He said the weightiness and twistiness gave her a distinctive bearing. Perhaps that’s why he couldn’t give her up. He had watched her walk across the lawn, not because he wanted to lie in wait for her but because desire had left him helpless. He had watched her leave through the glass doors of her condo, stopping for a chat on the lawn with an acquaintance walking his dog, saying the weather’s so nice, hope it stays this way. Then Hongmei had patted the dog tenderly, so he could tell she got on well with animals and was comfortable around them. As she had bent to stroke the dog, her shawl had fallen on the ground. He said that shawl had made her thoughtlessly put-together outfit come together in a powerful statement. The near-extinct pattern and color had made the vast grass plain pale in comparison. The red had put him in mind of Native American rugs, made by crushing a species of bugs into fragments. Saturated, animalistic, different from any other shade of red, antiquity itself. And then Hongmei had walked on, her posture as modest and evasive as always, the stark white bourgeois condo building behind her, its sixteen stories housing more than ten of this college’s professors, living their stark white lives.

So he even knew how many professors lived in her building? Hongmei looked around. A young guy nearby was laughing loudly, chatting animatedly with some unseen person. She’d heard they could have parties online, ten or more of them gabbing away, thousands of miles apart.

The man said he was surprised at himself, ruthlessly abandoning his usual ethical standards and giving in to desire, behaving in such an underhanded manner. There were several long benches around the lawn. He’d sat on one of them, and when she had been within twenty yards of him, he’d said to himself, All right, time to make my entrance. He only had to stand and reach out a hand. But when she was just five paces away, she suddenly had turned back to the condo and waved at a sixteenth-floor balcony. Her gesture had been mundane, just like her smile, full of the security and numbness of her present life. From his angle, he had been able to see a furled, pale blue picnic umbrella, white plastic chairs around a table, and a steaming mug. Perhaps her husband had been having his last cup of coffee for the morning. And so the man hadn’t stood and started things off with her. Perhaps he wanted to wait a little longer, so the feeling of uselessness caused by desire would have a chance to dissipate. Not just desire, also vague, shameful schemes, he frankly told her.