Chapter 3
Edward Quan ·
Mom turned, her voice very low.
"Come and look."
Dad didn't answer.
He was already beside her.
The person on the phone was still speaking. Dad took it and followed the instructions, checking me and calling my name again and again.
Mom took off her coat and laid it over me.
It had just come off her body.
It must still have been warm.
But I couldn't feel anything.
"Didn't they say the fever was gone?"
She kept breathing warmth onto my hands.
"Why are you so cold?"
"An'an, don't frighten me."
I crouched in front of her.
A strand of hair had come loose at her temple when she hurried. It stuck to the corner of her eye.
I used to like smoothing it back for her.
She'd always smile and ask whether I thought she was the prettiest.
This time, no matter how I tried, I couldn't touch it.
"Mommy, I tried to crawl onto the bed."
"But I was so tired."
"I couldn't even hold Huang anymore."
She couldn't hear.
Outside, my aunt began to cry.
"Brother, I really didn't know."
"She didn't call me. I thought she was asleep…"
Dad looked up.
"What medicine did you give her for the fever?"
My aunt stepped back.
"Just… what we had at home."
"What medicine?"
"I can't remember."
Dad stood and pulled open the bedside drawer.
The box was still where it had been.
Inside, the little sachets remained joined in unbroken strips.
Not one had been torn open.
He carried the box to the doorway.
My aunt glanced at it and looked away.
"She wouldn't take it."
Mom suddenly spoke.
"Where's her phone?"
No answer.
"She sent me a voice message on Tuesday evening. She still had it then."
Mom's gaze slowly shifted.
"You locked her up and took her phone?"
My aunt's crying grew quieter.
She went to the living room, opened a drawer, and pulled the phone from beneath a pile of shopping bags.
The screen lit.
It was Mom's old phone.
Mom took it. She needed two tries to tap the right place.
She scrolled up.
Her hands shook so badly that she accidentally played a voice message.
My voice filled the room.
"Mommy, my chest feels bad. I can't breathe when I lie dow—"
She stopped it in a panic.
The room went quiet.
Dad still held the unopened medicine.
Mom stared at the screen, her eyes wide.
"I heard this."
No one answered.
She said it again.
"I've heard this before."
Dad slowly lowered his head.
Mom played the next message.
Her own voice.
"Your aunt has even given up work to look after you. Can't you be a little more sensible?"
She pressed the phone hard against her chest.
But the sentence had already finished.
My aunt cried, "You thought she was just sulking too."
Dad lunged and seized her collar.
"Shut up!"
"You kept saying she was fine!"
She coughed as her collar tightened, but she still shouted.
"You told me not to spoil her! You said it too!"
Mom didn't get up to separate them.
She set the phone on the floor and knelt beside me again.
"An'an."
"Mommy's here."
She leaned very close, as though I simply couldn't hear.
"Tell me again."
"Tell Mommy where it hurts. Just one more time."
Dad let go.
My aunt slumped beside the sofa.
I looked at Mom.
I wanted to tell her again too.
That my forehead wasn't hot anymore.
My chest didn't hurt anymore either.
That evening, I'd only been frightened.
Hurried footsteps sounded in the corridor.
Mom's head snapped up.
"Doctor!"
She held out both hands, as though she'd finally found something to grasp.
"Please hurry. She's only eight."
"She's always such a good girl."
Chapter 6
6
The doctor set his equipment by the door and crouched beside Mom.
She moved over a little but couldn't bear to release my hand.
She kept repeating that I'd only had a fever.
He didn't answer that.
After examining me, he looked up at his colleague.
Mom asked immediately, "The hospital. We need to take her to hospital right away, don't we?"
The doctor was quiet for a moment.
"She's passed away."
Mom's fingers were still smoothing my hair.
"Is she just exhausted?"
He repeated softly, "She's been gone for some time."
The medicine box fell from Dad's hand.
At last, he covered his face with both hands.
I stood behind Mom and watched her shoulders slowly sink.
She didn't cry right away.
As though she were waiting for them to take back what they'd said.
Dad called the police.
When they arrived, my aunt was still sitting beside the sofa.
She looked up.
Her first words were, "I never hit her."
No one had asked whether she had.
An officer went to my door and looked at the fallen bolt.
Then the frame.
"Who installed this?"
My aunt pulled her hands into her sleeves.
"I did."
"Why on the outside?"
"She kept coming out. It made it difficult to work."
The officer looked up.
"What work?"
In the living room, the ring light was still on.
The phone stand faced the sofa.
Colored letters on the wall behind it read:
"Auntie's Little Darling."
My aunt said nothing more.
They photographed the room, bit by bit.
The empty cup.
The unopened medicine.