There is a feeling called heartache

Chapter 20 Sugar That Melts In The Palm Of The Palm
The fruit candy softened in the palm of the mother, and the dried pancakes placed by the mother-in-law's pillow, are so fragrant and sweet that they cannot be bought with money.

Last summer, I took my son back to my hometown.There is a grandma in my hometown who is over [-] years old and likes to eat walnuts. I bought her a box of walnut kernels.

Those neighbors who watched me grow up, seeing me married from afar, come back from time to time, chatting about my childhood, asking about my current life, and telling me where my childhood friends are now , how is life.

This morning, an aunt who lives behind my grandma's house also came to sit. Her daughter is my childhood friend.While chatting, grandma took out the walnut kernels I brought and ate them, and then grabbed a handful and handed them to her, and she politely accepted them after some excuses and thanks.In the next hour of talking, my grandma and I both ate a lot of walnuts. The aunt, she broke off a small piece of walnut from a whole piece of walnut and put it in her mouth, and ate it slowly for a long time. Just never eat it again.I was a little surprised and told her not to be polite, and to grab it after eating, but she firmly refused, telling me not to be polite.I have always been big and flexible, and seeing that she didn't eat, I didn't insist too much, so I sat until she left, and she didn't move the handful of walnuts.In such a hot summer, I thought to myself, should the walnut kernels be sweaty?

After my aunt left, I got up and went to the back room to read a book. Through the small window, I saw my aunt standing in the small living room of my house, surrounded by three children around 10 years old. Knowing that they were her grandchildren, including my friend's children.The little hands of the children stretched out to grandma, and she was distributing the walnut kernels to them one by one. The three children divided up all the walnut kernels in grandma's hands, sat on the threshold, counted them heartily, and ate them happily, while their grandma, He took out the broom from behind the door and bent over to sweep the floor, with an extremely flat expression on his face.

Tears welled up in my eyes, and I was afraid that I would be embarrassed if she saw it, so I quickly retracted my body.

I vaguely remember when I was a child, riding on the threshold with my brother many times, sharing a piece of hard black and red fruit candy brought by my mother with joy, without knowing or caring where the candy came from.I always watch my brother carefully peel off the candy paper that has been glued to the surface of the candy with his hands, and watch him put the candy in his mouth and bite it into two halves, and then spit it out for comparison. The size is similar. Then each took a small piece and ate it sweetly. We didn't know where mother was and what she was doing at this time, but the sugar that was about to melt was so sweet.

When I was studying abroad, every time I came home from vacation, my mother and grandma would take out the things they had accumulated for a long time for us to eat. What they kept for a long time was always nothing but sugar that had melted into a ball, pancakes that had changed their taste, and had grown Moldy snacks, wilted and dried fruits... I often complain about them: I ate it myself!Don't keep it, it's all broken.But they still stay year after year.

After getting married, one day I took the child to my mother-in-law’s house. The mother-in-law beckoned my son to follow her into the room. I quietly followed in to see what tricks the grandparents and grandchildren were playing. What I saw was a game played by all mothers in the world: the mother-in-law played from the side of the pillow. I took out a well-wrapped pancake in a handkerchief and gave it to my son with a smile. It must have been distributed by a new daughter-in-law according to the old rules, and I don’t know how many days it has been left there.

Now, my mother and mother-in-law have passed away one after another, and I rarely eat candy anymore, even my son doesn’t like it. The candy at home is always put into a ball and then thrown away. Later, I simply don’t buy it.The walnut kernels wet in the hands of the aunt, the fruit candy softened in the palm of the mother, and the dried pancakes beside the pillow of the mother-in-law, are so fragrant and sweet that they cannot be bought with money.

(Xiao Yu)
(End of this chapter)