I found out on a Tuesday afternoon. On the radio, an announcer read the news in a flat tone: Wannian County, Jiangxi, would no longer be hiring English teachers starting in 2025. I was making coffee, and the hissing of the boiling water mixed with the announcer's voice, like some kind of old jazz.

I put down the moka pot and went to the window. Outside, the rain was relentless. The gray sky was like a giant, damp old newspaper, the words on it blurred. I thought of my English teacher, a middle-aged man who liked to wear plaid shirts and gold-rimmed glasses. He always played Beatles songs during breaks. He said they were memories of his youth. And now, English, along with those songs, seemed to be disappearing from this small county.

李明哲觉得自己像一只被剪了翅膀的燕子，困在名为“985”的镀金鸟笼里。

那是一个灰蒙蒙的早晨，和往常一样，K先生醒来，准备去税务局上班。他的人生就像一张被精确划分的表格，每一个格子都填满了重复的数字和无意义的符号。他对此习以为常，甚至可以说，他在这无尽的重复中找到了一种近乎麻木的安全感。

Under the dim light, Sun Haiyang hunched over, staring intently at his phone screen. It was a faded photo of a child with a bright smile, his eyes sparkling like stars. It was his son, Sun Zhuo, a child who had been abducted fifteen years ago.

Old Zhang has been feeling a bit troubled lately.

It's not because of anything in particular, it's just that he feels like he can't understand the world anymore.

Old Liu has no other hobbies in his life, he just loves watching football. To be precise, it's watching the national football team. It's not because they play so well, but on the contrary, because they play so badly. So bad it reaches a certain realm, so bad it develops a certain style, so bad it's addictive, like knowing it's bitter wine, but still wanting to drink it all.

Old Chen's mobile phone was an old-fashioned button phone handed down from his son. Apart from making and receiving calls, the flickering icons on the screen were like ancient hieroglyphs to him, both familiar and strange. Every month, he would go to the business hall at the corner of the street to pay his phone bill, no more, no less, always fifty yuan. The clerk mechanically tapped on the keyboard and handed him a thin piece of paper printed with numbers and symbols he couldn't understand.

夜，黑魆魆的，像一块巨大的幕布，严严实实地罩下来，连一丝风都不透。墙上的挂钟，滴答，滴答，每一声都像是敲在心坎上，钝钝的，却又让人心烦意乱。

我翻了个身，将被子裹得更紧了些，可还是睡不着。医生说，半夜醒来超过半小时睡不着，就干脆起来。这算什么道理？起来又能做什么？在这钢筋水泥的盒子里，在这无边的黑夜里，我不过是一只困兽，连挣扎的力气都快要耗尽了。

Liu Fang's heart felt like it was being brutally scrubbed with sandpaper, each stroke bringing a bloody pain. She stared at the small, pale face; it was her son, Xiaojie, a boy who should have been celebrating his third birthday tomorrow. Now, he lay there quietly, like a discarded, broken toy, having stopped breathing forever.

I found out the parcel was lost on a gloomy afternoon. The voice on the other end of the phone was mechanical and indifferent, like a programmed machine, repeating words like "sorry," "unable to track," and "recommend reporting to the police." I hung up the phone and walked to the window, looking at the gray sky outside. In March in Tokyo, the air is filled with an indescribable dampness and a scent of decay.