The Child's Past Life

by Cai Jun

  Si Wang was waiting for him at the noodle shop. The teenager looked different again: His chest was even broader, visible muscles lined his chest and arms. No one would dare pick a fight with him.

  “What happened?” Si Wang looked around. “Who did this to you?”

  “Know what happened at Future Fantasy Plaza?”

  “Everyone does.”

  “I was buried almost one hundred meters deep. I almost died.”

  “If you died, what other cop would help me?” Si Wang spoke to Ye Xiao like they were the same age.

  Ye Xiao didn’t mind. Each man ordered a bowl of Suzhou-style lamb noodles.

  “Why can’t we meet at your house?”

  “Huang Hai came to my house all the time, then he died. I don’t want that to happen to you.”

  “Not a bad reason. How’s your mom doing?”

  “Still stressed about the forced move. The money from the developers isn’t enough to buy a bathroom. She’s always worrying about where we’ll end up.”

  Ye Xiao pointed to Si Wang’s bulging biceps. “Where’d you get those?”

  “Boxing club. It’s a charity club for boxing fans. I don’t have to pay to practice. They say it’s the end of the world this year, but I’m not worried. I’ve already died once, so I’ve got nothing to lose. I just don’t want to miss out on catching my killer. I don’t want Lu Zhongyue to kill me the next time I see him.”

  “I won’t let you run into him.” The wounded Ye Xiao looked masculine inside the loud, greasy noodle shop. “When I get better, we can practice.”

  “But who knows if I would even remember anything in my next life? I might not after passing through the River of Forgetfulness and drinking the Meng Po Soup. Then there’s the Animal realm in the Six Realms of reincarnation. I could return as a cow, a horse, a dog.”

  The cop’s face darkened. “A week ago, I went to Shen Yuanchao’s house and borrowed that book with Shen Ming’s handwriting—How the Steel Was Tempered. I took the book and your handwritten Pavel Korchagin quote to the Police Academy’s handwriting lab. The experts said they were written by the same person.”

  “So now you believe that I’m Shen Ming?”

  “Even the best handwriting experts can be wrong. I don’t believe in ghosts.”

  “I’m not a ghost.”

  “Kid, I’m not debating this with you, I’m here to warn you—don’t pretend to be Huang Hai’s son. This is not a game. You’re disrespecting Huang Hai and his son, and playing a joke on poor Shen Yuanchao. If you were really possessed by Shen Ming’s ghost, you shouldn’t lie like this.”

  “He told you?”

  “Yes, Shen Yuanchao said he was paying his respects at Huang Hai’s grave when he saw the dead son of Huang. That kid has been dead for eight years, but now he’s apparently grown up and looking for Shen Ming’s killer—as well as his own father’s killer.”

  “I’m sorry, I didn’t really think he would believe me.”

  “Prosecutor Shen believes you.”

  “I . . .” Si Wang couldn’t eat anymore; he put down his chopsticks. “Did you tell him everything?”

  “I almost did. But I thought if he knew that a high school student called Si Wang was impersonating Huang Hai’s son, he could make trouble for you at school. Then you’d be done. What if your mom found out?”

  “Please, no!”

  “You should thank me. I told Shen Yuanchao it was his imagination. But he made his daughter, the girl born after Shen Ming’s death, prove that she also saw you at their house on Mid-Autumn Festival.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “Don’t look for him again. You’ll ruin his life.”

  “He was my dad in my past life. I won’t risk his life.”

  Ye Xiao finished his noodle soup. “Si Wang, you’re risking your life, too.”

  CHAPTER 59

  Shen Yuanchao never saw Huang Hai’s dead son again.

  A month later, the weather turned hot. The rush hour bus reeked of sweat as a high school girl with a ponytail did her English homework by the window. Finals were coming up in a few days.

  Colorful sights passed outside the bus. Someone saw her face reflected in the window. She was prettier than before; her white face had rounded a bit and looked youthful and fresh.

  Shen Min suddenly noticed him.

  The young man wore a track suit. He held on to the pole to avoid falling on the crowded bus.

  She remembered him from last year’s Mid-Autumn Festival.

  There was no place to hide. He greeted her without conviction.

  She pretended not to hear and kept doing her homework, though her heart started beating faster.

  The bus lurched along its route, drove some more. Si Wang couldn’t stay silent. “It’s too dark—don’t write on here.”

  Signs for Haidilao Hot Pot went on outside the window. Her ponytail shook, and she put down her pen, but she still refused to look at him. The air on the bus was swampy, and Shen Min’s face flushed. She tried to avoid the young man’s gaze. Past the countless tired faces crammed together, she noticed a middle-aged man with the typical haircut looking at her. He was unremarkable except for the birthmark on his forehead.

  The bus stopped and he suddenly squeezed toward the exit.

  “Stop,” Shen Min cried.

  Si Wang also noticed the man with the birthmark. He shouted, too, and pushed aside two older ladies trying to get to the exit. He was stuck, however, and being screamed at by his fellow passengers. The guy had already jumped off the bus and many more people streamed onboard, blocking Si Wang’s exit.

  “Don’t close the door,” he pleaded.

  The driver looked back in the mirror, cursed, closed the doors, and merged with traffic.

  A scared Shen Min looked out the bus window. The older man stood calmly on the street, watching the bus roll away. She stood up and pushed her way through the pathetic passengers and got close to the out-of-breath young man.

  They got off the bus together two stops later.

  Shen Min started talking first. “Why did you try to chase him?”

  He coughed and said, “I saw him stealing someone’s wallet.”

  “You can catch thieves?”

  “I try to do good.”

  “Thanks.”

  “For what? He wasn’t stealing from you.”

  “I’m talking about that day when you came to my house and made an offering for my older brother.”

  “That’s something I needed to do. I will catch your brother’s killer.”

  A lot of street vendors were next to the dark bus stop, feeding hungry workers on their way home. Delicious smells swirled up from the stands. They walked to a stand selling deep-fried stinky tofu.

  “You hungry?” he asked.

  “A little.”

  Si Wang bought some piping-hot tofu, and the two shared it. Shen Min stared at him as she ate.

  He lowered his head shyly. “What are you looking at?”

  “You look familiar. I met you when I was a kid. When was it?” She looked at him more closely. “I remember! It was at Number One Elementary School on Longevity Road. You were in Section 2, and I was in Section 3. Lots of kids said you were a genius. I was your only friend.”

  “Yes, that’s right. I can’t believe you recognized me. If you showed me a photo of myself back then, I probably wouldn’t even recognize me.”

  “I remember you telling me you were Si Wang, Si as in ‘general,’ Wang as in ‘lookout.’ But why did my dad say your last name was Huang?”

  “Sorry, I lied to you. Si Wang is siwang, or death.”

  “So Si Wang isn’t your name—it’s just an alias?”

  “Right, my name is Huang Zhiliang, but I also have a nickname—Little Ming.”

  She ate the tofu as she sa
id, “Wait, I’m called Little Min!”

  “My Ming is ming as in ‘tomorrow.’ ”

  “Why is Huang Zhiliang also Little Ming?”

  “So many questions! But fine, I’ll tell you. You know Zhuge Liang, the great historian?”

  “Of course!”

  “What was his middle name?”

  She opened her eyes wide. “Kong Ming! So, Huang Zhiliang is Little Ming?”

  “Yep, you figured it out!”

  “But my dad said you died.”

  “Your dad is right. I died eight years ago when I was ten.”

  “You’re lying!”

  “Fine, I’m lying.”

  His mix of lies and truth unsettled her. She backed up two steps. “I need to go home.”

  “Municipal inspectors are here,” someone shouted. Within seconds, the vendors had pushed their carts away into the night.

  The young man also disappeared.

  Dazed, Shen Min mumbled, “Si Wang? Little Ming?”

  CHAPTER 60

  June 19, 2012. The seventeenth anniversary of Shen Ming’s death.

  A new moon decorated the sky. She crossed the path near Nanming Road and reached the space between two construction lots; the abandoned factory was still there. Tall chimneys stood among wild reeds; insects and frogs chirped. She crawled inside the factory ruins. Her flashlight revealed piles of junk scattered all around. She reached the stairs that went underground.

  Demon Girl Zone.

  One, two, three, four, five, six, seven. She counted seven steps to reach the end of the path. She faced the thick hatch door, the round handle thickly layered with cobwebs.

  Deep breathing.

  She imagined the body, Mr. Shen’s twenty-five-year-old body, decaying in the dirty, bloody water.

  She was afraid to open the door.

  It was 10:00 p.m. She returned to the factory’s ground floor. She crouched down and from her bag took out some silver joss paper that she lit.

  The woman burning the offering was dressed in white and her black hair draped her profile. Her slender fingers almost touched the flames. She was neither Nie Xiaoqian, the female ghost of A Chinese Ghost Story, nor any ghost or spirit. She only looked like an unearthly creature. No wonder students called her Ms. Goddess.

  She always kept her dates, even if it was seventeen years later.

  The flames colored her face red. She held her skirt hem carefully to keep it from the fire. Some ashes from the burning joss paper fluttered into her eyes. Her tears sizzled as they fell into the fire.

  Someone else was there. She could tell by the sound of crying.

  Ouyang Xiaozhi turned around and saw a person entering the chamber.

  Si Wang.

  She screamed loud enough to scare off any ghosts. She covered her face with her sleeve and mumbled, “Why are you here?”

  “Xiaozhi.”

  The final exams had been administered last week. Si Wang was the only student who had not left school. He crossed the bonfire and slowly approached her, as if he was ready to shed his ghost shell.

  “Don’t touch me.”

  He grabbed his teacher’s arm. “Don’t be afraid! I’m here!”

  She looked up and tried to retain her teacher’s composure. “It’s summer break—why aren’t you at home? Why are you here in the middle of the night?”

  “Shouldn’t I be asking you that?”

  Her eyes looked like puzzles drenched in tears. The flames burned out, leaving yellow and black ashes.

  “This has nothing to do with you. You weren’t even born when he died.” She shook her arm. “Let me go.”

  Si Wang was a lot stronger now. His shoulders didn’t even move. His fingers still gripped her like a vise. “Still remember Dead Poets Society?”

  Si Wang’s unwavering voice made Xiaozhi’s heart beat fast. She looked downstairs and shook her head. “You mean that American movie?”

  Shen Ming had played that movie for his students when she was in high school, getting him in trouble with the principal and the teaching director.

  “Not just that, did you really forget?” Si Wang said in his youthful voice, “Starting tomorrow, I will be a happy person / Feed the horses, cut firewood, travel the world / Starting tomorrow, I will think about grains and vegetables / I have a house facing the sea, flowers blooming in spring.”

  She was losing her sense of reality, time, and space. On the eve of Grave-Sweeping Day in 1995, Shen Ming took Ma Li, Liu Man, and Ouyang Xiaozhi over the school walls. They went to the Demon Girl Zone and recited poem after poem by Hai Zi.

  This was the Dead Poets Society founded by Shen Ming. It was a secret among the four of them. No one else ever knew about it. Had the school administrators found out, Shen Ming would have been fired.

  The Demon Girl Zone didn’t frighten the four of them—it was just a place to hold their poetry-appreciation gatherings.

  Two months later, two members of the society died: one on the library roof, one in the Zone’s underground area.

  “The society read two poets the most, one was Hai Zi, the other one was Gu Cheng. They both died. One died by suicide on the railroad tracks. The other one killed his wife with an ax and then himself on a South Pacific island.”

  “What does that have to do with Shen Ming’s death?”

  “You dressed the same way on June 19, 1995.”

  She looked down at her white dress and then stared at him. “Who are you?”

  “If I said I was Shen Ming, would you believe me?” The voice came from deep within his chest, and his eyes looked like those of a thirty-five-year-old man.

  “No!”

  He coolly recited a conversation from the past.

  “Mr. Shen.”

  “Don’t talk to me, don’t get close to me. I’m not a teacher anymore.”

  “I heard you won’t be at school after tomorrow. When are you leaving?”

  “Tonight—eight o’clock.”

  “Can it be any later? I will wait for you at ten o’clock in the Demon Girl Zone.”

  “Demon Girl Zone? Is it important?”

  “I have some things to tell you. It’s not easy to do during the day.”

  “OK, I promise you. I have some things to say to you, too.”

  “Ten o’clock, see you by the entrance to the Demon Girl Zone.”

  June 19, 1995, the last day Shen Ming was alive. They had their final conversation by the school fence.

  “Shut up. No. Stop, please . . . don’t say anymore . . . please.” She covered her ears and kept mumbling.

  “Xiaozhi, at ten o’clock that night seventeen years ago, I was here. But I didn’t see you.” Si Wang let go of her and stroked her hair. “Did you come here that rainy night?”

  She couldn’t say anything. She just kept shaking her head.

  “You didn’t come here?” He smelled her hair. “OK, I believe you.”

  “Leave me alone!”

  She crawled out of the dirty factory. The new moon had faded. The night reminded her of a spring night seventeen years ago. Mr. Shen and his students sat in the woods, watching the Lyra constellation meteor showers.

  Ouyang Xiaozhi tried to run but Si Wang gripped her wrist.

  The seventeen-year-old student ran with his teacher; they rushed to the subway stop, but they had missed the last train.

  Xiaozhi hailed a taxi. Si Wang wouldn’t let go of her door. She was rattled, but her voice was firm. “Let go. Let me go home!”

  June 19, 2012—10:45 p.m.

  She left in a taxi. She watched the star-less sky and thought of the Demon Girl Zone seventeen years ago: damp and cold underground, Shen Ming sitting with the members of the Dead Poets Society. The white candles surrounding them made it seem like an ancient rite. Flickering shadows on the walls lo
oked like cave paintings. Ouyang Xiaozhi, dressed in a big white sweater, passionately read a Gu Cheng poem, “The sky is gray…”

  CHAPTER 61

  July 7, 2012. Chinese Valentine’s Day.

  The school organized a summer trip just for the eleventh-graders. They were going to a nearby island, a well-known vacation spot. On the way to the dock, Xiaozhi ran into anti-Japanese protests. Signs saying “Protect Diaoyu Islands” were everywhere. Cars couldn’t move at all, so drivers turned off engines and waited. One protester put up a “Boycott Japanese Products” poster on the car window. She was reminded of Shen Ming from seventeen years ago. He would get indignant talking about modern Chinese history. One day he actually led the class in singing “Blood of the Republic.”

  She got to the dock at the last minute.

  It was the hottest day of the year. The whole class was going on the trip, over one hundred kids, plus the teachers. The school didn’t pay for this excursion, but the students’ families didn’t mind. The kids were just back from vacation and eager to share their stories. Some had just gone to Taiwan, some went to Hong Kong Disneyland every summer, and some had even been to Europe.

  Xiaozhi stood apart from everyone, watching Si Wang. He leaned against the ship’s railing. Seagulls flew around him; salt scented the air. His eyes were closed, as though he was meditating. Some of the students whispered, “Mental case.”

  Si Wang left his spot and walked close to Xiaozhi. His face was especially handsome in the sunlight.

  “Have you seen the sea before?” she asked casually, her eyes fixed on the murky water.

  “I’ve lived a sheltered life. In seventeen years I’ve never left this city. Maybe traveling is all about giving you another life. I remember my past life, though. I’ve already lived twice as much as other people. It’s like traveling through time.”

  Xiaozhi turned around and left without another word.

  A few hours later, the ship docked at a fishing island with tall mountains and white sandy beaches. The teachers and students were staying in a homey inn. Zhang Mingsong led the group, taking endless photos with his DSLR. He got shots of all the students, except for Si Wang.