Life Is Not Worth It

A young man was riding his motorcycle when the phone fixed to his dashboard suddenly rang.

“Hello? Dummy, what’s up?” The young man reached out, pressed the call button, and answered through his headphones.

This young man’s name was Yang Meng, twenty-three years old, with a rugged, masculine look but a distinctly feminine name. He had his eccentric parents to “thank” for that.

His parents were typical farmers, not much educated, so when it came time to name their child, they asked Zhang Ironmouth, the village fortune-teller, for help. Zhang Ironmouth thumbed through a battered copy of “Explaining Simple and Analyzing Compound Characters” for a long while before waving his hand decisively, “Meng—it means the sprouting of grass and trees. That’s the name for this child!”

And so, he ended up with this name, and it became a source of endless amusement for his peers throughout his life.

Like the other young people in his village, Yang Meng left home early to find work in the city. People always said there were more opportunities in the city, but from his years of hard experience, that only meant there were more opportunities for menial labor.

With little education, Yang Meng could only rely on his strength to make a living—carrying bricks on construction sites, standing guard at residential gates, fixing cars in repair shops… Now, he was delivering food to earn some pocket money.

As soon as he spoke, a roar came from the other end of the line. “Mengmeng, how many times do I have to tell you! Call me by my proper name! Hu Guohui! Not D