Chapter Five: A Stranger’s Relics

The next morning, his wife died at an intersection she should never have crossed. He sang again. His wife lived, but his daughter no longer knew him. After the third song, his drummer died. After the fourth, an entire audience lost its relationships to one another in a stampede. “The tide isn’t charging a price,” He Chen said. “It is balancing an account. If someone returns from death, another person has to occupy the place they left.” “Did the people on White Whale die for Wen Yu?” “No. That storm was always coming. But in some realities, there is one additional casualty. Her surname is Tang.” Tang Li’s phone fell. Wen Yu opened the casualty list. As if soaked through, a ninth name surfaced on the paper: Tang Li.