One evening he wandered on to Wangfujing Road
and was almost killed.

When Weng caught up with him, people shouted:

“Get the old man home!”

The next afternoon, the woman who supplied the Fun family
with vegetables advised Weng to tie a piece of rope
to his father’s legs so he could go only so far.

Weng thought about it all that afternoon

while bagging pea sprouts

then went home and kicked the leg of the kitchen table

with his worn-out shoe and the leg snapped.

Soup bowls went crashing.

Mr. Fun got up quickly from the old spring bed.

Was it burglars? he thought.

“It’s okay, Father,” Weng said. “I’m not hurt.”

The bowls Mrs. Fun had filled with soup for so many years
lay in pieces.

But Mr. Fun remembered her voice on the cassette,
heard her speak to him.

“If your mother could see us, Weng,” he said,
“what do you think she would say?”

Weng swept the floor with his eyes.

“She would say,” his father went on,
“‘Even though all my bowls are broken,

you can still have another helping.’”