Zeng Yan's mother, nearly forty but fair-faced and beautiful with graceful movements unlike a typical country woman. She was clearly adored by her husband. On the surface she showed affection to Zeng Yan—applying ointment to bruises, secretly giving her food, altering her own clothes for her—but never intervened when Zeng Yan was beaten or forced into heavy labor. She brought powdered milk and rented an aluminum lunchbox after Zeng Yan's accident. Zeng Yan realized her mother's kindness was a calculated emotional trap to make her more blindly devoted to self-sacrifice.
