin's memory.
Finally, after tossing and turning in bed for two hours, the fragment became clear...
There is no specific time, just a very small fragment: Gou Rixin returned to his hometown village to show off his newly bought mobile phone, turned on the shrill music, and walked from one end of the village to the other.
The village chief finally came back and saw Gou Rixin. His eyes lit up and he said, "Damn it, you're back. Just in time! I have something to talk to you about!"
Gou Rixin waved his new mobile phone, which was the trophy he won after playing mahjong for half a month at 50 cents per shot.
"Village chief, damn it, come here, I'll show you a peep show!"
I switched my phone to playback mode and started playing the foreign pornographic films according to the instructions.
The village chief wiped his eyes and said, "Ah! Damn it, this, this, this thing is..."
"Looks good, doesn't it? Hey, look, is the foreigner's thing big?"
"big!"
"Is this foreign bitch pretty?"
"It looks good... Damn it, how much does it cost?"
Gou Rixin's vanity was greatly satisfied when he returned to the village. He bought a second-hand mobile phone product from a mobile phone store on the street in the county town for two hundred yuan.
Gou Rixin hooked his index finger, "Nine hundred, not a cent less! I can also listen to the radio, watch TV, movies, watch VCDs, DVDs, watch porn, listen to music, and make phone calls. Oh, the sound, turn on the hands-free mode, the whole village can hear people talking, farting, and burping thousands of miles away! Trains are not pushed, and cows are not blown. Village chief, since you have taken care of me since I was a child, five hundred, take it if you want."
The village chief stared at the screen and sighed, "Damn it, you've lived in vain and you still use this kind of moves? If I were like this foreigner, I would make your aunt die of joy! Damn it, it's too fierce, the power is so strong, this foreign bitch is also experienced, too experienced."
Gou Rixin snatched the phone, stopped the play, and spat, boasting, "It costs two yuan to watch a movie in the township. Village chief, do you want to say something?"
The village chief responded, "How much?"
"I'll buy it for nine hundred. You're my uncle and have taken care of me since I was a kid. Five hundred. No bargaining."
The village chief's eyes lit up when he heard this. He pulled Gou Rixin over and crouched beside the corn stalks in the corner of the house. He whispered, "Damn it, good news is coming. I heard that some important secretary will come to visit our village tomorrow. The township has assigned me a task to find two poor families with the elderly, orphans and disabled."
He took out a piece of letter paper from the four pockets of his jacket and handed it to Gou Rixin. "Here, the lyrics are all written. Just memorize a few sentences. I heard that the big boss will give money on the spot, and there will be reporters accompanying him. Uncle wants to make a deal with you. You pretend to be a poor person. But, you, damn, have been an orphan since you were a child, and you grew up eating at other people's homes. This makes sense."
Gou Rixin shouted impatiently, "Let's talk about the matter, let's talk about the matter."
"Tomorrow, the senior leader will come to visit and give you the subsidy on the spot. This way, any amount over 500 will be yours. If it's less than 500, your uncle will give you more."
Gou Rixin blinked and said, "Is the phone for you?"
The village chief's eyes glowed like a wolf, the scene he just saw was still flying in his mind. When he thought of that foreign golden-haired woman, he couldn't help but sigh, "It's so bad, so bad, so bad."
Who is Gou Rixin? He is a gangster who has been cheating and doing all kinds of bad things for so many years. How could he not be the first to rush to do something good when it comes to this?
"Village chief, my uncle, do you think I should make my leg a boil? And then break my hand?"
The village chief thought about it, a mobile phone, a foreign one, and nodded vigorously, "Okay!"
The next day, Gou Rixin hadn’t eaten anything. He had stayed up all night with cold water on his head. He put his head into the chicken coop and corn pile for more than a dozen rounds. Then he put on the pants that the old widows in the village wore, filled a plastic bag with manure, wrapped it around his thighs, and wrapped it with countless dirty rags. Finally, he got two bottles of bezoar ointment from the village chief’s house, mixed it with yellow mud water, and squeezed it to spread on the obvious “wounds”. When someone came, he quietly pricked them with a needle. The stench…
A broken hand is easier to fix by clamping it with two pieces of bamboo, wrapping it in countless circles, and then putting it around the neck.
Pretends: A simple, honest, and pitiful . He had no land to live on, no roof over his head, his parents died early, and he grew up as an orphan.
There are only three lines in the dialogue: I eat potato porridge in the morning. I eat porridge and potatoes at noon. I drink water to fill myself up for dinner. Thank you, government.
Everything before this had nothing to do with Hu Jiao. The key was the leader who gave him two thousand yuan in Gou Rixin’s memory!
Hu Jianguo, who is called Secretary Hu by people on the left and the right!
There is also what the county leader who introduced Hu Jianguo said: Brother, Secretary Hu of the Provincial Party Committee is here to visit you.
Secretary Hu, still Secretary Hu of the Provincial Party Committee!
Hu Jiao was completely stunned.
Is this true? My father will become the provincial party secretary in the future? It doesn't matter if he is a full-time secretary or a deputy secretary. He is at the vice-ministerial level!
In my memory, Gou Rixin's sinister smile after his evil plan succeeded was far inferior to Hu Jianguo's old eyes flashing with tears of compassion.
Is this true?
Hu Jiao fell into memories again. No one could explain this kind of thing, a person living in the present "recalling" things in the future!
If Gou Rixin's memory really happened at some time in the future, it means that his father Hu Jianguo would never fall into the "August 15" case.
Hu Jiao began to infer the time. It was September 1994. Gou Rixin was 30 years old when he died. That happened three years before his death, when he was 27 years old. Gou Rixin was a sheep and was born in 1979.
So, Hu Jianguo became the provincial party committee (deputy) secretary before 2006, which is 12 years ago. Next year is the provincial and municipal level election, and the current term is three years..
Hu Jianguo is now a member of the Municipal Party Committee, the head of the Organization Department, and a deputy mayor. Next year, regardless of whether the previous rumors are true or not, he will become the top deputy secretary and the secretary in charge of cadres. Although his rank may not necessarily be upgraded, it will be more conducive to the change of leadership in three years. As long as he does not make a big mistake, he will definitely be promoted to the level of a full mayor.
By 1997, my father Hu Jianguo, whether he was mayor or municipal party secretary, would at least be promoted to a provincial department or bureau.
Based on the fact that he served as provincial party secretary in 2006, it is very likely that after 1997, he transitioned to the mayor level for another three years, remained at the mayor level for another three years, and then six years later, was promoted to the vice-provincial level in 2002. This is completely reasonable, in line with the rules and principles.
Of course, Hu Jiao did not expect that the term of office of leading cadres would become five years .
Hu Jiao's heart finally returned to its original place truly, completely, and firmly, and the depression caused by forty days of confinement was swept away.
I couldn't help but squint my eyes, thinking back to the words of the "village chief". The meaning behind them was so profound. "It's been a long time. It's been a long time."
