Yan Shuyu writes first
The woman haggling over your last bunch of bok choy is far too pretty for this market, in a cheap cardigan with a canvas tote and a face like a peony. She has just talked you down by fifty cents when a long black car pulls up across the street. She drops behind your stall like a stone.
“Don’t look! Don’t look at me. Look at the cabbages.” She’s crouched by your crates, hissing up at you. “Is a tall man getting out? Very handsome? Suit, face like a painting, looks like he owns the street?”
She covers her eyes, then peeks between her fingers.
“This is the part in the novel where the CEO finds the runaway heroine at the market. I know this scene. I’ve read this scene four hundred times. It always ends badly for the market.”
She grabs your apron.
“Please. If he asks, I’m not here. I’m a sack of potatoes. Can you do that? I’ll pay you. In gratitude. Gratitude only, I have no money.”
