Hong Kong Young Writers Anthologies Fiction 12 | Page 151

The New Tales of Old Shanghai
Dulwich College Shanghai, Lin, Jingkai – 10
T
he sun baked down on my bare dry skin. My sandals scraped against the hard stone pathways of Old
Shanghai. Sweat trickled down my neck, and I let it run down my spine. The sound of construction reached
my ears: the clinging of metal against metal, the shouting of workers, and the faint rustling of leaves in the distance.
The handles of the rickshaw were rough against the skin of my palms. The baby was whimpering. I peered back at
my passengers: a woman clinging on to her baby, her left hand lifting to brush off the loose hairs wandering into
her sight. I limped on, the rhythm of the wheels a steady beat in my ears. A bird flew overhead, and I waded into
the river of people in the bustling market.
I stopped at our destination, and at that moment caught a glimpse of a dark figure at a modest, brightly-lit stall.
He muscled his way to the front of the queue, shouting “Give me a job!” People shot him dirty looks, filthy looks.
The shopkeeper reeled from the horrid smell.
He was scrawny and undernourished, most likely a street-dog, orphaned from birth.
“You want a job?” The shopkeeper asked.
“I work hard,” the boy replied.
“I suppose you could take some of my sweet potatoes, and sell them on the corner there.”
The shopkeeper handed him sweet potatoes in a sack. The boy swung them behind his back, and with a quiet
word of thanks, went in the corner, calling out his sales.
Suddenly, something stirred at the back of my mind, a mere memory: another young orphan, standing on the
streets without a job, struggling to find food. It was hard for that boy to make it in the world, and that little bo