When I awoke in the county hospital, my mind was suddenly clear and the fever had broken. My mom hugged me with tears in her eyes.
"Where are we?" I asked her immediately.
"The hospital in town, sweet one. You were very sick."
Suddenly, I remembered the old woman's severed head and shivered.
"Where's Xiao Chun's mother?"
She smiled sadly at me, "My good boy, Xiao Yong, it is okay. She was buried by the villagers."
The fear that was clenching my gut fell away with her words. That and the hospital was very distant from my village.
"You were babbling, sweet one. I am so glad you are okay."
"What did I say?" I asked timidly. Two men in the ward with us were looking at us with sharp uncomfortable glances. "Nothing bad I hope." I told her.
"Did I tell everyone that I want to be a monk in the Shaolin Temple?" I thought embarrassedly.
My dad interrupted my thoughts by bringing fruit for me.
"Did I say something bad, Dad?" I asked him.
He looked at me for a moment and said simply, "Xiao Yong, you should go to school. You are so superstitious."
I realized that I should not question him further. I didn't know what I had said. "Did I tell him that I want to go to the Shaolin Temple?" I thought worriedly.
Sun Sheng, Uncle Sun's son came to my ward that afternoon. After all, we were from the same village and my parents had been to visit Uncle Sun. I didn't know that he was still alive. I didn't even know that he was still in the hospital!
My back was suddenly very cold.
Uncle Sun had been in the hospital since the burial, it had been a week now. He was still unconscious and the doctors had predicted that he wouldn't wake.
"They told me to plan for the worst outcome," Sun Sheng told my parents. "But I know my father, he's strong."
I drifted off while they were talking and awoke later that night. My father had returned to the village to continue teaching his students.
"They'd be without class for too long if he stayed," My mother told me. "Your father is a good man to contribute to others' education and take care of us."
I smiled at her and closed my eyes again. "He will be safe." I thought, "She doesn't want anything to do with him."
The next afternoon there were three patients in my ward. One had left the previous morning and there was now a vacancy across the way.
"I may test to see how comfortable that bed is." Mom told me with a yawn, but the wife of a sick man beside me put her belongs on it. We watched as the nurses found the belongings and chastised the woman for "taking up medical equipment."
Mom ended up sleeping on the bed with me.
The light turned off at ten o'clock on the ward. The sick man beside me fell asleep quickly and was snoring terribly. His wife cleaned away the vacant bed and then she too soon fell asleep.
I didn't know how long it was before I heard someone murmuring, "So crowded! So crowded..."
I thought I had pushed or squeezed my mom. I scooted over to the other side to give her more space.
Again the voice cried out, "So crowded! So crowded..."
This time, I heard it clearly. It wasn't my mom's voice. It was low pitched and whiney like a swimmer with their nose pinched.
I opened my eyes woozily. My mom was sleeping beside me, hugging me with one hand to stop either of us from falling off. It was our first time sleeping in a hospital bed and it could have been worse.
The voice became clearer. It resounded from the bed closest to the door. I was curious. "That woman was alone," I remember thinking. "That woman is alone. Who could be pushing or squeezing her?"
I slowly got up, slipping mom's hand gently onto the bed and looking past the sleeping sick man. There were two people in the bed. One woman was in calico, and the other rickety old woman was in black.
The black figure seemed familiar. I took a step towards them and thought "An old woman in bla-"
My eyes widened. The old woman turned her back to me. "So crowded! So crowded!" The voice came again.
"Is she related to the sick man? Maybe she lives here?" I thought.
The old woman turned over abruptly, "So crowded!" She lifted her face to me in a jerking twisting motion.
Her face shone just as it had in the hands of her son. The wrinkles were pulled taut and forcing a strange smile lined by drawn lips. Gleaming teeth caught the moonlight and shined out at me. It was a familiar face. It was Xiao Chun's mother's face. I looked into the eyes that had frightened me into delirium.
I cried out.
The noise caught in my chest and I saw that Xiao Chun's mother became restless. She turned around, ethereal skin moving through the body of the woman she inhabited, and disappeared.
My mom stirred awake by my cry. She hurried to the light switch. "What happened sweet one?"
"Xiao Chun's mother, Xiao Chun's mother..." I cried.
My mom's face paled. The sick man stirred awake with a grumble and his wife rose out of bed as if she'd been awake the entire time. "Who is Xiao Chun's mother?" The woman demanded, "You have been calling her name for three days." Her voice was shrill and annoyed. She looked tired, but apparently unharmed by the creature that had just been sharing her bed.
My mom spoke immediately, "I am sorry. Sister, my son was frightened. He has been very sick and speaking nonsense. Please, don't pay his words any mind."
I hugged my mom aggrievedly, "It is not nonsense. I really saw Xiao Chun's mother! She was on that bed," I pointed, "And she shouted 'So crowded! So crowded!' Didn't you hear her shouting?" I was screaming hysterically at this point and stepping towards the woman without even thinking about it.
She was frightened by my words and stood up unconsciously, moving away from the bed and me.
My mom apologized embarrassedly, "Sister, don't worry! He's just had a nightmare."
"Mom, I didn't have a nightmare." I turned towards her and pointed at the woman who now had her hands raised as if to ward me away. "I saw Xiao Chun's mother going through her body."
She appeared stunned for a moment, as if she'd been slapped across the face. "You are a naughty boy. Why would you curse me? Hasn't your mom taught you to respect others?"
Mom looked at the woman sharply, "Sister, my son is six years old. He was very sick and has had a nightmare. Why would you think he cursed you?"
That sick man interrupted the woman by coughing loudly, clearly uncomfortable. He said in a slow drawling voice, "Come on. Stop it now! The boy had a fright. Don't make a fuss! Go to sleep. If you are scared, turn on the lamp! The hospital can afford the electricity bills." He looked at the three of them with dreary blood shot eyes.
That woman didn't say anything. She looked at her husband, turned and laid down in the bed. She got back up again, looked around the bed to make sure no one else was in it, I suppose, and laid down again. We didn't turn off the light in the ward that night.
My mom hugged me back to sleep. I closed my eyes but did not sleep. I waited to hear the old woman again, but I didn't hear anything for the rest of that night.
I had a dream when sleep finally took me over. A dark man with a vague face came to me and asked that I visit Uncle Sun.
"See him," the vague face spoke in a low scratchy voice. "See him. Take him home."
I awoke with a start the next morning, long before anyone else.
"See him." I whispered.