Little Su was so startled that she just stared at the three kids who seemed to be similar to her in age for half a minute. When one of the twins in faded blue t-shirt impatiently repeated his question, she finally responded in her usual terse manner, "Su Lin. Living here."
The boy nodded, "So you are the new roommate. I am Bai, this is my brother Min, and this girl is Mei. We don't use our family names here since we will officially decide our family names when we are sixteen. Why are you still using yours?"
"Ah?" Little Su was even more confused. What was wrong with using family names? Why weren't they using them anyway?
Bai was exasperated with little Su's slow responses, "Since you still have your stuff, you didn't get rescued from a brick kiln. So what did your parents do? Drugs, domestic violence, murder?"
Little Su's confusion was increasing. But instructor Gao had told her to get along with her new roommates, so she had to respond. She knew the word "brick", but what was a "kiln"? She didn't know, so she could only respond to the part about her parents, "Left."
"Oh, so they abandoned you," Bai said understandingly, "No worries. We are all the same. Mei was sold to a black brick kiln at six and was only rescued last year. Don't look at her height, she is nine years old- the eldest among us. As for our parents...our dad assaulted our mom when he was drunk. She passed away from her injuries, so dad went to prison for life. Oh, and we ended up here. Of course, none of our relatives want to take care of children of a convict."
Bai's voice was normal as though he wasn't talking about himself. His brother Min reached out and patted Bai's head once gently. On the other hand, little Su felt this was too much information. She was sad for them. But she wanted to clarify that her parents didn't sell her, they weren't convicts, and they may soon be back for her. She wasn't abandoned...or was she? Little Su didn't know the answer. So in the end, she didn't say anything.
Bai wasn't expecting an answer anyway and just said curtly, "Dinner is from 7:30-8:30pm. Get down if you want it." Su Lin climbed down her bunk, and the four of them headed out to the canteen. On their way, there were a lot of other kids moving in the same direction. The canteen was fairly big with five long rows of tables and chairs. Bai took the lead in getting the plate, bowl and spoon for himself. Little Su just copied his actions. There was no menu- only a giant pot of black bean soup and a big basket of bread. The woman serving would give each child exactly two thin slices of bread, and fill half their bowl with soup. There were no second servings. Oh, but there was dessert. One small butter cookie for each child. (Link for what bean soup looks like: https://bit.ly/2LixfeN)
Everyone was done in less than ten minutes. Soon they returned back to her rooms. Little Su was still hungry, but she endured and just resumed her chess training on her tablet. Bai poked his head to look at what she was up to, and then menacingly said, "Before you play, shouldn't you have something to give us?"
"Ah?" Little Su was confused again.
"What 'ah'?" Bai took out four pieces of butter cookies from his pocket. Min took out three from his. Then, Mei took out two from her sleeves. "So where's your share?"
Su Lin shook her head. She didn't have any. Wasn't only one allowed? "Just one?" she inquired, wanting to make sure. Bai glared at her.
"In this place, you will starve if you follow the rules blindly," Mei spoke for the first time. "If you need to steal to live, then you steal. We will share with you just this once." Mei evenly divided the eight cookies among the four of them. Su Lin grimaced; mom had said stealing was bad. She didn't want mom to come back and find that she had done bad things.
Bai was disgusted at her expression, "Hmph, so you are a goody two-shoes. You won't steal, won't trick and won't set up traps. And you still want to play chess? Isn't chess all about using tactics to trap and outsmart the opponent? You will never be any good. Wasting time."
Su Lin was horrified. Was her thinking really no good?