Wang Jing| Micro Novel: Xiao Hui

I went to the barbershop in the neighborhood to blow the wind. Pulling open the door of the plastic steel shop, I saw a young woman sitting on a small round stool in front of the washing tank. She looked down at the magazine. The two small fang-style braids are quite eye-catching. I saw her slender eyelashes from the side and was thrilled. False hair or real hair, medium length. The hair dryer sang "whoosh, whoosh", and I stood behind the boss Ah Qin, touching Ah Qin's eyes in the mirror and smiling at each other. Ah Qin greeted, turned off the hair dryer again, and sorted out the newspaper on the sofa, "Teacher Wang, come here." Sit on the couch for a while, right away. ”

"Ah Qin will also open Chinese." The customer in the barber chair quipped. I also secretly thought, Ah Qin, why don't you talk about stone bones and hard Ningbo gossip? Obviously there are still customers, why do you say that it will be good right away?

Ah Qin untied the customer's bib, picked up the round mirror resting on the movable rack, aimed at the back of the customer's head, slowly moved from left to right, and then from right to left, asking: "Are you satisfied?" I have long wanted to recommend this hairstyle, your melon face shape, mushroom hair, is a perfect match. When I went home, the more my husband looked at it, the more he became angry. Don't look at Teacher Wang's messy hair, blowing well is also a mushroom cloud. Nong asked her if her colleague was praising her hairstyle. Classic, absolutely classic. The customer smiled, even said good, paid, and left.

Teacher Wang sat up. After the hair is washed, the wind blows. ”

I looked at her on the little round stool, as if to ask, isn't there still her?

"She. She was the hair washer I invited. Xiao Hui, I asked you to work, not to read the book. ”

"Introducing a 'foreigner' is a fu zhixiang, and I have been busy for a day, and like a bride sitting on the edge of the stage, I don't take a handle."

Ah Qin Chinese for a while, and in tongues for a while. I looked at the hair washer in the mirror, and she was like a wooden person, who didn't move, and her head didn't lift. If it weren't for Ah Qin's gossip, I really wouldn't have seen that she was a migrant worker in the countryside who went to the city. From the moment I walked in the store, her eyes barely left the magazine, not even flipping through it. The wind blew well, and the moment I stepped out of the store, Xiao Hui finally raised her head, squinted and smiled with me, and said goodbye.

Image source: Qianku.com

A few weeks later, due to a business trip, I went to the barbershop instead of the morning. Approaching the small shop, I heard Ah Qin's voice: "What god is not fair, the same is the mother who is pregnant in October, why am I poor and rich, rich enough to wear gold and silver." ”

When I entered the door, I realized that Ah Qin had made his own head. When Ah Qin saw me, She Qing chuckled her head and asked, "Teacher Wang, I wear gold and silver, and Ah is what I have worked so hard to earn." ”

"Boss Ah Qin, who made Nong angry?"

"And who, please, the hair washer." He asked me, 'Why am I poor, but you are rich in gold and silver?' He also said that God was unfair, and that the same mother was born in October. I replied, 'You only saw me wearing gold and silver, and you didn't see me getting up early and falling.' ”

Xiao Hui would think like this, say this! Where is she? ”

"Nong asked Xiao Hui, he would try his best, and the boss lady dialed him to do it." Ah Qin approached me and quietly bit my ear, "Listening to what Qijie said, I was just as surprised as Nong just now." However, I told him that he had opened the door in the morning to earn money, and Nong was still covering the quilt with her husband. She, ah, was muffled by my words. ”

"Can Xiao Hui understand what you're saying?"

"Listen, listen... Looking at her unconvinced face, I think she could understand. ”

After every hair wash, I always go to the barber shop and let Ah Qin blow the wind. When she met Xiaohui, she either washed the hair of customers, or sat on a small round stool to read newspapers and periodicals, and never took the initiative to talk to people. If someone asked her, her answer would be broad and blind, but her words did not match her childish face, and her gossip was tender. She gave me the impression of being beautiful and innocent. Whenever you speak, your eyes are not turning, you whisper softly, you have a smile, and those gui round eyes occasionally flicker, which makes people feel comfortable.

Spring to summer solstice, barber shop customers are relatively small, several times in a row did not meet Xiaohui, originally thought that because of the off-season by Ah Qin turned back. I am the first customer of this barber shop, I have enjoyed the discounts of the small shop that has just opened, and I am a perennial customer of the small shop, so to speak, since the opening of the small shop for more than ten years, Ah Qin has only earned his own craftsmanship and kung fu. That is to say, Ah Qin did not hire a hair washer, and Xiao Hui was Ah Qin's first hired worker. I don't know whether to rejoice in Xiaohui's smile or her voice, but on the days when I don't see Xiaohui, I can always hear Ah Qin's discussion with customers. I also understood the reason why I didn't meet Xiaohui, and she found a second part-time job at the food stall at the entrance of the community. During the day she helps Ah Qin at the barber shop and at night she goes to the food stall to wash dishes.

"Ah Qin, Nong's conscience is good, Nong's shop is also busy at night, and there is not much life in the day."

"The basic salary is not much, and I am not bad for a few hundred yuan." It's not that I have a good conscience, I really look at her too sinfully. Married a stupid husband. ”

"What does her husband do?"

"Do what west, the community sweeps the floor." After the dawn is cleared, there is nothing to idle. Idle and bored, I don't see my wife thinking wildly. Xiao Hui asked her husband to find some more work, but the man only felt that in addition to sweeping the floor. Now Xiaohui came out to earn money. The man felt frightened and came to stare at Xiaohui every day, as if I would eat his wife. ”

"Mo said that he was the man who swept the floor of the community."

"Yes. Sweeping around the store door every day. ”

"No wonder every time I always touch a man, he seems to be holding a broom handle and his eyes are tilted."

"Sad. Residents will have an opinion, the cleaning is the whole community, not the barber shop door, the introduction of the cleaning to the door of the food stalls. ”

"Hey, men are afraid of getting into the wrong line, and women are afraid of marrying the wrong man." I see that Xiao Hui was born fresh and refreshing, why would he marry such a man. I heard that the clothes she wore were all given by Nong. ”

"The old clothes at the bottom of the press box, I'm fat and can't wear them." Mo saw that he was younger than me, and there were already two sons and three little people. ”

"Ah, I will be more, family planning, its pull can not pull the big belly ah."

"His grandfather wants grandchildren. Hi, the belly of the intermediary is also angry, it will be plucked out of it. In the past, I hid in the east and the west, but now I am making a big noise. I joke with you, you poor people, not getting poorer. After Xiao Hui listened, he did not make a sound. I told him again that he wanted his children to study well. Still silent. Ah Qin, speaking of this, pointed to the door of his head and chased: "It is particularly bright here." ”

"Have you read any of his books?"

"I read it, I graduated from high school, and I didn't read until junior high school."

"Nanon banknotes earn more than they do."

"Mo Jiemo said that the dishwasher when he went to the food stall has now been promoted to the front desk reception and has increased his salary."

"What is the front desk reception of the food stalls, nong dang five-star hotel, ah, there is a talk."

"It's just a good bowl, change it to a la carte."

"A la carte, food stalls are usually made by the owner or the hostess herself."

"Yes, Xiao Hui calculates the account and will recruit customers."

"Oh, that's the way it is."

From Ah Qin's conversation with customers, although she knew some things about Xiaohui, she gradually forgot about her because she didn't touch much.

After the winter solstice, the days are getting shorter and shorter, and when I go home from work, it is already a thousand lights. One day, I was hurrying home from the bus stop when suddenly a crisp cry made me look back. She even called Teacher Wang, if it wasn't for her saying Lady Ah Qin, I really wouldn't recognize Xiao Hui. Her two braids were perming long waves, a parrot green tweed skirt, and the most dazzling was the gold earrings that hung down her shoulders, the shape of the leaves, polished and shiny, flashing in the black hair as she spoke.

"Teacher Wang, just got off work." If you don't take two small stir-fry, save it from burning again. ”

Seeing that I didn't say a word, she said: "Teacher Wang, Hangzhou pepper beef fillet is good, beef is just entered by the boss, fresh." Not expensive. If it's good, I'll talk to the boss and give you a discount. ”

Xiao Hui looked at me with a smile, expecting me to take care of business... I went home carrying the food boxes that Xiaohui had packed for me.

Occasionally, I met Xiao Hui, but much less than listening to Ah Qin and the like talking about her. Every time I hear the conversation, I can always see Ah Qin's proud expression. Ah Qin always said that Xiao Hui was serious about love and righteousness and could be adjusted. It turned out that Xiaohui always sent lunch to Ah Qin, saying that eating instant noodles often was not conducive to health. When delivering meals, if there is a customer washing their hair, Xiaohui always washes the customer's hair before leaving. At that time, Ah Qin had long since stopped hiring Xiao Hui.

The first time I saw Xiaohui before I moved, it was also the last time I saw it. She cried like a rain in the barbershop that day. Listening to Ah Qin, her big husband listened to the customer call Xiaohui the boss lady, threw down the broom, and came to beat people. The food stall owner saw the situation, went forward to dissuade, and the big husband beat the boss to the ground and beat him into a concussion. He is still lying in the hospital. Xiaohui's husband was taken away by 110.

Xiao Hui covered his face with both hands and asked, "What should I do?"

About the Author

Wang Jing, pen name Xiaocao, Bishui. He is a member of the Chinese Writers Association and the Chinese Folk Writers Association. His works have been published in Ningbo Daily, Ningbo Evening News, Xinmin Evening News, Liberation Daily, People's Daily, European Times, Yinzhou Literature and Art, Literary Harbor, Zhejiang Writers, Selected Essays, etc., and he is the author of the essay collection "Keeping Cicheng", "Half-Life Literary Edge", "Wutong Leaf Necklace", "Re-searching Qilin Tong - Ningbo Peking Opera Master Zhou Xinfang" (documentary literature), "Folk Culture Cifeng Filial Piety", "The Feng Family of the Thousand-year-old Wang clan Cicheng - A Field Investigation of a Ningbo Clan", etc., including "China's Gypsies —— Fieldwork of the Fallen People of Cicheng" and "Cultural Memory of Cicheng Rice Cake" won the Chinese Folk Art Mountain Flower Award and Folk Literature Academic Book Award.

First Instance Zheng Yamin Second Trial Xu Jie Third Trial Zhao Peng

【Source: Ningbo City Media】