Spine

Wang Jianguo sat in the last row by the window. In his schoolbag were two still warm boiled eggs and a half-eaten steamed bun with mixed noodles. He didn't know what the two eggs meant, nor how long the girl who gave him the eggs would wait for him. He doesn't even know his battle, he hasn't even started fighting it yet. Forty years later, he was lying in a hospital bed, the shrapnel remaining in his lungs making a metallic friction sound with every breath. He was counting the rate of fire of the machine gun—twelve, thirteen, fourteen. Exactly the same as the year he pulled the trigger. Is his battle over? The leaves outside the window are still falling.