The woman had already walked some distance.
I didn't wait for Fu Ying to answer before following her.
The woman paid no attention to anyone around her, just keeping her head down as she walked.
After crossing another road and turning a corner, we saw a residential complex under construction. The buildings were already up, but the windows hadn't been installed.
A phone booth by the roadside was easy to miss, just like the streetlights and road signs. An ordinary person passing by wouldn't pay it any special attention.
The red paint on the phone booth was peeling and mottled, but its original vivid color was still visible. It was also the only bright spot on this otherwise colorless road.
The phone booth was fully enclosed, a square space with a flat roof and the words "Public Telephone" on it. The side facing the road was also an advertising box. The ad inside had faded, but you could still just make out a movie poster.
I remembered that movie. It had been shown when I was in high school, as part of a campus romance film series. The male lead had been a popular young star at the time, and the female lead a popular actress, so the film had drawn plenty of attention and done well at the box office. But its reputation had been dreadful, and its earnings had plummeted until it was pulled from theaters across the board.
The poster in the advertising box no longer showed the youthful good looks of its leads. All that remained were two ghastly pale faces. Even the movie's title had blurred beyond recognition, and the other writing had disappeared entirely.
The woman quickened her pace, crossed the road, and headed straight for the phone booth.
I followed her.
The phone