Three people laid out the fruit and pastries they brought, along with the almond dew mother loved most when she was alive. They lit the incense, and Zhao Yang and Yingtao knelt and kowtowed in front of the grave.
Seeing his children grown up, Zhao Yishan secretly wiped away tears. He muttered words to the grave, his voice very soft, speaking nothing but intimate words shared between him and Zhao Yang's mother.
In the past, the family of three would come to the hill several times a year; these past three years, Zhao Yishan forbade Zhao Yang from coming home, so Zhao Yang hadn't visited his mother's grave in three years.
Zhao Yishan and his wife were Zhao Yang's adoptive parents. After adopting Zhao Yang, they abandoned the thought of having another child.
When Zhao Yang was eighteen, his adoptive mother died. The day after the funeral, the owner of the small store not far from Zhao Yang's house discovered that a whole case of donkey-hide gelatin had been emptied into bottles.
