Food: Selling Boxed Meals at a Construction Site

It was already four in the afternoon when they left the fifth construction site. The last bus back was at five, and if they didn’t head to the bus station now, they wouldn’t make it.

The two of them walked toward the bus stop they remembered from their arrival. As it came into view in the distance, Xu Heping suddenly let out a sound of surprise and tugged on Xu An’s arm.

"That man in the striped shirt looks a little familiar. I think it might be your younger uncle."

Xu An followed Xu Heping’s finger and sure enough, he saw a man in a brown-striped shirt. He was tall and thin as a bamboo pole, his clothes hanging off his frame like a loose sack. Coupled with his sharp-chinned and hollow-cheeked face, Xu An could tell at a glance that this was indeed his younger uncle.

In his memory, his younger uncle had always worked at a garment factory. Today was a workday, and it was still during work hours. ’This place is over half an hour away from the factory, so why is he here?’

His younger uncle stood at the bus stop, a complicated expression on his face as he stared at two pieces of paper in his hand. After a moment of conflict, he tore off a corner of one, crumpled the rest into a ball, and threw it into a trash can. Then he boarded a bus and disappeared from Xu An’s sight.

Xu An quickened his pace, went over, and picked the crumpled paper out of the trash can, smoothing it open.

"He already threw it in the trash, why’d you pick it up? What’s written on it? Hai City Second People’s Hospital... Is your younger uncle not feeling well?"

Xu Heping was disgusted by Xu An’s action, but he couldn’t suppress his curiosity and leaned his head in to see what was on the paper.

Semen Analysis Report... Sperm Count: 0. Diagnosis: Azoospermia.

Xu An snatched the paper, crumpled it back into a ball, and stuffed it into his pocket so quickly that Xu Heping didn’t have time to react. He hadn’t seen anything other than the hospital’s name.

At that moment, Xu An’s mind was reeling. A diagnosis of azoospermia was only given when there were zero sperm in the semen. ’No sperm... that means my younger uncle can never have a biological child of his own in this lifetime.’

’Then in my last life, whose child was my younger aunt pregnant with? If my younger uncle had been tested and knew about his condition, did he also know that the child his aunt gave birth to wasn’t his?’

It was too much information at once, and Xu An’s brain couldn’t quite process it.

After steadying himself, Xu An started to consider other possibilities.

’The name on the report was torn off, so I can’t be sure this report belongs to my younger uncle.’

’Maybe it’s a report for his friend or a colleague, and he was just asked to pick it up.’

’Maybe it’s a report someone else threw away, and my younger uncle just happened to find it.’

’Maybe...’

He came up with countless excuses for his younger uncle’s behavior, but even Xu An himself couldn’t believe them.

Because when his little cousin was three, his younger uncle, while drunk at dinner with some people, had mentioned that his cousin wasn’t his biological son, but that he didn’t care.

Some people from the village had been at that dinner, and the rumor had spread through Xu Family Village. Xu An had heard bits and pieces of it.

But his younger uncle and aunt acted perfectly normal with each other on a daily basis; there was nothing amiss. Plus, Xu Kang and Xu Le were still living at their house at the time. Everyone assumed the younger uncle had just been drunkenly rambling and didn’t take the matter to heart.

But now, seeing this report and recalling that rumor, it was hard for Xu An not to believe it was true.

It was the first time in two lifetimes he’d gotten such fresh, hot gossip. Xu An was in a daze the whole way back. This revelation was even harder to accept than his own rebirth fifteen years into the past.

Not long after Xu An and Xu Heping left on the bus, the younger uncle reappeared at the same bus stop.

Pinching his nose, he rummaged through the trash can, muttering to himself as he searched, "I was only gone for a few minutes, how is it gone already? Don’t tell me a scrap collector took it. Taking even a tiny scrap of paper like this... they must be desperate."

It was already past five in the afternoon when he got home.

Unlike usual, when Xu An walked into the courtyard today, Xu Kang and Xu Le merely glanced at him before turning back to play in the sand, the aggrieved expressions on their faces impossible to ignore.

Xu An crouched down beside them, and they both turned in unison, showing him the backs of their heads.

"What’s wrong, Kangkang, Lele? You don’t want to see your big brother?"

His only response was two synchronized "Hmph!"s.

"Let me guess why you don’t want to see your big brother. Are you unhappy because I went out without you?"

The two didn’t answer. ’Looks like that’s not the reason.’

"Is it because your big brother came back too late and you’re hungry, so you don’t want to talk to me?"

Still no answer.

Xu An thought back. Even though Xu Kang and Lele were just little kids, they rarely threw tantrums for no reason. ’They must have run into some trouble and needed their big brother for help or comfort, but I wasn’t here, so now they’re sulking.’

He immediately remembered the scene from yesterday afternoon when they woke up from a nightmare, crying their eyes out and wanting him to hold them.

’Could it be they had another nightmare?’

Xu An reached out and pulled the two little figures into his arms, asking in a low voice, "Did you have another nightmare?"

Hearing this, the two aggrieved faces looked up, their eyes welling with tears. They hugged Xu An’s arms tightly and nodded pitifully.

"Did you dream about the Old Witch again?"

They both nodded again, then corrected him.

"It wasn’t just the Old Witch. We also dreamed of the Old Demon King. The Old Demon King was really, really tall, just like a bamboo pole. He was holding a bamboo cane and standing with the Old Witch. Whenever we were hungry and wanted to eat, he would hit us with the cane."

"There was nothing to eat in the dream, we were so, so hungry, and then we woke up from the hunger."

’Alright, mystery solved. These two little rascals are just hungry.’

"Okay, okay, Big Brother will go make dinner right now. You two eat a lot later, and make up for all the food you didn’t get to eat in your dream."

When he got to the kitchen, he remembered they had finished all the meat at lunch. The only non-vegetarian thing left in the house was eggs.

’Alright, I’ll make some steamed eggs, scrambled eggs with green peppers, and a simple stir-fried bok choy. People in Hai City generally don’t eat spicy food. Even the green peppers here have no heat; they’re actually a bit sweet, so they’re perfectly fine for kids to eat.’

Xu An had been worried the two would fuss because there was no meat in the meal, but to his surprise, they happily ate two large bowls of rice each with the steamed eggs, behaving impeccably.

Only then did Xu An realize. It was only after he graduated, started working, and began earning money that their family could afford to have meat with every meal. The two boys had been starved so often at their aunt’s house that they developed a love for meat, becoming picky eaters who wouldn’t be happy without it.

But now, the two of them hadn’t gone hungry, and Xu An’s cooking was much tastier than Granny Xu’s.

If Granny Xu’s cooking was a passing grade of sixty, then Xu An’s could score an eighty-eight. How could the boys possibly be picky?

After dinner, he cleaned up the dishes, drew water from the well to give his grandmother a sponge bath, bathed the two little ones, and finally, washed himself and his clothes.

By the time all the chores were done, it was already eight at night.

’Uncle Dongliang should be back from the construction site by now.’ Xu An closed the courtyard gate and walked toward the back of the house.

Xu Family Village was laid out in a rectangle. The houses were arranged in four rows, with six to seven houses per row, for a total of 26.

The blue-brick and tile-roofed houses like Xu An’s were mostly built during his grandfather’s generation. There were seven such houses in the village, mostly inhabited by people of his grandmother’s generation.

Most of Mr. Xu’s generation had already started their own families and built new houses on other plots of land in the village. The new houses were easy to spot—they were the ones with three or four-centimeter square tiles on their exterior walls.

As for Xu An’s generation, some of the older ones, already twenty-eight or twenty-nine, had also started their own families. The newly built houses of this era had simple waterproof paint on the outside, with the main focus being on the interior decoration and furnishings.

Third Granny had two daughters and four sons in total. Uncle Dongliang was her youngest son, twenty-five this year and still unmarried. The two daughters were already married off, and of the other three sons, one had settled in the city, while the other two had built new houses in the village. Uncle Dongliang currently lived with Third Granny in the old house.

As he approached, he heard Third Granny scolding Uncle Dongliang. He paused and listened for a moment. She was chewing him out for coming home to eat at seven or eight every night, saying he’d ruin his stomach sooner or later.

"Mom, you think I don’t want to eat at the site before coming home? Today at mealtime, I went to line up for food, and before I even got any, someone found half a steel-wool scouring pad in their vegetables. The pad was still covered in black grime from scrubbing pots."

"Finding sand and bugs in the food on other days is one thing, but steel wool and plastic bags? I can’t stomach that. I was afraid if I ate that food, I’d end up in the hospital. The money I earn wouldn’t even be enough to cover the IV drip."

"The people who made this are just too careless. How can they throw a steel-wool pad into the vegetables and cook it?"

Xu An knocked on the gate of Third Granny’s courtyard and called out, "Third Granny, Uncle Dongliang, it’s Anzi. I have something I want to ask Uncle Dongliang."

The gate opened with a CREAK. It was Uncle Dongliang who opened it, holding a large bowl in his right hand and shoveling rice into his mouth as he did.

"Anzi, what’s up? Is it urgent? If not, wait until I finish eating."

Before he could finish speaking, Third Granny snatched the large bowl from his hands.

"When Anzi comes looking for you, it must be for something urgent! You can eat anytime. Go on, hurry up."

Feeling a mix of amusement and exasperation, Xu An stopped Third Granny. "Third Granny, it’s nothing major. I just have a little something to ask Uncle Dongliang. It won’t take long."

Hearing Xu An say this, Third Granny finally relented and stuffed the bowl back into Uncle Dongliang’s hands.

To say Xu An wasn’t moved by this would be a lie.

Ever since his parents passed away four years ago, Granny Xu had managed to raise one half-grown child and two wailing infants all by herself, but she couldn’t have done it without the help of the villagers.

When Granny Xu broke her leg a few days ago, it was Uncle Dongliang who had helped take her to the hospital.

Uncle Dongliang brought a chair out of the house for Xu An, then went back to burying his head in his bowl. After stuffing his cheeks full, he looked up and asked, "So, Anzi, what’s up?"

"I wanted to ask you about things at the construction site."

Uncle Dongliang’s pupils suddenly dilated. He strained his neck to swallow the half-chewed food in his mouth, his voice trembling slightly. "Anzi, you’re not thinking of working on a construction site like me, are you? You have to listen to your uncle on this. You need to go to college, study hard. Toiling in the fields or working on a construction site is back-breaking work, and it doesn’t even pay much."

"Don’t be fooled by the high-looking wages on construction sites. You only get paid every six months or once a year. If you run into a crooked boss, you could work a whole year for free and even end up losing money."

Xu An reached out and wiped away a few grains of rice that Uncle Dongliang had sprayed onto his face, saying with a wry smile, "Uncle Dongliang, don’t get so worked up. I’m not planning to work on a construction site for the rest of my life. It’s summer vacation after the college entrance exams, and I don’t have much to do at home, so I was just thinking of finding something to do to earn a little money."

"Oh, so you’re looking for odd jobs? That’s not so bad. But with a scrawny frame like yours, construction work isn’t really for you." Uncle Dongliang looked Xu An up and down, his expression full of disdain for Xu An’s skinny physique.

"That’s not it, Uncle Dongliang. Heping and I went to a few construction sites in the city this afternoon and noticed that the food at most of them isn’t great and lacks any real substance. So we were thinking of making and selling bento boxes at the sites. What do you think? Would that work?"

Uncle Dongliang’s first instinct was to say that Xu An was being ridiculous. But before the words left his mouth, something seemed to occur to him. His eyes suddenly lit up, and he stared intently at Xu An. "Tell me more."