Chapter 1

Chapter 1

After my parents divorced, eight-year-old me was left alone in an adobe house up in the hills.

No one looked after me.

I could go days without washing my hair.

I could roll around in the mud.

I could climb high up into the trees to pick wild fruit.

I could swim all the way to the deepest, most dangerous part of the little river.

My friends were terribly envious. “I wish my parents would stop caring about me too.”

“If I went home covered in mud, my mom would break my legs.”

“My mom won’t let me swim in the river.”

…

Dusk settled over the village, and cooking smoke curled into the sky.

Voices called out one after another:

“Xiaoqiang, where the hell did you die off to?”

“Dapeng, get back here and eat!”

“Jiaojiao, dinner’s ready!”

…

They all had to go home.

I tilted my head, watching with envy as Aunt Meng chased Dapeng all over the village with a broom.

“You just put those pants on and already tore a hole that big? Are you trying to drive me to my grave?”

He howled as he ran, but still didn’t forget to glare at me. “Don’t you dare stand there laughing at me.”

I kicked stones all the way back to my own home on the hillside.

Then I lit the stove and made dinner.

I put in too much firewood, and the flames burned too high.

The rice burned again.

In a panic, I tried to drag the blazing firewood out.

A piece of scorching charcoal fell onto the top of my foot. I screamed, “Mom…”

My cry of pain was swallowed by the mountain wind rolling past.

Only silence remained.

Oh…

I had forgotten.

I no longer had a mother by my side.

Actually, even if Mom had been there,

she would only have scolded me for being useless, for not even being able to handle something so simple.

A huge blister swelled up on the top of my foot.

Gritting my teeth, I used a needle to prick it open, squeezed out the pus, tore away the dead skin, then sprinkled some wood ash over the wound.

I broke out in a lot of sweat.

It hurt quite a bit.

But it hurt less than that time Dad got drunk and angry and jabbed me in the lower back with a shoulder pole, leaving the whole area bruised blue.

The rice was still burned.

I had put too much soy sauce in the steamed egg custard. It was full of air pockets, dark and sour.

After all that fuss, I was already starving.

I didn’t care that it was hot. I shoveled it into my mouth in huge bites.

The tip of my tongue went numb from the burn.

After wolfing down one bowl of rice, I immediately ran to the kitchen for a second.

The rice was packed tightly into the bowl, like a brick.

When I returned to the table, I found the egg custard hadn’t decreased at all.

Sigh.

I had forgotten again.

There was no one left to limit how much I ate.

No one would call me a starving ghost reborn.

No one would sweep all the food off the table while I was filling my bowl.

I could…

eat slowly now.

That night, I sat on the threshold with my rice bowl in my hands.

Bite by bite, I finished that burned, bitter, sour dinner.

My stomach was so full it felt like it might burst.

But I still felt very hungry.

When I was little, I didn’t understand. I thought eating more could keep hunger away.

But in truth, what felt hungry back then wasn’t my stomach. It was my soul.

Every child’s soul needs to be fed with lots and lots of love.

No one loved me.

So my young soul was like a starving taotie, impossible to satisfy.

Living alone came with many inconveniences.