The Creatures that We Are

“Say it! Are you a man or a woman? Say it out loud!”

Liu Haoqiang’s drunk father had lost it completely. He whipped Liu Haoqiang as she cowered in a corner and demanded an answer.

“Man, I’m a man! Stop it, please. I made a mistake. I knew I was in the wrong…” Liu Haoqiang begged while holding onto herself with both hands.

“You don’t fucking seem like one! You sissy! Freak! Source of my bad luck…” Her father went even harder. “Don’t cry! Men don’t cry!!”

The violent outburst usually lasted over ten minutes until her father was exhausted. Then he would fall sound asleep on the sofa.

Liu Haoqiang always dried her tears quietly and cleaned up the mess in the living room. She even had to lift her father onto the bed before using the first-aid kit to disinfect her wounds.

There were many times when Liu Haoqiang thought about shutting the windows and doors and opening the gas in the kitchen to drag his father to hell with her. But she was a coward who only dared to consider the option, never carrying it out.

Last night, her father beat her because he saw the small red stains on the jeans she hadn’t been able to wash. The blood was from her period.

Her father forbade her from using sanitary pads because he believed it to be repulsive and cursed. However, Liu Haoqiang had no better way to deal with her natural biological phenomenon. She could only resort to using tissues as pads.

She embarrassed herself many times because of that and became the butt of the jokes in the class. The girls kept a wide berth from her, and the boys shunned her. She had no friends.

Her homeroom teacher took it seriously, though, and visited her family in person to talk to her father about it.

Her father accepted whatever the teacher said with simple yeses, but as soon as the teacher was out of the room, Liu Haoqiang got another beating. Her father cursed her out for being a humiliating and cursed one.

Nothing came out of it in the end. It was as if the problem would go away as long as everyone pretended it wasn’t there.

Now, Liu Haoqiang got out of bed and walked into the cramped kitchen, opening the fridge and steaming the cold hard buns in the electric pot. Then she prepared some mustard greens and a small bowl of liquor. This would be her father’s breakfast.

If she didn’t do this, she could receive another beating when she came back home after school.

After all that, Liu Haoqiang returned to her room and stood before the mirror. She took off her shirt, wrapping bandages around her chest tightly to cover her pronounced curves until her torso seemed completely flat from the side.

Then she put on boys’ uniform and put on her backpack. With her hair cut short, she looked like a boy with more delicate features.

She stared at herself in the mirror and practiced the sort of broad smile that boys usually made. She had to make herself seem more like a boy to win their respect and avoid bullying.

When she was about done, the wound around her collarbones throbbed in pain.

A ray of morning light shone into the room, splashing white onto the mirror and obscuring her face.

Suddenly, Liu Haoqiang felt frustration, exhaustion, and deep resentment greater than ever before rising in her heart. The resentment was targeted at her father, herself, and the world.

“Aghh!!”

She screamed, smashing the full-length mirror in her closet with a punch. The knuckles of her fair fingers bled profusely. The “boy” reflected in the mirror shattered into pieces. řаΝỌΒЕş

She threw away her backpack and took off her shirt, yanking off the bandages wrapped around her chest. Then she stepped onto a small stool on the side to take a small brown suitcase from the top of the closet. Inside was the red dress her mother had worn at her wedding.

She put it on and smeared her lips with the blood from her fingers like she was applying vibrant lipstick.

Then she strode into the kitchen, putting the breakfast she had prepared into the trashcan.

Satisfied, she walked out of the house alone.

Dressed in an old-fashioned red dress, she walked barefoot across the corridor of the apartment building that was filled with clothes, bedsheets, pickled vegetables, and cured meat. The neighbors who had already woken up stared at her in surprise, but none dared to strike up a conversation.

Soon, Liu Haoqiang made it out of the stuffy apartment and reached the main road. The awakening city was boisterous and thriving with vitality. The warm morning sun cast the roads still damp with early morning rain in a reddish glow.

Liu Haoqiang walked along the sidewalk. A group of construction workers in deep blue were coming her way. Like a red dolphin swimming across the ocean, Liu Haoqiang waded through the group.

Her footsteps gained a skip, and her breathing became free. She had never felt so happy. She hummed and spun and jumped, enjoying the sunlight, flower fragrance, and morning dew to their full like an innocent princess who had just escaped the castle.

About ten minutes later, she reached a creek and walked onto the stone bridge, standing at the center of it.

The happiness and liberation derived from insanity were shortlived, leaving deeper despair and a sense of loss.

She climbed over the bridge railing, looking down at the creek against the morning wind.

The creek was no more than ten meters wide and two meters deep, and the water flow wasn’t quick. For a girl who couldn’t swim and wanted to die, though, it was more than enough.

Liu Haoqiang took a deep breath and closed her eyes, picturing herself as a flying bird getting shot, about to dive in.

“Really? You’re gonna die in a smelly ditch like this?”

A girl’s voice came from behind her. It was a pretty voice, but there was a hint of mischievousness to the tone.

Liu Haoqiang started and almost fell. She flailed her arms around to regain balance. Then she slowly turned to the side to look at the uninvited guest.

It was a girl with twin tails and dressed in a high school uniform. She was on a bicycle with her arms crossed and resting on the handlebar, a callous and playful smile tugging her lips.

She was pretty with large bright eyes, a high-bridged nose, and a tapered chin. She looked bright and cute with an edge of rebellion.

“Who, who are you?” Liu Haoqiang asked.

“Does it matter? You’re jumping into the creek, aren’t you?” The girl was still smiling. “Don’t take this the wrong way. I’m not trying to stop you. I’m just surprised that someone would want to die in this smelly ditch. What a sad way to go it’ll be.”

“Doesn’t matter.” Liu Haoqiang laughed at her own expense. “Death is death…”

“Right!” The girl slapped her thigh and spoke impassionedly. “Death is death. Why not kill yourself in a better place? The creek used to be quite clean, but now that all the residential wastewater and human waste discharge into this creek…tsk, tsk, it’s dirty with all the bacteria…”

Liu Haoqiang couldn’t help but picture it, and she felt nauseous.

“There are also water snakes, swamp eels, and all sorts of bugs in the water. Think about it. After your death, they’ll all burrow into your mouth and lay eggs in your body, giving birth to a colony of small water snakes…”

“Oh boy…” The girl braced herself dramatically. “Just thinking about it gives me goosebumps.”

Liu Haoqiang paled. She was already covered in goosebumps.

“Hey, ever see the ocean?” the girl suddenly asked apropos to nothing.

Liu Haoqiang shook her head.

“Neither have I. I’m saving up to go on a ferry trip after graduating from high school to look at the ocean,” the girl said. “What about it? Wanna join me?”

“Huh?” Liu Haoqiang thought she had heard her wrong.

“Then you can jump into the ocean to kill yourself,” the girl said earnestly. “Isn’t that better than this ditch?”

Liu Haoqiang thought about it, and to her surprise, it did seem like the better option. Yes, if she was going to die anyway, why not look for a better place? The ocean must be beautiful.

“That’s a promise.” The girl winked at her with her left eye. “Hey, stop standing on the railing. You look stupid.”

Liu Haoqiang flushed red before going pale. She slowly lowered herself.

In a flash, the girl pushed her bicycle aside and took a big stride forward to grab her hand, yanking her toward the bridge.

Liu Haoqiang fell into her arms, and they fell on the stone floor.

Worried that Liu Haoqiang would run away, the girl wrapped her arms so tightly around Liu Haoqiang that she found it difficult to breathe.

The girl shouted, “Why would you do this at this age? Think about your parents! You’re being selfish…”

The moment Liu Haoqiang heard that, the frustration and grievances she had bottled up for more than a decade erupted like a volcano.

“What do you know about me?! My mom died when I was young! My father resents me! He beats me up and whips me with a belt every time he gets drunk… My classmates hate me and stay away from me. No one would be my friends… I’m being selfish by being alive. It’s better that I die. That’ll please everyone…”

The girl gaped at her. That was…more tragic than she could ever imagine.

Liu Haoqiang burst out crying.

“Huh? Eh, ehhhhh?”

The girl was still lying prone on the ground. Suddenly helpless, she kept patting Liu Haoqiang on the back. “Say, people should be more selfish. You…you don’t have to care about other people. You should live for yourself… Hey, girl, would you stop crying and get up first? My legs are going numb…”

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