Selected Works of Liu Zhenyun - 60th Century Literary Masters

Author: Liu Zhenyun
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2006-05-01
Features: "Damn it, they don’t even want the gift!" He grumbled at his wife, "I told you not to give it, but you insisted. Look at this gift-giving—do you want to be embarrassed or not?" Xiao Lin’s wife also complained, "Why is this person so mean? How petty can someone be!" So the two of them carried the drinks back home. Since the gift wasn’t given, they ended up feeling guilty about spending money on it later. A box of "Coca-Cola" for over forty yuan—wasn’t that just being wasteful? What to do with a box of "Coca-Cola"? Return it to the store? No, they wouldn’t take back food items. Drink it yourself? How could you just sit at home and drink "Coca-Cola" for nothing?
A couple of days later, it was still his wife who was clever. She opened the "Coca-Cola" and often took out a can, letting their daughter go to the courtyard to drink it. They had never bought drinks or herring before; their child was always in ragged clothes and had become known in the neighborhood for being poor. Once, they did buy some herring, but it was cheap and smelled rancid. The stench spread to the hallway, and the Indian woman next door spread the word everywhere. Now, they had their daughter holding the "Coca-Cola" and drinking it around the neighborhood, which served as positive publicity. It was as if the box of "Coca-Cola" hadn’t been wasted after all.
But the matter of work still hadn’t been resolved, and it remained Xiao Lin and his wife’s biggest worry.
Guests came to the house. When Xiao Lin came home from work that evening, he knew there were guests as soon as he stepped into the hallway. His door was wide open, and the coughing of his relatives from the hometown could be heard from inside. When Xiao Lin got home, there they were—two relatives from the hometown, their skin tanned to a crisp, veins bulging on their foreheads. Beside them lay a few canvas bags from the 1970s, with Chairman Mao’s still printed on the tote bags. The two men kept smoking and coughing, carelessly flicking ash and spitting phlegm all over the floor. Xiao Lin’s little daughter was coughing nonstop from the smoke, running around in the haze.
Xiao Lin had actually been in a good mood that day. His office had a new supervisor, Lao Guan, who, despite his stern appearance, turned out to be well-meaning. During the quarterly awards, Xiao Lin had been given the top prize and an extra fifty yuan. Though fifty yuan wasn’t much, it was still better than having nothing. He thought he could use the money to make his wife happy. But as he eagerly headed home, his wife wasn’t back yet, and there were already two relatives from the hometown waiting. Xiao Lin felt as if he’d been drenched in a bucket of cold water, and his entire day’s enthusiasm vanished instantly.
Normally, it would be a joy to have relatives from the hometown visit after so many years, and there was nothing wrong with catching up. But since they came so often, the visits no longer brought happiness but instead became a burden. Guests had to be entertained, and each time cost tens of yuan. Frequent visits strained the family’s finances.
Relatives from the hometown were different from other classmates or friends. Though they looked tanned and had bulging veins, they were from the countryside, where people were even more hospitable than city dwellers. If classmates or friends weren’t treated well, they could be forgiven. But these rural relatives took offense if they weren’t treated properly, and when they returned to their hometown, they’d complain about Xiao Lin. They thought it was his responsibility to entertain them since he was in Beijing, completely unaware that Xiao Lin was also at the bottom of society in Beijing, queuing up early every morning to buy tofu. But when guests came, he’d just add two extra dishes.
Sometimes, when Xiao Lin saw the relatives from the hometown putting on airs, he couldn’t help but feel both annoyed and amused.