Big Breasts & Wipe Hips: A Novel

since even Comrade Lenin wants me to talk, that’s what I’ll do.” Mrs. Guo sighed. “There was a full moon that night, so bright I could have embroidered in its light. There aren’t many nights like that. When I was a girl, an old-timer told me he recalled a white moon like that way back during the Taiping Rebellion. I couldn’t sleep, worrying that something bad was about to happen, so I got up to go borrow a shoe pattern from the mother of Fusheng in West Lane and, while I was at it, talk to Fusheng about finding a wife, since I had a niece who had reached marrying age. As I was walking out the door, I spotted Little Lion, carrying a big, shiny sword, with Jincai’s mother and wife and his two kids, the older one only seven or eight years old, and the younger one, a girl, barely two. The older kid was walking with his grandmother, scared and crying. Jincai’s wife was carrying the little girl, who was also scared and crying. Jincai himself had a sword cut, a big, gaping, bloody wound on his slumping shoulder that scared me half to death. Three mean-looking fellows I thought I knew were walking behind Little Lion, also with swords, and I tried to hide so they wouldn’t see me, but it was too late, and that bastard Little Lion spotted me. Now Little Lion’s mother and I are some sort of cousins, so he said, ‘Isn’t that my aunt over there?’ ‘Little Lion,’ I. said, ‘when did you get back?’ He said, ‘Last night.’ ‘What are you doing?’ I asked him. ‘Nothing,’ he said. ‘Just looking for a place for this family to sleep.’ That didn’t sound good, so I said, ‘They’re our neighbors, Lion, no matter how bad things get.’ He said, ‘There are no bad feelings, not even between them and my dad. In fact, my dad and his dad are sworn brothers. But he hung my dad up from a tree and demanded money from him.’ Jincai’s mother said, ‘He didn’t know what he was doing, so forgive him for the sake of the older generation. I’ll get down on my knees and kowtow to you.’ ‘Mother,’ Jincai said, ‘don’t beg.’ Little Lion said, ‘Jincai, you’re starting to sound like a man, so no wonder they made you head of the militia.’ ‘You won’t last more than a few days,’ Jincai said. ‘You’re right,’ Little Lion said, ‘I imagine I’ll last ten days or a couple of weeks. But tonight’s all the time I’ll need to take care of you and your family’ I tried to take advantage of my age by saying, ‘Let them go, Little Lion. If you don’t you’re no nephew of mine.’ He just glared at me and said, ‘Who the hell is your nephew? Don’t pull any of that relation stuff on me! The time I accidentally squashed one of your little chicks that year, you split my head open with a club.’ ‘Lion, what kind of human being are you?’ He turned and asked the men with him, ‘Boys, how many have we killed today?’ One of them said, ‘Counting this family, exactly ninety-nine.’ ‘You old woman, you’re such a distant aunt that you’ll have to sacrifice yourself so I can make it an even number.’ That made my hair stand on edge. That bastard was talking about killing me! I ran into the house, but could I really get away from them? Family meant nothing to Little Lion. When he thought his wife was having an affair, he buried a live grenade in the stove ashes, but his mother got up early to clean out the stove and she was the one who dug out the grenade. I'd forgotten that incident, and now I was going to suffer, all because of my big mouth. They dragged Jincai and his family, plus me, over to Sandy Ridge Village, where one of them starting digging a big pit. It didn’t take him long in that sandy ground. The moon was so bright we could see everything on the ground — blades of grass, flowers, ants, slugs — clear as day. Little Lion walked up to the edge of the pit to take a look. ‘Make it a little deeper, men,’ he said. ‘Jincai’s as big as a fucking mule.’ So the man continued, and wet sand flew. Little Lion asked Jincai, ‘Got anything to say?’ ‘Lion,’ Jincai said, ‘I’m not going to beg. I killed your dad, but if I hadn’t done it, somebody else would have.’ ‘My dad was a frugal man who sold seafood along with your dad. He saved up a little money and bought a few acres of land. Unfortunately for your dad, somebody stole his money. You tell me, what was my dad’s crime?’ ‘He bought land, that was his crime!’ ‘Jincai, tell me the