Chi Qing returned to the village (2)

Yue Meifen glanced at her with a smile, and the two of them moved the things from the courtyard into the house. Since everything was packed in foam boxes or bags, Yue Meifen did not pay much attention to what Chi Qing had bought. She set everything on the floor, then hurried to pull Chi Qing farther inside.

"Quick, get on the kang and warm up. It's been heated nice and toasty," Yue Meifen said, bringing out cotton slippers and urging Chi Qing onto the kang.

"I'm not cold, Mom. Stop fussing." Chi Qing sat cross-legged on the kang and said, "Mom, come sit up here too. When Dad gets back, I have something to tell you both."

Just then, the courtyard gate creaked open, and Chi Yongliang came in on two crutches. Yes, that was right: Chi Yongliang had a disability. That was also why he had not come down to help at any point while mother and daughter were carrying things inside.

As a child, Chi Yongliang had lived with his parents in the south, where his father was stationed. When Chi Yongliang was one year old, Chi Qing's grandfather was demobilized. On the train home, Chi Yongliang developed a fever and did not receive proper treatment. He contracted polio, which left his right leg disabled.

Chi Qing's grandfather had originally held quite a high rank, but after being demobilized, the old man actually never reported to the Armed Forces Department. Just like that, he squandered the chance at a high-ranking position and a generous salary. A full-fledged battalion-level cadre spent the rest of his life farming in the village.

It was not until Chi Qing's eldest uncle was old enough to work that her grandmother finally could not stand it anymore and approached the government. Only then did her eldest uncle get the opportunity to work in the city, but no job could be arranged for her father because of his disability.

And why had Chi Qing's grandfather never reported in? The truth was enough to make anyone laugh and cry. It turned out that the village was more than fifty kilometers from the Armed Forces Department. Her grandfather could not ride a bicycle and had always gone everywhere on foot. Carefree as he was, he kept putting it off and putting it off until his personnel file was gone...

Still, Chi Qing's grandfather went on to live to ninety-seven and died of old age. Chi Qing often recalled how, whenever the whole family gathered to berate him for squandering such a wonderful opportunity, the little old man, whose hearing was normally so sharp, would always turn selectively deaf. "What did you say? Huh?" Perhaps her grandfather's military merits had bought him a long life.

So, as it turned out, Chi Qing's carefree nature had its roots too.

Returning to Chi Yongliang, when he was in his fifties, years of physical labor caused a cyst to develop in his otherwise healthy left leg. What should have been a simple cyst-removal operation actually ended in medical malpractice, leaving him permanently reliant on two crutches.

And the elderly couple did not even realize there had been medical malpractice until Chi Qing returned from out of town, noticed something was wrong with her father, and asked about it. They had kept clinging to the hope that perhaps he simply had not recovered properly, and that with a little more rest, his leg might get better.

By then, six or seven years had already passed since Chi Yongliang's operation. And so, without really understanding what had happened, Chi Yongliang ended up on two crutches. Sigh, another carefree one.

Chi Yongliang was clever, and because he had been disabled since childhood, he had taught himself many skills. Aside from his former main occupation of repairing watches, he could teach himself to repair vehicles, sew, fix all kinds of electrical appliances, and more. Even the little car he drove had been modified by his own hands, with some of the foot-operated mechanisms converted to hand controls.

Thanks to his skills, despite his disability, he had never been bullied in the village. On the contrary, he was quite popular.

Of course, Chi Yongliang's disability also meant he could not earn much money. Putting Chi Qing through university had already taken every ounce of his primordial power. That was also the main reason mentioned earlier for why Chi Qing's family had not been well-off when she was young.