Zu
Before the age of 6, Zu lived a relatively joyful life in a small town, with her parents who are has stable tedious jobs, within a lovely community where everybody likes to get into each other’s business. They lived in a house right beside a hill, with a small pond in the middle of the field. There were schools, factories, local shops, a mini self-sustainable ecosystem. All the kids knew each other; snacks were being exchanged in the classroom, kites were flying far up in the sky every summer evening after the supper.
But somehow, some onion-shaped alien far away in the universe decided to pass by earth planet, and accidentally left some trace of the god’s miracle and unintentionally been saw by some random four-year-old girl who was standing alone at her balcony and looking up to the sky while waiting for her mom to come home.
What is this god’s miracle? Oh, that is the fluffy clouds turning into animal shapes.
“Ain’t got time for this bullshit!” someone might jumps up and argues with that everybody once saw a piece of cloud, imagining it was a kitten or puppy, and this is nothing interesting, and most certainly not a miracle.
But if I told you, what she witnessed that day is something like an extremely detailed 3D model of a cat, an eagle, a snake, and possibly even a wolf? Every single body hair of these living creatures had been shaped out, and they were spinning themself like it was some kind of jewelry shopping channel on TV.
Although it lasted almost an hour, there is no record, no scientific report in a god damned newspaper. Did anybody else see it that day? Not a single soul. She told her dad and mom, her uncle and her aunt, her classmates, her teacher, and no one believed her. Then she told it to the guard at the factory building, the staff in the grocery shop, a passenger on the road when he was fixing a bike, and an irrelevant woman at the bus station. Only the woman listened to her story tentatively and said, “Sweetheart, I believe you, my brother saw the same thing when he was a child, and I am on my way to visit him. He is in a mental institution; maybe you should meet him as well.”
Eli
Eli’s father was wandering back from a long trip that day. He was gone for such a long time that Eli and her mother didn’t even remember how he looked. “I might as well think he is dead,” her mom had always said. When she came back from school one day, she realized there was a strange man sitting in her apartment smiling at her awkwardly, and he stayed with them for dinner. At the dinner table, Eli was unusually quiet, and she was glancing at him through the drinking glass. This strange yet familiar face suddenly reminded her of something.
That was her 4th birthday, and her father took her to the nearby supermarket and whispered into her ear that she could buy anything she wants because it’s her birthday. They grabbed anything they could, filled the cart to the brim with all the sweets and snacks that they could. Drinking soda, eating out of the chip package before buying. Her dad put her in the cart and pushed her forward quickly like they were in an amusement park. While they were waiting in the long check-out line, he told her he needed to grab one last thing and would be back in a minute. Eli nodded in response. She didn’t remember how long had passed, but the line was getting shorter and shorter, and she pushed the cart forward a bit with her tiny hands while turning her head back to keep checking on where her dad was.
Until it got to her turn, and no one showed up.
Later on that day, Eli remembered her mom came without knowing anything about what had happened, soaked in sweat, and paid a big stack of cash to the security guy. When they left the supermarket, the security guard waved them goodbye and told them not to come back, forever.
Ian
Ian’s mom got him a small baby rabbit as a pet. She looked into his eyes and told him the baby girl’s name was “DOG”.
He loved “DOG” so much. He would feed her, sleep with her, and make her tiny shoes. Ian would go to the kindergarten every day and brag about it to his friends around the lunch table, “I love my DOG, she is my best friend.” Those kinds of simple words were the best way in which he could describe his pet. All the other kids were so envious of him!
At his 6th birthday party, Ian’s best mates from kindergarten were all invited to his house to have an afternoon party. He got up at 6 in the morning, changed into several outfits for himself and DOG. It is the early ’90s; there is no cellphone you can take a photo with and send to your friends or post it on social media for some party preheating. When the children arrived, they were all intimidated by how big Ian’s house is and all the fancy weird shit his mom bought to decorate the house, sort of in a tropical jungle theme. He led them to his backyard to show them “DOG”.
From not far away, children saw a white fluffy creature moving on the lawn, and the closer they got, the more confused they became. “It’s a rabbit!” a boy suddenly shouted out with his tiny index finger pointing toward the “DOG”. “Her name is DOG, not rabbit.” Ian was trying to correct him, “She, she is a rabbit, not a dog,” another small girl said intimidatingly. “No, she is DOG!” All the children were laughing out loud, and Ian almost wanted to cry. He can hear someone whispering and calling him stupid about how he can’t distinguish between a dog and a rabbit.
After the party, Ian asked his mom, “Why did everybody say DOG is a rabbit? His mom held a whiskey bottle, lying on the couch, half asleep and half awake. She lifted his tiny sad face, and looked deeply into his eyes, “Don’t be sad, sweetheart, they just see things as it is, and you, you are different.”
