Chapter 4 — My Daughter's Iron Box

If you find her only to subject her to more suffering, you might as well turn back right now.

The lips of Shen Zhiqiang trembled. He wanted to deny it, to say that was not his intention. Yet the words caught in his throat, refusing to pass his lips. Because he realized, with a sudden and devastating clarity, that his past self had indeed done nothing but force the child to endure. To endure her worn, frayed schoolbag. To endure half a bowl of rice. To endure the humiliation of unpaid tuition. To endure the way his second wife silenced every grievance with a single, weaponized label: being sensible.

He got into the car, and the engine roared to life. In the rearview mirror, Uncle Feng still stood by the gate, the iron box clutched in his weathered hands. Shen Zhiqiang rolled down the window.

"Give me the box."

Uncle Feng handed the iron box over.

Mr. Shen, she left this for you, not so you could cry. She wanted you to know that she simply could not hold on any longer.

Shen Zhiqiang gripped the iron box tightly. As the car sped toward the southern district, his phone rang again. It was Meiqin. He ignored it. The phone stopped, then rang again. By the third time, he swiped to answer. Meiqin's frantic voice pierced the air.

"Shen Zhiqiang, you need to come home right now." Jiahao's tuition money--twelve thousand--has vanished. I suspect Anan took it.

Shen Zhiqiang slammed on the brakes, pulling over to the side of the road. Cars behind him blared their horns in angry succession. He clutched the phone, his voice turning so frigid that even he barely recognized it.

Say that again.

Meiqin faltered for a moment. "I said the twelve thousand for Jiahao is gone." Lately, Anan is the only one acting up in this house. She dropped out and ran away; who knows if she didn't take the money with her to flee?

Shen Zhiqiang looked down at the iron box resting on the passenger seat. The medical receipt inside felt like a knife blade pressing directly against his chest.

Inside her iron box, there are only debt ledgers and prescriptions. She refused to accept even the small advance her teacher offered out of kindness. "And you accuse her of stealing?"

Meiqin instantly shifted her tone. "I was only panicked." Jiahao has to pay the fees this afternoon, and his teacher is pressing us hard.

Shen Zhiqiang closed his eyes. "You are the only one who has the key to the safe in this house." "Where the money went, you know better than anyone."

The other end of the line fell silent for several seconds. "Shen Zhiqiang, what is that supposed to mean?"

Shen Zhiqiang said nothing more. He hung up and drove straight to the southern bus station. The terminal was a churning sea of people. Holding a screenshot of her from the surveillance footage, he went from shop to shop, asking every vendor he could find. The ticket counter attendants had no recollection of her. A small supermarket owner stared at the photo for a long time before recalling that a girl had indeed come in to buy bottled water.

Her face was deathly pale, and she was carrying a bag, the shopkeeper murmured. "She asked me how to get to the southern secondhand market."

Shen Zhiqiang rushed immediately to the secondhand market. The place was piled high with cardboard boxes and discarded furniture, the air thick with the heavy scent of dust and rust. He found the scrap dealer stationed near the entrance. The owner glanced at the photo and nodded.

She came here. Sold a few books.

Shen Zhiqiang's chest tightened painfully. She sold her books?

From a towering stack of old publications, the dealer pulled out a few volumes: Olympic Math problem sets, Physics notebooks, English vocabulary logs. On the corner of the cover, three characters were scrawled: Shen Anan. Shen Zhiqiang reached out to take them, but the dealer pulled them back.

"Are you looking to buy them back?"

Shen Zhiqiang instantly pulled out his wallet, but the scrap dealer refused the cash.

This isn't about money. When the girl sold them, she said if anyone ever came looking with her picture, "I should give the books to them."

Shen Zhiqiang froze. The dealer reached into a drawer and drew out a piece of paper. On it was Anan's familiar handwriting. "Father, if you have come looking here, it means you have finally started to look for me." "I can no longer carry these books with me." You used to say that useless things should not be kept, but these were useful to me. If you still want them, please keep them safe for me.

The veins on the back of Shen Zhiqiang's hands bulged violently. He pulled the stack of books into his embrace. Seeing his state, the dealer's voice softened considerably.

She sold them for twenty-six yuan. I saw she was terribly ill, so I tried to give her an extra twenty. She refused to take it. Only when I told her to treat it as a loan did she finally accept.

"Where did she go after that?" Shen Zhiqiang asked, his voice low and strained.

The dealer pointed toward the end of a narrow alley. There's a small diner down there. They were hiring someone to wash dishes.

Shen Zhiqiang bolted toward the diner. The proprietress was busy sorting vegetables. When she saw the photo, her expression changed entirely.

"Are you the girl's father?"

Shen Zhiqiang nodded. The woman slammed the basin of vegetables down onto the ground.

"You people are truly heartless parents! A fifteen-year-old child, suffering from stomach ulcers so severe she was breaking out in cold sweats, yet she lied and said she was eighteen. She couldn't even produce an identity card."

Shen Zhiqiang's voice trembled. She was here?

The proprietress shook her head. She worked for two days. On the third day, she collapsed in the back kitchen. I told her to go to the hospital, but she begged me not to call the police and not to contact her family. She said her father would find her a nuisance.

Shen Zhiqiang braced himself against the edge of a table. "And then?"

The woman sighed deeply. "I paid her two hundred yuan and told her to go to the hospital." She wouldn't go. She said she wanted to find a place that provided room and board. After that, a woman took her away.

Shen Zhiqiang snapped his head up. "What woman?"

The proprietress thought for a moment. Around forty years old, short hair, driving a battered van.