Chapter 8

Without even changing my clothes, I hurried out as fast as I could and bought half a rack of ribs, two pig legs, and an electric saw.

On my way back, I heard a little child talking about me to his mother.

“Look at that auntie. She’s hurt her face!”

“That’s normal. She’s married.”

“Look, she’s carrying an electric saw too.”

“That’s normal. She’s cooking. It’s for sawing up pig legs.”

“But there’s blood on her clothes!”

“That’s normal. She must’ve got it on herself sawing up the pig legs.”

“But she’s bought so much. Why didn’t her husband come and help her?”

“That’s normal too, sweetheart. Your father doesn’t come and help Mommy either, does he? It’s all perfectly normal.”

And so on.

I didn’t have time to listen to the rest.

I thought that even if the buzzing of an electric saw came from my home, someone would surely say, “That’s normal.”

The world was that absurd. That ridiculous.

I stewed all the ribs and pig legs for my child, divided them among several big bowls, and put them in the freezer.

It was enough to feed him for ten days or a fortnight.

Once I wasn’t there, he’d have to learn to live on his own.

After doing all that, I dialed 110 and 120.

Li Dazhuang was dead. I was turning myself in.

There wasn’t much to say. His death had been entirely accidental.

How could I prove that? There was a security camera in the living room.

I was busy working. My child was busy studying.

When I got off work, he’d be studying. When he finished, it was time for bed.

I didn’t want to disturb him. We barely exchanged a few words all day.

All I could do was steal a look at him through the camera while he ate.

The police investigated and found nothing suspicious. They were going to close the case as an accident.

But in the end, my conscience couldn’t take it anymore. I told them what I’d done when I was eighteen.

I was still at the police station giving my statement. When they heard I’d killed four people back then, a whole group of officers immediately surrounded me.

I told them not to be so nervous. I wouldn’t run. I’d had enough of my guilty conscience.

I gave them a brief account of why I’d killed those people and how I’d done it.

The station chief smoked half a pack of cigarettes in dismay. Finally he said the case was too big. They’d hand it over to the district bureau that very night.

The police investigated for a long time. It had happened so long ago and so far away. It wasn’t easy to investigate.

But the eventual findings still took me by surprise.

They couldn’t find the trafficker, dead or alive. He’d probably survived the fall down the slope and run away.

And then there was this: Grandma was still alive!

The rat poison probably hadn’t done much. It worked on rats, but apparently wasn’t so good at poisoning people.

She’d always believed the trafficker had killed my father and my brother, then abducted me.

And taken the money with him.

It had never crossed her mind that I’d done it all.

In her exact words, “A little girl like her? Have the nerve to do that?”

Sorry to disappoint her. Not only did I have the nerve, I’d done it long ago.

So the four deaths on my hands became two. The police found no reason to dispute the findings, and the prosecution brought charges against me.

I found myself a lawyer.

I had to try. Maybe it really could count as self-defense.

The lawyer was a woman. She told me not to worry. It probably wouldn’t be a big problem.

All right. I trusted her.

In the dozen-odd years since I’d run away…

One of the things I’d come to feel most strongly was this.

Girls were still worth trusting.