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Bo Siyan's mother called the next morning. There was a family dinner that weekend, she said, and I had to come. Her tone suggested I was lucky to be invited. "Siyan has so many girls watching him. Being able to stay beside him is your blessing. Sisi will be there too. You can chat with her." I looked out at the gray sky. "I am not coming." "Lin Yin." Her voice hardened. "You have been sensible for so many years. Do not become foolish now." Sensible. They all believed my patience was natural, unlimited, something they could spend without ever repaying. I hung up. In the afternoon I went to the art studio where I taught. My assistant Xiao Xia met me at the door, uneasy. "Sister Yin, Mr. Bo is here." He sat in the lounge with his jacket over a chair and a coffee in his hand. Chen Sisi sat beside him, flipping through my students' work. When she saw me she smiled sweetly. "Sister Yin, you paint so well." Her finger stopped on a watercolor I had made for a youth exhibition: an old streetlamp with an empty chair beneath it. Bo had once said he liked it. I had repainted the light seventeen times because of that sentence. He looked up at me. "Come to dinner tonight," he said. "Your mother's care home has been charging us a lot. Perhaps we should review the arrangement." The room tilted. My mother had been in that facility for years. Bo paid the bills. I paid him back a little every month, slowly, like filling a hole that had no bottom. "Are you threatening me with my mother?" I asked. "I am reminding you," he said, almost gently. "Seven o'clock. Wear the white dress. My mother likes it."0

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