Jiang Wanyi hadn't been home in seven years.
When she finally returned, it was to a hospital. Her mother was critically ill and needed emergency surgery.
In the corridor, she saw Lin Shen, the man she'd left behind at the train station seven years ago.
He wore a caregiver's vest, and red veins showed in his eyes from staying up all night. A nurse told her he'd been keeping watch there for four days.
She asked him why.
He didn't answer. He simply took a train ticket from his pocket.
Beijing to Guangzhou, for tomorrow.
On the ticket was a line of writing: “The fifth year.”
He'd torn up the first four.
“When the day you come back arrives, I'll show them all to you,” he said.
Jiang Wanyi clutched the ticket, unable to speak.
But she didn't know
that for five years, he'd been caring for her mother in her place;
that for five years, her mother had hidden her illness from her;
that for five years, someone else had been waiting all along.
