THE SADDEST GIRL SINCE THE SONG DYNASTY

CONFESSIONS ON A ROOFTOP - PART II

The grounds for Lady Zhao having reservations about the bar they were headed for related to her either kissing, sleeping with or stalking on social media the manager who was also a barman. She explained in exasperations, as if it was all obvious, yet flipping between these three and other interpretations of history in a deliberate act of obfuscation, so Ander thought, listening from where he was. Several times, she made reference to 'an unspeakable shame.'

Yenny tried to console. "He won't be there anyway... these places change hands so often, there's most likely a new owner, new staff..."

"But you don't understand the circumstances."

When they arrived, and when Sooming eventually caught up, Yenny was taken aside by his fiancée for what looked like a stank encounter. Trav, still talking to someone not physically present with him, mimed an offer to get refreshments for Dor—Yen, Sooming and Lady Zhao. Ander, who was never addressed directly by name or with eye contact, asked for a Sangria.

So Lady Zhao and Ander, the two certified business-world-ready King Endowment summer school alumni, were left with only one another for company, and they made their way upstairs to the rooftop where it was a little quieter, a little less congested to hang out. On the face of it, the situation was like old times, that one August four years earlier when they had spent nearly every day in one another's company. Except, they had both changed so much. A few video calls, emails, exchanged photos had filled the gap – these had kept them in touch, had enabled this trip – but a week into Ander's visit, it was becoming clear it wasn't like old times at all.

On the north, east and south faces of the rooftop were sixth floor views of the city – streaks of neon blue picking out the highways, and yellow speckled oblongs marking the taller residences. On the west was an austere, modern wall, the undecorated side of a building that rose maybe a dozen stories higher. On the side furthest from where Ander and Lady Zhao leaned over railings to pass judgments on passersby on the street below was a drinks station made of driftwood to look like a beach shack, adorned with a surfboard that probably had never seen surf, a meaningless slogan ("Tide in guy so glass up"), and a menu of sea related puns. In the center, a tree, a huge banyan, elegant, its tendrils covered in fairy lights and drooping down to granite flagstones, its mushroom canopy heavy looking, surely too big to be hovering twenty meters above street level.