"Mom! I'm back," Li Jing said, tugging me along as if walking a little puppy, leading me into her home.
Though Li Jing's mother was only in her forties, her hair was already streaked with white, and her forehead was lined with deep wrinkles, making her look weathered by life.
"Xiao Jing... who is this? A classmate of yours?"
"No, Mom," Li Jing replied, still holding onto my arm. "Mom, I caught this guy by the moat just now. He was acting sneaky and didn't look like a good person at all. I suspect he's an electrofisher."
"Electrofisher?" Li Jing's mother asked me doubtfully. "Young man, are you an electrofisher?"
I hurriedly clarified that it was all a misunderstanding and that I was definitely not an electrofisher.
Li Jing's mother looked at me kindly, shook her head, and smiled. "You don't look like an electrofisher to me, young man. Xiao Jing, you must have made a mistake this time. You even dragged him all the way here—you should apologize to him."
Later, I figured out the situation and understood why Li Jing was so determined to catch electrofishers.
It turned out that the Shunde Forestry Bureau was offering a reward. At the time, the aquatic ecosystem of the Yangtze River was severely damaged, with Chinese sturgeons and Yangtze River dolphins on the brink of extinction. The authorities were determined to protect the inland water environment, and this initiative had also reached Shunde.
Anyone who caught an electrofisher or someone using explosives to fish could claim a reward from the Forestry Bureau—a hefty 500 yuan per person!
That was why Li Jing had refused to let me go. She thought I was an electrofisher and wanted to turn me in for the reward money...
Because her family needed the money.
Under her mother's insistence, Li Jing reluctantly apologized to me, saying, "Sorry, classmate."
Li Jing's mother was warm and hospitable. To make up for the misunderstanding, she invited me to stay for lunch.
It was almost 2 p.m., and I was starving, so I agreed.
For lunch, we had rice, and Mother Li prepared three dishes: scrambled eggs with chives, zucchini with green beans, and a cold lotus root salad. The home-cooked meal was authentic and delicious.
I kept my head down, focused on eating from my bowl. Li Jing watched me coldly, occasionally tapping her porcelain bowl loudly with her chopsticks on purpose, creating a commotion that made Mother Li frown repeatedly.
She was upset that I had eaten their eggs.
Mother Li scolded her, "Xiao Jing, where are your manners? What has this classmate ever done to you?"
Li Jing bit the tip of her chopsticks and sneered, "He hasn't done anything, but I just can't stand the sight of him."
That got me angry too.
Even though I had no parents, came from a humble background, and my family was a broken household with no one to care for me, one thing about me was that I had strong self-respect.
I immediately put down my bowl and chopsticks, stood up, and said my goodbyes to Mother Li.
"Who even wants to eat your family's eggs?" I thought angrily.
But just as I reached the door, I was pushed back inside by a large group of people.
There were six or seven of them, all strong young men in their twenties or thirties, carrying buckets of paint. Some even had sticks in their hands.
"Where is Li Dequan? Li Dequan, get out here!"
"If you don't come out now, I'll beat your wife and kids to death!"
They looked fierce and menacing. I had never seen such a scene before and was instantly terrified. Li Jing and her mother weren't faring much better, their faces pale with fear.
One of the men walked inside with a paint bucket. When he saw the food on the table, he laughed coldly.
"Damn, you still have money to eat eggs? You have money for eggs but not to pay me back?"
"Let's see you eat this!" he shouted, lifting the paint bucket and pouring red paint all over the table.
The smell of paint was pungent and nauseating. The dishes on the table were immediately covered in red paint. Mother Li stared in terror, while Li Jing lowered her head and stayed silent.
"Hehe..." the man sneered. "You like eating eggs, huh? You have no money, huh?"
He used a stick to push the paint-covered eggs with chives in front of Li Jing.
"Go on, eat it. You like eggs, right? If you finish this plate today, we'll leave. Haha!" The others joined in, laughing mockingly.
"What are you doing?" I couldn't take it anymore. This was just bullying!
"Oh?" The man looked at me and grinned. "Buddy, who the hell do you think you are?"
I took a deep breath and said, "I'm Li Jing's classmate! If you dare cause any trouble, I'll call the police!"
"Huh? Call the police?"
Suddenly, everyone around burst into laughter.
"Paying back what you owe is only right! How dare a little brat like you threaten to call the police!"
He swung the stick in his hand hard toward my head.
Instinctively, I raised my arm to block it, but I was too slow. I couldn't stop the blow, and the stick landed squarely on my head.
My head felt sticky. I reached out to touch it and realized it had been split open by the stick and was bleeding.
Everything started spinning before my eyes.
"Stop hitting him!"
"I'll eat it! I'll eat it!" Li Jing, who had been keeping her head down, suddenly looked up. With reddened eyes, she shouted loudly.
Li Jing's mother kept wiping away her tears.
Li Jing grabbed the eggs from the plate with her hand and shoved them into her mouth...
The eggs were covered in paint, and the pungent smell was overwhelming. Li Jing retched after just one bite.
"Haha, not good enough? Eat it all! I said eat all of it! Are you deaf?"
Li Jing grabbed the eggs again and forced them into her mouth.
Five minutes later, the plate of eggs was gone.
"Heh, interesting. Today wasn't a waste. We got to watch a good show. Also, remember to tell Li Dequan that if there's still no money when we come back next time, it won't be this simple."
After saying this, the group cursed and left.
My head was bleeding badly, and I was lying on the ground, feeling awful.
"Are you okay?" Li Jing wiped the paint from her mouth and carefully helped me up.
Li Jing's mother brought some gauze and bandaged my head roughly. I rested on their bed for over an hour before I started to feel better.
"Sorry... I'm so sorry you got hurt because of us," Li Jing's mother said to me, full of guilt.
"Auntie, who were those people?" My head still hurt, but I endured the pain to ask.
"My dad's business failed, and he owes them a large sum of money," Li Jing said.
"Business failed? How much does he owe?"
"Ah..." Li Jing's mother shook her head helplessly. "Fifty thousand..."
"Fifty thousand! That much!" I was shocked by the amount. Even if they saved every penny, it would take two or three years to pay back that much money.
"Are you heading back to school or the hospital? Let us take you back. We're really sorry about this," Li Jing's mother apologized again.
"No, no, I don't need to go back to school. I can leave on my own. I'm fine to walk now."
After leaving the house, Li Jing came out to see me off.
"Hey, sorry about what happened earlier," she said, walking beside me with her head down.
"It's fine, it's all over," I said magnanimously, waving my hand with a smile.
"You're not from our school, right? Which high school do you go to? I'll come visit you sometime," Li Jing suddenly asked.
"Ah? Well, uh..."
I lied, "I'm in my second year at No. 1 High School."
"No. 1 High School? Then you must be a good student," Li Jing said with a smile.
I blushed, too embarrassed to respond. My grades had always been among the bottom three in my class—a consistent achievement.
At that time, Little Smart phones had just become popular, but ordinary students couldn't afford mobile phones, so we didn't exchange numbers. However, Li Jing told me to visit her when I had time and even asked me to tutor her.
When I returned to the hostel, Uncle Wang was drinking tea.
He nearly spat out his tea when he saw my head wrapped in gauze.
"Yunfeng, what happened to you?" Uncle Wang exclaimed. "Did you fall into a hole while scattering the soil?"
A bit embarrassed, I replied, "Uncle Wang, I got beaten up."