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The thing was, he told himself, of course the market was up and down, of course he knew that—he wasn’t stupid. But the government would never let the market drop. It had happened before, three years ago, and people still talked about it. The market had dropped by more than 40 percent and people w…

At first he’d tried moving 1,000 yuan to his account. He let it sit there for a month before moving it back, and no one noticed. Gradually the dawning realization set in. As long as the books added up when they were tallied at the quarter’s end, the money, it seemed, was his. And why not? Why let t…

If only he had more money to invest, he thought. Li Xueshi had recently bought a brand-new speaker set, and the two of them spent hours listening to the sounds of rappers paying frantic homage to places they’d never seen, New York, London, São Paulo. They had beautiful women in their beds and the b…

I missed work and didn’t mind. After the Tunnel of Love’s initial success, Hongxi wanted me to design more rides; they’d sent me to Europe, to Australia. I’d had other ideas, lots of them. But all they wanted were flying ladybugs, Tilt-A-Whirls, and the like. I had no interest! These days an amusem…

Later that night, he and Anning lay in bed under their duvet, which had started life as a white blanket trimmed with pink flowers but had since gone gray with dirt and age. The moonlight spilled in from the window across the floor. Beside him, Anning’s snores vibrated the room. Cao Cao turned on hi…