Gu Xiaobai had already booked his train ticket home online.
Putting on a face mask and rolling up his sleeves, he decided to take advantage of the few days before returning to his hometown to give his rental apartment a thorough cleaning.
First on the list was to pack up a dozen pounds of accumulated delivery boxes and miscellaneous junk, and take the whole lot down to the residential garbage station.
Before he even reached the station, he heard a commotion.
"Mom, Dad, can you two please give it a rest? It's so hard for me to finally come home for the New Year, and look at how you've filled my room with trash—I don't even have a place to stand!"
"Son, just bear with it for a couple of days. Something seems to have happened with the recycling station in our neighborhood; it hasn't been open for a week."
"Fine, just pile all the stuff we scavenged today onto my tricycle, okay?"
Over by the residential garbage station, a family of three didn't seem to mind the filthy and chaotic surroundings at all, arguing over scavenging recyclables amidst a swarm of buzzing flies.
As it turned out, Gu Xiaobai actually knew this elderly couple.
They lived in the same residential complex as him, and their son worked out of town as a programmer, several years older than Gu.
Since last year, both elderly parents had reached the age to receive pensions. According to gossip from the neighborhood aunties, the couple's monthly pension wasn't low at all—in fact, it was double the royalties G…
Chapter 83