The tramp

After much persuasion, Zhang Youzhi finally saw He Min off. As the last glow of her taillights faded into the distance, his world returned to darkness.

It was already so late that even the colored lights along both banks had gone out.

Once he reached the stone bridge, Zhang Youzhi took out the house key He Min had given him. At the spot where they had warmed themselves with a lighter and eaten egg-yolk pies, he used all his strength to scratch a few words into the edge of the bridge.

"Terminally ill, with little time left. Stay strong and live well."

Then he tossed the key into the Crane River beneath the bridge.

Zhang Youzhi climbed down beneath the bridge and gathered his belongings. He found a rope, rolled everything into the quilt He Min had given him, and bound the bundle with three turns across and two lengthwise. He hoisted it onto his back, then climbed back up.

Leave. I have to leave.

Unless necessary, don't create more ties.

By the time he finished all that climbing and packing, the sky was already growing faintly light again.

With everything he owned on his back, Zhang Youzhi walked on toward the dawn.

Life countdown.

10 days.

Zhang Youzhi's physical condition deteriorated a little further, forcing him to stop his aimless wandering and find a place to hole up for the second time.

This time, it was an abandoned recycling yard. There was a fairly decent-looking tent inside, and after making a few repairs, Zhang Youzhi moved in.

He hadn't spent a cent of the thousand-odd yuan he had left, keeping it all in his bag for emergencies. In truth, he didn't even know whether he had any "emergencies" left to deal with.

It was already early July, yet Crane City had been hit by another cold snap. It was unheard of. After a sudden downpour, the temperature dropped into the teens, and the north wind, carrying the chill of a Siberian cold front, left him freezing his ass off.

The clothes He Min had brought were only a thin shirt and dress trousers. They weren't much use; it was the quilt that saved his life.

It was July. He really hadn't expected Crane City to get this cold.

Perhaps his luck was decent: he found a military greatcoat that was still mostly intact. He couldn't bother with washing it, so he shook off the dust and draped it over himself.

His legs and feet were still cold, but there was nothing he could do.

In the past, Zhang Youzhi would have been delighted by this bizarre summer weather. On days like this, the small company he worked for would usually give him a day or half a day off.

Compared with necessities like food, sleep, and warmth, Zhang Youzhi's greatest "enemy" was actually the kindhearted people everywhere. With no other choice, he took increasingly remote routes.

Without a map or navigation to guide him, he couldn't work out where he was. He couldn't even be sure whether he was still within Crane City's urban area.

Aside from him, a limping gray kitten also lived in his tent. Half its right front paw had rotted away. It looked barely weaned, and its mother was nowhere to be found.

He had discovered the kitten inside an old tire, tucked away in a well-hidden spot, lying there quietly.

Zhang Youzhi had put it in the pocket of his military greatcoat and brought it back with him. After disinfecting and bandaging the little gray kitten's wound, he had himself a temporary companion.

In truth, he knew the kitten might not even outlive him.

The infection was too severe. When he found some liquor to disinfect the wound, the kitten had bitten and struggled in pain. Zhang Youzhi had held it down and barely managed to finish. His bandaging was amateurish, too; he didn't have any proper gauze or iodine antiseptic.

Besides, the little gray kitten was starving, nothing but skin and bones.

Following the tradition of naming animals after their coat colors, Zhang Youzhi named the little gray kitten-Gray Kitten!

"Little Gray, try to hang on a few more days. We can go together." Zhang Youzhi stroked its head, and Gray Kitten shrank back in fear.

The pain of having its wound disinfected earlier had genuinely left the kitten traumatized.

Life countdown.

9 days.

Zhang Youzhi felt pretty good that day. He went out and found some tape to patch the damaged parts of the tent against the rain, then bought a few sausages to improve their meals.

"If I'd known, I'd have taken the dog food Yuyu bought. She has no use for it anyway. Maybe this kitten would like it."

Watching Gray Kitten tear into a sausage, Zhang Youzhi inwardly regretted the missed opportunity.

Like Zhang Youzhi, Gray Kitten was doing fairly well. It could already hop around inside the tent on its bad leg, and it was no longer afraid of him. Zhang Youzhi didn't let it leave the tent. Conditions outside were too harsh, so he kept it shut in for now.

From the look of things, the kitten might actually outlive him.

"A few more days alive is a good thing, too."

Only, once he died, it would be a stray again.

Zhang Youzhi didn't sit idle that day, either. He picked out a temporary coffin for himself-an abandoned concrete pipe a meter in diameter.

Where to leave his body had always been an important concern.

Cool, ventilated, waterproof, resistant to decay, and no stink.

Isn't this better than a wooden coffin?

With a certain sense of ceremony, Zhang Youzhi found some dry grass and lined the concrete pipe so it wouldn't feel so hard when he lay down. He planted a little black flag on top to help the body collection staff find him. Finally, he hung grass curtains over both ends of the pipe to block the view, so anyone who wandered in by accident wouldn't discover his body.

After he finished all that, it started raining again. Zhang Youzhi had no choice but to return to the tent, where he held Gray Kitten and wrote his final letter.

Though he called it a final letter, it was really instructions for the funeral company about what to do with the gray kitten afterward.

While Zhang Youzhi sheltered in the tent with his kitten, a stooped tramp entered the recycling yard from outside, carrying a sack of plastic water bottles on his back as he made his way along the wall.

The tramp casually hung his tattered rain hat on the iron fence, then skirted the shabby tent with practiced familiarity. He set his sack down on an open patch farther away before heading straight into the half-standing corrugated-metal shelter.

Most of the recycling yard was an open courtyard. Zhang Youzhi's tent stood in a secluded corner, while part of the yard was occupied by a half-collapsed corrugated-metal shelter.

Concerned that the shelter might collapse, Zhang Youzhi hadn't moved his tent beneath it, choosing to remain out in the open instead.

As he passed the shabby tent, the tramp gave a soft murmur of surprise.

Why does this old tent I stopped using look a little sturdier? It looks like someone repaired quite a bit of it.

It was too cold. He had to hurry back to his own spot.

Zhang Youzhi slept groggily inside the tent. Beside him, Gray Kitten heard the movement outside and meowed twice, but it neither woke Zhang Youzhi nor caught the attention of the man outside.

Scattered tires filled the corrugated-metal shelter. Some had been neatly stacked into a wall, which concealed an abandoned, thick mattress. Unless someone came over to look, they would never discover it.

It was a Simmons mattress, old and large, but very clean.

Discarded tires had been stacked into a triangular frame, enclosing the mattress against the wall to form a little bedroom of its own.

The tramp draped his soaked clothes over the tires to dry, switched on the power outlet beside the mattress, and plugged in the small electric blanket lying on it.

Several quilts lay neatly folded on the mattress. Beside it, a large plastic basin fitted snugly inside a tire, holding a collection of empty shampoo containers.

Clearly, he used whatever bottles he could scavenge.

The tramp took off his mud-covered shoes and changed into a clean pair of slippers. Then he picked up the folded towel beside him, shook it out, dipped it into a bucket of water, and began wiping down his body.

His beard, eyebrows, and hair were all long, but he didn't look unkempt. Clearly, those piles of empty shampoo bottles had done a good job of keeping up his appearance.

He simply looked rather old, somewhere in his forties or fifties. Yet he was far more vigorous than Zhang Youzhi, who was only in his twenties, and his eyes were bright and alert.

Once he had cleaned himself up, he boiled a kettle of water, tore open a packet of instant noodles, and wolfed them down. Afterward, looking at the broth left in his bowl, he seemed to suddenly remember something. He got up and searched around.

"Where's my cat?" the tramp wondered.

He knew the limping kitten wouldn't live long, but he hadn't expected it to disappear after he had only been away for two days.

Did a rat carry it off?

The tramp simply returned to his "bedroom," lay down on the mattress, and fell asleep.

A moment later, thunderous snores rose, only to be drowned out by the patter of rain.