They don't know.
When I was stepped on the ground, what I remember is not the pain, but the sound of the sole of the shoe running over my phalanges. When the steamed buns were trampled to pieces, what I remembered was not hunger, but the light in my grandma's eyes when she said, "I want to eat something hot."
They call me Horsewhip. In the toilet, in the corridor, in the silence of the teacher lowering his head to correct his homework.
I'm not called Horsewhip. My name is Ma Yu. Rain of rain.
It was my dad who went through half a dictionary and went to an old fortune teller with two pounds of eggs, just to give me this name. He said that water governs wealth and good fortune. You will never step into mud pits or suffer misfortunes in your life.
When he died, he was still holding the new pencil he bought for me.
I endured it for fourteen years. I endured it until the steamed buns were trampled to pieces, I endured it until my grandma's medicine bowl was overturned, and I endured it until New Year's Eve when they blocked the door of my house.
That night I opened the door, holding in my hand a beer bottle that I had been grinding all day.
Later someone asked me if I was afraid.
Afraid. But what is worse than fear is hatred.
Whoever cuts off my way of survival, I will cut off his limbs. Anyone who bullies my relatives will never be able to stand up again.
The young man who climbed up from the mud will eventually step on the bones of his enemy and stand on the top of the city.
If the carp reverses its scales, it will turn into a dragon.
My name is Ma Yu.
