1. The old man in a windbreaker
These days, everything is easy to find, except jobs. Chen Nan has only just found a job as a salesperson in a supermarket after graduating from university for almost a year.
This supermarket is different from other supermarkets. It is open 24 hours a day. In addition, the supermarket owner is very stingy. There are only two employees including Chen Nan. Chen Nan is paid a basic salary of 800 yuan plus commission. The monthly sales target is 20,000 yuan. If the sales exceed the target by 10,000, the commission will be 200 yuan. Chen Nan works the night shift, from 8 pm to 9 am the next day.
Chen Nan was reluctant at first, but he agreed when he thought that he could find a part-time job besides sleeping during the day.
At first, Chen Nan was not used to it. Sometimes no one came for hours in the long night. When someone finally came, he was afraid of being robbed. Fortunately, the security in the community has always been good, and Chen Nan's worries were not relieved. Never happened.
Before he knew it, Chen Nan had been working in the supermarket for two months. As autumn was about to pass, the weather was getting colder and colder, and even fewer people came to the supermarket at night. After completing the basic tasks, it seems there is no chance of getting commission.
Late in the night, around two or three o'clock, Chen Nan suddenly heard the sound of a motorcycle.
Chen Nan, who was originally sitting, was about to stand up to check when the door of the supermarket was pushed open and an old man wearing a baseball cap and a black windbreaker walked in.
Chen Nan was so surprised that his mouth opened wide and he almost cried out. This old man looked too much like his grandfather. But when he looked closely, he saw that his face was dark and had a gloomy aura. Besides, my hometown is hundreds of miles away from here. How could my grandfather come here, not to mention that he can ride a motorcycle?
Since Chen Nan went to college, she has not been home for almost five years. She doesn't know what her grandfather is like now. Chen Nan's nose is sour. She bit her lip and secretly vowed to go back to her hometown during the Spring Festival this year. Visit grandpa and spend a few more days with him.
Chen Nan saw the old man walk straight to the shelf, pick up a shopping basket and randomly put things into it without choosing.
Chen Nan was shocked. It was the first time she met a customer who bought without being picky about the products. Besides, a basket like this would cost at least one or two thousand yuan. Since the boss stipulated that after 10 o'clock at night, each item would be charged an additional 10 yuan. % service fee, she wanted to persuade the old man to come back the next day to buy, because it would be more cost-effective. But Chen Nan swallowed it back when she was about to say it. Chen Nan suddenly remembered that there was still a lot of sales to be done for this month. It’s a long way away.
While he was in a daze, Chen Nan found that the old man had put the shopping basket in front of him. Chen Nan negotiated the price and added a 10% service fee, a total of 2,180 yuan.
The old man paid the money, took his things and left without saying a word.
Listening to the "thump, thump" sound of the motorcycle disappearing into the distance, Chen Nan felt a little lost and weird.
2. Strange Customers
The next night, the old man in the black windbreaker came again on a motorcycle. This time, he was followed by two middle-aged women with fashionable curly hair. However, the two women looked tired and sleepy. She was still in her pajamas.
Next, Chen Nan was frightened to death, because she found that the two middle-aged women seemed to be possessed. They imitated the old man and put things into the basket with half-squinted eyes without even looking.
Chen Nan originally thought that he was being robbed, but luckily his worries were unnecessary. Soon, two middle-aged women put their shopping baskets in front of Chen Nan. Chen Nan offered 2,200 yuan and 1,860 yuan respectively. A middle-aged woman paid the money and walked away carrying her things with difficulty.
Although Chen Nan felt strange, she still didn't ask anything. That night, Chen Nan sold more than 6,000 yuan worth of goods, and the old man still didn't say a word when he left.
"If it's like this every night, I'll hopefully get a bonus commission this month!" Chen Nan was very excited. The rapidly increasing sales made her forget her initial uneasiness and fear.
As the saying goes, what you wish for will come true. In the next few nights, the old man in the black windbreaker came with middle-aged women of different faces to buy things.
After a week, Chen Nan's sales had already exceeded 40,000 yuan. Chen Nan planned to ask the old man in the black windbreaker for an explanation tonight and thank him properly.
That night, Chen Nan discovered that the old man in the black windbreaker brought two fat middle-aged women to shop.
The three of them had just come in for a while when suddenly a large group of people came in from outside, both men and women, chattering. They picked up the shopping baskets and started putting things in them.
Chen Nan didn't understand a word they were saying, but she was extremely happy. She was calculating in her mind that she would have to sell tens of thousands of yuan tonight and would definitely create the miracle of having sales of more than 20,000 yuan in a single night.
But before Chen Nan could calm down from his excitement, he found that the old man in the black windbreaker suddenly became furious and shouted at the group of people to get out. The group of people stopped taking things, changed their expressions and started to look at the old man. The old man spat.
The old man couldn't stand it anymore, and hurriedly ran to Chen Nan and said in a low voice: "Girl, you must not sell things to them, and ask them to get out quickly."
"Why?" Chen Nan asked angrily.
"Believe me, I will tell you the reason later. Tell them quickly that the cash register is broken tonight and they won't sell anything." The old man replied.
Chen Nan hesitated for a moment, but still believed the old man's words and said to the group of people: "Uncle, Auntie , is Chen Shan dead ? I'm sorry, the cash register is broken tonight and I can't bargain. Please come back another day."
After hearing this, the group of people had no choice but to put down their shopping baskets and walked out cursing.
However, the two fat middle-aged women who came with the old man seemed not to have seen what had just happened. They still paid the money, took the things and left with half-closed eyes and sleepy look.
After seeing the two fat women walk away, the old man turned around and said to Chen Nan: "Girl, do you believe that there are ghosts in this world?"
Chen Nan smiled and replied, "Uncle, I was just thinking of thanking you. It was because you brought people to buy things these days that I was able to complete the sales task set by the boss. If there is a ghost in this world, I will never believe it even if I die."
"Girl, I tell you the truth, that group of people just now were ghosts. They will come again tomorrow night, so you must be careful!" The old man said anxiously when he saw that Chen Nan didn't believe it.
"Uncle, you are just like my grandfather. He also believes that there are ghosts in this world, but I am a psychology student. I only believe that ghosts come from the mind. The so-called ghosts are just illusions caused by our psychological effects. "Chen Nan still said with a smile.
Seeing that Chen Nan didn't believe it at all, the old man became even more anxious: "Are you afraid of ghosts?"
"There are no ghosts in this world, so why should I be afraid? To be honest, I'm only afraid of robbers."
"Girl, if you say so, do you dare to come with me to my house? Actually, you don't have to be afraid. I just want you to persuade my old lady. She misses her son so much."
The old man told Chen Nan that their son Zhang Qiang had been abroad for five years and had never come back. However, the child was very filial and bought a house for the two old people in the suburbs before going abroad. She missed her son so much that she got sick. He came to Chen Nan to buy so many things, but he just wanted to help Chen Nan with his meager ability. Besides, the old lady had been eating a lot recently for some reason. I ate three bags of instant noodles and still felt hungry.
Chen Nan was already grateful to the old man, and after hearing his words, he felt even more soft-hearted. So he closed the shop, got on the back of the old man's motorcycle and followed him.
3. Weird story
Soon they arrived at the residence of the two elderly people. Chen Nan found that it was just a small farmyard, located alone at the foot of a mountain. It was dark all around, with only a little light coming through a window on the second floor.
Chen Nan followed the old man into the house and came to the lighted room. He saw an old woman sitting on the sofa, stuffing handfuls of snacks into her mouth. The old woman's eyes were dull, and she was completely unaware of Chen Nan's arrival. She kept repeating: "Qiangzi, come back soon, mom misses you…"
"Don't mind, she's just making trouble because of her son. Do you want me to tell you a story?" The old man asked after asking Chen Nan to sit down.
Chen Nan nodded and pretended to listen attentively.
The story told by the old man didn't seem to be very exciting, but as Chen Nan listened, he felt a sense of inexplicable fear.
The story goes like this: there was a young couple who lived in the countryside and made a living doing farm work. They had a very smart son who always got first place in every subject in every exam. In order to let their son study with peace of mind, the couple never They never let their son do any housework, so his son couldn't wash his clothes until he went to high school, let alone cook for himself.
Later, the son with excellent grades was admitted to a key university in another province. In order to take good care of their son, the couple gave up their farm work and followed their son to another province, where they began to earn money by doing odd jobs to support their son's studies.
Thirty years have passed since my son finished his undergraduate studies, got his master's degree, and finally graduated with a doctorate before going to work. The couple has become old. During this period, the couple has suffered countless hardships. They originally thought that they could now live as a family. The family of three lived together and had a comfortable life. But the son wanted to go abroad and emphasized that he didn't want the couple to go with him. The son said he wanted to fight hard on his own and didn't want to be bound by his parents' arms anymore.
The son left for five years and never came back. During this period, the son sent some pocket money to the two elderly people. Although the two elderly people had no problem with their lives, they were extremely empty in spirit and wanted to see their son very much, so they had to make up a story. One of them said her mother was seriously ill. The son said he could come back, but he had to wait two months because a larger project was about to start and he couldn't spare the time.
The two old people counted the days on their fingers all day long, and called their son every now and then to urge him to leave quickly. At first, the son answered the calls, but later he got annoyed and simply ignored them. Later, he turned off his phone and could not be contacted.
The two elderly people still waited and looked forward to their son's return every day. However, when there were more than 20 days before their son's scheduled return, something unexpected happened. The old woman was absent-minded while cooking because she missed her son, and the pot burned. The water in the stove overflowed and extinguished the fire, causing a gas accident, and both elderly people died unfortunately.
The strange thing is that although the two old people died, their souls still remained at home because they missed their son so much.
What is heartbreaking is that among the two old people, only the old man knew that he was dead, while the old woman still thought she was alive.
Few people came to the place where the two lived, so no one would find out even if they died for ten days or half a month. The old man was afraid that their bodies would rot when his son came back, so he secretly went to the supermarket every night to buy a lot of food. This will slow down the decay of the body.
Later, the old man found out that the female salesperson in the supermarket was very tired working late into the night to sell things, so he wanted to help her. Not only did he go shopping himself, he also called two wealthy middle-aged women from their sleep every night to go with him. Unfortunately, a group of ghosts came to the supermarket tonight…
The old man stopped talking here, looked at Chen Nan and asked, "Girl, do you believe that I am the old man in the story? I am a ghost?"
Although Chen Nan felt that the story told by the old man was a little bizarre and strange, and a trace of cold sweat appeared on his back, he still answered firmly: "Uncle, you are so humorous. To be honest, the story you told is very touching. It reminds me of those empty-nest elderly people who are left behind, and it also reminds me of my grandfather, but I majored in psychology and I never believe in ghosts. "
"You, why are you so stubborn? But, girl, you must remember to change the name of the store tomorrow, otherwise the ghosts you and I drove away tonight will come back again." The old man paused and said, "I I wanted you to persuade the old woman to let her soul leave as soon as possible, but you don’t believe in ghosts. You are too stubborn. I really want to slap you in the face!" The old man said, suddenly raising his hand to hit Chen Nan.
Chen Nan was so scared that she woke up from her dream with a scream. It turned out that it was already dawn. Sister Wang, who came to take over the shift, had just patted her on the shoulder.
4. I hope it’s not true
Chen Nan shook his head vigorously to wake himself up, then began to pack up and prepare to go home.
At this moment, a middle-aged man suddenly rushed in from outside, slapped a receipt on the counter with an angry face and said: "What kind of supermarket is this? My wife is like sleepwalking. She is so sleepwalking in the middle of the night. Come here to buy things? Look, what a mess you bought. Ask your boss to return all the things…"
The middle-aged man was still shouting, but Chen Nan didn't listen to a word. She ran out of the store and looked up at the store sign. She didn't know when the sign that originally said "Yangyang Supermarket" had become "Yinyang Supermarket". ”.
Chen Nan took a closer look and found that a small piece of the paint base of the character "阳" had peeled off after being wetted by rain, and the vertical stroke on the left side of the character "日" had a black stroke added out of thin air, making the whole character "日" look very dark. The character "Yang" became a similar character "Yin".
Chen Nan returned to the store, took a high stool and stood on it, and scraped the peeling paint with a small knife a few more times. Finally, the "Yin Yang Supermarket" became the "Yang Yang Supermarket".
Chen Nan returned to the ground, relaxed and let out a long sigh, thinking that he would never attract dirty things because of the name of the store again.
"Ah!" Chen Nan suddenly screamed. She remembered that there was something she had to do now, which was to go to the suburbs to see the old man's house. She hurriedly called a taxi and followed the memory in her dream. Drive towards the old man’s residence at the foot of the mountain.
Sitting in the taxi, Chen Nan closed his eyes, clasped his hands together and prayed silently: "Buddha bless me, I hope all this is just a dream and not real…"
However, when Chen Nan finished praying and slowly opened his eyes, he found that the taxi had arrived in the suburbs, and a farmhouse like the one he saw in his dream stood clearly at the foot of the mountain.