Cheng Huizi tells a heartfelt story of the love between mother and daughter in a society that often values sons more highly
Afraid of missing the bus, I set an alarm for 6:30, but when I woke up, it was not yet 6. I wiped the sleep from my eyes and lay in the dark, listening to my mother shuffling across the kitchen floor in her slippers. The next things I heard were the sound of water boiling in a pot and my mother whisking eggs with chopsticks. After I got up, she watched me slurp up the eggs poached in brown sugar syrup.
Red and White | Short Story is a story from our issue, “Education Nation.” To read the entire issue, become a subscriber and receive the full magazine.
Born in 1996 in Xi’an, Cheng Huizi is currently a PhD student at Beijing Normal University, specializing in contemporary Chinese literature. She has a master’s degree in modern literature from Peking University. She writes both fiction and non-fiction. Her short stories and essays have been published in a number of literary magazines, such as Shanghai Literature, Youth Literature, and more. Cheng Huizi was awarded the Best Short Story Prize at the 6th Youth Literature Awards in 2020.
Translated By
Dylan Levi King is a writer and translator. His most recent translations are Cai Chongda’s “Vessel” (HarperCollins) and Jia Pingwa’s “The Shaanxi Opera” (AmazonCrossing).
