I Became the Mother of His Child

Xu Xiuxiu brought Song Yuanming straight to the construction site at Soup City the next day and left him with the site's foreman, Yao Peng, while she herself went to discuss important matters with the architect, Fei Han.

Song Yuanming had arrived full of confidence. He had been prepared to move thousands of bricks and make tens of yuan a day, then ascend to the heights of a rich and handsome man, marry a fair and wealthy lady, and reach the pinnacle of life.

But... imagination is beautiful, and reality is vastly different from it. It brutally shattered Song Yuanming's fighting spirit and confidence.

A morning of bustling brick-moving reduced Song Yuanming from a clean-cut young lad to a man who had seen his share of hard times. His fingers and palms, even with gloves on, were chafed and ached as they were covered in dust, sweat poured down like rain, soaking his sturdy work clothes, and even when eating his boxed lunch at noon, Song Yuanming's tremble with the chopsticks was so bad, he looked like someone suffering from epilepsy.

"Yuanying, how's it going, can you handle it?" Xu Xiuxiu, holding a lunchbox just like Song Yuanming's, sat down in a cool spot at the construction site. The city was in the throes of a blistering summer heat, with the midday sun harsh enough to scorch a person to death. Xu Xiuxiu wasn't an unscrupulous employer. In this area of the city, the conditions and treatment she provided for her construction workers were exceptionally good. It was just that, despite the favorable conditions and benefits Xu Xiuxiu offered, her expectations were high. However, she never forced her workers to begin their day under the scorching sun.

"I'm okay," Song Yuanming replied, hands so weak he could barely hold the chopsticks. But when he heard his sister-in-law's question, he still mustered up the energy to respond. Even though he was starving, for some reason, he now found the boxed lunch almost inedible, truly bland in taste.

At first, Xu Xiuxiu also had trouble stomaching the construction site's food when she started supervising the work. She only adapted to it later and even ceased her complaints after finding out that their meals were considered top-notch by site standards, choosing instead to join everyone in eating the same food. Seeing Song Yuanming now staring at his meal in prolonged silent contemplation, Xu Xiuxiu could roughly guess what was going through his mind.

After all, he was just a young boy. He had so many ideals and resentments toward life and society. He had never imagined that life at the bottom could be so tough. The Song Family had modest means, but by rural standards, they were considered wealthy. Although Song Yuanming had to do manual labor at home, it was nothing compared to the extreme hardship of moving bricks on a construction site.

The vast disparity between expectations and reality was somewhat hard to accept.

"Aren't you hungry?" Xu Xiuxiu continued to ask.

"Hungry," Song Yuanming answered truthfully, his gaze intense as he looked at his chafed hands, his eyes heating up a bit.

"If you're hungry, why aren't you eating? Does it taste so bad you can't stomach it?" Xu Xiuxiu took a few more bites of her meal. Seeing Song Yuanming still hadn't touched his chopsticks, she shook her head in resignation. "Yuanying, you should know that in our country, there are many places where people can't even get enough to eat, where some children are so hungry they have to fill their stomachs with water, their bellies bloating like those of pregnant women. There are also many construction sites where workers' meals are stale, yet our site's standards are quite good. Two vegetarian dishes and one meat dish might not taste great, but at least the food is clean and hygienic."

Xiuxiu actually wanted to offer better treatment to the construction workers, but she was so financially strained that the best she could do was this. After all, it was a suburban construction site with no shortage of workers, and the nearby small stir-fry restaurant managed to deliver meals on time every day at affordable prices. Besides, the men working in this trade were all capable of enduring hardships, and they were already quite satisfied with the free meals provided on the site every day.

"Is there really still someone who doesn't have enough to eat?" Song Yuanming seemed deeply touched. He had heard from his parents about the people who couldn't get enough food or warm clothing in the seventies and eighties, but he lived in a fortunate era, having never experienced such deprivation. There were always clothes to wear, and once they were too small for his two older brothers, they got handed down to him with a few alterations. As for food, being the youngest of the Song Family, it seemed that going hungry was something that never quite reached him.

Therefore, it was difficult for him to imagine what it meant to lack enough food or warm clothing. The concept, especially the one mentioned by his sister-in-law about children being so hungry they resorted to filling their bellies with water, was just too far outside his previous understanding.

"Yes, there are! There are far more poor people in this world than you realize, more than what you learn from books," Xiuxiu nodded her affirmation.

Song Yuanming remained silent, his hand clutching his chopsticks without taking a bite for a long while.

"The Spanish mackerel's actually quite tasty today, young fellow; you should try it. Xiao Wang has to handle cement transport at noon, leaving just you and me to move bricks on the first floor, so you'd better eat up and get some energy! Otherwise, I alone won't be able to handle it," Wei Jiaqiang said with a simple smile, joining in the conversation. He had been assigned to brick-moving by Yao Peng because he could endure hardships and work efficiently. Piecework, whether moving bricks or cement, was relatively more profitable for him, so he earned a bit more than others.

And Xiuxiu wanted to take Song Yuanming down a peg, so she hinted this to Yao Peng, and thus Song Yuanming was assigned to the brick-moving crew, with Wei Jiaqiang in charge of teaching him the ropes. By the end of the morning, the two had become quite familiar with each other.

"Mhmm," Song Yuanming digested Xiuxiu's words and, after mustering a great deal of willpower, finally murmured a reply. After a moment, he began shoveling food into his mouth with his chopsticks, looking somewhat resigned to his fate.

Xiuxiu, seeing Song Yuanming this way, knew there had been a shift in his mentality, but she wasn't worried. People like Song Yuanming, who wore their emotions on their sleeves, often had a capacity for recovery that was much easier to facilitate than those who suppressed their feelings. Thus, Xiuxiu ate her own boxed lunch leisurely and untroubled.

After lunch and about an hour of rest, Song Yuanming once again joined Wei Jiaqiang in the brick-moving endeavor, while Xiuxiu was pulled by Fei Han to supervise work on the top floor. The two hesitated in discussing whether to make a loft on the top floor.

From the morning he started moving the first brick, Song Yuanming excitedly counted each one in his head, but by the afternoon, drenched in sweat, he had stopped counting. At that moment, he seemed to be operating solely on instinct, his limbs stiffening as he moved bricks back and forth, trip after trip.

By the time the sun had set, Song Yuanming's limbs had become somewhat numb, and even wiping sweat off with a towel felt laborious.

"That's enough work for today! Yuanying, wrap things up, we're heading back," Xiuxiu, having finished her duties as it was nearly time to clock out, came over to where the bricks were being moved and called Song Yuanming over, "Wei Jiaqiang, you've done enough for today too, let's call it a day. This work will never be finished in one day, save some for tomorrow."