Chapter 49 - 049 The Qin Family’s Past 2: The Azure Blood Phoenix and the He Shi Bi Additional -
As their children, they were sent down to be reeducated through labor. Because my eldest brother was divorced, my sister-in-law, with her two children, was not sent down. Instead, she was regarded with favor for severing ties with a bad element and got a decent job.
The daughter of my eldest brother had become an educated youth in the village next door a year ago.
And the elder brother was assigned to a rural area in Zebei Province, which was said to have good conditions. There, double-cropping rice yielded not-bad harvests, and the annual grain allocation was also plentiful.
However, none of this was of much concern to me. Why? Because Qin Shouren and the elder brother did not share the same mother.
Such circumstances were actually quite common in that era.
Qin Shouren was ten years younger than his elder brother Qin Shouhan. The elder brother was born to the father’s first wife in an arranged marriage. Later on, after the father’s return from studying abroad, everyone began divorcing, seeking a new era woman with whom they could communicate. Thus came Qin Shouren’s mother, Wang Shulan, a woman of the new era who had also studied abroad.
Although the couple got along, the mother was in poor health and passed away when Qin Shouren was ten years old.
At that time, the elder brother’s mother also passed away, so the father brought the elder brother back from the countryside.
The ten-year-old Qin Shouren, grieving from the loss of his mother, was thrilled to have an elder brother and could not help but seek him out to play. However, nine out of ten attempts were met with cold rejection. The only time the elder brother would agree was when the father was present, needing to play the role of a good brother.
A child of ten already had some understanding and gradually realized why. Not of the same womb, how could somebody else treat you well? Such a fool I was.
What followed was an even colder relationship between the two, which persisted until the appearance of the Red Guards. I was repeatedly betrayed and reported by that so-called elder brother.