Ferocious Dog of Old

All in all, Tao Xiaodong hit him three times.

Drunkards had no common sense. Even after being struck, the man didn’t wither away and make himself scarce, instead trying to deck Tao Xiaodong a few times himself. But before he could stand up straight, Tao Xiaodong whacked him back down with a blow of the stick.

The old lady wept and screamed as she tried to hold Tao Xiaodong back, calling him “Tao’s little boy” and begging him to stop.

Later on, the drunkard left with the old lady. Even as he was leaving, he picked up a brick and hurled it into their yard, where it fell and broke in two with a thunk. The noise pierced the night, sudden and startling.

Not waiting for a second strike, Tao Xiaodong had already entered the building, switching the light on to check on his little brother.

Tao Huainan had already found himself a small jumper and put it on. He was squatting on the floor feeling for his shoes. When he heard someone coming in, he lifted his face high. “Ge1?”

Tao Xiaodong picked him up and patted his back. “It’s alright,” he said.

“Who was it…” Tao Huainan blinked his empty eyes, reaching out with both hands to touch his brother’s cheeks. His palms were warm and damp. “Did they hit you?”

“No.” Tao Xiaodong’s face was as cold as ice, as was the coat he wore. He put Tao Huainan back on the heated bed and stroked his head a few times. “Were you scared?”

“I was scared that someone hit you,” Tao Huainan mumbled.

“They didn’t hit me. They can’t beat your brother,” Tao Xiaodong comforted him.

The jumper was on backwards. Tao Xiaodong took it off for him. Hearing the commotion, their uncle next door got dressed and came over to ask what was going on.

Tao Xiaodong had poured a bit of hot water from the thermos flask onto a towel and was wiping Tao Huainan’s feet. The boy had trod about barefoot earlier, making his feet dirty and cold. Wiping his feet, Tao Xiaodong said, “It’s nothing. Just Chi Zhide with his drunken antics.”

“He came all the way here in the middle of the night?” Their uncle swore. “He scared Xiao Nan2, didn’t he? Why not let Xiao Nan sleep over at my place? With his aunt.”

No need, said Tao Xiaodong. Tao Huainan shook his head as well.

“He’ll stay here.” Tao Xiaodong finished wiping his feet. He patted the soles, urging him to lie down again. “I’ll be outside anyway.”

Tao Huainan obediently returned to his blanket and lay back down, tucking himself in tightly.

Their uncle sat around for a while. Once he was assured that nothing was the matter, he went home. Tao Xiaodong went looking around the house, but didn’t see the Chi boy anywhere.

“I won’t turn the lamp off, so you’ll have some light,” said Tao Xiaodong.

Tao Huainan nodded and said okay.

Tao Xiaodong looked for Tao Huainan’s clothes, the ones sprayed with milk earlier in the day. He took them outside with him.

The boy was curled up into a ball next to the fire pit. The fire had died long ago. His two hands encircled the fire pit. Shuddering in the snow, he looked like some small animal, abused and crippled.

Tao Xiaodong put the clothes next to him. “Put them on,” he said.

The boy lifted his head and looked at him. His teeth chattered, a series of clacks ringing out in rapid succession. He stretched his arm out stiffly. All skin and bones, he was quite a terrifying sight.

Tao Xiaodong glanced at him for a while. Finally, he walked over and picked him up, grabbing the clothes he had placed on the ground as he went. The child struggled. Tao Xiaodong frowned and said, “Don’t move.” Perhaps the child had run out of energy too; he let Tao Xiaodong scoop him up with one arm, balancing against his waist. His limbs hung limp and half-dead.

Tao Huainan lay without moving. He could hear his brother opening the door and coming back in.

Tao Huainan heard his brother place something on the other end of the heated bed. After this, he heard the sound of teeth chattering: an exaggerated, uncontrolled noise.

At that point, Tao Huainan thought that his brother had brought in a dog from the cold.

“Lie down and warm up,” his brother said.

“Your father was just like you when he was little. But he grew up to be just like his father.” Tao Xiaodong looked at the dirty child splayed out against the heated bed, absorbing the warmth. “Passing down degeneracy like a family heirloom.”

When he heard these words, Tao Huainan felt that it probably wasn’t a dog. By the sounds of it, this was the child who had snatched his milk earlier that day.

The child didn’t speak. He plastered his face to the heated bed and twitched; from the way his teeth clacked with his shudders, he probably wouldn’t be able to form the words anyway.

There was only one set of bedclothes in the house, and even this was taken from their uncle. Tao Huainan was huddled in them now, so Tao Xiaodong took off his army coat and threw it over the dirty little child, covering him.

“Sleep here tonight, then,” said Tao Xiaodong.

The child didn’t speak, didn’t make a noise but the chitter-chatter of his teeth.

Tao Xiaodong went out to keep watch. The chattering went on for at least an hour. Tao Huainan kept his eyes open wide as he listened to the fast clacking on the other end of the heated bed. The sound gradually slowed, then stopped: the boy was asleep.

Only then did Tao Huainan silently turn. He was a very timid child. Sharing a room with a totally unfamiliar child, moreover who had snatched his milk from him, he didn’t even dare to move.

He turned his back to the other. Tao Huainan tugged at the blanket wrapped around him and hid half of his face in it.

The child was a hardy one. After freezing his butt off all day, nothing especially bad came of it. Tao Xiaodong gave him Tao Huainan’s soiled clothing to wear, but he didn’t hear a peep from him, not even a “thanks”. When Tao Xiaodong was feeding Tao Huainan congee, he filled a bowl for the boy as well— a big bowl, the kind they used for serving. The boy raised his head and looked at Tao Xiaodong. He stretched a hand out and took it, then went to a corner and supped directly from the bowl.

Tao Xiaodong blew at the congee in his spoon. “Does your dad beat you often?” he asked casually.

The child raised his head from his bowl and looked over, then lowered his eyelids without a sound.

If he wouldn’t speak, Tao Xiaodong couldn’t be bothered to ask again.

On the other hand, Tao Huainan was very conscious that there was another person in the room, his unseeing eyes turning in that direction to peek every now and again. Tao Xiaodong rapped his cheek and made him turn back.

The Chi family had never been well liked. Normally, a child this big from such a family with such a father would be cared for by the adults in the village, no matter how cold-hearted they were. But this child didn’t speak when spoken to, giving no answers no matter what was asked and who asked it. He garnered no sympathy. On top of this, his drunkard of a father was a pain to deal with. Not wanting to invite trouble, the adults stopped minding him after a while. The most they ever did was invite him indoors to warm up and eat a little whenever they saw him running naked outside.

He was like the dirty mutt of the village, eating the leftovers and wearing the old clothes of a hundred families. No matter how much he tried to hide, he always had to go home eventually, in time for his father to beat him after getting drunk.

Tao Xiaodong didn’t plan on minding him either; it was beyond him. In this world, anything that wasn’t the affairs of his own family was the affairs of someone else’s family. There were many such affairs. He wouldn’t be able to manage it all, nor did he have the time and willpower to do so. All he could do was say to the boy, “Stay here for the next few days. Don’t go home while your father’s still there.”

Tao Huainan’s eyes turned that way again, his empty gaze full of a child’s timid curiosity.

Tao Xiaodong asked him to stay here, and the child really did stay for a few days. He went home when night fell and came over when morning broke. Even when he came, he made no sound, curling up in the corner, leaving no sense of his presence. Nobody noticed him. When it came time to eat, Tao Xiaodong would usually put some of the food in a bowl and hand it over to him. He would carry the bowl to the corner and eat there.

He kept wearing Tao Huainan’s clothes, even with that patch of milk stained across the chest. The sleeves and front lapels were so filthy they seemed to be turning black, but he never changed out of it.

After the initial fear of the unknown, Tao Huainan gradually became used to the addition of this noiseless presence to his surroundings. The child always stayed far away from him, keeping to the wall. Sometimes, when Tao Xiaodong was outdoors and wasn’t minding them, Tao Huainan would squat with the kid. He still lacked any sense of belonging, but all the same, it was better than standing alone and confused in an unknown place.

A truly blind boy and a fake mute one. They made a silent pair.

Tao Huainan had a big cup of milk every day and peed a lot in the morning. Today was the day of his parents’ burial, so Tao Huainan was carried to the cemetery early in the morning. When the casket entered the ground, Tao Huainan was led by his brother to bow his head to the ground a total of nine times. The morning was far too cold. Tao Xiaodong didn’t bring him along for the complicated rituals that followed next, sending him back to the house.

Tao Huainan sat waiting on the heated bed in his little woollen jumper. He didn’t sit very still; his bum shifted several times as he waited and waited and simply couldn’t wait any longer for his brother to return.

The mute child stood leaning against the wall opposite him, watching him.

Tao Huainan creased his brow and turned occasionally to listen for any sounds. The iron gate outside clanged once. Tao Huainan listened hard. Nobody came. “Is it my brother?” he asked the person in front of him.

His voice was quite gentle and soft. Milkish.

The child opposite him looked out the window. He spoke for the first time, in a voice not nearly as gentle as Tao Huainan’s. “No.”

Tao Huainan opened his lips. “Ah,” he said. He lowered his head and sat without moving, then pursed his lips, his finger scratching the covering of the heated bed.

Outside, there was no movement to be heard. After another moment, Tao Huainan opened his lips again. “Can you find me a bottle…”

He blinked his empty eyes. His voice seemed on the verge of tears. “…I need to pee.”

Such was the pain of being blind. He was an eight-year-old boy, and he couldn’t even pee on his own.

The boy standing across from him blinked too. After this, he lifted his usually downcast gaze and looked around him, then pushed aside the half-length door curtain and walked outside.

He returned with a feeding dish3, its mouth somewhat wider than a serving dish. Tao Xiaodong sometimes gave him rice in this bowl. The aluminium dish landed on the wooden bed with a thunk. He flung his lumpy sleeves back and pushed it forward a bit more, then turned to return to the wall where he was standing at before.

Tao Huainan stretched out in front of him and felt about. He touched the ice cold surface of the round bowl. He had never peed in this thing before, but he didn’t hesitate——he simply couldn’t hold it in any longer.

After a long moment, he pulled his trousers back on and pushed the bowl forward a little. In an even smaller voice, he said, “Can you help pour it away…”

The cement floor wasn’t quite flat. As the boy’s ill-fitting cotton shoes dragged across the floor, the sound of the soles rubbing the surface was exceedingly clear. Tao Huainan heard him come over, then heard him open the door and walk out. There was a sound at the back door, and then the “clang” of the aluminium dish upon the countertop outside. The shuffling of the soles against the cement floor came back again, step by step. The now-relieved Tao Huainan smiled sheepishly in the direction of the wall.

When the adults were away, the two children secretly did something bad: they used a feeding dish for peeing.

Now that he was done peeing, he grew embarrassed. Tao Huainan’s hand still dug at the bed covering. He didn’t raise his head, muttering quietly, “… Let’s not tell anyone, okay?”

–

1 Ge/ge-ge (哥/哥哥), as in older brother. In many conventional Chinese families, younger siblings only refer to their older siblings by ge (brother) or jie (sister), rather than just their names. You may also call someone who is not your sibling ge or jie if they are within that age range.
2 Affectionate name for Huainan. Different Xiao (小) from Xiaodong (晓东), though pronounced the same way. Literally “Little Nan”, but Xiao is sometimes appended to names of adults as well, just as a casual form of address.
3 Big bowls usually used to feed animals or to rinse rice/vegetables. Sometimes people eat out of them.