Hunting 81: Gathering Goods in the Mountains, I Spoil My Ex-Wife to the Extreme

"Okay, here are two boxes of shotgun shells, take them."

The sales clerk took the money and handed two boxes of shotgun shells to Gao Hongmei.

With the hunting rifle in hand, Gao Hongmei happily carried it and the bullets, ready to head outside.

Su Lihua quickly pulled her aside: "Carrying a gun out like that is too scary. I'll go buy some cloth to wrap the gun up for you so it won't frighten people."

As she spoke, Su Lihua went to buy cloth for Gao Hongmei.

"Too."

After thinking about it, Gao Hongmei also felt that Su Lihua's words made sense.

After all, guns are quite intimidating and scary.

Before long, Su Lihua returned with a piece of gray linen. She carefully used the linen to wrap Gao Hongmei's hunting rifle before the two left the supply and marketing cooperative.

"I bought ten bullets with the gun, and the two boxes I bought had a total of fifty bullets, so that's sixty bullets in total, enough for me to use for quite a long time."

After leaving the supply and marketing cooperative, Gao Hongmei muttered to herself while counting on her fingers.

"Hongmei, I need to go to the post office, do you want to come?"

At this moment, Su Lihua suddenly spoke.

"Going to the post office? What for?"

Gao Hongmei was stunned for a moment, then asked after she came to her senses.

Send a letter home.

Su Lihua said.

"Oh." Gao Hongmei suddenly looked enlightened, but then she asked in surprise, "Lihua, you sent a letter home, your parents...?"

"Last month, I received a letter from my dad. He and my mom have been exonerated, and now the higher authorities are considering arranging jobs for them... I wrote to ask them when I can go back and reunite with them."

As Su Lihua spoke, she couldn't help but choke up.

Back then, not long after she was sent to the countryside as an educated youth, her parents were wrongly criticized and sent to a labor farm in the south for labor reform, where they stayed for several years.

During this period, due to wrong criticism and poor communication, her contact with her parents was constantly interrupted.

Even her parents didn't know that she had been married once in the place where she was sent to the countryside as an educated youth.

In fact, among the educated youth who went to Guapigou Village with her back then, there were two others who were forced to go to the countryside to hide because their elders had been wrongly criticized.

However, the elders of those two educated youths had long been exonerated and returned to the city.

But there was still no news from her parents. Su Lihua even thought that her parents had died far from home because they couldn't withstand the wrong criticism.

Unexpectedly, she received a letter from her father last month.

This made her cry tears of joy.

However, her joy was short-lived; Gao Zhankui broke his leg and was hospitalized in the county hospital.

In order to help Gao Hongmei take care of Gao Zhankui, she never wrote back home.

"Okay, let's go to the post office first."

As she said this, Gao Hongmei felt a void in her heart, thinking that Su Lihua might leave her and her home soon.

Having known Su Lihua for so many years, Gao Hongmei and Su Lihua came together because of their similar experiences and became like sisters. Gao Hongmei had long regarded Su Lihua as her own younger sister.

However, Gao Hongmei also understood that the person in front of her, whom she treated as her own sister, was not her biological sister. She also had her own parents and family. One day, Su Lihua would return to the city and reunite with her parents.

However, she didn't expect this day to come so suddenly, which caught her off guard.

However, if Su Lihua really returns to the city to reunite with her parents, Gao Hongmei will also wish her well.

Soon, the two arrived at the post office of Xiangyang Commune.

After Su Lihua mailed the letter, the two of them set off on their way home, heading towards Guapigou Village.

"Lihua, you didn't mention to your parents in your letter that you and Li Yunshan were previously married, did you?"

On the way back, Gao Hongmei couldn't help but ask.

"No, I didn't tell them in the letter, so as not to make them worry about me or feel sad for me. After all, divorce is not something to be proud of."

Su Lihua shook her head.

In this day and age, although gender equality and freedom of marriage and love are advocated, divorce is not a big deal.

But in reality, if a woman really gets divorced from a man, many people will still view her with prejudice.

Even if the fault doesn't lie with the woman, some rumors and gossip can still cause her some distress.

"It's all that bastard Li Yunshan's fault. If he hadn't been messing around with Yu Ergou and his gang of cronies and not doing anything productive, you wouldn't have divorced him."

When it comes to divorce, Gao Hongmei thinks of Li Yunshan.

After divorcing her, Li Yunshan set his sights on Su Lihua, a young woman who had just been sent to the countryside as an educated youth.

Back then, Su Lihua was young and a naive girl from the city. Before long, she was swayed by Li Yunshan's sweet talk and married him.

As a result, after Su Lihua and Li Yunshan got married, Li Yunshan remained incorrigible and idle. Su Lihua tried to persuade him and scolded him, but Li Yunshan wouldn't listen to her advice at all. Instead, he complained that Su Lihua was interfering too much and wanted to divorce her.

Su Lihua disagreed, and that bastard Li Yunshan even hit her.

Gao Hongmei knew all of this.

Therefore, after Su Lihua and Li Yunshan divorced, if it weren't for seeing Lin Xiulan jump into Li Yunshan's fire pit again, and in order to support Lin Xiulan, Su Lihua rarely went near Li Yunshan's house, let alone went to Li Yunshan's house or entered Li Yunshan's house.

Gao Hongmei knew that Su Lihua actually harbored resentment towards Li Yunshan, resenting him for taking away her innocence and then abandoning her.

"Who says otherwise? If it weren't for Li Yunshan, I might still be a virgin now."

"However, I am also grateful to Li Yunshan for insisting on divorcing me back then. If I hadn't divorced him, I wouldn't even dare to think about going back to the city now."

Su Lihua said with a mixture of resentment and relief.

Because, according to national policy, if educated youth who have been sent to the countryside settle down, get married, and have children there, they are generally not allowed to return to the city.

Therefore, many educated youth who settled down in the countryside, married and had children, would choose to divorce their spouses in order to return to the city.

Some people use persistent pleading and cajoling, while others use a combination of coaxing and deception.

Two years ago, there was a young intellectual from the neighboring village who had been sent to the countryside. He had already married and had children in the village, and started a family. But in order to return to the city, he asked his wife for a divorce.

The educated youth's wife disagreed, firstly because they already had three children, the oldest being almost ten years old and the youngest five; secondly, she feared that the educated youth would abandon his wife and children after divorcing her and returning to the city, and never come back.

As a result, in order to return to the city, that educated youth threatened suicide and actually drank half a bottle of pesticide.

If it hadn't been discovered early and the young man hadn't been taken to the commune clinic for a stomach pump, he probably would have died long ago.

After this threat of suicide, the educated youth's wife realized that he was determined to leave, and so she tearfully agreed to the divorce.

Before leaving, the educated youth solemnly promised that once he settled down in the city, he would return to remarry his wife and then bring his wife and four children to the city to enjoy a better life.

But now, two years have passed, and we haven't seen a single trace of that educated youth, not even a single letter has been sent to the countryside.

The mother who gave birth to three children for the educated youth became ill with longing and developed a serious mental illness because she had not received any replies from them for a long time.

Therefore, according to national policy, if Su Lihua hadn't divorced Li Yunshan, it would be impossible for her to return to the city right now.

If she hadn't divorced Li Yunshan, she would have to divorce him first if she wanted to return to the city.

But what if Li Yunshan doesn't get a divorce?

Could it be that she's going to follow the example of that male educated youth from the next village and threaten suicide by drinking pesticide?

"Sigh, I know your parents have been exonerated, and I know you might have to go back to the city soon. I'm genuinely happy for you, but I also can't bear to let you go." Gao Hongmei sighed, unable to hold back her sadness.

Upon hearing this, Su Lihua fell silent for a moment.

After a long while, she slowly spoke, "Hongmei, if I go back to the city, let's keep in touch by letter. If I have time, I will come back to Guapigou Village to find you, or you can come to the city to find me."

"You make it sound so easy. I don't even know where the provincial capital is. The farthest place I've ever been in my life is a county town. You want me to go to the provincial capital to find you? I can't even tell which way is north, south, east, or west." Gao Hongmei rolled her eyes at Su Lihua, but as she spoke, her eyes unconsciously reddened.

She quickly raised her hand, wiped away the tears that had just come out with her sleeve, took a deep breath and said, "It's too early to talk about these things now. Let's talk about it when you're sure you're going back to the city. But Lihua, let me tell you, you mustn't forget me when you go back to the city. Remember what you said, and write to me often."

"I will."

Su Lihua nodded solemnly.

"That's my true sister."

Gao Hongmei patted Su Lihua on the shoulder.

Seeing that it was getting late, the two quickened their pace back to the village.

……

"Hey, Lao Li, why haven't Gao Hongmei and Su Lihua come back yet? Did they take a shortcut back to the village?"

As the sun began to set and dusk fell, several street thugs squatted on a high spot along the dirt road leading from Xiangyang Commune to Guapigou Village, gazing in the direction of Xiangyang Commune.

They looked for a long time but couldn't find any sign of their target. So one of the street urchins with long hair couldn't help but ask.

"They couldn't possibly take the back roads back unless they knew we were waiting for them here. Otherwise, they would definitely take the main road back to the village."

Li Jianren, who was standing to the side with a cheap cigarette in his mouth, said with great certainty.

"But it's getting dark, and we still haven't seen the two young women. The brothers are all shivering from the cold, and their hands and feet are almost numb."

"Exactly, it's so cold, we should just stay home. If you hadn't said that Gao Hongmei had money, we wouldn't have followed you out and spent most of the day huddled in this freezing weather."

Two street urchins couldn't help but start complaining.

Just then, Li Jianren suddenly spotted two figures he had been waiting for on the distant rural dirt road.

"They're here, they're here, they're here."