chapter 5
“Hello, the number you’ve dialed is temporarily unavailable…”
Jiang Zhiheng hung up.
Half an hour ago, he’d seen Jiang Xiaoxiao into the car and told her to call home to let everyone know she was safe.
But this was now his fifth call.
Jiang Xiaoxiao still wasn’t answering.
Had something happened?
He pushed aside the woman beside him and got up to leave.
The street outside the bar was quiet and bleak.
He’d been drinking, so he couldn’t drive.
He walked to the other side of the street, planning to order a ride on his phone.
Strange.
Why was there no signal?
Jiang Zhiheng clicked his tongue and raised his phone to try again.
Still no signal.
He’d have to go back to the bar and try.
He looked up at the other side of the street.
What?
Across the street wasn’t a bar anymore.
It was an amusement park.
An amusement park that had been demolished five years ago.
The entire park was dead and decayed.
A sickly pale lamp hung at the entrance.
There were only two visitors.
A ten-year-old boy, holding the hand of a five-year-old girl.
They wore the children’s clothes that were popular in that era, standing at the gate.
They didn’t turn around.
But Jiang Zhiheng knew who they were.
Himself, and his sister, Jiang Ye.
Back when the amusement park had just been built, plenty of kids had clamored to come.
Jiang Zhiheng never had.
Amusement parks are full of children—even the air is dirty.
That’s what his mother always said.
His father said it was better to go to the library.
Fifteen years ago, that summer.
At ten years old, he sat in the library reading as usual.
His sister, five years younger, sat beside him looking at picture books.
He read for a while, then grew more and more restless.
The laughter and cheers from the amusement park seemed to drift to his ears.
Finally, he closed his book and asked his sister: “Want me to take you somewhere fun?”
Outside the library’s main gate, the family driver was waiting in the car.
He thought it over, then crawled out with his sister through a window on the first floor.
Three bus stops later, they reached the amusement park.
The park was packed with people.
He stared at the rides, unable to look away.
His sister, though, lowered her head and quietly asked if they could go home.
He refused.
He told his sister to sit on a bench and wait for him.
He got on the roller coaster himself.
The roller coaster shot toward the clouds like an arrow from a bow.
Then dove back toward the ground.
When he came down, his head was still spinning.
He glanced over at the bench, meaning to call his sister over for the next ride.
He froze.
The bench was empty.