When I was in the first year of junior high school, English courses were offered in junior high schools. But in the first semester of junior high school, no one taught us this course in my rural middle school.
For this reason, the principal hired an English teacher to make up lessons for us during the holidays. But there is a fee for making up classes, which is ten yuan per person.
I told my parents about it immediately after I got home. My father was very happy after hearing this, and immediately said: "It's a good thing to have someone to make up the class. Go, study hard, and be sure to catch up on this class." Mother said nothing, frowned lightly, and sighed quietly. tone.
Children from poor families become sensible early: As soon as my mother sighed, I immediately realized that I was afraid that my family would not be able to afford the ten yuan tuition fee. So I murmured: "If my family doesn't have money, I won't make up for this lesson." My mother remained silent, while my father slapped his thigh and shouted, "Why don't you make up for it? Make up for it! It's about the money, I won't make up for it." I'll find a way!"
At noon the next day, the production team had finished work for a long time, and they still hadn't seen their father come back. My mother asked me to ask my third uncle next door. My third uncle told me that after my father finished work, he went to the ruined temple behind the village alone.
There is a small temple behind our village, which has collapsed for several years. There are few people there all year round. What is my father doing there?
I walked towards the ruined temple behind the village with questions. From a distance, I saw my father bent over, flipping bricks among the ruins, as if he was looking for treasures, looking very focused. I asked my father what this was for. He raised his head, held up a bottle in his hand, and said with joy, "Look, what's in my bottle?" When I saw it, there were two big centipedes in the bottle.
My father’s colorful face smiled happily. He told me that he had found out today that the commune’s health center wanted to purchase centipedes for use in traditional Chinese medicine. A five-inch centipede could be sold for 40 cents, and a three-inch centipede could be sold for 2 cents. money. "The two centipedes I caught are more than five inches long, and the smaller one is about three inches. This is only sixty cents. In less than a month, your tuition fee will be paid."
I got excited and wanted to catch centipedes there. But my father grabbed me by the collar and took me home. Along the way, he said angrily: "Do you think catching centipedes is fun? If you get stung by one, it will be serious."
My father's words could not be frightened. I. After school that afternoon, I went to the ruined temple behind the village and rummaged among the bricks. I searched for a long time but found nothing.
When it was dark, the production team finished work, and my father came. When he saw me, he was stunned for a moment, and then he yelled: "Why don't you listen to what I say? You brat, see if I don't beat you to death!" He tried to hit me, but the slap he raised didn't come after all. Falling on my face, he persuaded me nicely: "You have to be obedient. Centipedes are very poisonous. If you are stung by a centipede, I'm afraid you won't be able to cure your injury even if you spend ten yuan. Then you can make up for it. There is really no hope." My father's words made sense, so I had to stand aside and watch my father catch the centipede.
My father removed the bricks on the remaining wall piece by piece. As he was doing so, he told me that centipedes like the shade and would hide in the gaps between the bricks. After dismantling it for a while, when my father lifted a brick, a centipede came out from the crack of the brick and ran along the remaining wall. I was afraid that the centipede would escape, so I hurriedly picked up a branch on the ground and hit the centipede. However, my father stretched out his hand to block the branch, and the back of his hand received a hard blow from my branch. Then regardless of the pain, he accurately pressed the centipede's head and tail with both hands, caught the centipede, and put it into the bottle. After closing the bottle cap, he rubbed the painful back of his hand and said thankfully: "What a risk! You almost scrapped these 40 cents. You have to know that the centipedes purchased by the health office are intact and broken centipedes." If you get some skin, they will lower the price. If you beat this centipede to pieces, how can you sell it?"
It was probably the fifth day. In the evening, my father poured a captured centipede out of the bottle. When I came out and was about to pick up the bamboo pieces to bow, the centipede ran away, so my father had to catch it. I don’t know whether it was because I was too impatient or something, but as soon as my father’s finger touched the centipede, I heard my father yell “Yeah”, he was stung by the centipede.But my father did not let go, and he still bowed the centipede. When he put the centipede on the window sill, I saw that the muscles on my father's face were twisted, and he breathed in painfully "hissing" in his mouth.
When eating breakfast the next day, my father’s index finger on his right hand was swollen like a carrot and he couldn’t even hold chopsticks. But he still went to work, and after finishing work, he still went to the ruined temple behind the village. My mother told me that my father was so painful that he couldn't sleep a wink all night last night. In order not to disturb us or to prevent himself from moaning, he bit the pillow to pieces. But he refused to go to the health center. He said that after finally catching a few centipedes, he could get some money back. He couldn't waste the money because of this injury. Hearing this, I could no longer restrain myself and burst into tears.
It took ten days for my father’s finger to gradually reduce swelling and heal.
After about twenty days like this, twenty-nine centipedes appeared on the windowsill of my house. I repeatedly measured them with a ruler and found that there were 17 that were over five inches long and 12 that were three to four inches long. In this way, it can be sold for nine yuan and two cents. As long as my father catches two or three more centipedes, my ten yuan tuition fee will be paid. While the family was rejoicing about the upcoming victory, something unexpected happened.
After lunch that day, the bell for the production team to start work rang, but my father had not come back yet. My mother was worried, so she went to find my father with me. We walked to the ruined temple and found that my father had fallen unconscious among the piles of bricks. My mother and I were so frightened that we hurriedly picked up my father and ran to the commune health center. After the doctor checked, he said that my father had fallen and his left arm was broken and he had to be hospitalized. It turned out that when my father was catching centipedes on the remaining wall, he missed his footing and fell off the wall.
That afternoon, my father woke up. As soon as he woke up, he shouted to go home: "This injury is okay, I can't lie in the hospital and waste money." But this time, no matter how he yelled, my mother and I didn't Let him go.
My father’s arm was basically healed after two months, but I was ultimately unable to enter that English tutoring class because I sold all the twenty-nine centipedes to pay for my father’s medical expenses.
As soon as my father mentioned this incident, he blamed himself and said that he was so useless that I couldn't get into the supplementary class. But I didn't regret at all that I couldn't get into the supplementary class. On the contrary, I felt warm and happy. I lost an opportunity to make up a lesson, but I felt the most precious thing in the world, which is my father's deep love.
Author: Fang Guanqing
The original title "Twenty-Nine Centipedes"
is excerpted from the June 2022 issue of the campus version of " Story Club "
Friends who have not enjoyed reading it can read the paper "Story Club" magazine on WeChat Search Story Club and Taobao Story China are both available for sale in the WeChat mini program! "Story Meeting" blue version , not only beautiful ~
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