My story begins on a dark, gloomy Chinese New Year's Eve, late at night.

It is said that on the night I was found, the snow was flying all over the sky and it was bitterly cold; Lightning is shining, and a storm is about to hit the sky. When a grandmother who went out to eat and drink returned to the orphanage, she saw a wooden basin containing a baby who was purple from the cold, and she was crying, as if she was not to be outdone and sued God for injustice; There are crumpled strips of silk and satin cloth on the small clothes, and the blood characters are written on them: "Lunar calendar, July 14, zero o'clock, mother Na's, name Nalan, lotus seed heart bitter, away from the child's abdomen sour." Cry goodbye to my daughter. (The corner of the name is torn, and the full name is not named)

It's a bit weird that I, who was born on Halloween, met with such a ghost weather. When she opened the swaddling clothes tremblingly, she found that the little baby was such a shocking beauty embryo, and the beauty mole on the eyebrows was very special, and she smiled at her like a flower, and she was so frightened that she sat on the doorrail.

The rough mother believed in the king of Hades, in this stormy and thunderous turn, the eerie Halloween, hearing the "ghost baby" crying and smiling treacherously, afraid that abandoning me would be thundered by the sky, and finally carried me back to the courtyard.

It is said that the hurricane snow did not freeze me to death, according to the orphan ranking named cat ninety-nine, the cat has nine lives, and ranked the ninth child in the orphanage, it is really like the will of God, in the orphanage life for 16 years, nine lives are just enough to pay, it is really a cat life hard than a piece of.

The orphanage I grew up in is called the Orphanage of the Sons of God, but it is not an orphanage run by a serious foreigner. Organize three or four old women who don't know what Christ is, dress up, that is, "façade" dressed up like a goddess, adopt orphans in various places, "care" for their daily life, and rightfully accept the "incense money" in the world like Chinese nuns, and fill their pockets.

The orphanage was located in the forested valley of the mountain village, where there was a forest, dark and dreary, almost like a forest. It's about a hundred miles away from the town. Although the orphanage is tall at the top and outside the courtyard wall with a protective net, there is a large forest behind it, the large forest can reach the sky, the magnificent mountain peaks, the verdant trees and valleys around it in spring, the clear and transparent stream full of black stones and flashing whirlpools, and in winter there can only be a frost and snow covered scenery under the gray and white sky. The cold, damp mist was driven away by the east wind, drifting over the purple peaks, blowing through the groves, and condensing with the vapour on the stream. At that time, the stream was still muddy, and it flowed so fast that it seemed to rush into a grove and shiver in the air. The trembling was mixed with the sound of rain and hail, or the sound of the wind roaring in the woods, and the wind hurt so much that it seemed to tear off a layer of skin.

The unique feature of this location is that as long as the gate of the orphanage is tightly sealed, no one will want to fly with wings, and if you choose to escape from the backyard forest, it is a way to survive, because the lush forest is so vast that no one can get out alive from there, also known as 'Savage Mountain'.

The orphanage has taken in more than 30 children, all of whom are wild children who have no roots and no roots, and no one can remember the disappearance of human life by chance. The orphanage was already managed by a few rough villagers.

A terrible plague invades the orphanage, and most of the children in the orphanage are sick. Children who have become sick can only hide in bed and wait for their lives to end. People who no longer showed signs of life were carried to the forest by children who were not sick and buried in secret, and death was a regular visitor, and the whole compound was filled with the rancid smell of death.

When the orphanage was ransacked by typhoid fever, it was gone, and only nine orphans were left in the orphanage to avoid the catastrophe.

In order to please an auspicious situation, our name was renamed, and of course this also gave full play to the paranoid desire of the grandmothers for food: rat one, two dogs, pig head three, oil four chickens, five donkeys, pony six, turtle and phoenix seven, horse eight, cat ninety-nine.

Therefore, for us, we can't talk about literacy, let alone filial piety, etiquette and righteousness, under the discipline of a group of rough village women, as long as our life itself does not disappear, for them, we are like monkeys in the vegetable field who are wrapped around their necks with iron ropes for the audience to laugh and scold, and the monkeys can make them win the applause and silver taels of the audience.

There is a world of difference between lavish churches and orphans in tattered patches. Whenever it was time to eat, I would go to a room with a very low ceiling, and the room was lit by candles because the lighting equipment was broken, which made the room darker. There are only two large basins of steaming stuff on the table. But the smell they give off is so disappointing that it wafts into your nose if you have to eat them, and the food is simply inedible and disgusting.

The poisonous rice is mixed with rotten red vetch and boiled, and even when we are hungry, we try to swallow it, because in order to survive, this food supply is often insufficient. If the mountains are covered with heavy snow from January to March, the outdoors is covered with snow, and the long road to the town is blocked, so food is often cut off.

The children who survive here are at the age of growing up and have good appetites, but the food provided to us is pitiful. Even if we are physically weak, these foods are not enough, so it is easy to form a threat. I guess it was the dean's grandmother who did it on purpose:

Younger children are bullied by older children because of food. The older childish, who is hungry, will do everything they can to coerce or induce, and the older child will snatch food from the younger childish, and the little child can only drink the northwest wind with tears in his eyes.

However, it is a raw instinct.

The physical torture is endless, but the mental torture should not be underestimated, it is much more serious than the physical torture: poverty, fighting, poverty, chaos are the labels of our life, repeatedly frustrating your instinct for life hope, and in the end, hope will be exhausted with time, and become a bubble of quicksand together.

But an orphan like me, not being treated but dominant, and the mothers hate me like a shadow, and I often wonder if my existence makes them have a tragedy, or can they hate me so tragically?

Fate, this dog thing, always loves to make faces at me.

During my infancy, I probably felt hostility from the outside world, and when I heard that I cried less, when I first learned to walk, I only showed a surprised expression when I fell, and soon got up again. He rarely gets sick, combs his braids and tangles into a pile, and loves to run around barefoot.

Before I was six years old, I only knew rice soup, not rice, and listened to the grandmothers in the courtyard talk about my worst achievement was to grab an unknown object on the ground (in the yard) and eat wildly, it is estimated that I was hungry, and the result was vomiting and diarrhea for three days, half dead and hanging half a life. Since then, as long as I see chickens, I will smell the smell of chicken, and my mouth will be full of physiological reactions with convulsions in my throat, and I will spit out water.

I was often carried to a very high stool, which was just as high as the dean's nose, and I only knew that I was far away from her, and I only said that she had a gloomy expression and restrained her disgust for me. The eyes of the children in the orphanage were so hot that my skin was burning.

The dean's grandmother said in a weird manner: "She is not one of us, she is a bad child, everyone needs to be wary of her from time to time, let alone like her." Don't be friends with her, don't play with, or even talk to. Everyone, everyone should pay attention and also take action, we have to save her. ”

Before the dean's end, Mama would always say, "Let Mao Jiujiu continue to stand on the stool for an hour and cancel today's dinner, and no one is allowed to talk to her today." ”

When I was young, I could only stand obediently on a high place, and I could only stand on a high platform for public display, and the children under the high platform would throw stones at me from time to time, and most of them could be accurately projected onto me, accompanied by loud shouts: "Dead child! ”

I stared blankly at the spittle, the garbage, the rocks flying at me, and at the fist in the air, it was like an angry and blind flag.

Before the age of eight, others had three meals a day, but I was a bowl of rice every Monday, Wednesday, 51, 1461 bowls of clear soup noodles, and the so-called intestinal cleansing (no food) on Sundays could basically ensure the state of survival. When any food enters my throat, which I think is the most wonderful food, I always eat it too quickly to taste it, rub the oil from my mouth on my hands, and then lick the oil from my hands into my mouth. Perhaps, at this time, at that time, food was a crude physiological need for me.

I began to learn to run for my life, and the forest behind the orphanage was my favorite place, and of course my place of refuge. Whether it is windy or snowy or sunny or rainy, I love to enjoy the fun of nature to the fullest, wandering in the forest all day long, wandering between heaven and earth from morning to night, unrestrained, and always alone, waiting for the moon to rise high in the sky before I return to the courtyard. But the lush forest, with its endless black shadows, is more like a terrible trap for other children.

Whenever the children in the orphanage started beating me up in groups, I learned to run as hard as I could in the woods behind the orphanage, even in the morning fog, which made it impossible for me to see the direction, I stumbled, but then I got up again, and although I was out of breath, I had to keep running, and I noticed another stone flying towards me, and they were about to catch me quickly, although the mysterious woods had all kinds of legends.

"Where is Cat Nine!" A little fat man named Pig's Head Three shouted, and the others raised their hands to throw stones. Actually, I was hanging my coat on a tree, and by the time they found out it was my coat, I was nowhere to be found.

Dodging the stones flying from the children, I know everything about the woods and never get lost, while other children will be led directly by me to get lost.

The dean's mother said: "Cat Jiujiu never walks well, always runs. She often fell, but she never cried, got up and continued. ”

I was not afraid of heaven and earth, and I began to look like a wild pony, more like a wild child in the bushes.

But the dean's grandmother and the coarse old ladies never liked me, and the dean's mama hated me even more, and her emaciated and shriveled face was always expressionless, with a pair of dull eyes, and a very beautiful cross necklace hanging from her neck, which was shining with silver. It's just that this kind of glamorous beauty makes the dean's grandmother's neck look more skinny and skinny, and her face is even more gray.

Her bullying and abusive behavior towards me was not two or three times a week, nor once or twice a day, but often. So much so that now every nerve in my body is afraid of her, and whenever she approaches, the muscles on every bone of mine will automatically curl up. Sometimes, I'm scared and act like I'm scared, or I'm a place to hide, and I don't know what to do. Because in the face of her bullying, I couldn't find anyone on my side, because the vulgar old ladies didn't dare to offend the superintendent at all, and the children in the orphanage were even more cowardly, and their pitiful appearance could be regarded as a comfort.

After I was ten years old, I began to try to break through the iron gate of the courtyard wall in the way of wild children, and the fists of the grandmothers and the fangs of the wolf dogs in the courtyard would be merciless in the "one-day souvenir" left behind by me every time I tried to break through: I had three broken left feet; left a deep mace on the thigh of the right foot of the wolfdog; Due to the failure to climb the wall, his head fell to the ground, the scoop was opened, and unfortunately he had ten stitches.

Once I snuck into my room, where I hid, there was a bookcase, and I quickly took down from it a book with many illustrations, which had been left by foreigners, and I had all kinds of books, and I climbed up to the windowsill, put my feet away, and sat cross-legged. I pulled the crimson corrugated curtains tightly together to hide myself even tighter.

On my left, the heavy folds of the scarlet curtain obscured my view, and on the right, the bright glass window protected me. In such a snowy winter, I can be protected from the cold wind and isolated from the world. While I was looking at the illustrations with relish, I was able to enjoy the brief silence again.

I saw a scene through the window: the child of the orphanage called Rat One was wandering around the kitchen, sneaking into the kitchen without anyone noticing, stealing the dough that had been placed on the kitchen windowsill and stealing it, quickly reaching out to pick it up, shrinking down and running down the window edge.

What does it matter to me? Hunger is a devil.

I focused my eyes on the page again, this is a book "Journey to the West", which tells the story of the red boy fighting the Monkey King, the red boy is the king of the mountain, free and easy, I am very envious in my heart. In my mind, there are always some erratic thoughts, like children's peculiar perceptions that seem to be understood and not understood, although they are short, but they are vivid and interesting. Due to my limited knowledge, I can't understand and appreciate them very well.

I put the book on my lap and was in a good mood, at least at ease. At this time, what I was most worried about came more and more, and it came so quickly. The door to the room was pushed open.

"Cat Ninety-Nine ——!" A person named Tian was screaming and searching, but suddenly the shouting disappeared because she did not find anyone in the house.

"It must have been this bad boy who stole the rice balls to eat," she then shouted, "Ah Xiang!" Tell the dean that the cat is not here, go and tell the attic to look for it, I will skin her! ”

"It's good that I closed the curtains." I thought, as long as I don't want them to find out, I didn't steal it.

It was almost time for dinner, and I stepped out from behind the curtains.

"Where were you just now?" I happened to meet Ah Xiang.

"Behind the curtains, read a book."

"We called you just now, and you didn't answer, did you shrink your head and hide behind the curtains to steal food? It was you who stole the glutinous rice balls! You're a mouse! ”

Ah Xiang is a relatively plump and robust woman in her forties, with broad shoulders, strong limbs, a large and prominent chin, and a normal mouth, but her eyebrows are so light and short that her eyes appear prominent, and even more prominent is the lack of sympathy and the rough expression on her face, all of which I am used to.

She scolded me with her mouth, and I knew she wanted to hit me, so I was worried about being beaten while looking at the ugly face in front of me that intended to be violent. I don't know if she could see my psychological disgust and curse for her, but she slapped me in the face in an instant. I stumbled and took a few steps backwards to gain a foothold.

I was angry, and I yelled, "I didn't steal it!" ”

Ah Xiang slapped me louder, and I fell to the ground again, my head hitting the door, bleeding and painful. The panic in me had reached its limit and was replaced by another emotion.

"You're an ugly, old woman!" I yelled at her.

"What, what!" Ah Xiang yelled.