Since I was very young,they’ve always been working in other provinces. Every year, they would come home to spend the Spring Festival with the family. Every time they left home,my younger brother and I would cry ourselves into sleep. You could never imagine how much we craved for company. Then again, it’s not their faults. They’ve gota whole family to support. As little education as they got, the only way they could make a living was through labor work, in cities far away.

We grew up under the roof of other families.Sometimes they treated us well, sometimes they didn’t. Nonetheless, we did spend a happy childhood. Me and my brother, it’s always the two of us. Spring festival remained our favorite time of year cause they would come home. The excitement counting down the days was just as overwhelming as the sadness whenthey fled home.

As we grew older, I had to separate from my brother cause high schools back then were all boarding schools. I came home once a month, which also became the best time of month for my younger brother. Still remember how he dreaded the time Ihad to leave---he couldn’t sleep at night; even if he could, he wouldn’t.

Then I went to college in Beijing. Family visit became semestral---summer and winter break have always been most exciting time of year. We got to spend entire months together. We would visit them during summer break in HZ, and we would all go back home for the spring festival. The trip to family reunion has always been sweet and pleasant in a very long time even after I graduated and started working, up until now.

Here I am, in a moving high speed train, took leave and had to go back cause they are getting divorced. It’s been ongoing for half a month. All those screaming, blaming, fighting, tears were all over the place. I decided as occupied as I am, I have to go back and see for myself what’s going on. I can’t do this any more through cell phones or messages. When I was little, there was one time when they were also fighting for divorce.

It looked pretty bad as far as my little soul could remember but in the end, itdidn’t work out. Back then, I was around 9 or 10 years old, couldn’t tell right from wrong. I wasn’t in the right place to make decisions based on rational analysis. Whoever first started the fight would be the bad guy who tried to tear the family apart and I would loathe. However, that little girl has grown up, good enough to respect whatever decisions they make now.

Just like this, family visit for the first time in my past 20 some years, has lost its all charm.