Meili walks over to her, takes her by the hand and leads her outside. ‘Do it by that tree. I’ll stand here and watch over you.’
‘She wet her bed almost every night while you were away,’ Kongzi whispers to Meili. ‘The foam mattress stinks of urine.’
Nannan returns, holding up her trousers, and climbs onto Kongzi’s lap. ‘Go back to bed,’ he says impatiently.
‘Tell me a “Once upon a time” first. A long one.’
‘No, it’s too late for that. Go to sleep. If you’re good, I’ll catch a frog for you in the morning and roast it on the fire.’
‘You know I don’t eat meat,’ Nannan whines, snuggling against his chest. ‘Meat is pink. I like pink.’
‘Go on, let Mummy put you to bed,’ he says.
‘No, I don’t want Mummy!’ Nannan cries. ‘Mummy smells bad. I miss my grandma.’
‘You were only two and a half when you last saw her. How can you miss her?’
‘Grandma gave me peanuts. She had white hair.’
‘I thought about you every second I was away, Nannan, but you didn’t miss me at all,’ Meili says, rubbing her ear, which is still sore from Kongzi’s slap.
Nannan wraps her arms around Kongzi’s neck and nuzzles her face into his shoulder. ‘I like you, Daddy. You’re warmer than the sun.’ Meili pulls her away, carries her to the bed and tucks a blanket around her. ‘I didn’t miss you a bit,’ Nannan says to her, closing one eye angrily. ‘Give me my red-dress doll.’
‘What an unlucky year this has been,’ Kongzi says, tapping his packet of cigarettes. ‘First your grandmother died, and now this week I heard my father’s fallen ill . . .’
‘I miss home as well,’ Meili says. ‘I want to go and see my parents. I don’t care if the authorities arrest me and bung an IUD inside me.’ She remembers glancing out of the window this morning, and seeing grey sunlight fall on a tarpaulin shelter in the middle of an empty field. The desolate scene made her pine for Nuwa Village, her family and her parents’ house with the osmanthus tree in the garden.
‘The village authorities don’t just arrest family planning criminals now,’ the brother says, cracking a sunflower seed between his teeth. ‘They confiscate their cash, and all the money in their accounts, and put it straight into the pockets of the county officials. There’s a farmers’ market now, near Nuwa Temple. It attracts many visitors. The authorities have set up an inspection post at the village gates, and everyone who passes through has to show their family planning certificate.’
‘I’m not afraid of those officers any more,’ says Meili. ‘It’s the custody centres that terrify me. They round up peasants and kick us out of the cities saying we ruin their image. But not everyone in the cities is rich and well dressed.’ Her mind suddenly returns to the pregnant woman who was kicked in the fields of the labour camp for daring to speak back to a policeman.
‘Well, I saw a notice up in Guai Village today forbidding landlords from renting their property to family planning criminals, so you won’t be safe here either for much longer,’ says the brother, cupping his mug of rice wine.
‘You’re right,’ says Kongzi. ‘And besides, this isn’t a healthy place for a family to live. I don’t want Meili to give birth to another handicapped child . . .’ He turns his eyes to Meili, who stops cracking the sunflower seed between her teeth and looks straight back at him. As soon as she thinks of Waterborn, her body seizes up with rage. She longs to know where Kongzi took her, but hasn’t the courage to ask him. She feels guilty for having run away, and can’t help seeing her grandmother’s death as some divine punishment for her irresponsible behaviour.
‘What about that place, Heaven Township, you were talking about?’ the brother asks, then spits onto the floor. ‘How long would it take you to sail there?’
‘Two, three weeks, at least. And God knows how many inspection posts we’d have to pass through on the way and how many fines we’d be forced to pay.’ Kongzi spits a small bone onto the floor and wipes his mouth.
‘Where has Grandmother been buried?’ Meili asks her brother, looking up at him just like a mouse that’s fallen into an earthen jar.
‘Don’t ask him,’ Kongzi says, rubbing some dirt off the back of his hand. ‘He’s so furious about what happened, he says he wants to blow up