It was as if a thunderbolt sounded in Lu Jing's ears, shocking him so much that he was unable to react.
"Xiao Jing, come quickly! I'll call your brother right away." Hu Ying said and hung up the phone.
Lu Jing held the phone and remained silent. Despite his psychological expectations, the news still made him feel unspeakable pain. Uncontrollable sadness welled up from the bottom of my heart. The churning cut off all his five senses.
Last July, the old man fell into a coma several times. In the past few months, I have been unconscious more often than awake. Mother Luo Yulan has been staying with the old man in the hospital. Accompany him through the last journey of his life. I just didn't expect this day to come so quickly.
"Lu Jing, what's wrong with you?" In the bright office of Jinghua Building, Mo Jingwen reported work to Lu Jing, with light snow falling outside the window. Lu Jing went to the window to answer the phone and was stunned. He didn't hear her next words at all. Mo Jingwen couldn't help walking to him and asked. Then he covered his mouth in shock, "Ah"
Two lines of hot tears flowed straight out of Lu Jing's eye sockets.
A man doesn¡¯t shed tears easily, but he hasn¡¯t reached the sad point yet!
Mo Jingwen had never seen Lu Jing cry, not even when someone put a gun to his head in Jiaozhou that year. This startled her, she hugged Lu Jing's body tenderly, and comforted her in a soft voice: "Lu Jing, it's okay. It's okay."
Lu Jing smiled reluctantly and said with a choked voice: "Jingwen, my father is critically ill. Arrange a car to take me to *********."
"Okay, I'll make arrangements right away. Do you want to notify Sister Wei?"
"Well, I'll make a call."
¡
The news spread in the capital like a huge storm. Relatives and friends of the Lu family gathered in the hospital one after another.
That night, Lu Jing met his eldest brother Lu Jiang, who had rushed back from Xucheng, outside the ward.
Looking at the crying Lu Jing, Lu Jiang gently patted his younger brother's shoulder, but said nothing in the end. He knew that his brother wasn't not strong enough, he just couldn't help himself.
The two brothers stayed at their father's hospital bed all night.
For several days, relatives and friends came to the ward to visit my father.
The old man has been living in *****. This time the illness came very quickly. He passed away just two days ago. Everyone in the Lu family came to the hospital to accompany the old man on his final journey. But you can¡¯t always have too many people around the ward. Most of the time, the Lu family members were in the lounge next door.
The lounge was darkly filled with people. The Lu family, descendants of the second and third generations. Several people from the Wei family and the Hu family also came. The sofas and wooden chairs were full of people. But no one spoke, the atmosphere was very depressing, and only slight breathing could be heard.
"Why hasn't Brother Jiang returned yet?" Sister-in-law Hu Ying whispered anxiously.
Lu Jing supported his mother Luo Yulan, who was looking haggard, and said softly: "It's okay. Just wait." The eldest brother went to review the final obituary. We need to argue about the attribution on my father¡¯s obituary. This is a final evaluation, and there can be no room for error.
"The meaning of eldest brother is that three greatnesses, one outstandingness and one excellence should be used for father in the obituary. That is, a great proletarian revolutionist, statesman, and military strategist, an outstanding Marxist, and a long-tested and outstanding leader of the party and the country.
Until now. Everyone in the Lu family has been mentally prepared, and everything is proceeding in an orderly manner.
Wei Wanyi sat quietly in the corner holding her two-year-old daughter Lu Qionghua. Watching her husband struggle from extreme pain these days to sharing the family's burden with Lu Jiang. Distribute, organize, and comfort everyone. When they were alone last night, Lu Jing burst into tears in her arms.
¡
The light in the ward is dim.
"Xiao Jing, dad, we're gone." One minute after her father's heartbeat stopped, Hu Ying went to notify Lu Jing.
Lu Jing, Zhan Zhengfang, and Tang Yue, who had been waiting in the lounge next door, got the news. He followed his sister-in-law and poured out of the lounge.
Lu Jing quickly rushed into the ward. The eldest brother and mother were sobbing silently in front of their father's hospital bed.
Looking at my father on the hospital bed, his face was withered. Old and cold hands. Lu Jing knelt in front of the bed and held his father's hand. My heart felt like a knife, and tears fell down. My father didn't wake up again, and he didn't even say the last sentence.
Scenes of listening to my father¡¯s teachings from childhood to adulthood flashed through my mind. And now it is never heard again.
People staying in the hospital hotel kept coming.
The sound of crying echoed in the ward.
¡
On January 14, 2010, the obituary was published in the media.
A series of commemorative activities unfolded.
¡
February 11, the twenty-eighth day of the twelfth lunar month, Lu Jing was in the study room of Jinyuan Villa sorting out his father¡¯s belongings and manuscripts with his mother. In the study, stacks of books are placed neatly and slightly messily in various corners of the study.
"Mom, don't be tired. I'll cook something for them to eat." Lu Jing put a copy of "Historical Records" annotated by his father on the ground and said to his mother who was wearing reading glasses at the desk.
Luo Yulan stopped. He took off the reading glasses from his eyes, leaned on the chair tiredly and said, "I'm fine. Xiaojing, your dad and I talked before he left. He talked about the time we read "How Steel Was Tempered" together.
Life belongs to a person only once. Is this how a person¡¯s life should be spent? When he looks back on the past. He will not regret wasting his years, nor will he be ashamed of doing nothing, so that when he is dying, he can say: My life and all my experiences are dedicated to the most magnificent cause in the world - serving mankind. struggle for liberation.
Don¡¯t worry about me. In the next few days, I will sort out Lao Lu¡¯s books, deeds, and diaries. There won't be enough time. "
She knows her youngest son¡¯s worries. For almost a month, I have been living here with her. She's fine.
Lu Jing smiled in relief. "Mom, I will do these things with you."
Luo Yulan shook her head, "When we get old, it's easy to recall the past. Just go about your business. Here, your dad left you some copybooks, and I've sorted them out. You can take them back later and find someone to frame them."
Lu Jing nodded gently.
¡
Warm lights light up in the modern courtyard house. Lu Jing had taken a shower and was talking to his wife Wei Wanyi and daughter Lu Qionghua in the bedroom.
"Wanyi, you have worked hard during this time." Lu Jing held his wife's hand and said sincerely. This month, Wanyi has been running around and taking care of the little one.
Wei Wanyi snuggled into her husband's arms and smiled gently, "It's nothing. I'm not busy with my work at the General Administration of Sports."
"A little thinner again." Lu Jing looked at his wife under the light: the 30-year-old Wanyi had lost her girlish youthfulness, and was still as thin, pretty and delicate as when they first met her. Gentle temperament. As soft and beautiful as a rose flower.
"Same for you!" Wei Wanyi said softly. Lu Jing clearly made people feel more mature. Vicissitudes of life and tranquility. He needs to dress older and have the same demeanor as those successful men in their forties.
Lu Qionghua, who was running back and forth in the room and playing with her braids, like a little princess, noticed the conversation between Lu Jing and Wei Wanyi, and suddenly ran over to hold her parents' knees, raised her head and said, "Mom, I too Thin!"
Wei Wanyi laughed, touched her daughter's hair, and said gently: "Well, our Qionghua has also lost weight."
Lu Jing pinched his daughter's chubby face in a funny way, "Qionghua, you are almost a fat girl, where have you lost weight? Your sister Qi also said something about you yesterday, right?"
"Bad dad!" Lu Qionghua pouted, turned around and hid in her mother's arms to sulk. Children have little self-esteem.
Wei Wanyi gave Lu Jing a charming look, her bright eyes were as gentle as water, and she smiled softly. The warm feeling of home wells up from the bottom of my heart. She remembered what Lu Jing wrote to her last year: It takes a thousand years for a beautiful woman to meet. Probably, she would never get tired of meeting Lu Jing for a thousand years!
Lu Jing smiled and hugged his beloved wife's waist.
After a while, Lu Qionghua reluctantly poked her head out to look at her bad father, looking aggrieved and worried, and asked, "Dad, have I really become a fat girl?"
The innocence of that moment erased the huge trauma in Lu Jing¡¯s heart. Birth, old age, sickness and death. Death and rebirth. Old people and children
In the quiet winter night, the family of three laughed and talked. (To be continued.)