Courtyard House: A Start with Black Gold Swallowing 100,000 Silver Dollars

"You got a share?" Sha Zhu sneered. "You didn't even mention his name. If I hadn't spoken up today, you probably wouldn't even remember how many teeth he had, right? Your mind is completely tied to Jia Banggeng, to that treacherous bastard—you only have eyes for him!"

When "Jia Banggeng" is mentioned, Sha Zhu pronounces the word "Jia" with extra emphasis, like iron filings squeezed out from between his teeth.

"Silly Zhu, how could you make such a Korean joke?"

"He's your own son too! How can you call your own son an ungrateful wretch?"

"I know you love He Xiao, but I never imagined you'd love her so much that you'd abandon your own flesh and blood?"

Lin Meili's throat tightened, and she lacked confidence, but she instinctively retaliated—using his words to pierce his heart.

You say I only have eyes for Bang Geng? Then what about you? Besides He Xiao, who else is in your heart?

We're all equally bad!

"I want to manage? Can I even manage it?"

Sha Zhu strode forward, pointed into the house, and said, "You really don't know, or are you pretending? His character—shallow-skinned, narrow-minded, eating his own food while serving outsiders, and still complaining the bowl isn't precious enough!"

"It's just the cost of a meal, why are you making such a big deal out of it?"

Upon hearing this, Lin Meili immediately seized upon a flaw and hardened her tone.

"A meal costs 537 yuan."

When Sha Zhu announced the numbers, his voice was as flat as if he were reading from an account book, but each word landed heavily on the ground.

"Tell me, should I hold it against them?"

"Who do you think he is?"

"Doesn't he know his own limitations? He earns only 48.6 yuan a month, yet he dares to order over 500 yuan worth of food—tell me, how much pampering and spoiling must he have been raised from childhood to produce such a 'person'?"

He stared at her, a slight upward twitch at the corner of his mouth—not a smile, but a mockery, a weariness, a burst of pent-up anger finally burning through the last shred of his facade.

More than five hundred?

Lin Meili choked up, and a thin layer of sweat appeared on her palms.

In 1982, the average person's annual salary was just over 500 yuan.

One meal consumed the entire family's annual food supply... This isn't eating; it's swallowing gold!

"But...but it was just that one meal! Maybe his friend ordered it randomly, we can't blame Bang Geng entirely."

Her voice weakened, but she still held on to the last bit of stubbornness.

"That's exactly what you did! That's exactly what you did!" Sha Zhu interrupted her, his voice lower but even deeper, "You spoiled him since he was little, indulging him, turning a blind eye to everything, and that's how he became the person he is today!"

"You're still protecting him? Fine—I'll tell you something else, and after you hear it, think about whether it's worth it to cover for him."

He paused, his gaze sweeping over her pale face. "He didn't just come on credit for one or two meals; he came every day, and every meal was expensive. He also brought a bunch of unruly friends—in a year, the IOUs were stacked higher than a rolling pin, totaling over nine thousand eight hundred. He was just two hundred short of making it ten thousand."

"Listen to this, he bankrupts a family with ten thousand yuan a year—does Jia Banggeng have dragon liver and phoenix gall?"

"You don't believe me? I've kept all the receipts, not a single one missing. I was the one cleaning up his messes all along!"

"If I don't deal with this spendthrift, will he squander the whole business? And take my 20% share, all of it? Tell me—what makes him think he can inherit my shop?"

"Eating a family that earns ten thousand yuan a year will bankrupt them..."

These words buzzed in Lin Meili's ears, like someone striking a bell with a hammer.

Her legs went weak and she almost sat down on the ground.

How did the stick antler become like this?

Is it really because I spoiled it?

His father passed away early, so was it wrong for me to look at him a little more and give him a few more bites of food?

But... why does he become more crooked the more it hurts?

She finally heard the string in her heart snap.

"Really...really?"

She looked up at Sha Zhu, her gaze unfocused, like a candle flame about to go out in the wind.

"I'll show it to you tomorrow morning."

Sha Zhu didn't say anything more, turned around and left, his footsteps pounding heavily on the concrete ground, one after another.

Lin Meili slowly stood up, without saying a word or wiping away her tears. She walked straight into the kitchen, picked up the jujube wood rolling pin leaning against the stove—heavy, sturdy, and capable of hitting someone without breaking their skin, yet causing excruciating pain.

She pushed open Jia Banggeng's door.

The room was deathly silent at first, then a scream of pain, followed by wailing, "Mom! I was wrong! Stop hitting me!" Each cry was more urgent and more hoarse than the last.

Sha Zhu overheard this at his doorstep, his lips twitched slightly, and he remained silent, but a sense of relief washed over him.

—He deserves to be hit. He really deserves to be hit.

He shook his head, turned and went into the restroom.

After washing and drying my face, I pushed open the bedroom door and dove into bed.

I have to get up at 5:30 tomorrow, wash up, and rush to the morning market—picking out fresh green vegetables at the vegetable market, lively seafood at the seafood market, and meat with a good balance of fat and lean meat at the butcher's stall, carrying basket after basket back to the restaurant; when I get back, I still have to cut, braise, steam, simmer, peel shrimp, and pick vegetables... There's a mountain of work to do, and I can't shirk any of it.

The 20% stake he held wasn't just nominal; he actually controlled it. He treated himself as both the boss and the employee, wanting to personally oversee every detail, big or small. Strangely enough, no matter how tired he was, he never felt exhausted—he had a sense of purpose.

It was just that the day was too tense.

The moment my head hit the pillow, sleepiness washed over me like a tide. My eyelids drooped, my vision blurred, and my breathing gradually evened out...

Moonlight streamed quietly into the windowsill, illuminating an enamel mug on the bedside table. A piece of paint was chipped off the rim, revealing a grayish-white base underneath, like an old wound that hadn't healed.

In his dazed state, Sha Zhu felt a heat on his back as a hot body pressed against him. His eyelids twitched, and he instantly became more alert.

"Stop fooling around, we still have to cook first thing tomorrow morning."

There wasn't a hint of tenderness in his words; he sounded more like he was rushing to finish his work. Right now, all he could think about were ledgers, menus, and purchase orders—making money, making money quickly, making as much as possible, saving enough to support He Xiao and ensure a stable life for them in the future.

"Silly Zhu... how long has it been since you touched me?"

Lin Meili pressed her face against his earlobe, her breath soft and hot.

"I'm sleepy, let me sleep for a while."

But she wouldn't give up, and kept reaching up. Sha Zhu's head was throbbing from all the nagging, and in the end he could only deal with it hastily, like throwing away a rag halfway through erasing a blackboard, even he himself felt it was perfunctory.

Ever since "Siheju" opened for business, Shazhu has been completely absorbed in the kitchen and at the counter, leaving no time for anything more intimate. Lin Meili knows perfectly well: this relationship has to be maintained, not out of affection, but simply for the sake of the relationship.

Bang Geng, that kid, was always sweet-talking but lazy, always complaining about being tired, but the moment you mentioned "What do you want, brother?", he'd immediately perk up. Lin Meili believed in an old saying—"The squeaky wheel gets the grease." She doted on this eldest son, favoring him to the point of being biased, and doing so with a clear conscience.

What about He Xiao? He's always been a quiet person. He's obedient to Sha Zhu and never causes trouble at school. He's well-behaved like Li Guoxuan, studying, doing his homework, and helping his family sweep the floor and fold the blankets.

Lin Meili had already planned it out. After he graduated from high school, she would ask someone to arrange for him to get a job in a factory, a stable job, and live a peaceful life.

The joke is different.

She feared that one day when she closed her eyes, no one would care for his basic needs, and she was even more afraid that he would fall into poverty. So she planned to have Sha Zhu transfer the restaurant's shares to Bang Geng, even if it was just a nominal transfer, so that he would have no worries about food and clothing and could live the life of a rich young master.

As for He Xiao… Lin Meili wasn't indifferent; she simply didn't cherish him. Back then, she got pregnant with him because Sha Zhu forced her with the divorce papers—if she didn't give birth, they would separate; only by giving birth could they keep the family together. From the moment He Xiao was born, he carried the shadow of a transaction, something Lin Meili saw but didn't dwell on.

She also understood that Sha Zhu's heart was biased, clearly biased: the family property would definitely go to He Xiao.

When Sha Zhu wasn't home, she would often call He Xiao, who was still in high school, to the kitchen. While picking vegetables, she would sigh and say, "Your brother is the eldest son, and he should be the one to run this business." "No matter how good your uncle is to you, he's still raising someone else's son." "Don't you understand now who the shop will be named after?" She didn't say much, but every word was hooked, slowly planting seeds in the child's heart.

"Bang Geng, your stupid Uncle Zhu even puts a tab on your bill for a bowl of noodles at the shop. Is that what you call being a father? Is that what you call being a human being?"

"Ha, they don't treat you like the young master at all, they won't even let you into the kitchen."

"If the blood isn't warm, then the heart isn't close. I think this shop will eventually belong to your brother, and then you won't even be able to get a bowl of soup."

"Such a booming business, the profits must be overflowing, and it all goes to him alone? Are you willing to accept that?"

"Since you can't get it, don't let him get it too easily!"

……

A few weeks later, Banggeng gathered again under the old locust tree at the entrance of the alley, squatting with a few "friends" wearing slippers and smoking cigarettes.

These people call him "Brother Bang" all the time, but when it's mealtime, they either claim they "just ate," or they pull out five cents to buy two sesame seed cakes and sneak an ice pop. They're already seething with anger, and seeing that Bang Geng is well-off and talks a big game, they'll find something to nitpick: "Brother Bang, if you're not getting any, you might as well flip the pot!" "You won't get anything anyway, so let it burn completely, it'll save everyone trouble!"

As Banggeng listened, his fingers tightened their grip, until his knuckles turned white.

After "Siheju" opened, Shazhu delivered money to the door on time every month. Lin Meili's finances improved, and she bought a new TV and a washing machine. A Phoenix bicycle was parked in the yard, and her younger siblings each wore a Shanghai brand watch. He himself always carried ten or eight yuan in his pocket. His "friends" fawned over him, praising him for "having the air of an older brother" and saying he would "become a boss someday." All of this was earned by Shazhu.

He wanted that shop so badly that he dreamed of counting money at night.

But he also knew that Sha Zhu treated He Xiao differently—when He Xiao had a fever in the middle of the night, Sha Zhu carried him three miles to the hospital; when He Xiao won an award for his essay, Sha Zhu specially bought red paper and personally wrote a couplet to paste in the main room. And what about him? Last time he asked if he could go into the kitchen to learn how to cook, Sha Zhu only said, "Learn to wash vegetables for three days first."

A while ago, in an attempt to cheer up Sha Zhu, Lin Meili grabbed a rolling pin and beat him up. His back was covered in bruises, and he was in so much pain that he lay in bed for two days, too afraid to turn over.

The hatred gradually built up, making his chest feel suffocated.

Bang Geng has never been a grateful person. Sha Zhu used to buy him a schoolbag, fix his bicycle, and shield him from the neighbor's kid's punches—he's forgotten all of that. He only remembers that he didn't give him more pocket money today, and that he didn't promise to take him to the department store yesterday.

You won't give it to me, and you can't expect to leave it for He Xiao either.

That night, he carried a can of gasoline, rode his bicycle around the back wall of the compound, and quietly hid under an old wooden box at the very back of the storage shed.

"What are you putting here, sticky rice?"

Old Man Yan Bugui, who had been retired for many years, was returning from his stroll when he noticed the man acting suspiciously and casually asked him a question.

"Oh, a bucket of paint. The house smells too strong, so I'll leave it here to air out."

After saying that, Bang Geng slipped away as if his feet were greased.