Preparation For The Next Life

After spending the evening having sex, Skinner gives Zou Lei a cell phone. After she returns to her apartment later that evening, she looks at the phone and finds a message from Skinner to his mother, promising to return home when he is ready.

During another visit to Skinner’s home, Zou Lei becomes drunk and begins crying about her father, stating that she will never “see him again,” and Skinner tries to comfort her by wrapping her in his poncho liner (112). When she sobers up, Zou Lei tells Skinner that her father died a long time ago, and she is happy now. Zou Lei tells Skinner that she loves all of him, even his scars.

The narration shifts to Zou Lei’s first-person point of view. She states that people should thank the military for everything that they do because, without them, there would be no goods or services. She discusses incidents in which soldiers needlessly died in accidents or because the government refused to spend the money it would take to save them.

The story then shifts back to the third-person point of view as Skinner and Zou Lei look at pictures on Skinner’s phone.