Hong Kong Young Writers Anthologies Fiction 12 | Page 191

The New Tales of Old Shanghai Good Hope Primary School cum Kindergarten, Cheung, Ka Ching – 10 T hunder roared, the sky howled. In the safe village’s temple, The God was simply outraged. “Why haven’t anyone in this village prayed and obeyed me these days?” roared the god. But no one heard. “I will give revenge. You will all regret this!” The God snarled. And with that, the sky once again poured rain. I am Jiangnu and I once had a blessed and a happy family. There were Mama, Papa, Lihua and me. We all thought we were lucky, but we were very wrong… “Class dismissed!” my teacher announced. My friend Meiling and I raced back home. I can’t wait to tell Mama about my great news, I got very good results on my report card indeed! Suddenly, we saw our neighbour Long running toward us. “The Pirates…they have arrived! Help me warn the villagers!” he panted. His face was pale and it looked like all the blood was drained out of him. Meiling and I yelled, “Pirate invasion! Pirate invasion!” After that, I ran back home and saw Mama packing up things. “Quick! Hide! Under the bed! Lihua’s there already!” Mama shouted. I crawled underneath the bed and I heard Lihua crying. “It’s going to be alright, Lihua.” I said gently. I hugged her and we both remained silent. Mama and Papa hid inside the wardrobe and threw the key to me just in time. A pirate stepped in the door and was a bit surprised to find that no one was inside. He was about to leave when Lihua spotted the pirate stepping on her beloved teddy bear, Teddy. “Teddy!” she screamed. The pirate snarled and said, “Show yourself!” When no one came out, he shoved his hand under the bed and pulled Lihua out. Lihua screamed and I heard Papa forced open the wardrobe door. He shouted “Put her down!” The pirate took out a revolver and pointed it directly at Papa and shot. Mama and I gasped. This was no lie, Papa was shot dead. We were kept prisoners on the pirate ship. A strong rope was tied around us and we were tied around the pole. We all wept and morned for Papa. Lihua was very guilty indeed about it. Soon after, the pirates started having supper which was a huge and enormous feast and we licked our lips even though we knew we couldn’t eat the food. We heard them talking about living in the village, and by doing that, they would kill all the villagers in the village. We were terrified. At night, the pirates tucked in bed and Mama whispered “We must flee!” We sighed, we knew it couldn’t happen! Around midnight, a pirate woke up and took out a piece of bread, some butter and a butter knife. While he ate, he said cruelly, “We’ll have three of you hanged by morning.” “We know.” I said politely. Then he went back to sleep. What he didn’t know is that he dropped the butter knife on the floor. When I was sure all of the pirates were asleep, I took the butter knife and freed us. We each took a wooden plank and used it to swim to a nearby island. It was harder than I thought to swim across the almost frozen sea. Lihua was non-stop shivering and I was non-stop sneezing. My heart was pounding so fast and loud that I was sure the pirates could hear me back on the deck. Only Mama remained calm while Lihua and I were simply shivering with coldness and fear. When the sun rose, we finally arrived at an island. We lived on the island for a few days eating nuts and berries to survive. One day, we heard joyful sounds coming from the village. We swam back there and we were very surprised to find all the villagers happily dancing. When they saw us, they ran towards us and hugged. I was happy to see Meiling and her family were safe. They explained that they took the chance of the element of surprise and killed all the pirates. We were much overjoyed. And so, we lived happily ever after, though the memory of the pirate who killed Papa remains in our hearts forever.