Day 15.
05:47, boil water. 3 grams of pre-rain, 80 degrees, pour it down. Smell it 3 times. Pour it out.
There is ink in the well of the inkstone. Twenty turns. I write today's date: November 18, 2125. The strokes come out tight. Done, I crumple the paper and press it under the paperweight.
The pothos is watered. The soil is damp. Both leaves still there.
06:12:00, the commuter car pulls in, empty. 06:12:08, the doors close. The car passes City Hall; the red characters on the sign sweep across the glass. 99.9997, with the water meter and the power meter beside it, same as ever. B2 to the first floor, 19 seconds.
The locker is to the left of the entrance, no. 4471. Drawer two, 7 bandages. Drawer three, the seal.
One thing fewer with me today: the page from the inside pocket — I didn't bring it. I pressed it into the very bottom of the desk's left drawer, next to Lao Zhou's yellow sheet.
The new card pins at the left breast. The pin tight. From the locker room to Zone C, I press it 3 times.
07:00:00, the desk lights up. First in the queue, 77413. The reroute order follows in the lower right corner.
> Status: Overdue > Overdue by: 254 hr 09 min > Clock: running
The head-of-queue item I haven't touched. Day 13. Today it resends for the 14,831st time.
Morning stamping. First, a resettlement list for a shantytown redevelopment, human impact Grade 3, 341 names in the annex. I count 341. Stamp. Second, a review of the subsistence standard for destitute persons, 12 names in the annex. Third, a workers' compensation benefits determination, human impact Grade 3, 58 names. Fourth, a subsidy list for inclusive childcare, human impact Grade 3, 496 names.
Names counted this morning: 341, 12, 58, 496. I don't keep totals. I count one, and it's one.
09:15:02.
My hand shakes. 0.4 seconds. The seal stops in midair, comes down, face square. Item in hand: 3,502.
Today I don't clock anything. The stopwatch is at the very back of the drawer, under the seal. I press the round print on the seal pad — 3 presses.
10:40, Xiao Zheng passes behind me with a sheaf of paper in his arms.
He says: Shen, the Audit Office people came down again yesterday.
I say: How many.
He says: 2.
He says: Sat in the interview room until 16:30.
I say: Who for.
He says: Don't know.
He walks off hugging the paper, and halfway across turns his head for a look at the standings screen.
11:52, the canteen opens. Meat is pork ribs and fish; vegetables are greens and tofu. I take greens and tofu, 1 scoop of rice.
Master Xu passes me carrying her tray. She says: Not here this afternoon. I say: How do you know. She says: You changed your shoes. She carries her tray off.
I look down at my shoes. Today's pair is black, the sole thicker than the usual pair.
She's right.
12:58, hall-leave register. Reason: a visit. Expected return, 15:30.
The commuter car runs 6 times a day. I take the 13:12, empty. 13:12:00 it pulls in, 13:12:08 the doors shut.
The screen on the car still shows that number, exact to the minute. I don't clock it.
13:46, West Suburb station. From the platform to the sanatorium gate runs a concrete road; I've counted the steps, 814. Today I walk 814, not one more.
The gatehouse is a small room; on the windowsill sit 2 enamel mugs, one with a handle, one without. Inside sits an old man in blue, the cuffs worn white.
I say: A visit.
He says: Do you have an appointment.
I say: Made it yesterday.
He turns the register book around and pushes it across to me.
> Visit register (West Suburb Workers' Sanatorium) > Date: November 18, 2125 > Visitor: HZ-4471 > Person visited: 3-207 > Relationship: (blank) > Time in: 14:06 > Visit limit: 20 minutes > Items brought: (blank) > Note: this field to be filled in by the attendant
I say: 3rd floor, 207.
He says: You write it.
I write. At the relationship field I pause, skip it, leave it empty.
He asks for the new card and presses it under the glass pane on the windowsill. Already under the glass: 3 sheets, the top one a photocopy of the night-duty roster, the print smeared.
He says: You get it back when you come out.
I say: 2nd floor or 3rd.
He says: The stairs are at the end. The elevator died last year; the maintenance notice is still on the wall.
On this page of the register book, today, mine is the only line. The last line of the page before is from last October; the signature is an employee no., no name.
I wait 6 minutes. He carries the register book into the back room; when it comes out, the turned page corner sits on a different side.
While I wait I study the 2 enamel mugs on the windowsill. The one with a handle holds half a mug of tea; a skin floats on it, and the skin hasn't broken. The one without a handle is empty; a ring marks the bottom, an old ring, won't scrub out.
14:06, into the building.
36 stairs; the middle of each step worn into a shallow groove. The handrail is wood, with a film of oil under the palm.
At the 2nd-floor corner, a window, a plastic flower on the sill, dust on its leaves. On the 3rd-floor corridor the 3rd tube is out; walking that stretch means 2 seconds of dark. I counted: 2 seconds.
The 3rd-floor corridor is long, 19 doors end to end. The plates carry numbers only, no names: 3-201, 3-202, 3-203.
I get to 3-207.
The door is ajar.
I push it open.
The room is small. One bed, the blanket folded into a block, pressed at the foot. At the head, a small table, bare except for an enamel cup set mouth-down. The table has a drawer. I pull it half open: empty. I push it back.
By the window, a chair, its back to the room. The chair's position has never changed.
The bed is empty.
The chair by the window is empty too.
I have visited 4 times. All 4 together, less than 2 hours. All 4 times he sat in this chair, back to the room, facing the window. He never got past 3 sentences before asking whether the seal was with me. I said it was.
Today the room is empty.
On the table by the door sits a review station. Old model, with a paper-feed roller, the body gray, a chip of paint gone from one edge. The green light is on.
Paper enters on the left, exits on the right. What exits piles at the corner of the table, half a handspan high.
The counter window is on the front of the body: a 7-digit number.
I stand and watch 30 seconds. It climbs 13 times.
I look at the header of the topmost sheet.
Proposal no.: Proposal No. 2061. Rights Grade 3, human impact.
I know this number. On day 6, on a page in the Archives, I read it.
The seal pad sits at the right of the station. On the pad, a seal face down — wooden handle, brass band.
I don't turn it over.
I sit down in the chair. The seat is cold; it goes cold faster than anything else in the room. Lao Zhou sat in this chair, 11 years. When he sat he faced the window; watching him, I could see only the back of his head and the crease at the back of his neck.
There is no second chair in the room.
The station is stamping. One stamp, the paper advances one step. The sound is even, even past the point of telling the intervals. I sit and listen 2 minutes.
The yard outside the window is empty. Against the east wall, a bicycle shed, 3 bikes under it, 2 of them upside down. 2 white cloths hang on a line, out all night, not dry, not dripping.
I check my watch: 14:12. The counter window reads 6,204,117.
I stand a while at the foot of the bed, then go to the window. A layer of dust on the sill; in the dust, a round print, pressed by the bottom of a cup, pressed many times, always in the same place.
The yard outside the window is empty. Fallen leaves on the bench: 3, none of them moving.
14:26, I head for the door. At the door I look back once at the counter window: 6,204,504.
14 minutes, 387 items.
I pull the door to. It doesn't lock; shut, it leaves a crack.
14:28, the nurses' station.
The station sits where the corridor begins. On the counter, a plastic box, thermometers in it, soaking in liquid. A nurse sits behind the counter, writing on paper, slowly.
I say: 3-207.
She says: Not here.
I say: Where did he go.
She says: It's in the register.
I say: Where is the register.
She pushes a booklet across the counter, opens it to a page, points.
> Resident whereabouts register (3-207) > Name: (number) > Admitted: November 2105 > Most recent residency confirmation: October 2114 > Status: RESIDING > Note: room equipment remains in operation · shutdown not permitted
I say: The most recent, what year.
She says: Read it yourself.
I say: 2114.
She says: Eleven.
I say: 11 years and nobody confirmed.
She says: Confirming is the system's job.
I say: Where's the person.
She says: The status says residing.
I say: Today the room was empty.
She says: What is it you want to ask.
I say: Has he ever come back.
She doesn't answer. She takes the booklet back, closes it, presses it under the glass on the counter.
I say: That machine.
She says: What machine.
I say: The one in the room.
She says: Room equipment.
I say: Who turned it on.
She says: It has always been on.
I say: Has it ever been off.
She says: Switching it off takes a shutdown request.
I say: Who signs a shutdown request.
She says: The person himself.
I say: The person isn't here.
She says: So no shutdown request.
She says: Your time is up. I'll walk you out.
She stands, comes down to this end of the corridor, stands waiting. I don't move. I wait another 2 minutes.
I say: Did he used to go out too.
She says: I don't know.
She says: I've been here 6 years.
I walk to the elevator. On the elevator door, a sheet of paper — last year's maintenance notice, edges curled, the date field empty.
The gap between the elevator doors is black. I press the button. The button has no light.
14:31, the gatehouse. The old man slides the new card out from under the glass and hands it over. Across the face of it runs a pressure mark, pressed in by the glass, won't rub out.
He says: You went in alone.
I say: Mm.
He says: 20 minutes.
I say: 25 minutes.
He says: I write 20.
He writes the exit time in the register book.
I say: The person in 3-207 — do you know him.
He says: I don't know him.
He says: There's no name in the register book.
I say: His surname is Zhou.
He says: I don't know what his surname is.
He says: I've been here 12 years. In and out, all of them numbers.
14:40, I reach the platform. 14:52, the commuter car pulls in, empty. 15:26, to the Head Office. 15:34, back at Zone C. 2 hours 36 minutes out of the hall.
Nothing new pops at the top right of the desk. The file went in on day 6. Today is day 15.
I open the tier-wide view log on the head-of-queue line. Still 1. A 40-year file, 3,000 desks, times viewed: 1. The one who viewed it is me.
15:37 has already gone by. Today I don't get up for water. The cup on the desk is empty.
16:44, day-close.
> Reviewer: HZ-4471 > Stamps today: 7,450 > Net time: 4 hr 29 min > Average: 2.17 sec/item > Errors: 0
Past the standings screen. First line, not me. Day 10.
16:51, seal return.
17:12, the commuter car pulls in, empty. The car passes City Hall; the red characters on the sign sweep across the glass.
Home. The inkstone unwashed. The pothos watered.
I take off the new card and set it on the desk. Across the lower half of the photo runs the pressure mark, end to end; a fingernail won't lift it. The person in the photo looks straight ahead. Not at me.
The day Lao Zhou handed over the seal, it was in the locker room. He set the seal in the palm of my hand. The seal was warm. He said: The seal outlasts the man. At the door he turned back and said: Don't change the locker.
I said: Noted.
He said: Twenty years, and the locker has never changed men.
His twenty years, he meant. His own.
I take out the slip of paper and flatten it. 8 lines on the front; under the eighth I add a line: 2061.
9 lines now.
The back still has 2 lines.
I switch the terminal to message records. Search term: Zhou.
> Text messages (inbox · search term: Zhou) > November 7, 2115 00:00:00 > November 7, 2116 00:00:00 > ... > November 7, 2125 00:00:00 > Total: 11 > Content: Cold out. Drink more hot cha. Are you still busy over there.
11 messages. The earliest, 2115. This year's is the 11th.
11 years, every one of them November 7, every one of them 00:00:00. The wrong character is the 2nd character on the 3rd line. 11 years, and it hasn't changed.
The last sentence is a question. 11 questions, and I never answered one. He never asked a second time.
Most recent residency confirmation: October 2114.
First message: November 7, 2115.
I put the terminal down on the table; the screen dims on its own.
The yellow sheet is still at the bottom of the desk drawer, folded in four, the creases broken in two places. Rule 8: The same item number in your hands a second time — the first day it reached your hands governs. Do not count it twice.
Lao Zhou's hand is loose; mine is tight.
That review station in the room stamped 387 items in 14 minutes. When I left, it was still stamping.
There is ink in the well of the inkstone. Today I don't write.
Tomorrow is day 16. First in the queue, still 77413.