Chapter 31

In the third year of Jiayou, late spring. I crouched before the gravestone in the potter's field, using my sleeve to wipe away the green moss. The three characters "Shen Wanqiu" were blurred and weathered by wind and rain, yet they were embedded in my heart as if carved by a knife. In the distance, the sound of the night watchman echoed; the clapper of the third watch startled a few cold crows, tracing withered, slender silhouettes across the ashen sky. "Father, it is time to go home." My daughter tugged at my sleeve. In her hand, she clutched a freshly plucked wild chrysanthemum, its tender yellow petals stained with mud. I stroked her small face, frozen red, and planted the wild chrysanthemum in the mound of earth before the gravestone—just as I had pinned that apricot blossom into Wanqiu's hair twenty years ago.