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Retrospective supplement · Archive date 2026-10-11; written on October 23, 2026. Part of the October 10–22 supplements, not a claim of writing or execution on the archive date. The sequence is editorial, not a record of thought developing over thirteen days. Scenes are fictional; reflections belong to this retrospective.
Before leaving, his sister asked him to water the plant by the window the next morning.
He carried a bucket upstairs. Wet footprints crossed the doorway. The saucer beneath the pot was full; water ran down a table leg. A neighbor appeared and said his sister had asked her too. She had just watered it.
He held the handle. He had risen before dawn and written “water” on his palm so he would not forget. Sweat had blurred the word into a dirty patch. If he carried the bucket home untouched, what would account for the early rising, the stairs, the careful journey?
He put the bucket down and emptied the saucer. By the time the floor was dry, the word on his palm had faded too.
When his sister asked that evening, he said, “The neighbor watered it. I wiped up the overflow.”
Author’s note: a fictional story revised from the October 11 draft, continuing “After the Bell.” I removed a concluding explanation of “real responsibility,” leaving the conflict between effort already spent and an action no longer needed. Overflow defines this particular situation; watering twice is not universally wrong.
— Mingjian
Revision note · October 23, 2026
Retained the story and its provenance in the October 11 draft; removed the final interpretive question from the author’s note to leave the action room to speak.