The Twin Boys ( Part 1 of 2)
Author : Philip Chan
A Fanstory.com contest entry Winner : Third Place
"Wake up, Ah Ming. You've been sleeping after dinner." Ah Kong patted on Ah Ming's shoulder.
"Brother, let me sleep for one more hour, please."
"No. It's midnight. Tonight's job is a lot of money." Said Ah Kong.
"Really?"
"You didn't pay attention when I told you about this job in the afternoon," said Ah Kong, "the Chow family is in financial trouble. Rumors had it they are going to dig up their family treasures which are antiques."
"That isn't what I heard."
"What have you heard?" Ah Kong asked.
Ah Ming sat up and said, "They are going to pick up the bones from their ancestor's grave and rearrange them in a sitting position. Put them in a big jar and move the jar to another place with better feng shui (fortune)."
"My innocent brother, it is a cover-up story to save face. Let's get ready and go." Ah Kong replied.
"Well, you are the smarter twin. You're always right."
*****
It was a cloudy and windy night. The clouds covered the moon. The place was pitch dark. They found their grave-tomb.
"Ah Ming, why are you so timid? We've been in this business for almost two months. We're getting better, more careful and more skillful in our jobs."
"You're the braver twin. What can I say?"
They finally finished digging up the dirt and saw the coffin. The wood of the coffin was mahogany. It was an expensive coffin and still in a good condition. The brothers struggled hard to remove all the nails.
When they were about to open the coffin, all of a sudden, three crows flew over and sat on the coffin making noises to scare them. Ah Kong tried to drive them away with his shovel but they screamed back without moving. Ah Ming was scared and suggested to leave.
"I know the crows come for the corpse. But we had done all this work... and now... leave." Ah Kong continued to scare the crows away. But they ignored him. One of them flew around Ah Ming. Ah Ming started to run but Ah Kong stopped him and held tight onto his hand. Finally the crows flew away.
Ah Ming was relieved and Ah Kong put down his shovel.
The wood of the coffin was so heavy that they had a hard time sliding the cover off the coffin. They wouldn't give up and continued to use their youthful might to slide the cover.
As soon as they were able to open the lid by about one foot, rats ran out from the coffin. One after another rushed out. One or two jumped over Ah Ming's body. He stepped backwards and fell onto the ground. More rats ran over his body. He yelled for help. Ah Kong helped him to get up.
They had no idea how many rats came out but enough to scare Ah Ming. He wanted to go home but Ah Kong wanted to continue to open the lid and steal the jewellery and any other valuable items.
When they opened the lid a little bit more, a head jumped out with two red eyes looking at the twin brothers. Ah Ming was frozen. Ah Kong held Ah Ming's hand, pulling him running away.
They ran all the way home and the head followed them. Gradually the head disappeared.
*****
To be continued
Part 2 of 2
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