CH 3

The morning fog was receding, and the water vapor on the leaves of the plants was turning into delicate dewdrops that rolled gently off them.

The sunlight was gradually getting brighter, the sky clearer, and the air fresher. It looked like it was going to be good weather today.

Bo Zhou sat leaning against the grave fence and looked at the picture on the tombstone. Wan Dou, who had been running all the way over here, was apparently tired, and walked over, too, snuggling up to Bo Zhou.

«I wanted him to keep you company when I wasn't around.»

In those three years, only Wan Dou had been with her. It seemed that the words spoken by Sang Yang the night they decided to take the puppy were prophetic.

Bo Zhou stroked to Goroch, and he barked softly, looking up at her from below. Bo Zhou smiled and let him lean against her leg.

At twenty-six, Bo Zhou had become something that Sang Yang had never seen her before. She had become withdrawn and sullen, the life in her seemed to have dried up, and nothing pleased her.

But her eyes remained pure and clear, the look that Sang Yang loved so much remained the same.

«So time flies. Next month, Wan Dou will be four years old, he's already an adult dog,» Bo Zhou said as if she was having an everyday conversation, easy and relaxed.

Immediately after Sang Yang left, Bo Zhou could not adjust in any way. No sooner had she realized the tragic news than a multitude of trifles came over her and entangled her like seaweed.

She had to take care of Sang Yang's funeral, comfort her grieving parents, accept the condolences of her relatives, take care of Wan Dou, and deal with her many sketches that were still pending.

Time passed, just as it had when Sang Yang was still around, and Bo Zhou continued to exist, mechanically and ossified, performing one action after another without even time to cry.

Only after three months did the grief seem to subside. Except for the house where they lived together, there was less and less trace of Sang Yang, fewer and fewer people spoke of her, fewer and fewer events related to her.

It was as if her existence was not important at all, and her passing had no effect on anything.

Only Bo Zhou, waking up on a clear morning, saw the empty place next to her that belonged to Sang Yang, cold as ice.

Suddenly, a thought flashed through her mind: Sang Yang is gone and will never return.

At that moment, tears streamed down her cheeks and her face felt like glass that had been broken and cracked. She curled up, pressed herself against Sang Yang's pillow, and sobbed heartbreakingly.

After that day, she began to have insomnia, and she became anxious and cried for no reason. It was as if her heart had stopped, unable to feel joy, anger, sadness or happiness.

Jiang Yuan and a few others were very worried about her and made an appointment for her to see a psychologist.

The doctor advised her to move out of the house where she lived with Sang Yang and return there when her grief subsided.

But Bo Zhou couldn't do that.

This was the house they had set up together, and Sang Yang's presence was felt in it. It was the only thing Bo Zhou had left that allowed her to feel connected to her.

At first she pretended that she intended to follow the doctor's advice, but soon his insistent exhortation bore her and she stopped going to the sessions.

She wondered what her life would be like without Sang Yang.

It was not until one autumn morning last year, when she went for a walk with Gorokh, that things began to change.