Chapter 1
Edward Quan ·
When I was little, my family cooked a pot of pig’s head meat every New Year.
Once, a sickly beggar came asking for food. He peered into the pot and sighed.
“It’s too late… its karmic debt isn’t settled. Leave things as they are, and those who come after will suffer.”
Grandma looked bewildered.
“What do you mean?”
“That pig harmed you in its previous life,” he said sadly. “It was reborn as a pig to repay its debt. It’s almost paid. Don’t make it suffer anymore. Gather its remains and give them a burial. Help it settle what it owes.”
He took a small gold ingot from his pocket and put it in her hand.
“Take the meat out of the pot. Let me bury it.”
Before he finished, the door opened. Grandpa came in carrying a bundle of firewood.
He put it down, glanced at the beggar, and snapped, “Get out, you filthy beggar! There’s no food for you here!”
He waved him away.
Grandma stepped between them, showed him the gold, and explained what the man had said.
Grandpa bit the gold to test it. His eyes widened. It was heavy, like a small stone, solid in his palm.
He pocketed it anyway.
“How do I know you haven’t stolen this from me and brought it back?”
The beggar stood still for a few seconds, then smiled.
“The gold is mine. I give it freely. I only ask that you help bury the pig.”
He pointed into the pot, where the meat smelled rich and delicious, and repeated that all he wanted was to bury the remains.
Grandpa snorted.
“Nonsense! Who gives a dead pig a burial? Keep babbling and I’ll break your legs!”
He lunged for the man.
The beggar’s eyes widened. He backed toward the door, then fled.
As he left, he raised a hand and shouted, “I’ve given you the gold! Accept it, and you accept the debt!”
“If the remains aren’t whole in three days, disaster will strike your family. Ignore me at your own risk!”
Then he was gone.
Grandma frowned.
“Old man, something about what he said doesn’t feel right. As though it might be true.”
“He’s only trying to scrounge food and drink,” Grandpa grumbled. “Superstitious nonsense.”
“We’ve raised pigs and sold pork for years. How could anyone bury a whole carcass? Don’t listen to him.”
He scooped the pig’s head meat into an iron basin, fetched the offal from the storeroom, and put that in the pot instead.
Seeing Grandma’s worried face, he frowned.
“Stop fretting. We’ve got the hospital tomorrow and a hundred other things to do.”
Just then, our neighbor Old Chen came running, his face frightened.
“Something terrible’s happened! Zhang Laoqi is dead!”
Zhang Laoqi lived at the end of the village. He was about Grandpa’s age.
Only a few days earlier, he had bought five jin of pork from us to make dumplings for his new daughter-in-law. News of his sudden death stunned everyone.
The whole village went to his house. People already crowded the room.
On the table were garlic, half a bottle of liquor, and a small bowl with a few pieces of pork, fat layered with lean.
Zhang Laoqi leaned against the wall, his mouth slightly open.
He was dead.
“It looks as though he wanted to say something,” a young villager said. “But didn’t get the chance.”
Grandpa looked closely. Grease still shone at the corners of the dead man’s mouth, as though he had collapsed while eating.
He reached inside to check.
And pulled a large piece of meat from his throat.
2
The moment Grandpa removed it, everyone heard several sounds from the dead man’s throat.
“Urgh… urgh…”
As though air trapped for a long time had finally escaped.
After the last sound, his mouth slowly closed.
The villagers exchanged looks.
“He choked to death on pork?”
“One piece of meat can kill a man?”
Everyone shuddered.
Zhang Laoqi had been a decent man. They pitied him for dying like that.
Holding the meat, Grandpa muttered, “This isn’t good.”
Our village had a custom. Anyone who died suddenly had to be cremated before dark, to prevent the corpse from rising.
The villagers built a pyre. Several young men carried the body onto it and lit the wood.
Flames surged. The body vanished inside them, crackling as a burnt smell filled the air.
Grandma drew close.
“He choked on pork. I don’t like it.”
“What’s strange about that?” Grandpa frowned. “The man was poor. He hardly ever got good meat. He ate too fast. No wonder he choked.”
The fire burned until dusk. By then, the body had burned away.
A few young men stayed to clean up. Everyone else went home.
That evening, Grandpa took the offal out of our pot and sliced some pig’s head meat onto a plate.
I swallowed at the sight. It had been a long time since we had meat to eat.
As I reached for a piece, he struck my hand with his chopsticks.
“What’s the hurry? I eat first!”
He put a piece of fat in his mouth and chewed with relish, grease running down his chin.
Then he glanced contemptuously at Grandma.
“See? Nothing wrong with it. Stop fussing like a superstitious old woman!”
He put another piece in his mouth.
Before he could swallow, his chopsticks clattered to the floor.
His hands flew to his throat. His eyes bulged. His face turned red.
“Old man! What’s wrong?”
He rolled on the kang, our heated earthen bed, making choking sounds.
Grandma thrust her hand into his mouth and pulled out scraps of meat.
He doubled over, retching violently, then spat up a black, slimy lump.
It stank like flesh that had rotted for days.
Afterward, he slumped down, gasping, his face flushed and his eyes bloodshot.
He had nearly choked to death.
“That meat is unclean!” Grandma’s voice shook. “There’s something evil about it. Throw it all away!”
She reached for the plate.
He knocked her hand aside.
“No! Throw out good meat? That would be a sin against heaven!”
“I’ll sell it at the market tomorrow. If we won’t eat it, someone else can!”
Grandma frowned and lowered her voice.
“What if it hurts them?”
“What’s that to us? No one’s making them eat it!”
“Good food like this can’t go to waste!”
3
Early the next morning, Grandpa loaded all the remaining pork onto the donkey cart to take into town.
Grandma stopped him.
“I dreamed last night. Our spotted pig was begging me to gather its remains.”
He snorted.
“We’ve sold the meat. What remains are there to gather? It’s dead. Leave it.”
He raised the whip.
Grandma hurried in front of the cart.
“In the dream, it said the rest of the meat was hidden beneath the abandoned house at the end of the village.”
“If you don’t believe me, go and look.”
The house had stood empty for years. People said someone had hanged themselves there.
Grandpa hesitated, then set his jaw.
“Fine. Let’s look.”
The boundary walls had collapsed. Weeds grew higher than their heads.
Grandma took a spade and dug in front of the door.
About half a meter down, she struck something cold and hard.
Frozen meat.
Block after block, still whole, exactly like the portions they had sold.
Even the meat sold to Zhang Laoqi was there.
Grandma went pale.
“Everything that beggar said was true.”
Grandpa frowned and picked up a piece.
“What a waste to throw all this out!”
“We’ll sell it in town. It’s almost New Year. Prices have doubled. We’ll make a fortune.”
He threw back his head and laughed.
The sound was cold.
“That’s cursed money,” Grandma said sternly. “He told us to bury the pig. If we don’t, it won’t leave us alone!”
Grandpa pretended not to hear. He loaded the frozen meat onto the cart.
“It’s only a pig. Who’s afraid of a pig taking revenge?”
“I’ll sell it and buy four piglets. Next year, we’ll make twice as much.”
He cracked the whip.
The cart rolled away, leaving Grandma standing in the snow.
By evening, the snow was falling harder. The cold cut through the skin.
Grandma sat worrying at home.
He had left that morning in thin clothes. He might be frozen stiff.
She was about to go to the edge of the village to meet him when the door opened.
Grandpa came in covered in snow, his face red with cold.
In his hand was a tightly packed burlap sack.
Something inside moved.
“What have you brought?”
He grinned.
“Let’s get inside.”
He climbed onto the kang, took off his shoes, and pulled the sack toward him.
“Sold every bit! Bought four piglets with the money!”
He opened it and tipped out four plump, pink-and-white piglets. They trotted around the bed.
Grandma stared, then laughed.
“Piglets for sale in the dead of winter? Can you raise them when they’re this small?”
“Beautiful, aren’t they? A few months and they’ll fetch a fine price!”
He reached to stroke one.
The instant his hand touched it, the piglet snapped.
It tore a piece of flesh from his fingertip. Bright blood spurted.
Grandma cried out.
The piglet had a pattern of spots on its back.
Exactly like the spotted pig they had slaughtered.