After Zhao Anbang’s work and residence had been arranged, and his household registration and food rations were transferred, Feng Qingxue mailed the letter she had written to Lu Jiang a few days earlier, added with the incidents that occurred after Zhao Anbang returned home.
Upon receiving the letter, Lu Jiang was infuriated.
"Damn you, Zhao Anbang, I share my son with you, yet you are addressed as father by my son before me!" He roared with anger slapping the table in his dorm, wham, wham; the noise scared the lights out of the soldier, Han Ping, who had come to find him.
He was the rookie who owed his life to a sentence passed by Lu Jiang before the counterattack. He was no longer a rookie now.
"Brigadier General..." Han Ping stood in the wide-open door, not daring to move a muscle.
"What’s the matter!" Lu Jiang raised his head, tamping down his anger in an instant and his face was utterly frosty.
Witnessing the increasingly tactful and authoritarian brigade commander after his homecoming, Han Ping cautiously said, "Commander Ye and General Zhao invited you to the cafeteria for a drink. Commander Ye has specially purchased a bottle of Maotai!"
"Understood, I’ll be right there, you go ahead and announce them, help me get some food." Lu Jing waved him off, letting him go first.
After Han Ping left, Lu Jiang opened the few parcels Feng Qingxue had sent. Apart from clothes and footwear, as expected, there were grains and other foods that could be stored and transported. Given the grain harvest in the Wanglou Brigade, Feng Qingxue had enough reason to send him grain.
Suppressing the touch of emotion in his heart, Lu Jiang briskly took out a bag of salted peanuts with shells.
After scuffling through the parcel, other items were not appropriate to take out.
So, he pocketed a share of peanuts from the bag and walked into the cafeteria. He found Ye Zhengjun, Zhao Yong, and Zheng Xuefeng tucked away in a corner; all of high ranks, and naturally, their meals were of a superior standard. The food of the four gathered on the table filled it to the brim.
Ye Zhengjun beckoned him over and uncorked the wine, "Well, this bottle of wine has cost me seven or eight yuan."
"The total cost of the dishes on the table isn’t even seven or eight yuan!" Zhao Yong laughed.
"Indeed, this wine is damned expensive, no wonder it is used only at state banquets. We have families to provide for, we can afford a taste from time to time, but definitely not for a regular drink." As Ye Zhengjun was about to pour the wine, Lu Jiang stood up and took over, filling each glass to the full.
Zheng Xuefeng opened the small packet Lu Jiang had brought and distributed the peanuts rapidly, a small pile in front of each of the four.
By estimation, the quantities were almost even.
"Where did these peanuts come from?" Ye Zhengjun enjoyed having a few drinks with peanuts, but peanuts were hard to come by, they were scarce, exported like soybeans to earn foreign currency. Only on festive occasions could one see peanuts or melon seeds in the cafeteria.
Before Lu Jiang could answer, Zhao Yong interrupted, "No need to ask, they must have been sent by his sister-in-law!"
Ye Zhengjun remembered, "Right, right, Xiaohan just mentioned you were banging the table furiously in your dorm cursing Zhao Anbang. Receiving letters from your sister-in-law is a joyous event, why would you lambast Zhao Anbang? Has he arrived home yet? Are his work and other arrangements in order? We haven’t heard from him."
Lu Jiang reproached, "He gets to hear my son call him dad first, shouldn’t I be angry?"
The three men present were shocked and then broke into a roaring laughter.
After the laughter subsided Ye Zhengjun sighed, "It’s not surprising! We are away from home all year round, even when we do return home, our children don’t recognize us. In the past, my wife wrote to me saying that my younger son would call any military man who dressed similarly to me, ’dad’! By then, my younger son was four years old, he had never laid eyes on me since birth, he could only see me in photographs."
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