Wen Wan's name begins disappearing at morning roll call. Her teacher skips over her row, her name on the exam paper is an erased blank, and the name field in the school system turns to mist. Her parents set out four place settings but ask why they did, and the face of her older sister, Wen You, grows grayer in every photograph. She returns to her sister's room and lights seventeen candles. The photograph turns gray up to the brow, while a thin crack splits the back of her right hand at the second knuckle of her index finger. Pale gray light shines through it and crawls up her sleeve. She takes off the glasses she's worn for three years, the ones that belonged to her sister, and discovers a two-centimeter diagonal crack in the right lens. Every crack she has seen and sealed over the past three years was visible through that fissure. The first page of the booklet marked "Glue" in the drawer has been torn out recently. Three blood-ink squares and the words "Nails aren't meant to hold things in place" are right before her eyes. Who touched the booklet recently, and why was its first page torn out just as her own name began to disappear?
