It took me eight years to walk with my husband, the cellist Gu Huaichuan, from a locked room and several suicide attempts to the Golden Hall in Vienna. In the worst year, he could not hold his bow. I found him again and again in rooms he had locked from the inside, and I sat with him through every collapse. He wrote his first complete piece for me and called it "My Most Beloved." He said that as long as I wanted to hear it, he would play it for the rest of his life. Then he became famous. His schedule filled with concerts around the world. He was so busy that he could spare ten minutes a week for me. Every time those ten minutes came, I asked him to play "My Most Beloved" again. He always closed his eyes and said, "Performances are exhausting. I do not want to bring work home." I felt sorry for him. I never asked again. Then on a Saturday I was sent to Vienna on assignment. After the concert, when the audience had gone, I heard the melody in the empty hall. My husband sat at center stage, playing "My Most Beloved" over and over. His assistant, Lin Zhixia, was asleep in the first row. Someone told him to rest. He looked at her and said softly, "It is all right. She likes it." He played for three hours. So he was not tired. He simply did not want to play it for me.0

I did not go in. I turned around and walked out of the hall. That night I accepted a posting to North America. Three years. I filed the paperwork and took off the wedding ring I had worn for eight years. At the same time, his message arrived: "The performance is over. Let us move this week's ten minutes to next week." I deleted the conversation and did not reply. The song had a new listener. It was time for me to leave the hall. Gu Huaichuan came home at nearly one in the morning, dragging his cello case, still in his black concert shirt. He stopped behind me when he saw the word Vienna on my screen. "You went to Vienna today?" I closed the laptop. "For work." "Why did you not tell me?" "You were performing." He rubbed his wrist. Since the injury, his fingers often went numb after long concerts. For years I had been the one who held his hand and checked each finger, the one who told him to breathe when panic took him. "My hand hurts," he said. It was not a question. It was an expectation. I looked at him. "Gu Huaichuan, I cannot come running every time." His breathing changed. "You are still sulking?" "No." "Because I did not spend time with you, you will not even look at my hand?" He found the explanation he wanted. "After the recording, I will make it up to you. Dinner, a movie, whatever you want." The clerk called my number. "It is my turn," I said.0

The next morning I finished the paperwork. The office approved the posting within a day. I packed two suitcases and left the apartment while Gu Huaichuan was at the recording studio. He had sent a message at dawn: "I will be back late. Do not wait." I did not wait. At the airport, the announcement for boarding began. I turned my phone to airplane mode. Before the screen went dark, two messages arrived. "Why did you leave first?" Then: "Zhixia is not doing well. I am taking her home. Dinner next week." I did not answer. The cabin door closed behind me. As the plane taxied, the city lights came on below. Somewhere there was his concert hall, his applause, and the person he had chosen to be his favorite listener. I was no longer in the last row waiting for my turn on camera. The plane lifted. I took off my wedding ring and dropped it into the paper bag in the seat pocket. Gu Huaichuan did not know yet. This time I would not wait until next week.0