Zimo, You Must Be Happy

August 2005, Alxa, Inner Mongolia. A prodigy fell from a cliff while making a rubbing of a Western Xia rock inscription. Blood pooled inside his head, and he remained unconscious for six days.

When he woke, Zeng Zimo was sitting beside his bed.

She had already left once. She left a letter saying, "Because I love you, I have to leave you," then went to America alone. But one call from Old Zhao sent her flying from San Francisco to Beijing, then to Baotou, followed by an overnight train to Alxa. She didn't even go back to her home in Nanjing.

He asked her, "What are you doing here?"

Her hand paused in midair for half a second. "Old Zhao called me."

He believed her. He had always trusted reasons that made logical sense.

Later, he forgot what the letter said, forgot why she had left, and forgot why Zhang Yan was in Sydney. The doctors said it was the blood clot in his brain.

It took him ten years to learn that wasn't the reason.