It began with a tickle in the back of Wong An’s throat, light as a goose feather. She let out a long, rasping wheeze, and would have thought no more of it. But her son, Chen Wei, recently returned from his apprenticeship with Doctor Song in Peking, gave her a long, searching look. When he relayed his concern, suggesting she rest while he brought her red date ginger tea and massaged her feet, she sneered at him.
“If you cared so greatly for my well-being, you would never have abandoned me for three years without the courtesy of first acquiring a wife to care for me in your absence.”
“Mŭqīn,” Chen Wei said, “I left to make my fortune, for the girl I wished to marry is from a well-respected family. They would accept no small bride price.”
Her lips curved up. “And how did that choice go for you, son?”
Chen Wei dipped his head. “Her family did not wait for me to return with my fortune. She was married to a high-ranking official last autumn.”
Wong An nodded. They had spoken of this many times before, but she was not ready for her son’s pain to fade. Heartbreak was well-deserved punishment for his abandonment. It mattered not that circumstances had been different when Chen Wei left for his apprenticeship. He had been a second son then, free to pursue fortune-seeking while Wong An’s first son, Chen Xing, her golden child, held the responsibility of marrying a respectable woman.
After toiling as a daughter-in-law and a mother for many long years, it had been Wong An’s turn, at last, to command a daughter-in-law of her own.
Then her eldest son died before he could wed.
Upon Chen Xing’s death, Chen Wei should have returned immediately to marry a village girl; someone obedient and capable, who would devote her life to helping Wong An. Instead, he insisted on completing his apprenticeship, lovesick for that ridiculous girl he so treasured.
Chen Xing would never have placed love for a girl over filial duty.
Though neither mentioned him, Chen Xing stood between them, a widening gap between mother and remaining son.
“Do not speak to me of rest,” Wong An said. “I have toiled long hours in your absence. I will not change my ways simply because you have deigned to return.”
“Yes, Mother,” Chen Wei said, bowing before returning to his studies.
For several weeks, Wong An felt her movements slowing, her body weakening, but she refused to speak of it. She spent all of her dwindling energy cleaning the house. Still, more dust seemed to accumulate than she could manage, and cooking the same simple meal of rice and vegetables seemed to grow more exhausting each day. Each night, she went to bed earlier.
Chen Xing would have called for the village doctor immediately. He would have understood that her protests were mere duty, and insisted she lie down to rest while his wife—for he would have married by now—took care of the household.
But Chen Wei was all she had left, and he was meek as a kitten. He merely sent concerned glances his mother’s way when he thought she wasn’t looking and waited until nightfall to sweep the dusty floors. For all his bluster about the many medicines Doctor Song had taught him to make, he had offered them to his mother only once, early on, and had not persisted after her initial refusal.
Each time Wong An coughed, she glared at Chen Wei. If only he had been the one to die, instead of his older brother.
The more she considered, the more she wondered if this was Chen Wei’s fault. Perhaps, by speaking his worry aloud, he had invited illness into their home.
“Érzi! Kuài lái!” Wong An called out one morning, hours past when she normally awoke.
Chen Wei burst into her bedchamber; panic written across his features.
Good. He should be startled. Wong An had looked into her mirror that morning; she knew how she looked. Her face had grown pale as the flesh of a lychee, a stark contrast with the black, matted hair clinging to her forehead. Her cheeks had grown sunken. She was still in her bedclothes, tangled between rumpled sheets soaked in sweat.
“Mŭqīn?” Chen Wei looked agape.
Wong An felt herself grow annoyed. He should be assuring her that her illness was not as severe as it seemed. It was his duty, as her son, to accept the burden of her illness, not to let his jaw hang open like a timid child watching their first chicken slaughter. “You must prepare me one of those remedies you love to brag about. Or are they a fool boy’s boasts?”
“I will gladly prepare you a dose, Mother.”
“Quickly!”
Chen Wei left in a hurry. Wong An sat up to listen; their house was small and the walls thin. She heard her son open a lock; probably the chest of medicinal herbs he had hauled back from Peking. She watched him run past her doorway carrying several pouches and jars to the open kitchen. She heard the roar of a flame before the fragrant aroma of the soup she had cooked often for her family—flavored with ginger, wild yams, lotus root, bamboo shoots, and wood ear—filled the house. Then a sharp, medicinal scent cut through the air.
Good. Maybe he wasn’t completely useless after all.
Wong An heard her son approaching and quickly laid back down. With two hands, Chen Wei carried a bowl of soup into the room and set it on the table beside Wong An’s bed.
“I am too weak to drink it on my own, you fool!” Wong An snapped.
Abashed, Chen Wei quickly helped his mother up before lifting the bowl for her to sip.
Wong An took one sniff of the soup her son had prepared and turned up her nose. “There is no meat in this broth.”
“Mother, I have taken a Buddhist vow. I shall neither drink wine nor eat meat, and I will not harm a living creature.” To Wong An’s annoyance, Chen Wei offered his explanation with the exaggerated patience of the young, as if she had still failed to grasp the words he had spoken often since his return from the capital.
She understood his words. Just as she understood that once again, he valued something trivial over his own mother. “You are breaking your vow in your own refusal. For without meat, I will grow weaker and die, and I am a living thing.”
“Mother, I have put the finest herbs in this broth, a recipe devised by Doctor Song himself, and I assure you, it will help.”
“What a useless son I have raised,” Wong An lamented. “All I ask for is what every other mother in the village already has; an obedient son.”
Chen Wei bowed his head. “Mother, will you not try the soup first?”
She lay back down in the sheets. “Begone, and do not bring me a weak broth again.”
He left the room.
Wong An heard her son pace back and forth throughout the small house. She caught a phrase here and there as he muttered to himself. He seemed sure that his medicinal broth, administered regularly, would cure her. But he whined to himself about how he could not force her to take it. And still, he refused to forsake his vow.
At last, he stopped by Wong An’s room and informed her that he planned to visit the local Buddhist temple to meditate. She shooed him away in disgust. What was there to meditate upon? How dare he consider a foolish vow of equal import to his mother’s health? The longer he was gone, the more agitated Wong An grew. He should be here at home, tending to her needs.
The front door did not creak open until the sun had begun to set.
Upon his return, Chen Wei did not stop by Wong An’s room. Instead, she heard chopping from the kitchen. She listened for the sound of clucking to indicate that her son had traded something—a medicine of his own making, perhaps—for one of the neighbor’s chickens to slaughter. When no such sound rose to her ears, Wong An pursed her lips. Had he traded for a cut of meat, then, or would he try to tempt her with another meatless soup?
Wong An waited. This soup was taking far longer to cook than the last batch. Her stomach growled, protesting her lack of food all day. Just when Wong An was about to shout for her son, a yelp from the kitchen startled her. The fool boy must have touched the hot cooking pot.
At last, Chen Wei entered the room, bowl in hand. His palm was wrapped tightly in a strip of cloth. He set down the bowl, helped his mother up, and lifted the soup to her chin.
Wong An sniffed the broth suspiciously. The aroma was different this time; something in it reminded her of the scent of the butcher’s stall on a morning of slaughter. She looked up at her son, whose face was impassive, if paler than this morning.
She took a sip, noting her son’s look of great relief.
At the first taste of broth—something tangy and pungent, almost like pig’s blood—her head lifted, and a grin threatened to break out. She quickly suppressed it. No need for her second son’s head to grow any bigger. That doctor had already filled his pliable mind with too many suggestions of grandeur.
“It is acceptable,” she told Chen Wei. She waited until he sagged in relief. Then she added, “but next time, put chunks of meat directly into the soup, not merely in the broth. Don’t you want me to regain my strength?”
“Of course, Mother.” Chen Wei bowed. A bead of sweat dripped down his forehead, but he said nothing more.
The following day, Wong An’s cough lessened, and she woke more refreshed. It must be the meat, she thought, just like I told him. Eager for recovery, she called for her son again.
Chen Wei had bags under his eyes, too large for a boy in his twentieth year. He wrung his hands as he spoke, annoying Wong An to no end, but he assured her that he would begin preparing the soup immediately.
“With meat in it this time,” she said.
“With meat in it this time,” he agreed.
Wong An waited for her son to return with increasing impatience. She was used to being active and did not enjoy being stuck in bed all day. Sighing, she listened for the sounds of her son working on her meal.
Presently, she heard a squeak of pain, and sat up. Was Chen Wei slaughtering an animal right in their kitchen rather than taking it to the courtyard? Perhaps he thought it kinder, somehow. Foolish boy. He had better clean up without staining the floors she had worked so hard to scrub. She was still fuming when he entered the room, hobbling slightly.
“You let the animal get the best of you,” she remarked. “Your brother would never have injured himself performing such a menial task.” Her son did not reply, not even to congratulate her on being able to sit up on her own. Instead, he lifted the soup to her dry, cracked lips, and tipped the bowl forward.
She could smell the fragrance of the broth. And inside the bowl, just as she had requested, there were several floating chunks of meat.
Delighted, she quickly drank the soup, savoring the taste of the meat between her teeth. It had the flavor of pork, but it was sweeter than the usual cuts from the butcher. A juvenile, possibly.
Chen Wei winced as his mother ate the meal greedily. The weak, soft-hearted boy must be thinking of the animal he had killed. Too quickly, every last drop in the bowl was in her belly. Wong An held in a groan of satisfaction.
“That soup will help me recover,” she told him. “I want the same thing, every morning and every night, but don’t be stingy about the meat. Put in more next time.”
Chen Wei’s hand trembled, but he nodded, took the bowl from her hands, and left the room.
Each morning and each night, Chen Wei brought his mother soup, which she drank greedily.
Each day, Wong An felt herself grow stronger.
Each day, she noticed her son growing weaker. He had developed a noticeable shake, and his skin had an odd, waxen sheen. Some days, she heard sniveling through the walls.
She told herself all could be explained by the extra responsibilities he had taken on during her illness. Clearly, that doctor in Peking had not worked Chen Wei hard enough. This time spent running their household would be good for him, then. Let him have a taste of what his mother’s life had been like these past two decades.
At last, Wong An woke one morning and felt herself fully recovered. She stretched, long and languorous, and contemplated going outside for the first time since falling ill. She longed to feel the unfiltered breeze on her skin, to hear the chirping of birds, to brag to her friend Fangfang about how much her son cared for her—out of his earshot, of course. She longed to visit the market.
But then, she heard her son’s footsteps, and her mouth watered.
More than fresh air and town gossip, she wanted more of her son’s soup.
Quickly, she lay back down, feigning illness.
“Mŭqīn?” Chen Wei’s voice carried a weight far beyond his years.
Wong An inspected her son who was not her favorite son, but whom, she begrudgingly admitted to herself, had been dutifully caring for her through her illness. He limped into the room, slow as oxen at midday. He had a bandage tied around his arm and his robe hung strangely, as though he had grown too thin for it to cling properly. As she had several times these past few weeks, she wondered if he had injured himself—had he let another animal get the best of him? The boy was as clumsy as his brother had been competent.
As always, Wong An dismissed the concern. If his injury was serious, he would have told her. Besides, asking would invite him to complain about the extra chores. The last thing a recovering mother needed was a son who whined about every minor ailment.
She coughed purposefully, hoping he would look alarmed at her downturn for the worse. Instead, he merely looked tired.
“Surely you are not already bored of caring for your sick mother,” Wong An said coldly. “Liu Tai Tai’s son took care of her as she lay ill for ten years!”
“I will never tire of caring for you,” Chen Wei said, tipping the soup toward her mouth.
“Good,” Wong An replied. “Because I do believe I am growing ill again. I will need more soup.”
“Yes, Mother.”
When Wong An was done slurping the broth, Chen Wei bowed his head and shuffled out of the room.
One morning, Chen Wei brought in the usual bowl of soup. By now, his entire body was covered in bandages. His robes bulked in odd places, falling in others, and he was so weak, he crawled in, holding the bowl in his teeth.
Any concern Wong An might have felt for her second son fled quickly, as contempt filled her. Chen Xing had been strong and hearty before he’d been killed by a raiding bandit. He would never have let himself grow this weak, for he would know that maintaining peak health was vital to properly caring for his mother.
Wong An had been recovered for some time now, and she contemplated crossing the room to take the bowl herself. It was painfully slow, watching Chen Wei drag it across the floor. But she could not give any indication of her recovery, lest he refuse to make her more of the delicious soup.
When he neared the bed, Wong An snatched the bowl from his teeth, unable to help herself. The scent called to her, like mahjong tiles to a gambling addict.
She drank as he lay on the floor, catching his breath.
Halfway through the bowl of broth, she was interrupted.
“Mŭqīn?” Her son’s voice called up from the floor, tired and quiet.
“Mm?” She did not want to stop drinking long enough to say his name.
“Is my soup your favorite?” he asked, the words floating up into her ears.
“Mm,” she said, chewing the last bit of stringy, flavorful meat. “It is hard to say. It tastes good, but it has been acting rather slowly. Just because it has done some good, don’t think this means you can stop caring for your ailing mother. I think this may be a bad illness, indeed. Did you hear? Hongmei’s mother grew ill last year and nearly died after she strained herself trying to return to work too soon!”
“Yes, Mother,” Chen Wei said.
He dragged himself back out of the room at last, pulling at the floorboards with hands missing several fingers. Wong An’s lip curled in disgust. Chopping vegetables was not so difficult. She had spent many long years preparing food for her family without acquiring any serious kitchen injuries. If that fool boy could not manage a task as ordinary as cooking soup without wounding himself, a little pain would serve as a good lesson.
When Chen Wei was gone, Wong An yawned, looking out her window. Lying in bed all day grew tiresome. Was it time for her to magically recover? She thought about the soup. She thought about the birds and the breeze. She thought about the taste of meat between her teeth. She thought about what Fangfang would say when she bragged that her son had given up his Buddhist vow in order to care for her properly. She thought and thought and couldn’t decide.
At last, the sun began to set, and Wong An waited to hear the sound of her son’s footsteps. Or the strange new dragging method he was using to get around; whichever he chose tonight.
The hall was silent.
“Chen Wei? Érzi?”
He did not respond.
Annoyance tickled her skin. Āiyá, how would she brag about her obedient son if he was no longer doing her bidding?
She waited until she was sure he was not coming and threw off the sheets in search of her child, who had clearly lost his sense of filial piety. And after he had been doing so well!
She nearly fell several times; legs having grown weak while she was bedridden. Muttering curses, she clung to the walls and made her way to the kitchen.
Wong An turned the corner to see her son leaning against the wall near the cookfire, with tears running down his face and a stick clenched between his teeth. He clutched a knife in one hand. As she watched, he sawed off a tender chunk of flesh from beneath his ribs and threw it into the pot of soup.
Any mother would be horrified to witness such a sight. Wong An let a strangled cry escape her lips, even as her mouth began to water. At the sound, Chen Wei turned, and he collapsed to the ground, bloodshot eyes staring up at her.
Wong An stumbled toward him on her weakened limbs. The floor was covered in dark stains, and the air was rank with a sickly, metallic scent. When she reached Chen Wei at last, she dragged him into her lap, clutching him tight.
There was even less of him than she had thought.
He whimpered, teeth denting the stick.
She pulled it from his mouth.
“Mŭqīn?” His words came out a raspy whisper. His chest rose and fell with wheezing, labored breaths.
“Yes?” Blood bloomed against his tunic where he had cut his latest wound. She shifted, so that it wouldn’t stain her robe.
“Did you know about my secret ingredient?” Though Chen Wei’s face was weary with resignation and each word was strained, Wong An heard a note of pleading in his voice, reminding her of when he had been a child. He had spent every free minute following her and Chen Xing around, hoping for a scrap of attention. Even now, he sought her approval, his eyes round with longing.
Anger rose in Wong An. “How could I have known?” she snapped, “when you never breathed a word to me?”
He closed his eyes, slumping in her lap. Wong An took a deep breath and exhaled slowly, tamping down her rage.
“I didn’t know,” she said, softening her words for his benefit, the way a kind mother would. “Or I would never have allowed you to continue. I thought you were buying slabs of pork from the butcher or trapping wild rabbits. Or selling your tinctures to buy a chicken.”
She hadn’t known. She couldn’t have known, because only a monster would know what her son had been doing and allow him to continue.
And she was no monster.
In her lap, Chen Wei’s chin dropped. Wong An took the movement for a nod of assent. He understood, then, that this had been his own choice. It was not her fault.
“Mother?” Chen Wei’s whisper was so faint that Wong An couldn’t be sure she hadn’t imagined it.
“Yes?”
“Have I been an obedient son?”
Wong An bit her tongue, holding back her first, impulsive answer. She did not want to come back in the next life as a dung beetle, and kindness would cost her nothing now. She took a long look at her son, who was lighter now than he had been on his tenth birthday. At last, she settled on an answer that was true enough. “You are not as good a son as your brother was, but these past few months, you have been good enough to me.”
Chen Wei let out a long, world-weary sigh and moved no more.
Wong An stared down at her second son, who was useless now.
Or—almost useless.
Dutifully, she began to wail over his body, but not so loudly that a neighbor would come running to see what the matter was. She wailed until her throat ached. Until the fragrance of the soup still simmering over the fire became overpowering.
Carefully, she set the body of her second son down on the kitchen floor. She thought about his last question to her. All he had wanted, in the end, was to be her obedient son.
Like her eldest, her second son had abandoned her.
Wong An was all alone now, both a widow and childless. A difficult existence for a village woman. Chen Wei would want his mother to have one last piece of comfort before she entered this new phase of her life. No one could blame a bereaved mother for desiring one last chance to be close with her son. For fulfilling what must have been his last wish.
Wong An picked up the knife her son had dropped.
She lifted his tunic, looking for an unscarred piece of flesh.
And she began to carve.
Originally published in Death in the Mouth, edited by Sloane Leong & Cassie Hart.
