KA | Chapter 5

I opened Taobao and clicked on the refund page, returning the skateboard.

Luckily I hadn’t thrown away the box when I bought it, otherwise without a signed receipt I’d lose another 200 yuan, which would’ve depressed me for a while. A customer that even KA’s top performer couldn’t sign, there’s no way I could pull it off. I was just overestimating myself, refusing to turn back until I hit a wall, wasting time for nothing. Signing contracts for pots and pans doesn’t earn much, but it’s easy to close and quick; signing key accounts earns a lot, but it’s hard to close and takes forever, and if you fail you’ve worked for nothing. Eyeing what’s in the pot while eating what’s in the bowl, now the bowl’s almost empty and the pot has nothing to offer, I’m about to starve.

“Chuan’er, the holiday’s coming up soon, buy some pork head meat, will you?” My mother picked up a bite of tomato and egg stir-fry.

I chewed on pickled cucumber and said, “There’s still a week until the holiday.”

“I just scrolled through Douyin and everyone’s eating pork head meat. Let’s eat it early this year too.”

“Those influencers are promoting for brands, eating tangyuan on the fifth day of the lunar new year, eating pork head meat before the lunar month is even over.” I said, “Normal people don’t eat it until the second day of the second lunar month, right?”

My mother’s face hardened. “I just want to eat pork head meat. Is that not allowed?”

“Fine, I’ll buy it after work tomorrow.”

“You don’t need to buy it. I’ll go out this morning and get it myself. I’m just telling you.”

I sighed. “It just snowed and the roads are slippery outside. With your legs, just stay home and rest.”

My mother had rheumatism. On cloudy days or when it snowed, her legs would ache. When it was severe, one leg would swell while the other stayed thin, and getting out of bed was a struggle, let alone going downstairs. She got the disease while sitting the month after I was born.

Back then, my father left a thousand yuan and ran off with another woman.

I never knew what my father looked like. There were no photos of him in the house, not even a marriage certificate. Thirty years ago in the countryside, people just held banquets for weddings, they didn’t bother getting licenses.

My mother said my father was full of bad habits, his face was just barely acceptable. She also said I looked like my father, so whenever I looked in the mirror, I was convinced my father must have been devastatingly handsome.

How else could he have caught the eye of a rich man’s daughter?

“It’ll be better once we move into the elevator building next month.” I picked up a piece of ribs for my mother.

The off-plan apartment would be ready next month. Twenty thousand yuan down payment, thirty-year mortgage, four thousand yuan monthly payment.

Before I graduated from university, my mother spent all her earnings on my tuition. After I started working, my mother saved ten thousand yuan and gave it all to me for the house. I bombed my college entrance exam and got assigned a major by default, studied marketing for four years, and sales was the perfect fit after graduation. Sales income was tied to commissions. When I first started, I couldn’t close deals and made around three thousand a month. It gradually improved in the second year. I’d been in sales for five years, saved up one hundred fifty thousand. Ten thousand went to the new house down payment, thirty thousand for a car, and I kept twenty thousand for emergencies.

Before transferring to KA, I could make ten thousand a month. After deducting insurance and mortgage, I had about four thousand left. KA targets are high. If I don’t complete the sales task, my commission gets cut in half. I make five thousand a month, so I have to dip into my emergency fund.

“Yeah, when we were buying, we liked that location. The farmers market is right outside, everything’s convenient. Not like here, I have to ride an electric scooter to buy groceries.” My mother gnawed on the ribs.

The new apartment was on the edge of the Third Ring Road. It took an hour to drive to the office, not a great location, but for now, it was the best value-for-money house our family could afford.

I currently lived in a thirty-year-old residential complex, north-south facing, with decent heating. It took just over ten minutes to drive to the office. The only downside was no elevator, so every time I bought rice I had to carry it up three flights of stairs.

The contractor on the fourth floor always came home late at night. When he went upstairs, he’d cough to trigger the motion-sensor lights. My mother was a light sleeper, and once she woke up, it was hard to fall back asleep, so she often waited for him to come home before going to bed.

These years, the two of us had depended on each other. Soon we’d move into the new place, and the hard days would finally be over.

I believed that the setbacks at work were only temporary. As long as I worked hard, everything would get better and better.

*

Lanhai’s main business was advertising. We had no price advantage in public opinion monitoring services. When Shen Yuesheng directly pointed out that the “quote had water in it,” it meant he’d shopped around before.

Many companies could do public opinion monitoring, and the services were pretty much the same. Shen Yuesheng could easily choose a cheaper quote.

Shen Yuesheng understood marketing, was very opinionated, and overly assertive. The conditions he proposed, I couldn’t meet. The deal would just collapse.

I couldn’t sign Pinsheng. Nobody else could either. That was the only way I could comfort myself now.

Stop thinking about it. Right now I’ve only completed 30% of my targets. There’s no time for internal conflict.

I picked up the desk phone and started calling clients, tapping away. I called all morning and managed to schedule a meeting with a customer who sold screws. I was about to head to the appointment when my mother called.

“Chuan’er, I just rode my electric scooter to buy pork head meat and accidentally hit someone.”

I hung up and rushed to the accident scene.

The person hit was an old man in his sixties, lying crooked on the ground. His left ankle was inverted, toes pointing up, clearly a fracture. My mother must have been eager to eat the pork head meat and rode the scooter especially fast. When passing through the traffic checkpoint, she didn’t pay attention and hit the old man so hard he rolled several meters. His sneakers flew off into a nearby empty space, and his thermal pants were torn.

“Old Master, the ground is cold. Let me help you up. I’ll take you to the hospital. I’ll pay for all the medical expenses. Does that work for you?”

The old man nodded. I carefully helped him into the car. My mother, experiencing a traffic accident for the first time, was so scared she couldn’t speak, just standing there in a daze.

I walked over and whispered, “Mom, the scooter doesn’t have insurance. Let’s not report this to the police first. You go home. I’ll take the old man to the hospital and negotiate a private settlement with him.”

My mother nodded numbly, picked up the pork head meat, and pushed the scooter away.

The hospital was crowded. I took the old man to queue for registration and consultation. When the CT results came back, the old man’s family arrived.

“Oh my god, Dad, how did you get hit like this? Did you report it to the police!” The person who came was a woman in her forties, carrying a Chanel bag, looking quite wealthy.

The old man said, “It’s fine. The doctor said it’ll be good as new in a couple of months.”

I looked at the woman and said sincerely, “Sister, don’t worry. I’ll definitely take full responsibility. It’s just that my family doesn’t have much money. Could we discuss using medical insurance? I’ll cover whatever exceeds the insurance.”

The woman let out a cold snort and said irritably, “It’s only natural to pay compensation for hitting someone. If you don’t take responsibility, that’s hit-and-run. Besides medical fees, you owe lost wages and emotional distress compensation. My father’s thermal pants cost 300 yuan, and he makes 8 yuan a… “

“Alright, alright.” The old man spoke up for me. “This young man spent the whole afternoon taking me to the hospital. He’s more concerned than you are. Besides, I have money in my medical insurance. Let’s just give the kid a break.”

“That won’t do! Dad, you rest in the hospital room. I’m going to check out his place later.” The woman pointed at me, her tone sharp and bitter. “I need to see if he’s genuinely poor and trying to dodge responsibility, or if he really has no money.”

I had no choice but to take the woman home.

The woman found a lawyer friend on WeChat and gave him a video tour of my apartment while they talked.

The lawyer asked, “Does the person who hit you agree to compensation?”

“Yes, his attitude is quite good.” The woman sighed. “This place is about fifty square meters. The two of them, one sleeps in the bedroom and one in the living room. It’s really quite pitiful.”

The lawyer said, “If you report it to the police, they’ll try to mediate first. If mediation fails and the other party doesn’t agree to compensation, then it goes to litigation. Since the other party already agrees to compensate, why invite more trouble?”

This lawyer probably didn’t have a deep relationship with her and wasn’t too keen to get involved, which is why he spoke in my favor.

The woman said, “But he wants to use my father’s medical insurance…”

The lawyer said, “The person didn’t intentionally hit your father. His family is so poor they can barely make ends meet. Pushing him to the wall won’t benefit you either.”

After hearing the lawyer’s words, the woman agreed to use medical insurance. I had her write a receipt and transferred my twenty thousand yuan emergency fund to her.

“My father has a fracture. Twenty thousand yuan isn’t nearly enough. It needs to be at least fifty thousand.”

“Sister, hold onto this money first to pay the medical bills. I’ll make up the rest when your father is discharged.” I pleaded. “You’ve already come to my place. I’m not going to run away. Don’t worry, I definitely won’t short you.”

The woman thought for a moment, added me on WeChat, and left.

I let out a breath of relief.

My mother sniffled. Less than two seconds later, tears streamed down her face. “Chuan’er, Mom will never eat pork head meat again.”

Although I’d hit someone, fortunately the other party was reasonable. Both the old man and the lawyer spoke in my favor. If I’d really encountered someone trying to extort me, this wouldn’t be settled for less than one hundred thousand yuan.

At minimum, I’d have to pay fifty thousand. The old man would probably be discharged next month. I’d already given twenty thousand. Where was I going to find another thirty thousand?

Borrowing from friends was troublesome and created obligations. I thought about doing a cash advance on my credit card.

But now I had no emergency fund. If I couldn’t close deals and failed the performance review, I’d be in trouble. Knowing I couldn’t repay the debt and still doing a cash advance would only let the interest snowball.

It never rains but it pours. All the bad things happened at once.

My mother got inflamed. The next morning, she didn’t get out of bed.

I poured her a cup of hot water and forced a smile. “Mom, it’s fine. I’ll handle it. This money is nothing.”

But even as I said it, for the first time in my life facing something like this, I hadn’t slept all last night. Now I was just putting on a brave face.

When I was young, my mother sheltered me from the wind and rain. Now that she was old, if I couldn’t handle things, what would she do?

My mother had worked her whole life. She’d raised me with hardship and sacrifice. Now it was my turn to be her support.

In sales, you’re judged by your results. Leaders always say: the process doesn’t matter, only the results matter.

Now, as long as I could make money, the method really didn’t matter.

Life is a knife. When the blade pierces your body, if you can’t move, you can only grit your teeth and endure. My mother couldn’t reach my father, so she endured for half a lifetime, suffered for half a lifetime.

If you can move, you’ll definitely run, even if you know you’re running down the wrong path. It’s better than being stabbed until you bleed.

I took a shower and went to the pharmacy to buy sildenafil .