salt by salt

"Little friend, your name is Xu Junyan, right?"

"Look up at me, I won't do anything to you."

"Why don't you dare look at me?"

"why?"

On the street after school at dusk, I lowered my head and kicked the stones under my feet, and walked to the bus stop.

I was locked in the utility room of the school by Xu Yuzhong's prank, and finally waited until a kind teacher passing by let me out, and the car that Xu's family came to pick me up had already left.In the past few days, because Xu Yuzhong was mischievous, my uncle only brought Xu Yucheng with him when he was on a business trip. He was very angry, so he tried different ways to torment me at school.I knew that Xu Yuzhong would lie to the driver that I would go back first, he always did this, so I had to take the bus alone.

Later I understood how adults can easily be deceived by children, unless they know it all the time.

Why offend the real young master of the Xu family for these trivial matters, I'm just a bastard.

Then on a street corner, a man grabbed my arm.I forgot his face, maybe I was too scared to look up at him at all.He pulled me hard and dragged me, who was powerless, into an empty alley.

It was a particularly hot day, and I was sweating as I struggled, and my mind went blank with the fear of being controlled.

He didn't do anything to me, just grabbed my shoulders and pulled my clothes from the chest to see my school badge.I remember he asked me which class I was in and what my name was in a flustered and eager tone.I don't know what the meaning of this question is, I just resisted this man with instinct, and kept the school badge in my hand, refusing to let go.

In the end I failed. He saw my name, and let go of the hand that was pressing on my shoulder as if being shocked by an electric shock.I saw his fingers twitch unnaturally in the air, and he pinched my jaw instead to make me look up.I vaguely know that many kidnappers will kill anyone who sees their faces, so I close my eyes tightly.His tone became inexplicably urgent, with panic-stricken anger.

That dusk gradually blurred, leaving only the shadow of the narrow alley and my sweat-soaked back to prove that all this really happened.The man's chattering and persistent questioning has become my nightmare for many years, and this shadow haunts me hard to dissipate:

"Why don't you dare look at me?"

If nightmares have a name, it should be called Father.

I woke up drenched in cold sweat, Sun Ning withdrew his hand from pinching me, and there was still someone speaking in front of me.She held the report in front of her lips with light red lipstick, and whispered to me: "Xu Junyan, you have fallen asleep twice in the regular meeting this month. I know that it is hard to have a meeting early in the morning, but how many representatives do you have?" With our group, can you not embarrass us?"

I smiled apologetically, and rubbed between my brows to wake myself up.There are a lot of things on both sides these days, and I have a lot of new ideas. I want to do my best, so I often stay up until three or four o'clock, and unconsciously fall asleep with my forehead propped up during meetings.

After the meeting, everyone left the meeting room. Sun Ning and I walked behind. She suddenly said, "Recently... the project is not in such a hurry. Don't act like our team is squeezing the labor force."

"It's my personal matter, I will pay attention next time." I said with a wry smile, "Fortunately, you woke me up and had an unpleasant dream."

"The carefree rich young master also has unpleasant things?"

When the two of us get along, Sun Ning always stabs me with this incident from time to time. I think she probably hates the rich, but it’s not easy to explain the complicated situation of our family to her—I probably am not the young master of the rich family. It's just that outsiders look bright.

"Who doesn't have one or two troubles." I shrugged my shoulders without fussing with her, "You think I'm relaxed?"

"That's not true." There were too many people in the previous wave, and Sun Ning and I had to get into another elevator. She said, "In my opinion..."

Before I finished speaking, the elevator that was operating normally sank suddenly, and Sun Ning, wearing high heels, lost his balance and fell into my arms.She screamed and grabbed my clothes, I hugged her instinctively, stretched out my hand to support the wall to stabilize the center of gravity, the elevator descended uncontrollably and seemed about to fall, my heart jumped into my throat - no way , In the end, he died with Sun Ning? !

Fortunately, it just fell down at that moment, and then it got stuck between several floors and completely stopped moving.Sun Ning and I stood still in shock, the emergency light of the elevator came on, and we both looked at each other.

She quickly regained her composure, took out her mobile phone and called for maintenance, and learned that notices of the elevator failure had been posted on various floors yesterday, but neither she nor I paid attention to it.The maintenance personnel told us that they would be there in 10 minutes. Sun Ning hung up the phone with an ugly expression on his face: "I don't know when I can go out. I probably won't be able to do anything in the morning."

"We have been thinking about work for the rest of our lives after the disaster. You are really amazing." Because of the unexpected "throwing into your arms" just now, I felt that the atmosphere in this narrow space was a bit awkward, so I joked, "It's a pity that the company doesn't evaluate model workers. Otherwise, it must be you."

"I'm just responsible for my own tasks." Her face softened a little, "The competition here is fierce, if a woman wants to gain a foothold, like leading others and being respected, she must do everything to the best, you won't understand. "

I said: "Sometimes there's no need to force yourself to be so hard, it's almost enough, what's the point of working so hard?"

"That's why... You, a rich second generation, are completely different from me." She probably realized that no matter how irritable she is, she will not speed up the repair progress, so she breathed out and said in a chatty manner, "Even if you don't work hard, It’s not going to be a big deal, your family will provide you with food and clothing for the rest of your life. But if we don’t work hard, we will starve to death. What do you think I’m trying to do?”

"Hey..." I was at a loss for words for a while, so I had no choice but to persuade, "I'm not as relaxed as you said, everyone will have troubles. Sometimes I am very desperate and pessimistic, and I feel that life is difficult..."

"I have a background, and I have an outstanding brother on top, so I don't need to work hard to train myself. Even so, I graduated from a prestigious university. I am very smart. I was promoted when I first entered the family business. I have a house and a car in City B at a young age. You have savings, and you look... pretty good." She glanced at me, "In my eyes, you were born with a golden spoon in your mouth. If I can be like you, I can wake up with a smile in my dreams, so why not be dissatisfied? of?"

"Do you know what it's like to live in a basement of only nine square meters? Three by three, the bed takes up half of it, and you can only squat on the floor to eat. Clothes are spread on the bed during the day and put in boxes at night. You know that in the labor market under the sun Ask everywhere what is it like to work? The sunshine in city B can burn a layer of skin. When I was an intern, I was only paid 3000 yuan a month. Paying rent, utility bills...you haven’t suffered at all.”

"You have money, ability, and background. What you want to do depends entirely on whether you are willing or not. I tell you that the situation that mortals can change is not a predicament. Being choked by fate and being unable to breathe, this is called despair."

She turned to look at me with sincere eyes and a serious tone:

"Xu Junyan, people like you have never experienced any real troubles in your life, have you?"