Introduction

Shui Wa took the small package from her mother's trembling hands. The package contained a pair of thick-soled cloth shoes made by her mother, three steamed buns, two pieces of clothes with large patches, and twenty yuan. Dad was squatting on the side of the road, smoking a dry pipe.

"The baby is about to go out, can't you give me a good face?" Mom said to Dad, who was still squatting there, still silent. Mom added: "If I don't let the baby go out, can you give him money?" Build a house and get a wife!”

"Let's go! They're all gone. It's better to raise them than to raise a litter of dogs!" Dad howled without raising his head.

Shui Wa looked up at the village where she was born and grew up. This village was in an eternal drought and lived on only a little rainwater accumulated in the water cellar. Shuiwa's family didn't have money to build a cement cellar, so they still used an earthen water cellar. The water would stink on hot days. In previous years, you could drink this smelly water when it was hot, but it was a little bitter and astringent. But this summer, you would have diarrhea if you drank it even when it was hot. I heard from doctors in the nearby army that it was caused by some poisonous stones from the ground melted into it. In the water.

Shui Wa looked down at her father again, turned around and walked away without looking back. He didn't expect his father to raise his head to look at him. When his father felt uncomfortable, he would squat and smoke for several hours, as if he had turned into a big piece of dirt on the loess. But he clearly saw his father's face again, or in other words, he was walking on his father's face. He looked at the vast northwest land around him, which was dry and yellow-brown and covered with cracks carved by water and soil erosion. It was just a picture. The face of an old farmer? Everything here is like this, the trees, the ground, the houses, the people, all black and yellow, wrinkled. He couldn't see the eyes of this giant face stretching to the horizon, but he could feel its existence. Those giant eyes were looking at the sky. When he was young, his eyes were full of begging for rain, but when he was old, they were just dull. . In fact, this giant face has always been dull. He does not believe that this land has ever been young.

A gust of dry wind blew by, and the path leading out of the village was submerged in yellow dust. Shui Wa walked along this road and took the first step in his new life.

This road will lead to a place he never dreamed of.