Bedtime Stories
2020 Scholastics Art & Writing Awards
National Gold Medal
Illustration by Julia Cheng
Vignettes
- 月 yuè, moon.
- craters
- 天 tiān, sky
- typhoon
- 倒影 dào yǐng, reflection
- Shapeshifter
- 日 rì, sun
- supernova
- 生 shèng, life
- bedtime stories
4 | typhoon
The sky fell the day Father began drinking.
Water was leaking from our ceilings, the stained webbing of cracks above our heads threatening to give way at any moment. Arguments, too, trickled through like dirty rainwater: a back-and-forth of stilted dialects I was never taught; an ebb-and-flow of thinly sealed tension that was rapidly spinning into a raging tempest.
No—the sky fell the day Father first hit Jun.
That day, he crashed through the door, limbs waterlogged with alcohol, and curses shaking the walls like thunder. Ma was already screaming back, her eyes trembling like storm clouds about to burst.
You should have told us they let you go.
In a flash, Jun was by Ma’s side, a tiny soldier wading through crossfire, pushing Father away with his bony arms.
In a crack of lightning, Jun’s head was twisted at a strange, harsh angle, wide eyes pooling as one cheek flushed a dark, angry red. Father’s hand was still outstretched, pupils trembling, and I felt the world lurch.
My god.
What have you done?
Mother was already pushing us out but my feet refused to move, dragging across the floorboards like sandbags. Lost, I looked back, and caught my father’s face in the doorway. His expression was crumpling like a star that had collapsed in on itself, countless emotions stitching themselves together across his pockmarked features. Fury. Desperation. Guilt. Gong Gong, I remember thinking, made of equal parts monster and human.