“I can still talk and move, and I can still see. I’m not senile, so how could I possibly be bullied?”

Grandma smiled at Uncle Jack, then put away her smile and continued, “I still have some time left before I die.”

That last sentence was spoken softly, but it left everyone present with complicated expressions.

“The money your father left, the money I have myself, plus my pension and retirement insurance, should be enough to last a long time. There’s no need for you to chip in. At worst, there’s still the house.”

Grandma didn’t say much that day, but after these few sentences, she looked extremely tired. She lay back down, and the adults, each with their own expression, left the room. Zoe Young always felt there were all kinds of hidden meanings in Grandma’s words, but she couldn’t understand them.

“Alan Carter, but there’s one thing I do understand.

“I think Grandma is using her inheritance to keep them in check.

“I’ve always admired Grandma so much.

“But now I just feel sorry for her. The children she raised herself, and in the end, she has to use this kind of method just to get them to behave quietly. It looks like parental authority, but in reality, it’s so powerless. The parents who give the most end up the saddest.

Children owe their parents, and are in turn owed by their own children… Generation after generation, we just keep going in circles, endlessly in debt.

“Why did she raise these children, after all? If we could have known earlier that this road would end up like this, then why keep going?”

Zoe Young put down her pen. She didn’t know what was wrong with her. It was as if seeds of anger and restlessness were sprouting in her usually sensible and calm heart, struggling to break through the surface.

Growing up is a process of both imitation and refusing to imitate.

She saw her present self in her peers, and from Alan Carter and her mother, she chose who she wanted or didn’t want to become in the future. But in the end, she could only see the same death and helplessness in Grandpa Green and Grandma.

Grandma’s eyelids twitched, and she woke up.

The hourly worker Aunt Lucy was peeling an apple. Zoe Young didn’t alert anyone, just looked up at the IV bottle on the metal stand and pulled out the needle. When Grandma was sick as a child, she had always watched the nurses pull out needles, and now she finally had a chance to try it herself.

“Zoe, you’re here? I even forgot today is Saturday again. Have you finished your midterm exams?”

“They’re done. The finals are coming up soon.” Zoe Young smiled.

“Look at my memory. Getting more and more muddled.”

Zoe Young shook her head. “No, the finals and midterms are so close together, there’s really only a few days in between. You weren’t wrong.”

Grandma smiled, then suddenly turned her head and gazed at Zoe Young with gentle affection. She could even see her own reflection in Grandma’s slightly clouded eyes.

“In the blink of an eye, you’ve grown so big. I still remember when the nurse first carried you out of the delivery room—you were premature, so tiny.” Grandma struggled to lift her hands, showing a length of twenty or thirty centimeters.

Zoe Young did a quick calculation in her mind of her size back then, and couldn’t help but wonder how she’d survived.

“The first time I saw you, I just knew our Zoe would be a little beauty.”

Yeah, right. People always say newborns look like little monkeys, which is why they’re always being mixed up. Still, Zoe Young smiled shyly.

Zoe Young would never know what it was like when Grandma first saw her, but she would always remember the rainy day when she first formed an impression of the word “Grandma.”

Before that, there were only vague impressions: Grandma’s house, an old lady, lots of relatives, older brothers and sisters… But in a child’s memory, none of it had any real color or detail, like an old black-and-white silent film.

Her mother rarely took her to Grandma’s house. She didn’t even start spending New Year’s Eve there until after she turned three. Only now, as she’s grown up, does Zoe Young begin to understand her mother’s reluctance to “go home.”

Until that rainy afternoon in the autumn when she was four.

They were moving again. From one shabby rental to another. She squatted by a pile of scrap wood, watching her mother and the tricycle driver go from haggling to a heated argument. Her mother’s hoarse, harsh tone scared her, the gloomy sky, the onlooking neighbors and passersby, and the wind growing colder and colder.

The weather turned cold fast, but she was only wearing a vest and little shorts, hadn’t bathed in days, and was covered in dirt.

The scariest part was, her mother forgot about her.

That day, her mother was exhausted and irritable. In the morning, Zoe Young had spilled her millet porridge and been scolded to tears. So when her mother finally found another tricycle, sat in the back holding onto the furniture and headed for the “new home,” Zoe Young was too scared to even call out, “Mom, what about me?”

She waited where she was, not knowing how long she waited. She only remembered that when she finally got so cold she decided to stand up and find shelter, her legs wouldn’t straighten at all.

Eventually, when her mother realized she’d lost her child, she called Uncle Jack in a panic. As the drizzle started, Zoe Young looked up and finally saw the scowling face of Uncle Jack and the scruffy boy behind him, Joel Young.

Joel Young was walking along playing a huge handheld game—Tetris. She wanted to get closer for a look, but Joel Young frowned and pushed her away: “Don’t bother me, I’m almost out of lives.”

Zoe Young wanted to tell him, I only have one life, and I’m almost out too.

But the real embarrassment came when she got to Grandma’s house and saw a big table of unfamiliar people in the living room. They were eating, chopsticks still in hand, all staring at her in unison. The conversation stopped abruptly, and their probing, pitying, or slightly disdainful looks pinned her in place like spotlights. Zoe Young lowered her head and tugged at her wrinkled little vest, trying hard to smooth it out—from then on, even in the hottest summer, she never wore the cool shorts and vests that other girls liked.

She was afraid of that outfit, for no particular reason.

But Grandma stood up, walked over, managed to pick her up, and carried her into her own room, rescuing her from the “spotlight.”

“Little mud monkey, you must be freezing.”

“I’m not cold… Grandma, I’m not cold.” It was the first time Zoe Young consciously called out “Grandma.” From then on, the word had a real, warm meaning, no longer like those forced, meaningless greetings at New Year’s: “Happy New Year, Auntie,” “Happy New Year, Cousin”…

Zoe Young came out of her memories and gently smoothed Grandma’s white hair by her ear.

“Grandma.”

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12. Fruitless Flowers

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The adults all said Grandma’s memory was fading.

But Zoe Young always felt that maybe Grandma didn’t remember what she’d said or what had happened a few minutes ago simply because she couldn’t be bothered to remember.

Actually, Grandma had a great memory.

Grandma remembered the snacks Zoe Young liked, the embarrassing things she’d done, and so many truly important things.

For example, every time she came to Grandma’s house, she would gather all the pillowcases and sheets from every room, wrap them around her head, face, and waist, and pretend to be a stunning beauty.

For example, to hear what her own voice sounded like to others, she would stand in the innermost little room and shout “Grandma—” at the top of her lungs, then race to the kitchen where Grandma was, listening intently, but never hearing anything.

Or their daily afternoon card game, “Fishing.” If you had two or more cards that added up to 14, you’d catch a fish. Spades were one fish, hearts were three-quarters of a fish, clubs were half a fish, diamonds were a quarter of a fish.

Each fish was worth ten cents, and at the end of the game, the loser paid the winner for the total number of fish. All the coins Zoe Young had ended up in Grandma’s hands—though they were Grandma’s to begin with. Still, whenever Grandma went to water the flowers, she’d sneak her hand into Grandma’s coin tin, and when she got caught, she’d still grin and say, “I’m not stealing your money, Grandma, really, I just wanted… to help you count it.”

Or the time she helped Grandma water the flowers and killed the prettiest jasmine.

…………

Zoe Young loved basking in the warm afternoon sun, reminiscing with Grandma about these yellowed memories. At those times, she could see the clear light in Grandma’s eyes, as if she’d never grown old, as if she was just tired, and once she’d rested, she could get up right away and go water the clivia on the balcony.

“But slowly, I came to understand. Reminiscing with the elderly is actually a very cruel thing.”