Witnessing the Strange and Bizarre Events at the Funeral Home (1)

Before Big Mouth started working at the funeral home, my understanding of ghosts came entirely from hearsay. I had never encountered one myself, and asking me to admit their real existence was absolutely impossible. But this view was completely overturned after my friend Big Mouth started working at the funeral home and we personally experienced some mysterious and bizarre events together. I began to believe that in this world, there really are some inexplicable beings that appear at certain special moments and in certain special circumstances, leaving people both baffled and horrified. My friend Big Mouth graduated from vocational school and, by a stroke of luck, was among the last batch of graduates to still receive a job assignment. I remember the year Big Mouth graduated, he was full of ambition, waiting at home for his assignment, living an easygoing life, chatting and joking with us every day, boasting that he had connections at the top, who could smooth things over to get him into the police department any day now. While gesturing enthusiastically and patting our shoulders, he said, ‘If any of you ever have trouble, your brother can help out, right?' This made us feel very touched, even though we were law-abiding citizens all the time. After waiting several months, the outcome of the connections was: Big Mouth didn't get into the police department but got into the Civil Affairs Bureau. Fine, that wouldn't have been so bad, but instead, he ended up assigned to a subordinate unit of the Civil Affairs Bureau—the funeral home. Big Mouth was extremely frustrated about this, saying, ‘Damn it, I tried to use connections and here I am, sent to a funeral home instead. Might as well not have used the connections at all. The contrast between this funeral home and the police department is just too much.' I thought he had a point, but as his friend, I had to comfort him and say some nonsense: ‘On the surface, there might be a gap between the funeral home and the police department, but in reality, it's not that different. The most similar thing is that both have to deal with the dead. The difference is, they hope for as few dead as possible, while you guys hope there are plenty. Of course, that wish is a little immoral, but don't say it out loud; no one will curse you for it.' Fortunately, Big Mouth was naturally optimistic and had a great trait of adapting to circumstances. After being frustrated for a while, he came to terms with it and would casually list the various benefits of working at the funeral home: for example, leisure time, small tokens from the families of the deceased, the funeral home being located in a remote yet beautiful area conducive to self-cultivation, and so on.Speaking happily, he patted our shoulders again and said, "In the future, if you guys have anything, your brother can still, you know, um..." Before he finished speaking, we all rushed to beat him up; in monkey's words, it would be: "We'll collect your corpse first and then talk!" The small town we lived in was located at the border of Hunan and Jiangxi, a small basin surrounded by mountains. The town was tiny, with a small population—around twenty thousand, including locals and businesspeople from out of town. Due to the low population, the funeral home's business was relatively light. From top to bottom, the funeral home had only five people, sitting in a row: the director, the deputy director, Big Mouth, and two temporary workers hired externally. Big Mouth's main job at the funeral home was driving, along with some miscellaneous tasks like setting up the mourning halls. Because business was sparse, the funeral home had no cremation equipment. Whenever we received a body, Big Mouth had to drive the deceased more than 80 kilometers away to J City for cremation, and then bring the ashes back for burial. Sometimes if the deceased was a non-local who died far from home, at the family's request, we would transport them back to their hometown so the dead could return to their roots. Normally, bodies were taken for cremation during the day, with family members accompanying them. But in special cases, Big Mouth had to drive long distances alone. Although Brave as he was, even Big Mouth would get nervous sometimes. Whenever one of our friends had time, Big Mouth would take them along, covering all expenses for food and drinks, plus giving cigarettes and Red Envelopes as extras. What we had to do was just sit in the passenger seat, joking and chatting with him on the way out and back. Therefore, we were all more than happy to accompany him, treating it as a free road trip. Sometimes, when Big Mouth hadn't had to drive in a while, we would call and ask: Big Mouth, when will you have an out-of-town job? The first unbelievable thing I experienced happened on the way back from delivering a body. That day, around five in the afternoon, Big Mouth called me to say he had a job going to Y County (we didn't say carrying a body; we called it running a job) and asked if I had time to accompany him. Without a second thought, I agreed. Y County wasn't far from our town, about seventy kilometers, but the road condition was poor, with nearly two-thirds of it being bumpy mountain roads, so the car couldn't go fast. Under good weather conditions, a round trip would take about two and a half hours.The funeral home's corpse transport vehicle was an 11-seat Jinbei van that had been modified, divided into front and rear sections. The front still had two rows of seats, while the rear had the seats removed to place the bodies, separated from the front by a sheet of iron. Sometimes, when there were many bereaved family members, the front couldn't hold them all, so two long benches were added in the rear, one on each side, only for the family members to sit. We never crawled back there, after all, it was where the dead lay. It was December at the time, with fine drizzle falling from the sky. The mountainous area got dark early, and the mountain roads were difficult to drive on. Big Mouth drove very slowly. By the time the body was delivered, it was already past eight in the evening. We had dinner in Y County and then headed home.

As the car entered the mountain road, it jostled terribly. Big Mouth, eager to get home, drove relatively fast. I had eaten a bit too much at dinner and felt uncomfortable from the bumps. I said, ‘Slow down, man, it's really jostling me around.'

Big Mouth glanced at me and asked, ‘You're not getting car sick, are you?'

I said, ‘No, I just ate too much for dinner, and if it keeps jolting like this, it'll come back up.'

Big Mouth tossed me a cigarette and said, ‘It's okay, here, smoke one to settle your stomach.'

After saying this, he also lit a cigarette, squinting his eyes he said, ‘You know, Master Wang told me, this road to Y County isn't very clean.'

I cursed, ‘Damn it, out here in the middle of nowhere, don't drag Master Wang into this to scare me.'

Master Wang was one of the funeral home's outside workers, dedicated to grave maintenance. He had worked at the funeral home for nearly ten years. According to him, he had experienced quite a few strange things and firmly believed in ghosts and spirits. He also knew a lot about some local taboos. When I had free time to visit the funeral home to chat with Big Mouth, I would grab Master Wang whenever he was free and make him tell ghost stories for me.