After the death of his wife, the economist Zhang Hongchi actually brought back an illiterate old lady with an old dragon clock from the countryside of Tianjin and made her a stepmother. This puzzled his sons Zhang Cheng and Zhang Dare.
In November 2009, Zhang Hongchi passed away, and tens of millions of assets had to be divided among his stepmothers, and his son Zhang Cheng was extremely dissatisfied and unwilling. In the process of trying to prevent his stepmother from inheriting the inheritance, he follows his father's emotional trajectory, and after peeling back the cocoon layer by layer, he discovers a series of secrets between his father and stepmother...
01
His father died
On November 5, 2009, at 3 p.m., Zhang Hongchi, an 84-year-old economist, suddenly suffered a heart attack. On the way to the hospital, Zhang Hongchi still had a brief consciousness, he took his son Zhang Cheng's hand and told him hard: "If I can't survive, you and your brother must take good care of Aunt Wang..."
Aunt Wang was Zhang Cheng's stepmother, Wang Xiuzhu. Neither Zhang Cheng nor his younger brother Zhang Dare expected that this was his father's last words.
That night, Zhang Hongchi died of ineffective medical treatment. Zhang Cheng and Zhang Dare were devastated, and they were even more puzzled by their father's dying instructions: his father was a university professor, so why did he marry an illiterate person when he remarried? Why did my father have such deep feelings for this old lady in the countryside? On his deathbed, he did not mention any of his descendants, but only confessed that he "must take good care of Aunt Wang"!
The Zhang Cheng brothers were puzzled by this matter and were somewhat resentful of their father.
Born in Tianjin in 1925, Zhang Hongchi is a professor at a university in Beijing and enjoys special government allowances issued by the State Council. Zhang Cheng grew up under his father's fame, inherited his father's down-to-earth and tenacious character, and became the president of a technology company in Zhongguancun at a young age.
In 1996, Zhang Cheng's biological mother, Feng Hua, died. Afraid of their father's lonely life in his later years, Zhang Cheng and Zhang Dare both hoped that their father would continue the string, but they were rejected by their father. Five years later, my father suddenly called and asked the brothers to come home.
Zhang Cheng and Zhang Dare hurried back to see that there was a strange old lady in the house! She was dressed rustically, her face was wrinkled, her hair was full of white hair, and when she asked, the old lady was more than 70 years old, she was picked up from the countryside of Tianjin, and her father was ready to marry her!
The brothers were so shocked that they could not speak. It was understandable for my father to find an elderly female intellectual to accompany him, who had a common language and belonged to human nature; or if he had found a beautiful woman who had little culture but was more than ten or twenty years younger than him. But this old and uneducated rural old lady, what attracted him?
Hearing that his father would go to get a marriage license with this woman named Wang Xiuzhu the next day, Zhang Cheng's brothers were afraid that their father would not be happy, so they did not dare to object, but they could not accept this stepmother for a while.
So they tentatively asked their father how they met this woman, and the father was displeased, saying, "You don't have to worry about my business!" The brothers glanced at each other: Isn't the father old and confused?
02
After her father married Wang Xiuzhu, the brothers were very cold to her. They rarely returned to their father's house, and even when they came back to visit their father during the New Year's Holiday, they rarely spoke to her.
Wang Xiuzhu didn't say much, and in Zhang Cheng's impression, she was always just collecting and picking at home, and never deliberately flattered her brothers.
Now that her father has died suddenly, Wang Xiuzhu will participate in the distribution of the inheritance. His father studied all his life, fruitful, and extremely frugal, and the two houses assigned to him by the school within the third ring road of Beijing, plus years of allowances, copyright fees, and collections of calligraphy and paintings, totaling tens of millions of dollars.
Zhang Cheng and his brother were even more indignant—a village woman in her 70s, who had ascended to heaven by marrying her father. In the past 8 years, the brothers have not respected her but are polite, she has enjoyed 8 years of blessings in Beijing, which is already the creation of life, what qualifications does she have to share her father's inheritance?
But the brothers' identity, status, knowledge, and cultivation made them feel justified in their actions, even if they were dissatisfied.
In January 2010, the two began to deal with their father's posthumous affairs. Because Wang Xiuzhu was also an elderly person, with backs to her ears, eyes, and slow movements, Zhang Cheng, although she had a hundred reluctances, had to personally run to handle all the inheritance procedures for her.
In early February, Zhang Cheng came to the outskirts of Tianjin, Wang Xiuzhu's hometown. Wang Xiuzhu was childless all her life, and many things were kept by zhao liang, the child of her sister Wang Pei'e.
The Zhang Cheng brothers and Wang Xiuzhu's relatives had never had any contact, and they only knew each other this time to handle the inheritance procedures. Hearing that Zhang Cheng came to take the materials to go through the inheritance procedures, Zhao Liang was very happy and took the initiative to move out of the wooden box where the materials were placed at home.
At the bottom of the box, Zhang Cheng saw a yellowed family tree, opened it, and he was shocked: Wang Xiuzhu's mother turned out to be Zhang Hongchi's father's cousin! That is to say, Wang Xiuzhu and Zhang Hongchi are cousins! And marriages of collateral blood relatives within three generations are legally invalid!
Do Wang Xiuzhu's sister and Zhao Liang know about this? At least they certainly don't know that consanguineous marriages are invalid. Zhang Cheng did not dare to speak up, but quietly put the family tree into the briefcase.
At this time, he discovered something even more shocking to him - among the items treasured by Wang Xiuzhu, there was even a divorce certificate: Zhang Hongchi, Wang Xiuzhu, Gonghe County, Qinghai Province, married in 1955 and divorced in 1965. They were once married for 10 years! What's going on here?
03
Too many accidents came and went, making Zhang Cheng's heart flutter. He took all the materials with him. Bidding farewell to Wang Pei'e's family, Zhang Cheng immediately called his brother: "Dad and Wang Xiuzhu are related by blood, the marriage is invalid, and she has no inheritance rights!" ”
Zhang Gan was also extremely surprised and even more confused: "Why don't you ask Wang Xiuzhu's sister what is going on?" Zhang Cheng said: "I was thinking that Wang Xiuzhu did not have the right to inherit, and I did not dare to alarm them in other things." I'll talk to you about what to do when I get back. ”
Along the way, watching the straight telephone poles next to the railroad roaring backwards, Zhang Cheng's heart fluctuated. No wonder his father was secretive about his acquaintance with Aunt Wang.
Zhang Cheng understands that as long as he files a lawsuit with the court, it means that Wang Xiuzhu will not get any inheritance from this invalid marriage, and she will return to Yangliuqing Town in Tianjin. Is this too cruel for a confused old man?
But when her father was alive, the family was worthy of her. Instead of entering the family, how could she get in and out in a car? How can there be a babysitter to take care of? How can you calmly serve flowers and grass? And she didn't give anything to the family.
Zhang Cheng struggled all the way and finally decided to sue. Thinking that Wang Xiuzhu had no heirs and it would be desolate to return to Tianjin alone, Zhang Cheng and his brother discussed and paid her a certain monthly pension.
On March 25, 2010, Zhang Cheng filed a lawsuit with the Haidian District People's Court in Beijing, demanding that the marriage relationship between his father and stepmother be invalidated and that the stepmother Wang Xiuzhu's inheritance rights be revoked according to law.
Because of the victory, Zhang Cheng had a hint of apology and decided to go back to visit his stepmother. As soon as he entered the house, he saw Wang Xiuzhu sitting on the balcony basking in the sun, wearing the gray coat that his father often wore before he was alive, and the desolate evening scene of the wind and candles and the imminent death of the wood made Zhang Cheng inevitably have a little sadness.
He asked, "Aunt Wang, did you and my dad divorce once in 1965?" Why are you getting married and divorced? Wang Xiuzhu listened clearly and sighed slowly: "Your father has read a lot of books... How many years..."
Yeah, half a century later, when divorce was an earth-shattering event, what kind of relationship was it? Zhang Cheng continued to ask questions, but Wang Xiuzhu was already incoherent. She was so old that she could not utter a single logical word, leaving only sad and cloudy tears.
A few days later, Zhang Cheng visited his brother's house and discussed his stepmother with his brother and sister-in-law. The sister-in-law reminded the brothers: "When my father was dying, he told us to be worthy of Aunt Wang, and we all agreed." Now that his bones are not cold, we are depriving her of the right to inherit the inheritance, is it a bit excessive? Zhang Cheng's heart was shocked.
Why did my father have such a deep affection for a village woman? There must be an untold story behind this, and you can't do something unfilial and unjust. Zhang Cheng decided to go to Tianjin again, to find out the facts, and never to let his father be blind under the Nine Springs.
In early June, Zhang Cheng came to Yangliuqing Town in Tianjin again.
04
The search for the truth
Wang Xiuzhu's sister Wang Pei'e, when she learned that Zhang Cheng had come to pursue the trajectory of Zhang Hongchi's life, could not help but burst into tears. She told Zhang Cheng that Zhang Hongchi and her sister Wang Xiuzhu were cousins of Qingmei Zhuma. In those ignorant days, cousins could get married. In 1944, the two held a traditional marriage ceremony and worshipped heaven and earth.
In the same year, Zhang Hongchi was admitted to the Department of Social And Economics of Fu Jen University. In order to support him to study, Wang Xiuzhu came to Beijing and washed clothes and quilts in the homes of rich people, earning money for Zhang Hongchi to study.
Young feelings are turbulent like terrifying waves. During his studies, Zhang Hongchi fell in love with beautiful city girls. Moreover, after reading the book, he knew that it was against science and ethics for close relatives to marry.
In 1947, Wang Xiuzhu and Wang Pei'e went to the university to visit Zhang Hongchi. Zhang Hongchi did not want his classmates to know that he was married, and when he saw the sisters looking for him, he jumped like a thunderbolt: "Who let you come!" Wang Xiuzhu had no choice but to pull Wang Pei'e away quickly.
Wang Pei'e still remembers that in order to meet her brother-in-law that day, she and her sister wore the best flower shirts without a little patch. They came and went and walked on foot for a whole day.
She innocently asked, "Why is my brother-in-law unhappy?" The sister replied: "When he was studying, he was not allowed to get married, and he was afraid that his classmates would know." Wang Pei'e believed it to be true, and she did not know until decades later that the academy at that time did not have such a rule.
At noon when the sun was scorching, Wang Xiuzhu swallowed her grievances alone, and did not let her sister find out at all...
In 1948, Zhang Hongchi graduated from university. In 1955, thinking that they had only worshiped heaven and earth when they got married, Wang Xiuzhu's parents forced the two to register their marriage with the civil affairs department in order to consolidate their marriage.
In the early 1960s, widespread famine began in China, and Beijing was no exception. In the most cruel time, walking on the road to eat steamed buns will be robbed by hungry people.
In order to save the grain for Zhang Hongchi to eat, and not to be found stealing, Wang Xiuzhu sewed a small cloth bag tied to his waist, saved half of his rations in the cloth bag, and slept at night in the palm of his hand, waiting for her husband to come back every week and let him eat a full meal.
Wang Xiuzhu was skinny and bone-covered, but she guarded her cloth bag and kept the food all the time. Countless times she fainted from hunger in front of a large pile of quilt clothes to be washed, and when she woke up, she tightened her cloth bag and continued to work... Listening to Wang Pei'e's story, Zhang Cheng's heart was turbulent.
If a person can leave the hope of surviving to the other half when his own survival is threatened, how unquestionable such love is!
05
In 1961, Wang Xiuzhu told her sister that she had no culture and was afraid of being looked down upon by her husband in the future, and that she was also self-taught and wanted to find a job in Beijing. After several applications, the street office arranged Wang Xiuzhu to work in a factory. In order to better take care of her husband and in-laws, Wang Xiuzhu resolutely took her in-laws to Beijing.
At this time, Zhang Hongchi applied to his superiors to work in Qinghai, and the husband and wife lived in two places. One day in 1962, Wang Xiuzhu returned to her mother's house and cried bitterly as soon as she entered the door.
She told her sister that Zhang Hongchi not only did not return home, but also encouraged her parents to live separately from her. Only then did she realize that the marriage could no longer be sustained by her humble flattery and selfless efforts.
But even when she returned to her mother's house, Wang Xiuzhu still came to Zhang Hongchi's parents' house to help with farm work. She loved him humbly, desperately polishing herself, hoping to compete with him and have a long-lasting beauty with this man who was unsympathetic to her.
In the summer of 1965, Wang Xiuzhu and Wang Pei'e went to Qinghai to see Zhang Hongchi and found him wearing a fashionable and good shirt with his hair combed and shiny.
Zhang Hongchi is still very unhappy, proposing that there is no longer affection between the two and that it is illegal for close relatives to marry. Wang Xiuzhu thought about it and said to Wang Pei'e, "Do whatever he wants, I can't drag him down." In this way, the two calmly went through divorce procedures in Qinghai.
Wang Xiuzhu dedicated the best years of a woman's life to Zhang Hongchi, but did not complain at all. But Wang Pei'e clearly remembered that after her sister returned to her mother's house, she did not enter the grain of rice for three days and cried darkly.
People throughout the town knew she had been abandoned by her college husband. The sister stayed at home for two months, and when she went out, she had to explain for her husband: "It's not that he has a bad character, it's that our close relatives got married, which is illegal..."
Soon, Wang Xiuzhu returned to Beijing to work. Because she was soaked in too much cool water when she was young, she suffered from severe rheumatoid arthritis, with thick joints and unable to bend her legs.
Wang Pei'e went to Beijing to visit her sister, crying to help her sister massage her deformed legs, and her heart was uneven for her sister: At that time, she fell ill with arthritis in order to provide Zhang Hongchi with reading and washing clothes for others, was the fate of her sister's life to achieve and complete Zhang Hongchi?
In 1967, Zhang Hongchi married Zhang Cheng's mother, Feng Hua. Later, Zhang Hongchi was transferred to Beijing to teach. Hearing the news of her ex-husband's marriage, Wang Xiuzhu finally married a divorced retired worker under the mediation of relatives and friends.
Zhao Liang took the photos of his aunt and uncle, Zhang Chengyi looked at it, stunned! In the photo, Wang Xiuzhu's husband is the Uncle Chen who is deeply rooted in his childhood memories!
As the truth was revealed layer by layer, Zhang Cheng couldn't help but burst into tears...
06
Deep affection
The man in the photo is Lao Chen, who is called a "relative in the countryside" by his father, and Lao Chen often sends grain and noodles to Zhang Cheng's family. At that time, Zhang Cheng and Zhang Dare were still young, but as soon as they saw Uncle Chen, they knew that "the best food in the world has come."
When he was in elementary school, he saw children wearing military uniforms and wanted a set. Uncle Chen knew about it, so he gave his mother the cloth tickets for half a year, and her mother used these cloth tickets to buy cloth for Zhang Cheng to make a military uniform.
After my father went to england to study in 1977, the family was short of money, and Uncle Chen also sent money. Those fragmented memories are like black-and-white shots that suddenly flash in color real life, warm and heartbreaking.
Zhang Cheng couldn't have imagined that the Uncle Chen in his childhood memory was actually Wang Xiuzhu's husband! He immediately called his brother and told him: "Do you remember that when I was a child, there was often an Uncle Chen in the family.
He was Aunt Wang's former husband..." Zhang Dare learned everything on the phone, was silent for a long time, and couldn't cry...
It turned out that during the "Cultural Revolution" Wang Xiuzhu heard that Zhang Hongchi had become a bourgeoisie, and she was so anxious that she had no master, so she said to her sister: "Zhang Hongchi has not suffered a single bit since he was a child, and I am afraid that he will not be able to survive!" He has no salary, what do the two children eat? ”
In order not to embarrass Feng Hua, her equally kind husband, Lao Chen, visited Zhang Hongchi's family on her behalf and brought food to the Zhang family every week. When Zhang Hongchi went to study in the UK, Wang Xiuzhu and his wife resolutely stated: two children, they sent money to raise.
At that time, Wang Xiuzhu's salary was 18 yuan per month. They sent Feng Hua 6 yuan a month, as well as some food stamps and oil stamps. And one of her own clothes is "three years new, three years old, three years of sewing and mending"...
One day in the late 1970s, a student gave Zhang Hongchi a jar of malted milk creamer, which he was reluctant to drink and gave to Wang Xiuzhu.
Seeing that the pillow of her home was still patched, Zhang Hongchi felt about to be dazzling, reached over and turned over, but did not expect more patches on the back. Zhang Hongchi sighed: "When I was young, I didn't understand things... The only person I can't live with in my life is you, and I don't know if there is a chance to repay it. ”
Wang Xiuzhu said, "When you have the day of your head, you will send me and Lao Chen a pair of new pillows." ”
In 1990, Lao Chen died of illness. Zhang Hongchi came to send him to the end. At the memorial service, he burst into tears and sent a handwritten elegy: "Brotherhood and brotherhood have never left or left the left and right, and the words and proverbs of the heart have never been honored or humiliated, and the cold is never considered."
At this time, Zhang Hongchi and Wang Xiuzhu were both over the age of flower armor, and no matter how many grievances they had been polished and smoothed out by the years. After that, Wang Xiuzhu returned to her hometown in Tianjin to recuperate and live with her sister's family.
07
In early 2001, Zhao Liang suddenly received a phone call, looking for Wang Xiuzhu. Zhao Liang was very surprised, who would call an old man with the back of his ear? Seeing Wang Xiuzhu basking in the sun in the courtyard, Zhao Liang called out to her loudly: "Big aunt, your phone!" ”
Wang Xiuzhu, who is more than 70 years old, walked into the hall house trembling. On the other end of the phone was 76-year-old Zhang Hongchi.
Wang Xiuzhu quickly heard that it was him, and she held the phone next to her ear and laughed and said, "You are louder, my ears can't hear it!" Tears poured down. The two cried and laughed, many words were repeated continuously, and Zhao Liang stood on the side and couldn't help but shed tears.
Zhang Hongchi told Wang Xiuzhu that he had heard her phone from a friend from his hometown. His wife also died a few years ago, and both children have started a family, but he feels the loneliness of life.
He said: "You come to Beijing, we are all people who have not been in a state of life for a few years, let's live together." Who knows if people will have the next life? Wang Xiuzhu said without hesitation: "Wow." As soon as the words came out, I cried a mess.
In March 2001, Zhang Hongchi personally went to Yangliuqing Town to pick up Wang Xiuzhu, and Zhao Liang sent his aunt to Beijing. In the evening, Zhang Hongchi invited Wang Xiuzhu and Zhao Liang to dinner at the school's restaurant. Because Wang Xiuzhu was inconvenient to walk, Zhang Hongchi was afraid that she would fall and held her hand all the time.
Zhao Liang visits his aunt in Beijing once a year. In the last two years, both of them were a little confused, but Zhang Hongchi would sometimes lean over and kiss her with difficulty, and she still smiled like a girl...
Zhang Cheng did not expect that he would get such a lingering story. This ordinary woman runs through her father's entire life course. If not even she is eligible to inherit the inheritance, there will be no one in the world who is eligible! He returned to Beijing with tears in his eyes and consulted with his brother: to submit a letter of withdrawal.
On the afternoon of June 10, 2010, after Receiving notice of withdrawal of the lawsuit, Zhang Cheng immediately returned to his father's home to visit his stepmother. Wang Xiuzhu was still sitting on the balcony, as if she hadn't moved in months.
She looked at the outside world silently, squinting her eyes as if she were about to fall asleep. The sun shrouded her, and there was a peaceful glow.
Zhang Cheng burst into tears, squatted down, gently put his face on Wang Xiuzhu's large hand where his bones had been deformed, and called out: "Mother..." Wang Xiuzhu was stunned for a moment, and reached out to rub his hair.
Zhang Cheng said affectionately: "Whether your thinking is clear or not, I want to tell you that I have been to your hometown and learned about your and my father's past." You are a great mother..."
If Wang Xiuzhu can understand these words, then her selfless dedication in her life finally has the most powerful happiness reward. If Zhang Hongchi had a spirit in heaven, his lifelong regret finally had the most beautiful ending.
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