Hidden Assassin

Shaohua District, Jianghai, Winter 1998

Last night the rain leached in the middle of the night, the asphalt road at the entrance to the vegetable market was dirty, and under the combined efforts of all kinds of wheels to and from, the ground was stirred up as usual.

The building that makes up this market for vegetables, the outer wall is washed with stone rice, and this material cannot be used anymore; the unnecessary height of the roof creates a huge vertical space, and if the weather is good, the sun shines through the hollowed out areas of the surrounding walls to form a tilted column of light. The lowly ground floor houses stretch to both sides, looking slightly further away, but are new buildings and new communities wrapped in tiles, waterstones, mosaics. In fact, this is the epitome of most Chinese cities of that era: tradition and fashion are crowded together and they are safe with each other. Of course, the so-called traditions here, in fact, are only decades old at most, mostly starting at the end of the forties, deeply influenced by the Soviet style, gradually developed.

The cement table used for the sale has long been occupied, and there is a similarly sweeping outside along the roof of the vegetable market wall, with the trolley occupying the widest area, followed by the bamboo basket picked out by the flat burden, or simply one basket filled with eggs. Walking all the way through the entrance without a gate, the various ingredients smell different. Naturally, the river's fresh concentration is unshakeable fish, near the meat file always makes one think of greasy fat..... and this fluttering drink, loud greeting of the way, mixed together, is the smell of an active vegetable market.

“Sneeze--”

“Got a cold? ”

The girl touched the man's face with her hands outside and was still wearing a school uniform. Don't kids know how to be ashamed now.....

“No, maybe someone's been talking about me again, it's been like this for the last few days.....”

“I miss you, don't I? ”

“Generally, someone hates me.....”

“Who is it? ”

“Who knows, too many suspects.....”

Little age, not learning, flirting, how old are the two kids.......

.........

Being honest and knowledgeable, from a different perspective, you can also say: When life is worry-free, people start thinking about seven and eight things.

Fifty is the age of knowing destiny. Zhang Sufen felt he had learned something and lost more.

Whoever took the head and when, the residents of the first floor of the two buildings in the factory dormitory area gradually got hand-circled and leveled the garden on their doorstep as a yard. There was also that daring stool that led the way to the masonry cement in the factory, erecting a wall, mounting iron doors and roofs, and a small independent kingdom. Zhang Sufen's family had mother-in-law. They worked their whole lives. They were going back to the country nagging from time to time. Now, it's okay. If you want to eat at home, the two old people will grow whatever they want. It's also fun. Occasionally, if you can't eat it every day without letting it go, your mother-in-law will sell it to the nearby food market and exchange it for money to subsidize Zhang Sufen's household use. Old people do not take this as a pretext for so-called self-employed households, hawkers, etc., perhaps because the country was not born before their values of life were shaped.

What makes Zhang Sufen smarter than her mother-in-law is that she has learned to go further into the suburban shed to buy, because anti-seasonal vegetables are more popular. Perhaps at first she was daunted because she didn't want to show up with her usual personality, her life had been calm for many years, and now she was haunted by these trivial things every day, calculating what dishes to sell and what dishes to sell, and the resistance dissipated day after day.

Money cannot be guaranteed to earn a little more a day than a day, but in general it has gone up a lot, and the doorway to the goods is also more clear than a day. Since Zhang Sufen has been in the vegetable melon fruit trading industry, she no longer belongs to the habit of “employee family” for more than 20 years. Now, perhaps, instead, she should be called the “family of the hawker”.

Now even if the husband is really laid off, the family has the ability to resist the wind and rain. Zhang Sufen is sincerely happy. On the other hand, she is helpless about her own good fortune. She does not want to be familiar with the market gas day after day. She does not want to see the neighbors gradually break away from the life circle and rules of the factory, but she has no choice because she is one of them. Twenty years ago, the rhythm of life was slow and steady, and now everyone is forced to be swept forward by the rapids. Yes, the acceleration of this society is changing, we used to be all the same people, if there was a difference, we could probably know what each other is like, and now all kinds of freshness comes out, and more and more, Zhang Sufen doesn't like this state, and he's not used to looking at the vast majority of freshness.

“Why buy cucumbers.....”

“Cucumbers are good for the liver and tumor-proof, well, they can slice the face. ”

“I haven't seen you and Sha Sha. ”

“Oh, trouble, I don't like the sticky feeling either. ”

“I think your skin is good enough. ”

“Really?”

“Mmm.”

“Why are you laughing like this? ”

“Happy.....”

Come on, come on, get the money. You guys get out of here. I'm dizzy!

People left, the owner of another vegetable stall asked Zhang Sufen: “Hello, how are the new cucumbers selling? Says it's an anti-seasonal vegetable, so I can sell it tomorrow. ”

“Cucumber? It's not selling anymore.” Zhang Sufen's breath hasn't gone well yet.

“What's wrong? ”

“Now little girls know they're in love.....”