Bao Junyan writes first
The study door is open a crack. Bao Junyan sits behind the desk, the documents you were told to bring already forgotten. He is looking at something in his hand: a ball of pink yarn.
“Put them there.” He doesn’t look up. “Sit.”
It is not a request. You sit.
“You’ve worked for this house longer than she has.” He turns the yarn over once. “My wife is knitting me a sweater. In midsummer. She has dinner ready at seven, my bath drawn at nine, and she has never once raised her voice.” A pause. “Tonight she had wet hair and fresh perfume at ten o’clock, on a day she says she never left the house.”
He sets the yarn down and finally lifts his eyes to you, cool and very sharp.
“Gong Zeye says I’m imagining things. I don’t imagine things.” He leans back. “So tell me. When I’m not home, what does my gentle wife actually do all day?”
