Bitter Memories

Later, Jiang Jiankang and Comrade Wang Xiulian returned looking triumphant and full of vigor. One look at them was enough to tell that their negotiations with the owner of the breeding farm had succeeded.

"That pig was incredible—fat and strong, lean where it should've been lean and plump where it should've been plump. I remember those two hind legs clearly." Jiang Jiankang was clearly still thinking about the pig he had seen that day.

Wang Xiulian nodded in agreement. "Right. Send one back for Dad to make ham, and chop the other up for pork knuckle."

Just like that, the two of them had neatly assigned both legs of an entire pig.

"Boss Qian really knew how to raise pigs!" Jiang Jiankang smacked his lips, impatient to share the day's haul. Jiang Feng was cleaning up the back kitchen, and Ji Yue was the only one outside. Jiang Jiankang seized the chance to pull Ji Yue over, opened his phone's photo album, and showed her the pictures he had taken that day.

"Xiao Ji, look at this spotted pig. You could tell at a glance it ate well, slept well, and got plenty of exercise. The meat had to be firm—perfect for stir-fried pork. And this sow, look at that fat! Then there was this one, getting slaughtered tomorrow morning. I reserved its two hind legs. This one..." Jiang Jiankang kept swiping across his phone screen, displaying the pigs he had picked out that day.

Ji Yue: ...

Other than recognizing them as fat pigs awaiting slaughter, unable to tell whether they were happy or sad, she could not see anything else...

"Enough, enough. What are you looking at? Your son's still cleaning the kitchen, and you're sitting out here looking at pigs. Why aren't you helping him?" Seeing Jiang Jiankang loafing around in the dining area, Comrade Wang Xiulian slapped the counter in dissatisfaction. The wooden counter shook.

Seeing that the day's takings were clearly worse than yesterday's, Wang Xiulian raised her voice. "Have you paid off the debt? You owe your second brother so much money, yet you're still slacking off here. Are you planning to make your son pay back what you owe?"

Jiang Jiankang slunk into the kitchen in embarrassment.

Jiang Feng had actually already finished tidying up the back kitchen. He was making Pure Meat Wontons according to the recipe the game had given him.

Though it was destined to be a terrible bowl of wontons, Jiang Feng still wanted to know what it would taste like when made.

He especially wanted to know what his bitterest memory from his youth was.

The wontons had already been boiling in the pot for ten minutes. Jiang Feng figured that no matter how thick their wrappers were, they should have been cooked through by now. No—they should have been cooked to mush.

Wang Shitou's cooking was truly terrible. If the struggling common folk of the Republican era had not lacked food and clothing and cared little about flavor, Jiang Feng suspected Wang Shitou's wonton stall would not have lasted a week.

"You child, the wontons are about to boil apart. Hurry up and scoop them out." The moment Jiang Jiankang came in, he saw the wontons tumbling together with the broth. He quickly used a slotted spoon to scoop the already disintegrating wontons into a bowl.

Jiang Feng dripped two drops of sesame oil into the bowl.

Jiang Jiankang tried to add a few sheets of seaweed and a handful of dried shrimp, but Jiang Feng sternly refused.

Jiang Feng waited for the wontons to cool down a little.

Jiang Jiankang stared at the wontons in the bowl and swallowed.

To negotiate prices with Boss Qian at the breeding farm, he and Wang Xiulian had left early in the morning. In more than ten hours, he had only eaten three large bowls of shredded pork noodles that he had made himself—all before leaving that morning. They had long since been digested.

Although the wontons in the bowl were overcooked and had only two drops of sesame oil, and although they did not smell particularly appetizing, they were still meat.

Jiang Jiankang was a carnivore.

"Son, did you make these wontons today?" Jiang Jiankang asked, though he already knew the answer.

Jiang Feng nodded. "I followed an online tutorial. I only wrapped these few, so I cooked them all at once."

"Dad will taste them for you."

Jiang Jiankang's hands moved as quickly as he spoke. Before his words had even faded, three wontons had gone into his mouth.

They tasted awful!

Jiang Jiankang had never expected his son to make such awful wontons.

But in the next moment, he had no mind to think about that.

He suddenly remembered when he was twenty.

That year, the State-run Restaurant where he had worked for six years went bankrupt.

Ever since he was little, he had helped Jiang Weiguo at the State-run Restaurant. At fourteen, he had taken over Jiang Weiguo's position as head chef. At nineteen, he had married Wang Xiulian, then still a textile factory worker. Before turning twenty, he had believed that, like his father, he would work at the State-run Restaurant for the rest of his life until his son took over.

What awaited him, however, was unemployment and a mere six hundred yuan in compensation.

Half a year later, Wang Xiulian lost her job as well.

The couple borrowed from every friend and relative they could, scraped together tens of thousands of yuan, and opened Jiankang Stir-fry.

Jiang Jiankang remembered that business had been poor then. He had worried so much that he could not sleep night after night. To save money, Wang Xiulian went to the market to pick up discarded vegetable leaves that had been trampled over and over, then brought them home to stir-fry. If they sold stir-fried carrots at noon, they ate stir-fried carrot peels that night.

Because they had borrowed money from her parents and older brother-in-law without being able to repay it for so long, Wang Xiulian had not even dared return to her family home to pay New Year's calls.

As he thought about it, Jiang Jiankang squatted on the floor and burst into loud sobs.

"What happened? What's going on? Xiao Feng, why is your dad suddenly crying?" Hearing the crying, Wang Xiulian put down her calculator and rushed into the kitchen, with Ji Yue right behind her.

"Xiulian, Xiulian, I'm sorry! It's all because I'm useless. I made you suffer and endure so much hardship with me!" Jiang Jiankang clung to Wang Xiulian and cried.

Wang Xiulian stood there in utter confusion as he held her.

"What's wrong with your dad?"

Wang Xiulian was beginning to wonder whether her constant nagging about the family still owing money to her second brother had put too much pressure on Jiang Jiankang and caused him to suddenly break down.

"Dad took one bite of a wonton." Jiang Feng was somewhat dazed too.

Just how bitter did Comrade Jiang Jiankang's bitterest memory from his youth have to be for him to cry like this?

"A wonton?" Wang Xiulian looked at the wontons on the table, clearly unable to understand how one bite of wonton could lead to this.

"Jiankang, I only nag a little sometimes. Don't take it to heart. I haven't suffered or been wronged at all. Stop crying, stop crying. There, there." Wang Xiulian patted Jiang Jiankang's back as though soothing a child.

After comforting him for a while, Wang Xiulian's mouth became a little dry.

She picked up the bowl on the table and took a huge sip of wonton soup. Since the wontons had been boiled too soft, she swallowed a piece of wonton wrapper along with it.

Who made these wontons? They tasted awful!

Wang Xiulian's eyes widened, and in the next second, her eyes filled with tears.

The husband and wife clung to each other and wept.

Jiang Feng and Ji Yue were both completely stunned.

Jiang Feng picked up the wontons from the table and silently poured them into the Slop Bucket.

What a disaster, what a disaster!

"Senior, you should head home first. I... I need to talk to my parents."

"Ah, okay, oh." Ji Yue answered blankly. Only after a while did she realize she was allowed to get off work.

After Ji Yue left, Jiang Feng used every trick he had to finally calm Comrade Jiang Jiankang and Comrade Wang Xiulian down.

The next day, the two of them gave exactly the same explanation for the previous night.

The wontons were too awful—they had cried from how awful they were!