Consequences of Kindness
by Huina Zheng
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Table of Contents parts 1, 2, 3 |
1: The Girlfriend
My boyfriend Ming is an honest person. He was an excellent student who passed the gaokao to get into Sun Yat-sen University from a rural area. However, outside of academics, he’s a bit simple-minded. Today, I was riding in his car, rushing back to Zhuhai, about two hours’ drive from Guangzhou, to take care of my mom. Yesterday afternoon, during a routine checkup at the hospital, she found out she needed surgery. She was admitted to the hospital that very day.
When she told me this over the phone, she felt incredibly guilty. I understood her worry. Even though I bought her rural health insurance, which covers part of the surgery, the out-of-pocket expenses are still considerable. Every time she has to spend my money, it pains her. Ming and I are in the same situation; neither of our parents has social security, so we’re responsible for their care. Neither of us resents the other for this.
At a small intersection, Ming stopped the car for a red light. In the right lane, a person on an electric bike fell and tumbled to the roadside. She wasn’t even wearing a helmet! It was an elderly woman, and she fell just four or five meters away from us. The bystanders glanced at her but quickly went back to minding their own business. No one stepped forward to help. Who would dare help an elderly person who had fallen? Whoever helps could be blamed for pushing her down, with her or her family demanding compensation.
As I was thinking this, Ming said to me, “That elderly woman looks like she can’t get up on her own. If she keeps lying there, I’m afraid something might happen. I should go help her.”
I shot him a glare. “Don’t meddle in other people’s business. Just drive.”
He waved his phone in the air. “It’s fine. I’ll be recording the whole time. If I start filming before I get out of the car, it’ll prove I had nothing to do with her fall.”
“Even so, they could still accuse you of—”
He opened his phone, and said, “I’m at the intersection now. An elderly woman just fell off her electric bike in front of my car. I’m going to help her.”
I sighed, watching him lift the old woman to the roadside. As expected, just as he was about to leave, she grabbed his shirt and shouted, “Young man, you knocked me over and now you’re trying to run away? Where’s your conscience?”
A few bystanders started to gather. I hesitated, unsure whether I should get out of the car to help him, but then I thought, he didn’t listen to me, so why should I? Besides, it was hot and sunny outside, and I really didn’t want to argue with an old lady over who was in the right.
Ming started making a phone call. He probably had no choice but to call the police. The old lady wasn’t backing down either; she was making a call too, probably to her family. I glanced at the time on my phone: 10:50 a.m. How long was this farce going to drag on? I called my mom and told her we might be a few hours late to the hospital.
When she heard the reason, she was silent for a while but couldn’t resist: “Living with a man who’s too simple-minded will make your life miserable. Just like your father—”
“Mom, I understand. This incident will teach Ming a lesson. If he doesn’t learn from it, I’ll break up with him.”
I hung up the phone. I understood my mom’s concern. Years ago, she and my dad fled our hometown with me, still an infant, to avoid the one-child policy, taking a ten-hour bus ride to a village near Shenzhen to seek refuge with my dad’s Aunt Lan.
Aunt Lan’s husband, Chen, had leased an orchard, but a local villager wanted to take it over and tried to drive him out. Chen resisted and wanted to sue the villager. Since he was illiterate, he asked my dad to write the complaint. My mom tried to stop him, fearing trouble, but my dad insisted that relatives should help each other.
As it turned out, the villager had close ties to the local police chief, and they brought officers to confront Chen, who said my dad had written the complaint and given him the idea. As a result, my parents were driven out of the village. My dad’s straightforwardness and eagerness to help had repeatedly brought misfortune upon our family. I made up my mind long ago never to repeat my mom’s or dad’s mistakes.
A burly middle-aged man on an electric bike stopped beside the old woman. He looked furious. He grabbed Ming by the collar. Standing next to this man, Ming looked as frail as a bean sprout.
“You knocked over my mother, and now you want to run away?” the man shouted.
“It wasn’t me. Look, my car is several meters away from her. How could I have hit her?” Ming pointed towards me. “Look, my car doesn’t even have any damage.”
“Stop lying. If you didn’t hit her, why would you be so kind as to help her up?”
“He did knock me down, he did!” the old woman yelled.
Ming’s pale face turned bright red as he kept repeating, “It wasn’t me.”
Serves him right! I thought.
Before long, the traffic police arrived on motorcycles. The old woman started crying, wiping her tears as she said, “I was riding my electric bike just fine, and then this young man hit me with his car, knocking me to the ground. I lay there for so long, in too much pain to get up. And then he, after knocking me over, tried to run away—”
“No, I really didn’t hit her. I have a video to prove it—” Ming’s voice was trembling.
“His video is fake! He hit my mother, then backed up his car and started recording afterwards.” The middle-aged man’s voice drowned out Ming’s.
“Everyone, calm down!” The traffic police officer’s voice rose above the commotion. He asked Ming for his driver’s license, registration, and car insurance. Ming shuffled over toward the car while the officer checked the old woman’s injuries.
When he opened the car door, his face was as sour as if he had just swallowed a cockroach. I swallowed the words I wanted to use to scold him.
In the end, the officer said he would check the surveillance footage to see if Ming had hit the old woman. He registered the incident and told the middle-aged man to take his mother to the hospital for an examination. The officer also said he would impound Ming’s car, and asked him to remove any valuables from it.
After everything was settled, Ming and I had no choice but to take a cab to the bus station and buy tickets to Zhuhai. I held back the urge to reprimand Ming; there was no need for me to teach him a lesson. Once we arrived at the hospital, my mom would naturally give him an earful herself.
Copyright © 2024 by Huina Zheng
