On Christmas Day.
In the group were nine students, all around forty years old. The youngest, Jiang Wen, was already thirty-eight years old this year. They all had their own families, and some went back to their hometowns to celebrate Christmas, waiting to visit Hattie after the holidays. Those who were local spent Christmas Eve at home and then visited Hattie.
Hattie was alone at home, with only a dog by her side. On the big day of the New Year, the neighborhood was bustling with families reuniting, but Hattie’s home was quiet, as if no one was there.
Jiang Wen was a local. After Micah left, she was the one who contacted Hattie most frequently. From time to time, Jiang Wen would go to Hattie’s house with her husband and children, bringing gifts to visit her.
On Christmas Day, Jiang Wen was still the first to arrive. She had called Hattie the day before, saying she would come early in the morning. When she called before leaving, no one answered. She thought Hattie must be busy, so she sent her a text message instead.
Seeing the closed door, Jiang Wen rang the doorbell but got no response. She tried calling with her phone, but still no answer. Suddenly, Jiang Wen felt a surge of panic. She turned to her husband and said, “Nobody’s answering. Could something have happened to Hattie?”
“Ah, don’t talk about such inauspicious things on a big day like today,” her husband said.
Jiang Wen didn’t want to think too much about it, but with the door not opening and no one answering the phone, her emotions were beyond her control in this situation.
After waiting outside for ten minutes with no movement, it was evident that something had really happened inside. Feeling frightened, Jiang Wen quickly contacted the property management department to have the door opened. After half an hour of fuss, four other students also arrived. A group of people gathered at the door, and when it finally opened, Jiang Wen rushed in first. The TV in the living room was playing a rerun of the Spring Festival Gala from the previous night, and she saw Coco walking around the living room, but Hattie was nowhere to be found.
“Hattie-” Jiang Wen’s words had just fallen when she followed Coco’s path and saw Hattie lying on the sofa on the balcony, her hand hanging over the edge, her fingernails pale and bloodless. Following her fingertips down, there was a burnt-out cigarette butt, and ashes were scattered on the ground, only her ring on the ring finger of her right hand shimmered faintly…
Hattie had passed away.
On Christmas Eve, she had left, and on Christmas Day, the students found her.
She left quietly, facing death. Although it was a painful thing, she had a smile on her face.
“Mom, is grandma asleep? Why isn’t she covered with a blanket? She’s so cold,” the child didn’t understand the separation of life and death. Seeing Hattie with her eyes closed, she thought she was only asleep. People who are asleep can wake up and see each other again, but dead people are gone, never to be seen again.
Hattie had arranged her inheritance long ago. When Jiang Wen visited her before her passing, she had entrusted her last wishes. She wanted her property to be donated, and if the day came when she was ahead of Coco, a person should be arranged to take good care of her. She would provide the money for it.
Jiang Wen said that if that day really came, she would take care of Coco and wouldn’t accept Hattie’s money.
Hattie felt at ease, and she lived a more relaxed life after that.
On Christmas Day, Jiang Wen didn’t have the time to mourn. She forced herself to organize the funeral, placing Hattie and Micah together, with a cyclamen flower blooming between them.
Just two days earlier, Hattie had come here to clean Micah’s tombstone. Now, the two tombstones were side by side, both new, looking as if they were erected on the same day.
“Light a candle and burn joss paper in front of the gravestone, praying for peace and tranquility in this world and the next…”
…
At first, I was just a stray dog, but later I was adopted by my current parents. They named me “Coco,” which happened to be the day they adopted me, the seventh day of July.
My dad’s name was Micah, and my mom’s name was Hattie. Even a dog like me knew that my dad loved my mom the most.
When I was eleven, my dad went out and never returned. I spent the last two years with my mom.
I still remember that it was Christmas Eve. Don’t ask me how I knew it was Christmas Eve, because those days my mom frequently mentioned it to me, saying that once we got through Christmas Eve, we had made it through another year.
In truth, I knew that life for my mom was very hard after my dad passed away. If it weren’t for me, she probably would have gone to join my dad long ago.
With my dad gone, my mom was all alone. She turned on the lights and turned them off by herself, took me for walks, cooked by herself, read books by herself, slept by herself, soaked her feet by herself, watched TV by herself, celebrated the holidays by herself, and pasted the Spring Festival couplets by herself…
My mom would often subconsciously prepare two bowls and two pairs of chopsticks. She thought my dad was still there, and he would feed me and flush the toilet for me. Each time this happened, she would stand still for a long time, like a wooden statue. I knew that at these times, she was immersed in longing for my dad.
When my dad was at home, he often bought flowers. After he was gone, my mom was the one who bought them. They were always pink roses, placed in the dining room. She would change the flowers only after they had wilted.
I was just a dog, so I couldn’t hold my mom in my arms or comfort her like a person could. I could only quietly stay by her side and watch her cry.
My mom would often pat my head and say, “Coco, what will you do if I’m gone?”
Gone? Where would she go? Would she go outside to buy groceries? Or take a walk? Or, like my dad, leave and never come back?
I didn’t want my mom to leave. If she left, I might become a stray dog again.
The orange tree in the living room had lots of fruits, and the smell was sour. My mom picked one, peeled it, and wanted to give it to me, but I didn’t want to eat it because it was too sour. I didn’t want my mom to eat it either, but she didn’t understand dog language. You see, tears flowed from her eyes because of the sourness.
My mom didn’t like sour things. Despite the tree full of oranges, she only ate them late at night. I knew that was when she missed my dad the most. She used the sourness to cover up her tears of longing for my dad.
On the night of Christmas Eve, my mom cooked dumplings, her favorite being corn and pork dumplings, while she liked shrimp dumplings. My dad would always make a lot of shrimp dumplings, but this year my mom made corn and pork dumplings and made a few dumplings with dog food for me.
After eating the dumplings, my mom turned on the TV. The host on the TV said, “Wishing everyone a Merry Christmas.”
I saw my mom sleeping on the sofa outside. She asked me to fetch a sparkler and a lighter for her.
She recognized the lighter, but was the candy a box of sparklers she bought today? I bit one off from the box and handed it to her, watching as she ignited it with the lighter.
So these bright twinkling flowers came from sparklers. I watched my mom holding the sparkler and chanting my dad’s name over and over again.
“Micah… Micah… Micah… You’ve finally come to take me away…”
I knew that on Christmas Eve my mom was thinking of my dad, with the lights outside and the lively neighborhood, while our house was dark with all the lights on it could not dispel the loneliness.
That night, the last thing my mom said to me was, “Coco, I’m so tired, I can’t be with you anymore.”
Tired? Then go to sleep. I watched my mom look up at the sky, a smile on her lips. Eventually, she slowly closed her eyes, and the sparkler fell to the ground from her hand.
I sat by the edge of the sofa, watching my mom sleep. I knew that she had left, just like my dad, and she wasn’t coming back. I was once again a dog without a mom or dad.
I went over and nuzzled my mom’s hand, the same hand that usually petted me, now cold and lifeless, unable to move anymore.
My mom always told me that when she was gone, what would I do. I thought about it too. If I and my dad were gone, what would my mom do? I couldn’t bear to leave my mom alone, but sadly, I was just a dog, and my mom couldn’t understand what I had to say.
My eyes were wet, and I didn’t understand. I was just a dog, so why was I crying?
…
Jiang Wen brought Coco back home, and the child loved the dog, always sticking by it and calling it “Coco” over and over again. Since Hattie left, Coco became unusually quiet and seemed melancholic, losing its appetite. The bond between a pet and its owner was strong, and the owner’s death had a great impact on the pet.
Jiang Wen was at a loss for what to do, wondering if she should spend money to find a pet psychologist for Coco.
One day, while no one was paying attention, Coco ran away.
By the time Jiang Wen noticed, the dog was nowhere to be seen. She quickly went outside to look for Coco, calling out its name as she searched.
Coco was lost, and Jiang Wen blamed herself, determined to find it. The entire family drove around and looked at surveillance footage, seeing Coco running toward the house where it had spent time with Micah and Hattie.
Thirty kilometers later, a dog had run for four days and three nights, panting, exhausted, scavenging through trash cans when hungry and drinking water from the roadside when thirsty, then gathering the strength to continue running.
Coco was an old dog, already fifteen years old, and its physical strength and sense of smell were not what they used to be. It took many detours and encountered a pack of wild dogs attacking it, causing many wounds. Once cleaned by Hattie and Micah, the golden retriever was now like a mop that had been rolled in mud; its original color was no longer visible. Limping, gasping for breath, blood dripping from its mouth, dragging itsdirty tail, it looked like a pitiful stray dog, taking each arduous step one at a time… It knew that soon it would be able to see its mom and dad.
After checking the surveillance footage and went to Hattie’s home, but did not see the dog. They then scoured the roadsides, gardens, and nearby parks, asked the security guards, and checked the recent surveillance footage. Coco did not return here at all.
Where could it have gone? Jiang Wen worried incessantly that on New Year’s there were many dog traffickers and she feared that Coco might have encountered something unfortunate.
Just when she was feeling restless, her son grabbed her hand and asked, “Is Coco looking for Grandma?”
Looking for Grandma? But Hattie had already passed away… Suddenly, Jiang Wen thought of something and drove to the cemetery.
From a distance, she saw Coco lying in front of Hattie and Micah’s tombstone, holding a pink rose in its mouth, with the sunlight shining perfectly overhead.
Birth is as dazzling as a summer flower, and death is as serene as an autumn leaf.