Chapter 1
Chapter 1
April 12, 2016. Saturday.
It was my younger sister’s twelfth birthday.
Back home, people attached great importance to a child’s twelfth birthday. Passing that age meant the child had finally planted both feet firmly in this world and was ready to enter adolescence.
Yet my sister’s accident happened on the very day she crossed that threshold.
I attended university in the same city, so I had made a special trip home for her birthday. Her sixth-grade class happened to be taking a spring outing to nearby Lion Mountain that day.
Mom had not wanted her to go, but my sister had dreamed of visiting Lion Mountain for ages. We therefore postponed her birthday dinner until that evening.
Mom packed her a sun-protection jacket, a hat, water, and snacks, then reminded her to come home early.
“Don’t you two dare sneak any cake. You have to wait until I’m back before you put in the candles!” my sister warned Mom and me.
Then she stole a cautious glance at me and tried to make amends. “Sis, I heard these really pretty rock chrysanthemums grow on Lion Mountain. How about I bring some back and make you a bookmark?”
The night before, she had accidentally deleted the biochemistry paper I had labored over while playing a game on my computer. Biochemistry was the subject I hated most and struggled with the most.
I was gritting my teeth and rewriting the paper from scratch, so I snapped in a fit of temper, “You said it. If you can’t find any, don’t come back to see me!”
It wasn’t as if I truly needed a rock-chrysanthemum bookmark. I was angry and wanted to make things difficult for her.
None of us knew then that, beautiful as Lion Mountain’s rock chrysanthemums were, they were flowers meant to be admired only from a distance.
“She fell from the cliff because she was picking them for me. I didn’t learn until after her death that they grew only on the steepest precipices.
“For years afterward, I kept wondering: if I hadn’t told her not to come back without them, would she still be alive?”
Ten years later, I told the story to Xu Yan, my doctoral adviser in criminal psychology. Even after all that time, I could not stop crying.
“When did they find your sister?” Xu Yan pulled out a tissue and handed it to me.
“Three days later.
“I remember it perfectly. It was early morning, and the sunlight on her shriveled face felt so warm.
“My mother fainted on the spot. My father had a heart attack.
“I was the only one left to sit quietly beside her.”
The coffeepot burbled softly, unnaturally loud in the deathly stillness of the office.
“Many people who disappear in the mountains are never found,” Xu Yan said. “In that sense, recovering her body was a small mercy amid the tragedy.”
He rose to pour some coffee, then slid the warm bone-china cup toward me.
“Hundreds of people searched the mountain back then—police officers, my parents, relatives, friends, and my father’s students, both current and former. Many local villagers came on their own to help too.
“The police started from the place where she vanished, checked surveillance footage, and questioned people in every village within a ten-kilometer radius.”
When her body was found, Mom lunged at me, clawing at my clothes as she screamed in despair.
“You knew it was her birthday, and you still cursed her! How could you be so vicious?”
My father, a middle-school teacher, was wild with grief and rage. He rushed over and slapped me three times, then pointed at me and bellowed, “I’ve spent half my life teaching children to be decent human beings. How did I produce a cold-blooded, selfish animal like you? Why wasn’t it you who died?”
He disowned me on the spot.
Under the contemptuous stares of everyone around us, I neither dodged nor defended myself. I stood numb and accepted every blow, every insult.
Because I believed it too. I believed I had driven my own sister to her death.
I deserved whatever happened to me. Even death would have been too kind.
I forced down the burning in my throat and continued.
“At first, everyone assumed her death was an accident. Then the autopsy report came back.
“Her cause of death made no sense. It wasn’t hypothermia, an animal attack, a snakebite, or even the fall.”
Xu Yan stopped stirring his coffee.
“Then what killed her?”
“Thirst.”
“Dehydration is common when someone is lost in the wilderness.” He tapped his cup. “Isn’t it?”
“What if I told you there was still water in her bottle?” I stared at him, enunciating every word.
“Could someone have taken her water before the accident, then returned it afterward out of fear they would be held responsible?”
I shook my head. “Three people found her—my father, one of his students, and a rescue worker. Investigators found no footprints at the scene except theirs.”
“What about her classmates and teachers? How were her relationships at school?”
“She earned excellent grades and got along well with everyone. The investigation found no grudges, no bullying, and no evidence that anyone had bullied her.”
“And I assume the water itself tested clean?”
I nodded.
Xu Yan’s expression darkened.