Patriot Number One by Lauren Hilgers

Author:Lauren Hilgers
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Crown/Archetype
Published: 2018-03-20T04:00:00+00:00

* * *

• • •

The marital peace that had returned with their asylum was disrupted by the news that Little Yan would not be traveling to China. Zhuang was still giving driving lessons, but some days were busier than others. In the winter, he complained, nobody wanted to sign up for lessons. When he sent money back to Wukan to help a cousin fund a wedding, he and Little Yan argued about finances again, which made him chafe at the money they were sending to Little Yan’s village. The more his pride was hurt, the more he felt that a man’s children belonged with his own family. And the more they fought, the more hostile Little Yan’s parents were to Zhuang. He didn’t want Kaizhi’s maternal grandparents badmouthing him to his son.

Zhuang decided he wanted to send Kaizhi back to Wukan. “The food in Wukan is better,” he argued. Kaizhi would eat fresh fish every day. He told Little Yan that his father would do well as a grandfather.

“I don’t know why you think that,” she said sharply. “Did he do such a great job with his family?” She did not have to say, outright, that one of Zhuang’s brothers had been crippled and the other was addicted to drugs. It was in the tone of her voice, which Zhuang ignored.

“He doesn’t consider that his grandchildren are his to do whatever he wants with,” Zhuang explained. “He treats them better.” At the same time, Zhuang’s father was tough and wouldn’t let Kaizhi get away with being naughty.

Little Yan disagreed. Both families were poor, a poor farmer was different from a poor fisherman with a tendency to gamble away his money. “Have you seen his parents’ house?” Little Yan whispered to me later. “It looks like it would blow over in a strong wind.”

In the end, though, she agreed. She couldn’t argue with Zhuang about everything. “It’s like beating your head against a wall,” she said. Her parents took Kaizhi to stay with Zhuang’s parents. But sending Kaizhi to Wukan would give rise to other complications. For the first time since Zhuang left the United States, his father had influence again. After a few months of looking after Kaizhi, he asked Zhuang for about thirty thousand dollars to build himself a house, something suitable for a man with a son in the United States. Zhuang tried to tell him that he didn’t have the money, but his father didn’t believe him. Everyone who went to the United States had money, Zhuang Songkun said. What kind of thankless child would refuse his father—who raised him and who was raising his child, who had spent his life breaking his back pulling crabs out of the bay—the consolation of a comfortable home in which to live out his old age?

When Zhuang refused to pay, his father threatened to borrow money in Zhuang’s name.

“I can’t call people and tell them not to lend him anything,” Zhuang explained to me. “And I can’t pay them back if he takes out a loan.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.