The Ultimate Value of the Shopping Carts

Old Wang stood at the entrance of the "Good Neighbor" supermarket, staring at the huge red characters "Clearance Sale" pasted on the glass door. He felt like a sodden wad of old cotton stuffed in his chest, heavy and suffocating. This supermarket, which he had run for fifteen years, ultimately couldn't withstand the impact of the flashy, 24-hour new-style chain convenience store across the street. Like a leaking old boat, it was gurgling its way to the bottom.

The clearance sale had been going on for a week, and the shelves were emptying at a visible rate, as if a swarm of locusts had passed through. The neighborhood residents, the uncles and aunties who usually haggled over the price of a single spring onion, were now like sharks smelling blood, pushing and shoving, scrambling for the heavily discounted daily necessities and near-expiry food items. Old Wang looked at the expressions on their faces, a mixture of greed and excitement, and felt a sense of strangeness. He knew most of these people; he had even watched some of their children grow up. But now, the end of the supermarket seemed to them merely a frenzy of grabbing bargains. Human kindness, it seemed, was also being sold off at a discount.

However, what bothered Old Wang more than the empty shelves and the cheapened human sentiment were the missing shopping carts.

The supermarket wasn't large; even in its heyday, it only had about a hundred shopping carts. Over the years, through repairs, replacements, and phasing out, there were still seventy or eighty usable ones left before the clearance count. But in the past few days, the carts seemed to have grown legs, disappearing one after another into the vast sea of people. At first, Old Wang thought customers had casually pushed them away and forgotten to return them. After all, in this day and age, even shared bikes could be hoarded privately, let alone a sturdy-looking, durable shopping cart? But the number was truly astonishing. In just a few days, the young man responsible for watching the carts reported with a long face that at least fifty were gone!

"Manager Wang, this... we have to call the police!" the young man stomped his foot anxiously. "Even selling them as scrap metal would be worth quite a bit!"

Old Wang waved his hand, feeling even more frustrated. Call the police? What could the police do even if they came? The supermarket was about to close; who had the energy to track down these pieces of scrap metal? Besides, it wouldn't look good if word got out. Not only did the "Good Neighbor" supermarket go bankrupt due to poor management, but even its shopping carts were stolen. This would be the last straw, the ultimate mockery of his fifteen years of hard work.

He started paying attention. Sure enough, every evening, as the last batch of bargain hunters left satisfied, a few shopping carts would be missing from outside the supermarket. They vanished silently, as if quietly swallowed by the night. Old Wang even suspected a professional gang was at work, taking advantage of the chaos to steal the carts, dismantle them for parts, or sell them as scrap. He assigned more staff to watch them, but to little effect. The carts continued to dwindle, as if under some kind of invisibility spell.

This evening, another chaotic day was coming to an end. Old Wang leaned wearily against the checkout counter, watching the setting sun dye the empty space in front of the supermarket a desolate golden yellow. He noticed a familiar figure – Auntie Liu.

Auntie Liu lived in one of the old residential buildings nearby. In her seventies, childless, she survived by collecting scrap and living on a meager pension. She always wore a faded old smock, washed pale, her back hunched, silently rummaging through the trash cans near the supermarket. When the supermarket was doing well, Old Wang felt sorry for her and would allow her to come in and collect cardboard boxes, sometimes even giving her some bread nearing its expiration date.

At this moment, Auntie Liu was standing in a corner not far from the supermarket entrance, her gaze somewhat unfocused as she looked towards the few remaining shopping carts by the door. In her hand, she dragged a tattered woven bag, seemingly full of flattened plastic bottles.

A thought flashed through Old Wang's mind. Could it be her? An old lady collecting garbage, what would she do with so many shopping carts? Sell them as scrap? Unlikely, her frail body couldn't drag even one away at a time.

Old Wang calmly walked over.

"Auntie Liu, good haul today," Old Wang tried to keep his voice gentle.

Auntie Liu jumped, startled. A flicker of panic crossed her cloudy eyes before she quickly lowered her head, stammering, "Manager... Manager Wang, I... I didn't take anything of yours."

"I know, I just came over to chat," Old Wang sighed. "The supermarket... it's closing soon. Might not see you around anymore."

Auntie Liu was silent for a moment, then looked up, the dim evening sun illuminating her wrinkled face. "Yes, it's closing... it's a real shame." Her voice was low, tinged with an indescribable sense of loss. "From now on... buying things will mean walking much farther."

Old Wang felt a slight pang in his heart. Yes, for the elderly with mobility issues, "Good Neighbor" wasn't just a supermarket; it was an important anchor within their daily living radius.

"Auntie Liu," Old Wang paused, unable to resist asking, "Have you... have you seen anyone pushing our shopping carts away? We've lost quite a few recently."

Auntie Liu's body visibly stiffened. Her eyes darted away, and her hands unconsciously wrung the straps of her woven bag. "No... haven't seen..." Her voice became even lower, almost inaudible.

Looking at her, Old Wang was already seventy or eighty percent sure. But he didn't expose her, just felt even more desolate. An old woman struggling to make ends meet, would she also stoop to such petty gains? This world truly pushed people to desperation.

Just then, the sound of rolling wheels came from a distance. Old Wang looked towards the sound and saw a white-haired old man, pushing a "Good Neighbor" shopping cart, walking unsteadily out of another old building. Inside the cart sat a heavy gas canister. The old man's steps were slow, each one appearing strenuous, but the shopping cart was clearly a big help to him.

Old Wang's gaze returned to Auntie Liu. She had also seen the old man. The panic on her face gradually faded, replaced by a complex expression – shame, unease, but mostly an almost stubborn calm.

"Manager Wang," Auntie Liu finally spoke, her voice soft but exceptionally clear, "Those carts... I told the neighbors to push them away."

Old Wang was stunned.

"These few buildings, they're all full of old folks, trouble getting around," Auntie Liu gestured towards the cluster of dim, old residential buildings behind her. "There used to be a community service station, we could borrow handcarts to carry things, buy groceries. Later, the station closed, and the carts were gone too. Just going upstairs, buying some rice or a jug of oil, it's exhausting."

She paused, seeming to gather courage: "I saw your supermarket was closing, these carts... keeping them would just mean selling them as scrap. So... so I told Old Li, Old Zhang, and the others to quietly push a few back home at night to use. Since... since you wouldn't need them anymore."

Old Wang stared blankly at Auntie Liu, at her weather-beaten yet remarkably frank face. That damp wad of cotton in his chest felt as if it had been ignited, turning into a scorching warm current that flooded his entire body. He thought of the missing shopping carts, over fifty of them... So they hadn't been turned into scrap metal, nor greedily hoarded. Instead, they had become temporary pairs of legs, supporting the daily lives of the elderly people faltering in the forgotten corners of the city.

What professional gang, what invisibility spell, what coldness of the world... Old Wang suddenly felt how ridiculous his suspicions and despair had been.

The "Good Neighbor" supermarket, in his eyes as the owner, was a failed investment, a disappearing commercial symbol. But in the eyes of Auntie Liu and her old neighbors, it had, in an unexpected way, fulfilled the true meaning of its name "Good Neighbor" in its final moments. These shopping carts, destined for the scrap heap, had found their final, and most valuable, destination.

The sun had completely set, and night gently descended. Old Wang looked at the last three shopping carts remaining by the supermarket entrance, then looked back at Auntie Liu.

"Auntie Liu," Old Wang's voice was a bit hoarse. He walked forward and patted one of the carts. "These few, they look like they're in the way too. Why don't you... find someone to push them away as well? Leaving them here will just be a hassle when the scrap collector comes tomorrow."

Auntie Liu looked up in surprise, her cloudy eyes shining with an incredulous light.

Old Wang turned around, not looking at her anymore, and slowly walked back into the supermarket that was about to go completely dark. Behind him, he heard a few suppressed "thank yous," choked with emotion, and the faint yet distinct sound of wheels rolling across the concrete ground.

At that moment, Old Wang felt that his fifteen years of hard work hadn't been entirely in vain. At least, in a way he had never imagined, they had possessed a final value.