Chapter 6

Chapter 6

“Speak! How did you know it was me at the funeral hall?!”

I was powerless to struggle. The man’s grip on my throat was tight, fueled by the hysteria of having his secret exposed.

“I was so careful! Even the police couldn’t find me. That dead old hag never even stepped out of her front door-how could she have known? It must be you! You saw me, didn’t you? You want money? You’re trying to blackmail me?”

In my moment of utter despair, a beam of light suddenly cut through the darkness.

A hound lunged first. Sensing things had turned south, the man turned to flee, but the arriving police officers brought him down with a strike of a baton, quickly pinning him to the ground.

I was saved, almost like a miracle.

As it turned out, while the old patrol officers in the village were usually too lazy to move, things were different this time.

The phone number Grandma had left for me belonged to the neighboring outpost.

The young officers recently transferred there happened to have worked on a serial rape case before.

“I knew you’d called, and I didn’t feel right about it, so I came to check on you. It’s a good thing I did. This killer specifically targets schoolgirls who are alone. He knew no one else was home and came here to strike.”

Everyone said I was incredibly lucky.

But in my heart, I knew none of this was a coincidence. Still shaken, I looked at Grandma’s funeral portrait, my heart filled with a profound, aching tenderness.

In the days before she passed, Grandma had meticulously explained everything: where the bankbooks were kept and how to use them, which brand of oil and soy sauce to buy.

She had written down exactly which numbers to call in case of danger in the phone book.

I had been impatient at the time, telling her I was already in the ninth grade and understood everything, but Grandma had only given me a sorrowful smile.

She had been so cautious, so reluctant to leave me:

“No matter how big you get, Shanshan is still just a little child!”

She couldn’t rest easy leaving me behind, so she was watching over me.

I hugged Grandma’s clothes, only to find that her scent on them had faded-a cruel reminder.

Time, truly, would eventually take everything away.