A Bowl of Noodles

Crows flocked onto the lamppost. I noticed it at once. The wires, unable to bear their weight, already sagged downward. Throughout the summer, sudden showers came and went. If the wires snapped and fell into the water below, passing pedestrians could be at risk. I reported it to my supervisor, who simply ignored my warnings.

That night, when I returned to my dormitory, a pungent odor hung in the air. I followed it to a pot still simmering on the stove. As I lifted the lid, I almost threw up. A dead bird was boiling in the pot. It turned out that one of our men had cooked the dead crow. I scolded him, insisting that a dead crow was a bad omen, let alone something that should be eaten. He was angry with me, though he still threw the crow into the trash bin and poured the soup down the drain.

Our dormitory room was packed with five bunk beds and ten janitors. We worked in a medical university in southern China. I was grateful for the university’s generosity in giving us a place to stay. The dormitory, built from plastic panels and resembling a shipping container, was far from comfortable, but it shielded us from the torrential rains.

Throughout the night, an old hanging fan spun tirelessly, offering relief from the stifling heat and humidity. Even though it buzzed constantly, the noise did not bother us. We soon drifted off to sleep.

“Wake up!” I woke up to a sudden voice. My eyelids felt so heavy that I could barely open them. Light pierced through the narrow gap between my eyelids as I squinted. Lately, my eyes had been unusually sensitive. Whenever a bright light hit them, they stung and quickly filled with tears.

With a hoarse voice, our supervisor dragged us from our beds. “Get up! Now!” He panted between breaths. “Bring your cleaning tools to the main teaching building. A student has fallen down from the 24th floor.”

By then we were fully awake. I picked up my phone and checked the time: three o’clock in the morning. Within ten minutes, we reached the scene with mops, buckets and water hoses.

A cordon had been set up in front of the building, guarded by several security officers. I recognized one of them, a young guard who had once offered me a cigarette. I would never have considered quitting smoking if I hadn’t developed lung problems. He was only two years older than my son, yet he was already earning a living on his own. An ambulance stood waiting, its lights blinking, from which three men in white coats climbed out. They acted briskly, moved the body onto a stretcher, and lifted it back into the vehicle. The doors closed with a heavy thud, and moments later they vanished into the night.

I glanced up and was overwhelmed by the height. I tried to imagine a body plunging downward, falling endlessly until it hit the ground. I gasped, and a chill of imagined pain ran down my spine. Several floodlights had been switched on, allowing us to see clearly how the area had been “polluted”. This was not the first death I had witnessed, but none had been more tragic than this one. In my village, many elderly men and women chose to end their lives by drinking pesticide.

At this moment, however, I felt even heavier. This young man, about same age as my son, had seemed to have a bright future ahead of him. If everything had gone as planned, he would have become a doctor after graduation.

Our supervisor urged us to act quickly. One person fastened a hose to the faucet while another directed the stream of water across the pavement. The rest of us began mopping the ground. Water sprayed continuously as we scrubbed away every trace of the incident, until the pavement looked untouched as though nothing had ever happened.

Soon, a police car rolled in silently without flashing its lights, as if the officers were carrying out a secret mission. Not far away, a small group of students had gathered, and their murmurs gradually grew into an argument. The guards prevented them from approaching, pushing them back whenever they tried to move closer.

After completing the cleanup, we were led to a meeting room in the main building, the same building from which the student had jumped. In the middle of the room stood a long wooden table, one that nearly occupied the entire space. Two police officers sat on one side, and the ten of us were instructed to sit opposite them, as though we were criminals about to be interrogated. The two officers stared at us from across the table, their eyes radiating an intimidating intensity. I had done nothing illegal, yet their gaze frightened me.

The taller police officer spoke first.

“How long have you worked here?”

One by one, we answered.

“Three years.”

“Three years.”

“Two years.”

“Six months.”

…

The responses echoed around the room like a roll call.

“The rule is simple.” The taller officer continued. “Keep your mouth shut.”

The second officer then spoke. “People who don’t have full pictures tend to spread rumors everywhere. They add their own details, exaggerate the story, and enjoy the attention it brings.”

He looked at us coldly. “And who would turn down attention? Would you?”

Wang, the oldest among us, answered at once. He seemed quite familiar with this sort of situation.

“Officers, you don’t need to worry about us. We would never dare disobey your instructions.”

He cast a glance at the rest of us, and several voices immediately rose in agreement.

“We won’t say a word.”

“Not to anyone.”

The taller officer’s face darkened.

“You all know the consequence.”  

No one spoke, but we knew exactly what he meant.

We never said “jail”; we thought the word was too direct. Instead, we called it “pedaling on a sewing machine”, a phrase that referred to the endless labor prisoners were forced to perform behind bars.

We often joked about what life in jail might be like. Wang, in particular, liked to tease himself by saying that, if he were ever sent to prison, at least he would have a place to stay. He envied me and often joked that my son would take care of me when I grew old. Whenever he mentioned my son, my temper flared.

My son had called me just two days earlier. During the call, he asked me for 2,000 yuan to pay for a college computer course. I lost my temper and accused him of lying, convinced that the course was merely an excuse to hide his real purpose: playing video games.

After hanging up, I went to an ATM to check my bank balance. As soon as I logged into it, a number appeared on the screen: 1,780. I transferred every last yuan to my son and sent him a message: it was all I had. Days went by without a single reply. Once again, I lost my tempered and called him to give him a scolding.

I grew up in a small village, and the only inheritance I could offer my son was a small piece of land. But farming had become increasingly difficult, as harvests depended entirely on the weather. Years of hard labor left many villagers with chronic health problems, and I was no exception. I suffered from back pain, headaches, and poor eyesight. After my wife left, my parents took care of my son for nearly 18 years. Every month, I sent my paycheck home to help raise him.

 “Hey, let’s go,” one man said, nudging me. We all got up and left the room.

As we passed the spot where the young man had fallen, we all let out a sigh, but said nothing. The next morning, several bouquets of flowers had been placed in the corner. A security guard was carrying them to a trash bin. He opened the lid and tossed in one bouquet, then quickly picked up another and threw it away as well. Soon, all the flowers were gone.

At that moment, a man with a camera was taking pictures. The guard rushed toward him, trying to grab his camera and shouting, “No photos here! Give me your camera!”

They both fell to the ground, but the guard refused to let go of the camera. At the same time, the other man wrapped his hands around the guard’s neck, trying to restrain him. They shouted at each other as the struggle grew more intense.

I rushed over and tried to stop them, but they were wrestling so fiercely that I couldn’t pull them apart. I shouted for help, and one of my fellow janitors came. Finally, we separated them. Several buttons had been torn from the guard’s uniform, and the other man’s camera had fallen onto the pavement. Pieces of plastic were scattered across the ground.

“You broke my camera.” the man cried. “You need to compensate me for the damage.”

More security guards arrived. They formed a line in front of the man, each gripping a stick as if they were ready to strike the man at any moment. I didn’t want to see any more violence, so I grabbed the man’s arm and said, “Let’s go.” He looked at me in confusion. I met his gaze and nodded. After a moment, he seemed to understand what I meant and agreed to leave.

Once we were outside the campus, I let go of his arm. He squatted down, looking as deflated as a punctured balloon. With his head lowered, he sat silently on the ground, his broken camera resting beside him.

“Young man, don’t let your anger get the better of you,” I said. “They were prepared to strike you.”

“Bastards,” he spat. “They’re just watchdogs, biting and frightening anyone who gets in their way.”

 “I won’t be intimidated by them.”

I understood his anger. Still, relying on the lessons life had taught me, I tried to persuade him.

“I know you’re an honest and decent man,” I said. “But an egg is not a match for a rock. If you threw yourself against it, you’ll only end up broken.”

He fell silent, staring straight ahead.

“My sister fell from the same building two years ago,” he said. “This university gave my parents some compensation, and that was the end of it.”

His voice broke, and he began to sob.

“I just can’t believe she would choose to end her life that way,” he murmured. “She was always so optimistic and even couldn’t kill a fly.”

He wiped his eyes and took a deep breath.

“I can’t believe she would do something like that,” he said. “I’ve always thought she had been bullied by her PhD supervisor.”

“I didn’t do this only for the boy who fell last night,” he continued. “I did it for those who fall in the future as well. My sister is the reason I chose to become a reporter.”

When he finished speaking, he looked even more exhausted than before.

He studied me for a moment before thanking me. Then he asked whether I would be willing to testify about what I had witnessed.

I told him that all I had seen were the ambulance, the shadows of nurses carrying a stretcher, and the large pool of blood. I had nothing useful to offer him.

“They’re so afraid of people seeing it,” he said. “If you would like to talk about the cleanup, or anything else might help...”

Suddenly, the words of the two police officers echoed in my ears.

Keep your mouth shut.

I insisted that I had nothing valuable.

No matter how hard he pleaded or tried to persuade me, I kept my mouth shut.

“Fine,” he bit his lip hard. “You’re a shrewd man.”

I didn’t argue with him.

I had a son to raise. Justice was a luxury I couldn’t afford. My parents were already dead. Sometimes, I still saw my mother as she had been at the end, lying in a dim shelter, waiting for the death to claim her. My father passed away a year later.

I told myself: keep my mouth shut.

I watched the young reporter walk away until he disappeared from sight. Then I returned to my dormitory, changed my uniform, and headed to my second job at a small restaurant.

It was a small noodle shop. I got the job through a man from my hometown who introduced me to the owner. The pay wasn’t too much, but I was still grateful that he had reached out to help.

The bus announcement sounded:

“Han River Station.”

I squeezed past the other passengers and hurried off. 

As I walked, I sent a message to my son.

How’s your computer course going? Don’t make me worry. Reply when you have time.

Since the college student’s death, I couldn’t stop thinking about my son.

I realized how little I actually knew about him. I didn’t know what food he liked. I didn’t know what he did for fun. I didn’t know what was on his mind when he was alone.

And then a frightening thought occurred to me.

If he ever decided to end his life, I would know almost nothing about the life he had lived.

The thought sent a chill through me.

The noodle shop was in a market near the Han River, a five-minute walk from the bus stop. The afternoon sun was beginning to soften, but the heat still lingered in the air. I wiped the sweat from my face with the back of my hand.

Just as I was about to reach the noodle shop, my phone buzzed with a reply from my son.

The computer course is really fun. I’m learning how to code.

I read the message twice. Relief washed over me, and my mood immediately lifted.

The owner of the noodle shop was Sister Hua, about my age. Hua means “flower” in Chinese. Although the years had etched lines across her face, they had not completely erased the beauty she once had possessed. I didn’t know much about her. All I knew came from the rumors people whispered: her husband was in prison.

She treated me well. During the Dragon Boat Festival, she gave me a box of rice dumplings. At first, I refused to take it, but she insisted. 

Most of the customers eating here were people from the lower rungs of society. Construction workers, deliverymen, truck drivers, laborers, and peddlers crowded the tables night after night. You would rarely find them in the clean, brightly lit restaurants of the city center. Instead, when their shifts ended, they drifted into shops like ours, searching for a meal that matched the money in their pockets. Many of them were honest, hardworking people, but some were rough around the edges and not always well-mannered.

One evening, several construction workers were eating noodles and teasing Sister Hua.

One of them, a man in a grey suit, seemed to be the leader.

“Sister Hua, why don’t you give me a chance?” he said with a laugh. “Times have changed. You don’t have to live like a widow anymore.”

When Sister Hua came over to their table, he reached out and slapped her on the backside. Sister Hua didn’t react. She simply carried on with her work as though nothing had happened.

When I saw this, anger rose inside me. Later, when I served their table, I deliberately added too much salt to the man’s noodle soup. The moment he tasted it, he cursed, and demanded his money back. I met his gaze without looking away, so he immediately guessed I was responsible.

“You old bastard,” he spat.

Then he lunged at me and punched me in my face. I swung back and landed a punch on his cheek. Bowls crashed to the floor. Customers shouted. Before either of us could do more damage, the others rushed in and pulled us apart. At the bottom of society, mercy was a rare thing. People fought over jobs, over money, over respect.

I had done it for Sister Hua, because she had always treated me with kindness. Returning the kindness was the least I could do. I was fifty years old, but I was still a man.

Just as we were getting ready to close for the night, the young reporter appeared again.

I was so surprised that he managed to find me.

“I followed you,” he admitted.

I frowned.

“You won’t get anything from me.”

“That’s fine,” he said lightly. “I just want a bowl of noodles. I haven’t eaten all day.”

I couldn’t turn him away, so I served him a bowl.

He sat down alone and began wolfing down the noodles.

“Slow down,” I said. I brought him a bowl of soup and set it beside him.

After he finished eating, he reached for his wallet.

“It’s on the house,” I told him.

To my surprise, he started crying.

“They fired me,” he said.

I didn’t know what to say. By the time Sister Hua closed the shop, and then I took the young man for a walk along the river.

The last bus finally came, and we got on. Inside, bright light flooded the cabin; outside, the river shimmered with moonlight.