Zhou turned his phone sideways.
On the screen, a red chariot sat under his thumb. Three more spaces forward and it would be right in the black general's face.
He had the whole row of benches by the lake to himself. He didn't let go yet. This game had been hard to come by.
The six o'clock tai chi had barely reached its closing moves when he checked the lower left corner.
Games: 0 won, 5 lost | 3 days left
Old Gu's stone table was empty. He hadn't shown up yet.
Three days left and still no wins. Zhou wasn't going to sit around waiting, so he'd turned and sat down at the next table over. Across from him was an old man in a red vest, already ringed by a crowd of onlookers.
On move nineteen, the red vest pulled off a horse-and-cannon checkmate.
He swept the pieces back into the box.
"Go home and practice, young fella. Then come back."
Someone in the crowd laughed out loud.
Zhou's stool hadn't even warmed up before a new opponent took the other side, an old man carrying a birdcage. He hung the cage in the fork of a scholar tree, sat down on the stone stool, and this time the loss came even faster.
The birdcage man held up the chariot he'd captured and tapped it on the edge of the table.
"Fast, I'll give you that. Same as my grandson with his video games."
The box in the lower left corner ticked over twice.
Right about then, a soy milk tricycle rolled up beside the chess tables.
The red vest held his phone up to the QR code on the handlebars, stretched his arm way out, then brought it back in. He scanned three times, and all three times the same ad popped up. The birdcage man took the phone, peered at it, and just made a video call instead, yelling at the screen for his grandson to get out of bed.
Zhou didn't wait for the next person to sit down. He got up and headed for the lake, downloading a chess app on the way.
It had five difficulty levels. He picked the lowest one: Beginner.
Now he lifted his thumb, and the red chariot dropped into place.
Golden fireworks burst across the screen. In the middle, in big letters: VICTORY.
He held the phone up to his face and looked again.
At the park: Huaiyin Park. A game of chess: Chinese chess. Win: by checkmate. It said so right there on the screen.
All three, accounted for.
He held the phone level and waited for the box in the lower left corner to tick over.
A ding sounded in his ear.
[Elder Zhou, that's a machine you're playing! A machine can't stand in for a chess buddy. This game doesn't count.]
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[Chess belongs at the chess tables, face to face with your old pals. That's where the fun is!]
[Too much phone time is bad for your eyes! Close them and rest a couple of minutes, Elder Zhou!]
[Games: 0 won, 7 lost | 3 days left]
On the screen, the fireworks were still going off one after another, and the red chariot sat squarely in the black general's face.
Doesn't count.
Zhou stared at the trapped general and muttered, "The bench is in the park too."
Another ding sounded in his ear.
[You're absolutely right, Elder Zhou! The air in the park is so good for you. Sit a while longer!]
He didn't say anything else.
Something clattered behind him.
Old Gu was standing behind the bench with his hands clasped behind his back and the cloth bag hooked over his arm. The chess box that never quite closed was rattling around inside it. He leaned over for a look at the screen just as the last firework went off.
"Where's the fun in playing a phone?"
Zhou flipped the phone face down on his leg.
"It doesn't drink my tea."
Old Gu snorted.
"Stingy."
He headed off toward the stone tables, hands behind his back, the cloth bag clattering with every step.
The phone on Zhou's leg buzzed.
He turned it over. A pop-up sat in the middle of the screen, one line in big gold letters: Study master games one hour a night. Skyrocket your skill in 7 days!
Below it was an orange button that said Start Now. Just above the button, in small print, was the recommended time slot: 9:00–10:00 PM.
He looked at that nine-to-ten.
He tapped the X in the top right corner, went back to the home screen, pressed his thumb on the chess icon until it started to wiggle, and tapped Uninstall.
"I'm in bed by nine-thirty."
The clock in the top right corner of the screen flipped to 7:06. He put the phone back in his pocket, got up, and headed for the east gate.
Behind him, something clattered across a stone table. Old Gu had dumped out a whole box of wooden pieces.
At nine-thirty that morning, the chair diagonally ahead swiveled around.
Wen Yining had a pen in her hand. She glanced at the wall of monitors across from Zhou first, and only then looked at him.
"I read the plan. Just send out a survey. The template's on the shared drive. Use a different channel from Lu Heng. Send it out today. I want to see responses tomorrow."
By the time Zhou got an "Okay" out, she was already replying to someone else's message.
She'd read it.
A little after noon, things got lively behind the wall of monitors.
On Lu Heng's leftmost monitor, the big number in the center now read 213. The progress bar had made it a little way across. The five age-group colors had all filled in, one segment after another, tall ones and short ones lined up in a tidy row, like someone had measured them with a ruler.
Two or three coworkers came around the partition with their lunch boxes and crowded in behind him.
"Two hundred and thirteen already? Wasn't it eighty-something last night?"
"You could put that chart straight into the review."
Lu Heng held his coffee and didn't turn around. His eyes stayed on the screen.
"It's only day one."
Nearby, Song Xiaobei's chopsticks stopped in midair. It was a while before the bite made it into his mouth.
Zhou unscrewed his thermos and took a sip.
The last number he'd seen before turning off the light last night was 86. One night's sleep later, it had more than doubled.
At two that afternoon, he opened the shared drive.
The template was right at the top. The file was called Senior User Needs Survey_Standard. He changed the channel field the way Wen Yining had said, picked one that wasn't Lu Heng's, and went back to the first page.
Question 1: How much time do you spend on your smartphone each day?
Four options underneath: Less than 1 hour. 1–3 hours. 3–5 hours. More than 5 hours.
He thought of his grandma. Holding her phone up and squinting at it, hunting for the back button with her arm stretched way out, looking for ages and never finding it.
Then he thought of the red vest that morning, scanning the code on the handlebars three times and getting the same ad all three times. And the birdcage man yelling at a video call for his grandson to get out of bed.
How would they answer this one?
A little after three, he went to the break room to top up his hot water. When he came back, the same page was still on the screen.
Question 1 was still at the top.
The clock in the bottom right corner crept forward, minute by minute. Across the way, the typing never stopped. At one point Lu Heng posted another screenshot to the group chat. Zhou didn't open it.
5:29.
The cursor sat on the blue Send button.
His hand was on the mouse. He didn't click.
The bottom right corner flipped to 5:30.
Zhou let go of the mouse and closed his laptop.
Diagonally ahead, Wen Yining looked up and glanced at the laptop he'd just closed.
She didn't say anything.