Fiction: Group 3
New year day, the next year
I’ve sworn to myself last night, I would not go back home, until I find the place in the photo my
father gave me. My father must have hidden some sort of treasure in there.
Searching village by village, towns by towns, countries by countries, I tried to match the reality
with the photo. The scenery was same everywhere, there were the flat seas, a small hill behind it. But there
is something that never ever matched—the eyes. They were unique, not anybody else’s, and familiar.
I couldn’t stop myself from thinking of this: Due to the hugeness of the world, I felt nothing but
hopeless to find a little bay in the world according to the photo. Yet, I persuaded myself not to give up, for
my father must have left the greatest present to me.
Surrounded by the dense mist, I walked forward. It was a cellar. A genie appeared in front of me,
gently said, “What would you want, dearest, you can think of what ever you want. Just tell me, we have
whatever Earth has stored in the basement, but it may take time to fetch them, it is far too big here.”
“I want,” I said pleasantly, “a few kilos of gold, a few massive computers to manage my factory, I
want more time so I can work longer and earn more money, and I’d never have to rest so I can work
nonstop, and … Hold on, so who are you?”
“I am a slaved genie, my master is Maurice Tsoi, your father.”
“What?” I felt my blood freezing. Two eyes appeared in front of me, the blaze inside is burning as
if it’s going to explode, there was as if a sword poking out of his eyes, attempting to kill me …
Then I fainted in fear.
The eyes. They were the ones in the photo. Now they were fierce, but somehow, they were still
the same. I howled and sobbed on the bed, I thought of the past, when he…when he…
Lau Fau Shan, Hong Kong
“That’s it!” I couldn’t forbid myself from screaming.
“But is it?” I asked myself in reverse.
The landscape, nothing other than that.
Everything changed. Actually it
was
changed. Things don’t change themselves, there’ve got to be a
reason.
Big ships were going back and forth, to Macau, or up the Pearl River. A long white line was
following it, trying to brag about their speed.
The oyster farmers vanished leaving the wooden sticks saluting in the middle of the sea. I
wondered, will they collapsed one day, or standing there upright till the end of the world. Where had the
farmers been? They became waiters in restaurants and souvenir shopkeepers.
Behind my ears, was no longer just villagers speaking into Cantonese, but also French, Spanish,
Japanese, Korean, Mandarin and more.
Looking at the water, I saw something. Something you’d thought beautiful if you hadn’t seen
it.
A rainbow. Yet, of grease and heavy metals.
A sense of pity floated out from the deepest of my heart. Why would the world dare to make such
a sacrifice? We’ve forgotten something, indeed. We thought oyster farming doesn’t earn us enough, we left
for other occupations; Seems like tourism is a better business than all others; We reckon small wooden boats
were too slow, we used bigger and bigger fishes; Farming and living in small villages was thought to be
unable to produce much, so we started to build factories and polluted the environment. What was polluted
wasn’t just the water, yet also our hearts. Now, the world is different. Working and money were valued
more than anything else. Everything else.
A teardrop landed, a ripple spread all over the water. Drop by drop, sunset came, and it was time to
leave. I glanced at the sea one last time, perhaps it would not look like a sea a few years later. But I froze.
There was a wooden boat. A family was sitting on it, watching the sunset, laughing loudly. The flame in my
heart started to burn. I felt the blood throughtout my body heating up. Since I was born, I haven’t seen a
single scene like that. I had rarely seen any smile like that. Not, especially, in my family. My father had
always been a very solemn person. “Son, that was serious business,” He always said. “My company will lose
the whole game if I don’t finish it now.” Moreover, we seldom talk during dinner. He must had been
reading proposals, or clicking on his calculator.
That was what he lost.
And
I retrieved it.
