Free The Secret Mother by Victoria Delderfield Page A

Her eyes, so hauntingly hollow. Had she touched my cheek? Did that grey hand stroking my forehead belong to her or was it the roots of poison ivy retreating beneath the blanket as daylight chased away the nightmare?
    “Sky Eyes,” she said. “It was just a dream. Wake up now and eat. Work starts soon.”
    This wasn’t my
k’ang.
The room was too gloomy and cold. I heard strange voices – accents different to my own.
    “Who are you?”
    “Don’t you remember? We met on the bus. I’m Ren.”
    I wiped my eyes and spat. There were four bunks besides mine. The windows were shuttered. Wires hung from the ceiling, draped with washing. Sets of blue overalls – one, different to the rest, was an-off white blouse and grey skirt. A pipe jutted from the wall and out of it spewed something sludgy. Girls hurried, jostling to fill their bowls.
    Ren took my bowl. “Wait there, I’ll get you some congee.”
    Someone shouted, “Stop her! She’s taking double!”
    Ren was pushed aside. The pipe spat and puttered out. The small, dingy dorm reverberated with barely satisfied murmurings.
    “Thanks,” I said and spooned up the little congee she’d managed to collect in my bowl.
    “This shit doesn’t get any better does it?” protested a girl, half-dressed inside the bunk opposite. Her skin was the colour of candle wax, translucent and taut across her chest cavity. Her ribs stuck out in rows like a fire grate. She pulled her blouse down from the wire and her casket black eyes met mine.
    “Only slugs can eat that shit, y’know. It’s like slug shit. It’s like eating your own shit.” She pulled her blouse over her shoulders. “What are you looking at?”
    I pulled my blanket up under my chin. “Nothing. I …”
    “Take your nosy, creeping eyes off me. What are you, some kind of spy?”
    The girl’s arms seemed thin as kindling. “New ones are such weirdos these days. Where did they find you two – the Security Bureau? You both act like you’ve got hang ups.”
    Ren scraped the last congee from her bowl.
    “Stop scraping, slug, it’s getting on my nerves.”
    “You heard,” said another, concealed behind a dirty rag of curtain. “We don’t scrape our bowls, OK?”
    “I never read any rule,” said Ren, climbing down from our bunk. We watched her limp to the window and pull on the shutters. Light from the courtyard streaked in. The bully shielded her eyes, like a bat blinded by daylight.
    “You think you’re so smart,” she said. “I don’t know where you’ve crawled from, slug, but believe me, a few weeks in this shit hole and you aren’t going to think you’re so smart.”
    “We’ll see,” said Ren.
    The bully laughed. “Stupid as well as ugly. Where are you from?”
    “Hubei.”
    “Hubei
mei
– so you’re a drudge worker. They must be desperate if they’re hiring cripples.”
    “
Forward! Goes the cripple with her little slug
…”
the bully changed the company song and mimicked Ren’s limp. “
Crawling on the earth, begging to be crushed.
”
    “Damei,
bee-jway
,” warned another girl, “before your mouth gets us all fired.”
    “
Have Joy! For tomorrow you’ll be gone
…”
    I wanted to stand up for Ren, but daren’t.
    “Look girls, the Hubei
mei
is deaf as well as crippled!”
    Ren span round and lurched for Damei, clutching her by the wrists.
    “Don’t think you’re hurting me,” said Damei with false bravado.
    “
Niou-se
,” spat Ren, as though Damei was a piece of cow shit. She pushed Damei onto her bunk and swung past, out of the dorm.
    Clang-a-lang-a-lang-a-lang-a-lang-a-
    The room shook again, in disbelief, relief. Someone had stood up to the scrawny bully – had anyone done that before?
    I dressed in silence, pulled down my work cap, rubbed the sleep dragons from my eyes and pushed my feet into the cold, black slippers beneath my bunk. I was lost inside my new shapeless overalls. As I checked my appearance at the mirror, a face I recognised appeared.
    “You okay?