By Taigu standards, it was golden summer; three days in the upper 70s, with the kind of blue skies that I thought had ceased to exist in China. I was staying in Amelea’s room, though of course I had known it better as Ray’s room, and before hers, Nick’s. Even still, it seemed something of a misnomer – Amelea had already left, and in a few weeks’ time, the room would be newly appropriated by one of the first-year transplants to Taigu. The house they had each inhabited was adjacent to the identical red brick flat No. 11 where I used to live. For the entire duration of my visit, it was hard to reconcile the reality that I was sleeping, not in my own bed in my own house, but in a room that I had, for two years, scarcely ever entered.
Read MoreLast Train to Taigu
There were no more cars. That was how the station attendant announced that the subway had stopped running for the night. It was already 11:00 and I knew, even before I rounded the platform to transfer lines, that my fear of missing the last train would quickly be realized.
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