Hard work after winning the lottery

A plate of hot and sour shredded potatoes, a plate of homemade pickled cabbage stir-fried with pork, and a pot of steaming pumpkin porridge.

Hua An was wolfing down his food and complaining about the school food when Li Guifen, while criticizing his unseemly eating habits, put the biggest piece of meat into his bowl.

Hua Shu sipped a small glass of baijiu and chatted quietly with his grandfather about the route the sheep would take the next day.

Grandma watched all this with a smile, her eyes full of satisfaction.

Hua Yun silently finished the last mouthful of porridge.

She put down the bowl, and the chopsticks collided with the rough porcelain bowl, making a crisp sound.

It wasn't large, but it was enough to draw everyone's attention to her.

Her palms were already sweating with nervousness.

"Dad, Mom, Grandpa, Grandma."

Hua Yun took a deep breath, her voice not loud, but carrying an unprecedented solemnity.

"I have something I want to tell you."

Li Guifen put down her chopsticks and asked with concern, "What's wrong, Yunyun? Have you still been upset about what happened outside?"

Hua An also stopped eating and looked at her curiously.

Hua Shu and his grandfather exchanged a glance and put down their wine glasses.

The atmosphere in the room instantly shifted from a relaxed, casual setting to a serious one.

Hua Yun stood up and walked to them.

She didn't speak immediately, but first looked around.

A dim light bulb, cracked walls, a table with a missing corner, and the four faces she loved most on the edge of the table.

Her throat tightened; she couldn't utter a single word of the opening remarks she had rehearsed countless times.

Finally, she managed to say something in a hoarse voice.

"You all...sit down."

Although the family members were puzzled, they still did as they were told and sat on the stool more steadily.

Hua Yun pulled out her old cell phone with a scratched screen from her pocket.

She unlocked the door, opened the bank's app, and hovered her finger over the balance check button for a full three seconds.

Then, she closed her eyes and clicked the button.

She turned her phone screen toward her family, her voice trembling slightly with extreme nervousness.

"The lottery ticket I bought in town a few days ago..."

"I've won the lottery!"

"I won the first prize."

After she finished speaking, she stopped talking and simply held up her phone, making the long string of glaring numbers clearly visible to her family.

The air seemed to freeze at that moment.

Time seemed to have been paused.

The evening breeze slipped in through the cracks in the old window, causing the oil lamp flame on the table to flicker.

Outside, the familiar sounds of cicadas and frogs filled the air.

Inside, however, there was a deathly silence, a suffocating silence so profound that you could hear a heartbeat.

Hua An's mouth opened into an "O" shape, and the piece of shredded potato he was holding with his chopsticks fell back into the bowl with a "plop".

Li Guifen stared intently at the screen, as if trying to see through it. Her breathing became rapid, and her chest heaved violently.

Hua Shu forgot to light the cigarette that was dangling from his lips. He froze, like a petrified statue, with only his bloodshot eyes contracting violently.

Grandma instinctively clenched the hem of her clothes, her lips moving but no sound came out.

Only Grandpa, Zhou Yinchuan's old comrade-in-arms, the one who had been on the battlefield and seen life and death, after the initial shock, suddenly raised his head and stared intently into Hua Yun's eyes, as if to confirm that this was not a joke.

I don't know how much time passed, it felt like an eternity.

"One...ten...hundred...thousand...ten thousand..."

Hua An stammered as he counted the zeros on the screen, his voice trembling more violently with each one he counted.

When he counted to the unit "ten million", he gasped sharply, as if someone had grabbed his throat.

"Twenty...twenty million?!"

This number, like a thunderclap, exploded in the quiet little house!

Hua Shu was the first to break down.

This taciturn man, whose back was bent by the weight of life, suddenly stood up, knocking over the bench behind him in the process.

He didn't help her up; instead, he frantically rubbed his hands back and forth on the faded old clothes in front of him.

"This...this...Yunyun...this..." He stammered, his face turning a deep purplish-red, too excited to utter a complete sentence.

"My God!"

Li Guifen finally came to her senses, and after a gasp, tears instantly streamed down her face.

She wasn't sad, nor was she afraid; she was ecstatic, as if the bitterness and sorrow she had suppressed for half her life had finally found an outlet.

She covered her mouth, and scalding tears streamed down her face as she sobbed uncontrollably.

Grandma's reaction was the most traditional.

She stood up shakily, faced the ancestral tablets enshrined in the main room, clasped her hands together, and knelt down.

"Heavens have opened their eyes! Our ancestors have blessed us! Our Hua family ancestors have shown their power!"

The old man kept chanting and kowtowing repeatedly, his voice filled with sobs and endless piety.

Grandpa Hua Mutou's eyes also reddened.

A smile slowly spread across his face, which was covered with deep wrinkles, more unsightly than a cry, yet more genuine than any smile in the world.

His cloudy old eyes glistened with tears as he looked at Hua Yun and nodded heavily.

"Good...good boy...well done..."

Seeing the chaotic yet realistic scene before her, Hua Yun's tense nerves finally relaxed, and tears streamed down her face.

She laughed and cried at the same time, walked over to help her grandmother up, and then took her mother's hand.

"Mom, Grandma, don't cry, this is wonderful news!"

She then looked at her father and brother, who were almost at a loss, and spoke clearly, word by word.

"After taxes, this amount is a full twenty million."

"I kept three million in the card, and the remaining seventeen million has all been deposited into a five-year fixed deposit account."

"Dad, Mom, Grandpa, Grandma, we'll never have to live a hard life again!"

"We no longer have to worry about my brother's tuition and living expenses!"

"Our house can be torn down and rebuilt! It can be the best brick house in the whole village, no, the whole town!"

"Dad, you can buy a small truck now, so you don't have to rely on that beat-up tricycle to haul sheep anymore!"

"Mom, you can buy the most beautiful clothes now, and you won't have to wear patched clothes anymore!"

"Grandpa and Grandma, I'm going to take you to the best hospital in the provincial capital for a full checkup so you can get healthy and strong!"

Her words unfolded like beautiful paintings before her family.

However, after hearing her words, Li Guifen, who was the first to react, grabbed her hand and said urgently.

"No, no, no! Yunyun! This money is yours to have won; it's your good fortune! We can't accept it!"

Hua Shu immediately echoed, having calmed down somewhat, but his voice still trembled: "Yes! Your mother is right! Keep this money safe for yourself, as your dowry. No one is allowed to touch it!"

Throughout their lives, they never considered getting something for nothing, let alone taking such a huge sum of money from their own daughter.

Their first thought wasn't about how much better their lives would be, but rather that with this money, their daughter would no longer be bullied.

The family's rejections and care, like the warmest hot spring, enveloped Huayun's heart.

She knew they genuinely cared about her.

That's precisely why she's even more determined to persevere.

"Dad, Mom, what are you saying? What do you mean by 'my own'?"

Hua Yun's tears welled up again, but she smiled and said, "Without you, where would I be? From childhood to adulthood, everything I've eaten, worn, and paid for in college—every single penny of it was earned by you through hard work, digging it out of the soil and scraping it from the sheep."

"Before, I was incompetent, and you all suffered because of me. Now that I'm lucky and have this money, are you going to watch me live a good life while you're still living in this leaky mud house?"

"If that's the case, I won't feel at ease holding this money for even a second!"

Her voice wasn't loud, but it was firm and resonant.

The room fell silent once again.

Hua Shu lowered his head and took a deep sniff.

Looking into her daughter's determined eyes, Li Guifen covered her mouth and cried even harder.

Yes, we're family, how can we distinguish between what's yours and what's mine?

At this moment, Hua Yun felt that the heavy bank card in her hand finally had its most real meaning.

It is no longer just a string of cold numbers, but the burning tears on the faces of family members, and countless warm and peaceful days to come.

Grandpa walked over and gently patted Huayun's shoulder with his large, rough hand.

"Good children, we will listen to you."

The old man's words were final.

A family meeting, filled with tears and laughter, lasted until late at night.

After the initial shock and excitement subsided, the family gathered around the small oil lamp and began to enthusiastically discuss the plans for this "huge sum of money".

From buying the latest study materials for my younger brother, to purchasing retirement insurance for my parents, and then to buying things for my grandparents...

Things they never dared to imagine in their entire lives have become within reach tonight.

In the end, everyone's opinions converged on one point.

Hua Shu slapped his thigh and announced loudly in a tone of unprecedented pride.

"Yes! The first thing to do is build a house!"

"Tear down this old mud-brick house, and let's build a two-story house! No, a three-story one!"

"It needs to have a yard, full of flowers! It needs to have a private bathroom, so you won't have to go out to use the toilet in winter!"

His eyes shone with the most brilliant light of hope for the future.

Seeing the genuine smiles on her family's faces, Hua Yun smiled too.

The gloom in City A and the pain brought by Zhou Yanjin seemed to have been completely washed away on this hopeful night.

A new life must be built, brick by brick, from this land that gave her birth and nurtured her.