Chapter 98 Zhang Qiang
On Saturday afternoon, He Shu went outside the school to take the driving school subject one test.
I called Xia Miao in advance. Xia Miao joined the badminton club and couldn't come out because of an internal assessment competition on Saturday.
He Shu took the bus to the driving school alone.
Subject 1 mainly tests theoretical knowledge, including road traffic, traffic signals, traffic safety violations, etc.
100 questions are randomly selected from 973 questions for the test.
He Shu finished answering quickly and scored 100, which was not surprising at all.
Next, he just needs to wait for the second subject test time, and he doesn’t even need to come to the driving school to practice driving.
After finishing the test, He Shu left the driving school and suddenly remembered something.
Uncle Zhang’s son Zhang Qiang previously left his address, which seems to be near this driving school.
Now that he's here, thinking of Uncle Zhang's current situation, He Shu decided to take a look at what Zhang Qiang is doing.
He took out his cell phone, looked up the address on the notebook, then asked someone in the nearby shop and walked across.
Walking into this area, there are some old residential buildings, where many migrant workers from other places rent houses.
The community is quite chaotic, with a lot of messy things and a lot of people.
He Shu found a building according to the address. The building was about thirty or forty years old and was similar to the old building he lived in before. Both were dangerous buildings.
There was not even a door in the stairwell. Looking inside from the outside, it was dark and eerie.
Even for old buildings like this, I heard that the rent in Dadu is not cheap, and many people are renting renovated basements.
Zhang Qiang's address is in a basement in this community.
He Shu was a little confused about the structure of the building. He entered the stairwell but did not see the passage to the basement.
He Shu came outside and stood for a while, looking around. In just such a short while, he saw quite a few people coming and going.
At this time, he saw an old lady on the first floor, who seemed to be cooking at the window, so he went into the stairwell and knocked on the door on the first floor.
After a long while, the old lady who had just appeared at the window came to open the door for him.
Seeing He Shu, he squinted his eyes and recognized him for a while: "Who are you looking for?"
"Grandma, I want to ask you about someone who lives in this building."
"Oh, which one?"
"The one who lives in the basement, his last name is Zhang."
"It's in the basement. Go to the back. There's a door over there. But I don't know his last name. There are a lot of guys from other places living there."
The old lady was about to close the door when she finished speaking. He Shu asked again, "Grandma, do you know where the people who live there work?"
"I don't know. Go ask yourself."
He Shu didn't stop her, and the old lady was also very wary of him.
After going around to the back of the building, I found a small iron door between two large trash cans, which was open at this time.
But He Shu heard that there were many people living there, and he didn't know how big the area was, so he didn't rush in.
He stood outside and saw two men coming out. They were about 20 or 30 years old, and one of them was wearing a tacky leather jacket that was long outdated.
The other one was wearing a green sweater and looked like a migrant worker from the looks of his clothes.
The two men looked pale and unhappy, and walked quickly out of the community.
After a while, another young man came with two large plastic bags. He Shu saw that one of the bags was full of noodles.
The other bag contained some seasonings and other things.
"Brother." Before the young man was about to go in, He Shu called him because the man looked somewhat friendly.
The young man turned and looked at He Shu: "What's the matter?"
"Well, I want to ask about a man named Zhang Qiang, who is from Danhe. Does he live here?"
Hearing He Shu's question, the young man did not answer immediately, but looked at him carefully again.
But He Shu knew from his expression that he knew Zhang Qiang.
"Who are you?"
"I'm his neighbor. I came to Dadu to do some business. His father asked me to bring him a message."
"Oh, then come in? He's inside." The young man looked at He Shu carefully. He seemed to be young and fair-skinned.
He Shu hesitated a little: "Can't we ask him to come out and talk? My uncle is still waiting for me on the roadside. I will leave after I say a few words."
When the young man heard that He Shu and his elders were waiting outside, he couldn't tell what expression he had, and he just told He Shu to wait here.
Not long after, the young man who delivered the message came out again, followed by a man who looked to be in his thirties, wearing a dirty white shirt.
After coming out, he saw He Shu and showed a puzzled expression: "Are you looking for me?"
He Shu looked at the small iron gate. The young man who had gone in before didn't go in either. He was just standing there watching.
He felt something was increasingly wrong, luckily he had been careful and didn't go in.
"You must be Brother Zhang Qiang, I'm Xiao Shu, Uncle Zhang asked me to come and see you."
Zhang Qiang was a little impatient when he heard this: "What are you looking at me for? You came here empty-handed when I asked you to?"
"Uh..." He Shu didn't expect him to have such an attitude: "Brother Zhang, my uncle has a backache and can't get out of bed. Are you busy here? If not, why don't you go back and take care of him?"
When Zhang Qiang heard his father wanted him to go back and serve, he waved his hands and said, "Why am I not busy? Who will make money if I go back? He can't even move. If I don't make money, will we starve to death?"
"So what kind of job are you doing now?"
"Of course I'm starting a business. This is a critical time. Go back and tell my dad that I don't have time to go back. If your waist is not feeling well, go to the hospital by yourself."
After saying that, he looked at He Shu and said, "Didn't my dad ask you to bring me some money?"
He Shu looked incredulous: "Uncle Zhang's back pain is so severe that he has no money to go to the hospital. He now lives by picking up scraps. How can he have money to give you?"
Zhang Qiang looked back and quickly told He Shu to shut up: "If you don't have any money, then why are you yelling? My dad is just crying poor, how could he have no money? Okay, if you have nothing else, just leave."
He Shu nodded and walked to the side. As he walked, he turned his head and saw the young man coming out and talking to Zhang Qiang who was standing there.
He Shu had no way of eavesdropping and could only leave quickly.
When he was leaving the community, he saw the two people who had come out of the basement earlier walking back.
The man in the green sweater was holding a thin, cheapest sausage, half eaten.
The other man in the leather jacket followed him, smoking and saying, "If you want to eat meat, why don't you ask your family to send money over?"
"I did. There's no money left at home."
"Pretend to be pitiful. Say you are sick or you have an accident. How can they not give you money? I tell you, we are accumulating funds now. When the funds are sufficient, we will all be shareholders. When the time comes, you can pay them back a thousand times..."
As the two walked further away, the words became less audible.
He Shu walked out of the community and stood beside the road. People of all kinds were coming and going on the street.
Different styles of music are played in the small restaurants and shops along the street.
This lively scene couldn't resist the chill in He Shu's heart. The money that Uncle Zhang had saved by scavenging at home was all cheated out of him by Zhang Qiang in this way...
