Chapter 41: Record of Moving to the City in the 90s 41

Only someone with a mental illness could say something so insensitive.

Who among the logistics staff didn’t know about Old Master Yu’s family affairs?

Having an affair and marrying a mistress… if Ms. Zhou hadn’t considered her sons and chosen to leave quietly without making a scene, divorcing and stepping aside, Old Master Yu would have likely been dealt with long ago for his conduct issues.

At its root, wasn’t this whole mess caused by Old Master Yu and that old woman he married afterward?

And now what?

Did she really think that because she became the “General’s Wife,” the children of the first wife were obligated to provide for her in her old age?

What a load of nonsense.

Did she think this was the old society?

Did she think stepchildren had to worship their stepmothers like ancestors?

Why did the leadership assign you to find that “General’s Wife” and tell her that housing was tight and she needed to move out?

First, that “General’s Wife” herself was not a retired cadre from within the system. According to the regulations, she was not entitled to continue living in the Retired Cadres’ Residential Compound.

Second, a “General’s Wife” who rose to power as a mistress should be cleared out as soon as possible. Who would want to deal with such a person?

You didn’t even understand the core purpose of why the leadership sent you to find the “General’s Wife,” and yet you were actually fooled by her into going after Zhou Jing.

Heh, your head isn’t filled with brains; it’s filled with dishwater, isn’t it?

Does it slosh around when you walk?

“I heard that person’s husband also remarried her after a divorce. The daughter she gave birth to is four years older than the youngest son of the original wife.” Someone immediately dug up the background of the clerk who had gone to find Zhou Jing.

Oh, so she was also a mistress who moved up. No wonder she took the “General’s Wife’s” side. Birds of a feather flock together, don’t they?

People like that should be avoided at all costs, lest others question one’s own character.

The “General’s Wife,” Yu Zexiu’s step-grandmother, moved out of the Retired Cadres’ Residential Compound after the New Year.

Power cuts today, water cuts tomorrow… repairs?

“Sure, sure, we’ll be right there,” they’d say, but when did they ever show up to fix anything in less than three to five days?

How could anyone live like that?

They didn’t explicitly tell you to move out, but couldn’t they find other ways to make you leave?

In the Retired Cadres’ Residential Compound, there were plenty of widows who weren’t retired cadres themselves. Why did everyone else get to stay while you had to move?

It was only after she moved out that the step-grandmother realized it wasn’t a case of “the tea cooling after the person leaves.” It was that these people looked down on her from the start and were unwilling to let her enjoy the shade of Old Master Yu’s legacy.

How to survive after leaving the compound became the step-grandmother’s most urgent priority.

Before Old Master Yu died, she had saved a bit of money. However, if she lived alone, that money would be gone in less than five years. She wasn’t even seventy yet; what was she to do?

There was no way forward with Zhou Jing. She didn’t even dare show up at his door, fearing he might actually kill her.

Her daughters had been gone for years, and there hadn’t been a word from them.

But she wasn’t completely out of cards to play.

Didn’t Old Master Yu still have three sons who were listed on the same household registration as him?

Then she was their stepmother, and those three had to acknowledge her.

If she couldn’t handle Zhou Jing, could she really not handle the three of them?

The step-grandmother went to their doors, making a scene at the gates of each of their three workplaces one by one.

She didn’t turn against them in public, but in private, she truly threatened them: “If you three don’t take care of me, I’ll take this straight to your superiors. You’re all facing retirement soon. If I make enough of a scene and you get fired…”

“Fine, fine, fine. Just say it, what do you want?”

Driven by the hardships of life, the step-grandmother had actually learned to be clever. She didn’t ask for the moon: “A good environment for medical care, a place to live, and the three of you together provide me with living expenses. Just enough to keep my belly full. If I get sick, you have to take care of it. As for anything else? Even if I die and you throw me directly into the sea, it has nothing to do with me. I only ask for a steady meal.”

Was this request excessive?

It was very excessive. You aren’t our biological mother; why should we take care of you?

But the three brothers had tried to scheme against the second brother before and failed. Instead, they had been outmaneuvered by him. In their respective units, they had been criticized and given major demerits. If they hadn’t worked there for most of their lives and if the Old Master’s reputation hadn’t still carried some weight, they might have been fired.

Now they were keeping their heads down, just wanting to make it to retirement and secure their pensions.

They were now firmly under their stepmother’s thumb.

After settling their stepmother, the three brothers looked at each other and then up at the clear blue sky. Was this their retribution?

They hadn’t cared for their biological mother back then, yet they couldn’t escape the duty of providing for an elder. Look at this.

Didn’t they still have to provide for a stepmother?

If they had known they would end up in this situation, would life have turned out this way if they had treated their biological mother and their second brother well?

The path beneath one’s feet is made by one’s own walking. No matter what they thought now, they couldn’t blame anyone else. This was just how things were.

The three brothers were now somewhat resigned to their fate, not wanting to struggle anymore. Even if they were to make a fuss, they would at least wait until after they retired. By then, they wouldn’t be afraid of a scandal.

But were the wives at home easy to deal with?

Today, one would go to the stepmother’s door and give her a tongue-lashing.

Tomorrow, another would go and mock her.

The three took turns, seizing every opportunity. The step-grandmother might have lived another twenty years, but in less than six months, she was driven to a breaking point by their harassment.

Good heavens, she didn’t die outright, but she suffered a stroke.

Paralyzed in bed, she could still speak, but she couldn’t manage her daily needs without someone to care for her.

The step-grandmother’s new neighbors didn’t know the history between her and her daughters-in-law. One called the police, and another went to the neighborhood committee.

They asked how this was going to be handled.

How else could it be handled?

All the neighbors could testify that the daughters-in-law came to the door every day to curse at the mother-in-law, driving her to this state.

Therefore, the three daughters-in-law were now required to serve her.

The neighborhood committee and the neighbors would even supervise them.

Having caused such trouble, the three sisters-in-law became much more subdued.

But none of them wanted to wait on the old woman, so they hired a nanny.

Another half-year passed, and the step-grandmother breathed her last.

Wasn’t it a coincidence?

Just as the step-grandmother had been buried, her biological daughter returned. She was dressed very fashionably and brought along a foreign husband, saying she had come back to take her mother to America to enjoy a life of luxury.

But when she returned and saw that her biological mother was gone, how could she possibly endure it?

With a single lawsuit, even Su Huandan’s parents-in-law were dragged into court.

“What a curse! That woman was nothing; we never even treated her like a person. She was like a bedbug, someone completely irrelevant. And now, just because she’s dead, her own daughter has the nerve to drag our whole family into court? Who does she think she is?” Ms. Meng was beyond livid. She thought they were done with that woman forever, only for the woman’s death to result in her daughter suing them.

It was, indeed, an incredibly unlucky turn of events.

No one from the family showed up in person, leaving their lawyer to represent them entirely. By the time the first hearing ended, the family itself was largely cleared of involvement.

However, Yu Zexiu’s three uncles were met with disastrous luck.

The investigation dragged on, and while there were suspicions of abuse, there was no concrete evidence to secure a conviction. On the contrary, the nanny had actually taken quite good care of her.

But the scandal had grown too large, and the fallout was devastating. All three brothers were stripped of their positions, and their retirement pensions vanished into thin air.

Su Huandan felt that those three brothers got exactly what they deserved.