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Chapter 12
Everything had turned into a mess. Even the obituary notice became a point of dispute.
According to local customs, if a family had a son, the funeral notice had to be issued in the son’s name. It wasn’t proper to publish it under a daughter’s or wife’s name.
Zhuang Yan’s position was awkward—he wasn’t He Zhanghua’s biological son, so strictly speaking, he shouldn’t be listed as the chief mourner. But He Niaoniao was still too young, and some of the funeral rites also had taboos about women being present. That alone was enough for the family elders to argue endlessly.
In the end, Liao Tao made the decision.
Zhuang Yan would be listed as the son and take on the role of chief mourner.
The moment Zhuang Jie brought him back, relatives were already pulling him into mourning clothes without a word of discussion. Inside the house, the elders couldn’t agree on anything—some insisted the funeral had to be held at home, with the mourning hall set up there, while others argued more modernly that as long as the deceased left with dignity, the location didn’t matter.
Because of the unusual circumstances of the body, He Zhanghua was sent directly from the city hospital to the funeral home.
After arranging Zhuang Yan and He Niaoniao, Zhuang Jie went to the funeral home to find Liao Tao.
She was guided into the mortuary makeup room.
Liao Tao stood there, motionless, staring at He Zhanghua.
Chen Maidong, wearing protective gear, was about to begin the makeup process.
Zhuang Jie glanced at Liao Tao from the side and instinctively reached for her hand, holding it the entire time.
When the preparation was finished, Chen Maidong bowed slightly toward the deceased, then looked at them and offered his condolences.
Liao Tao walked forward and gently touched He Zhanghua’s forehead. Then she turned to thank Chen Maidong.
He had originally intended to stop her—touching the deceased directly wasn’t allowed—but when he met Liao Tao’s eyes, he said nothing.
Liao Tao looked at He Zhanghua one last time.
Then she turned away.
“Let’s go,” she said to Zhuang Jie. “There’s still a lot to handle.”
The funeral home had already set up the vigil hall.
Zhuang Jie went back to pick up Zhuang Yan and Niaoniao. They would spend the night there together.
By the second half of the night, both children had fallen asleep leaning against Liao Tao. The crying had already happened during the day—whatever grief had needed to be released had been spent. Even the strongest energy eventually ran out.
Liao Tao’s face was pale as she looked at Zhuang Jie.
“Go outside and rest for a bit,” she said.
Zhuang Jie couldn’t kneel because of her prosthetic, and sitting would look improper in a place like this. She had already been standing for five or six hours straight.
She moved her leg slightly, testing it, then slowly walked outside and sat down on a step.
Her mind began sorting itself out in fragments.
What happens next at home? What about Liao Tao? What about Zhuang Yan and Niaoniao?
There was still a critically injured relative in the hospital. The compensation alone would be a heavy burden.
When she heard footsteps, she turned her head.
Chen Maidong handed her a cigarette.
She took it, lit it, and fell back into silence.
He glanced at her prosthetic leg resting to the side.
“I’ve got a rest room,” he said. “You want to go lie down for a while?”
“No need,” Zhuang Jie replied softly. “I just want to sit alone for a bit.”
Chen Maidong nodded.
“Sorry for your loss,” he said.
Then he got on his motorcycle and left.
Three days after the funeral, Zhuang Jie sent Zhuang Yan back to school.
Zhuang Yan leaned against the classroom door, staring blankly out the window.
After a long pause, he asked quietly, “Sis… when are you going back to Shanghai?”
“After the first seven days,” she said.
“It all feels like a dream,” he murmured. “Like I’m talking to you inside a dream right now.”
Zhuang Jie rubbed his head.
“Don’t think too much.”
After sending him back, she went to the hospital to check on the seriously injured relative. He was still in the ICU.
After apologizing to the family and talking with them for a while, she transferred 80,000 yuan into their account.
“If it’s not enough for the medical bills, call me anytime,” she said.
No one could have predicted something like this. And since they were relatives, the family didn’t make things difficult for her.
By evening, when she got home, Liao Tao was sitting in the courtyard.
There were five or six cigarette butts on the ground. On the table beside her was an opened parcel—the medicinal patches Zhuang Jie had sent back.
Zhuang Jie pulled over a chair and sat down. She wanted to comfort her, but didn’t know where to begin, so she said nothing.
“There are frozen dumplings in the fridge,” Liao Tao said. “Cook them with Niaoniao.”
“Where’s Niaoniao?” Zhuang Jie asked.
“Upstairs on her tablet, I think.”
“I went to the hospital this afternoon,” Zhuang Jie said after a pause. “Transferred another eighty thousand to your second uncle. I also spoke with the doctor. It’ll probably cost another hundred thousand or so later.”
She took out a cigarette.
“Even after discharge, there’ll likely be complications. He probably won’t be able to do heavy work anymore.”
Liao Tao didn’t respond.
Zhuang Jie flicked her lighter absentmindedly.
“If he gets discharged, compensation will definitely come up too. It’s just a matter of how much.”
After a long silence, Liao Tao asked, “How much money do you have left?”
“Sixty thousand cash, three hundred thousand in funds,” Zhuang Jie calculated. “Two credit cards too, about a hundred thousand limit each.”
Liao Tao went inside and came back with a ledger, slapping it onto the table.
“There’s seventy thousand left in the house,” she said. “Your father’s funeral cost a few tens of thousands, the condolence money roughly balanced it out. The house purchase doesn’t count. Just the factory alone, we’ve put in two hundred thousand already.”
She paused, then added, “I’ve also saved some money over the years. Thirteen thousand.”
Zhuang Jie looked at her.
“Why were you secretly saving money?”
Liao Tao didn’t explain.
The truth was, it was money Zhuang Jie had brought home over the years. Liao Tao hadn’t spent it—she had quietly saved every bit.
“What’s the plan now?” Zhuang Jie asked.
“Do what needs to be done,” Liao Tao said. “The factory’s already invested two hundred thousand—I’m not giving up on it. First, we cover your second uncle’s medical bills and compensation. Right now we still have a 12,000 monthly mortgage, two houses, ten-year loans. The bank doesn’t stop collecting just because someone dies.”
“I’ll sell my funds tomorrow and transfer everything to you,” Zhuang Jie said. “Are all the machines for the factory already bought?”
“Yes.”
Liao Tao extinguished her cigarette.
“Call Niaoniao down for dinner.”
He Niaoniao came downstairs reluctantly, stabbing a dumpling repeatedly with her chopsticks until it was shredded.
Liao Tao snapped, “If you don’t want to eat, go upstairs.”
Niaoniao slammed her chopsticks down, tears already in her voice.
“You’re always yelling at people! That’s all you ever do! You yell at Zhuang Yan, you yell at me, you even yell at Dad! Grandma He said it’s because you’re too fierce—that’s why you killed him…”
“Niaoniao—” Zhuang Jie tried to stop her.
But before she could finish, Liao Tao slapped her.
“Go upstairs and sleep.”
Niaoniao turned and ran.
“Mom, you don’t have to—”
Before she could finish, a plate of dumplings was swept off the table.
Zhuang Jie said nothing more. She walked outside and took a call.
It was from a colleague at work. She said this hospital account was difficult to handle and the details would have to wait until Zhuang Jie returned. The hospital wasn’t in a hurry to sign the contract either—they wanted everything clarified first. The payment hadn’t even been approved yet.
Zhuang Jie agreed and said she would be back in three days.
When she returned to the courtyard, Liao Tao was gone.
She cleaned up the mess, then went upstairs and knocked on Niaoniao’s door.
Niaoniao was buried under the blanket, crying.
Zhuang Jie pulled the blanket off and told her that when she was done crying, she needed to apologize to Liao Tao.
Niaoniao sobbed out all her grievances—that Liao Tao never made sense, that she only knew how to yell. That she treated He Zhanghua like nothing had happened, as if she didn’t care at all, not even shedding a single tear.
Zhuang Jie asked whether these were her own thoughts or something she had heard from others.
Niaoniao cried, “It’s the same thing.”
Zhuang Jie was exhausted too.
She had already comforted one person after another. In the end, she simply let the child cry it out and went downstairs, riding an electric bike out aimlessly.
She rode without direction until she somehow reached an old graveyard.
These were wild graves—buried babies, people who couldn’t be interred in ancestral tombs for various reasons. There were no gravestones at all.
Even later, she couldn’t tell whether it had really happened or if it was an illusion.
She saw a woman in old-fashioned clothes from the 1990s, her belly swollen and heavy. She kept circling a grave mound. Behind her, a baby crawled along, following her in circles.
Terrified, Zhuang Jie sped back as fast as she could. Only when she reentered the noisy town did she dare look back toward the pitch-black graveyard.
The day she returned to Shanghai, Liao Tao and Niaoniao came to see her off.
At the parking lot, Zhuang Jie told Niaoniao, “Don’t make Mom angry. If she gets sick, no one will be able to take care of you.”
Niaoniao looked away, lips pressed tight, saying nothing.
“When I have time, I’ll take you to Disneyland,” Zhuang Jie added.
Niaoniao wiped her tears with her sleeve, then suddenly turned and ran back into the car.
Liao Tao didn’t come closer either. She just waved from a distance, signaling her to go inside.
On the high-speed train back, Zhuang Jie kept thinking.
She couldn’t stop worrying about Zhuang Yan, about Niaoniao, about Liao Tao. And she also thought of her late father.
When her father died, she had been the same age as Niaoniao. At the funeral, her grandmother had scolded and cursed her mother the entire time, but her mother hadn’t shed a single tear—she had just stood there, holding her pregnant belly.
The night before, Liao Tao had spoken to her all night.
She said He Zhanghua had never wronged them. He had always taken care of them emotionally and in life. When they were at their lowest point, he had reached out and pulled them up. He was a man of integrity and loyalty.
So no matter what, she would hold this family together—and make it better.
Half a month after returning to Shanghai, Zhuang Jie finally made up her mind to resign.
She planned to go back and help Liao Tao.
That night, when she submitted her resignation, she spoke with Wang Xixia until late.
She talked about sleepless nights, about not being able to let go of home. About how, when Liao Tao gave birth to Zhuang Yan, their grandmother secretly took the child away. Liao Tao had gone mad trying to get him back, fighting her way into the grandmother’s house just to bring him home.
Back then, Liao Tao was afraid of burdening her family, so she lived in a shack in the slums with her children.
When Zhuang Jie’s prosthetic stump became infected, she didn’t even dare say a word—because she knew there was no money at home.
When they were on the verge of starvation, He Zhanghua appeared.
He took Liao Tao to a bone specialist, got her a proper prosthetic socket. After months of helping them, he finally asked Liao Tao if she would be willing to be with him—he would take them back to Nanping Town, enroll the children in better schools.
Liao Tao agreed without hesitation. The next day, she carried Zhuang Yan and took Zhuang Jie back to Nanping.
Zhuang Jie said He Zhanghua wasn’t good with words, but every year on their birthdays, he would write four characters: eternal peace and safety. He bought them fashionable clothes, bicycles for school, books only city kids could afford.
Between her and He Zhanghua, like all blended families, there had always been an unspoken distance.
Wang Xixia listened quietly and said, “I knew this would be your choice. Shanghai has countless Zhuang Jies—it doesn’t lack you. But your mother only has you.”
“You should go back to her.”
Zhuang Jie looked out at the Oriental Pearl Tower and, for the first time, felt it was nothing special.
Just a tower, after all.
She began handing over her work. On November 15th, she officially resigned.
Her colleagues were reluctant to see her go and took turns inviting her out to meals.
Sometimes, after a few drinks, she would talk about her experience.
Don’t just run blindly—think, use your brain. If you really can’t handle a client, let it go early and move on. The world doesn’t lack smart people.
Never try tricks in front of hospital directors or department heads—they’ve survived long enough to reach their position. What are you, really? Trying to outsmart them just makes you look ridiculous.
A colleague asked, “So how do you actually win them over?”
“Sincerity,” Zhuang Jie said. “The most powerful thing in the world—and the easiest to see through—is sincerity. Then there’s trust. Be someone the client can trust, and only then will they consider your product.”
Everyone cheered, asking her to share more.
Zhuang Jie smiled.
Some things can only be understood through experience. They can’t really be taught.
She pulled out a thick notebook from her bag—everything she had learned as an intern, written down bit by bit through trial and error.
When she got home that night, she was slightly drunk.
Her phone rang several times before she finally answered.
It was Liao Tao.
Niaoniao had run away from home.
She had left a note saying she was going to Shanghai to find Zhuang Jie.
Liao Tao had only discovered it when she got home at night.
Zhuang Jie told her not to panic. At Niaoniao’s age, she probably couldn’t buy a ticket alone—and even if she did, train staff wouldn’t let her board.
But Liao Tao said she had used He Zhanghua’s phone to book the ticket online. The purchase records were there. Her piggy bank had been smashed open, her ID card—issued last year—was gone too.
Zhuang Jie wasn’t worried.
It was clearly planned.
With her intelligence, she might actually make it to Shanghai.
Liao Tao said she would report it to the police and check the train surveillance. If she really managed to get there on her own, then she hadn’t raised her in vain.
Just as the call ended, another incoming call appeared.
Zhuang Jie had a feeling—and picked up.
It was Shanghai Railway Station.
A little girl had gotten separated from her family.
They asked her to come pick her up.
When Zhuang Jie saw Niaoniao, she looked at her differently.
“Have you eaten?” she asked.
Niaoniao shook her head, clutching her bag.
“Train food is expensive. And I didn’t feel like eating.”
Zhuang Jie took her to eat first.
After she was full, she asked why she had run away.
Niaoniao twisted her fingers in her clothes.
“I’m scared being alone at home,” she said softly.
“What are you afraid of?”
