The factory had been closed for three years when Dave and Linda started walking there. It wasn't because they wanted to be somewhere private—though that was part of it—but because it was the only place in town that didn't ask you what you did for a living. Inside, the concrete floors were cracked and covered in a fine layer of rust dust that got into everything. The windows were broken, and the wind came through like a person breathing—slow, uneven, tired. There were machines in there still, big ones that had once shaped metal into something useful, but now they just sat there, covered in orange corrosion, like skeletons waiting to be buried. Linda liked it here. She said it made her feel like she was somewhere that had given up, which was comforting, because sometimes she felt like giving up too. Dave didn't say much when they came. He walked ahead of her, kicking at pieces of debris, watching them skitter across the floor like insects. He was thirty-two and had been working in a warehouse for ten years, and he had learned that silence was easier than conversation and conversation was easier than honesty. "My dad thinks you're useless," Linda said. They were sitting on a stack of pallets near the far wall, where the light from the broken windows made rectangles on the floor that looked like doors. Dave didn't look at her. "I figured." "He says you don't have ambition. That you just... exist. Like a plant." Dave kicked a piece of metal. It clattered across the floor and disappeared into the darkness. "Your dad knows a lot." "He doesn't know anything. He knows a police report. He doesn't know me." Dave looked at her. She was wearing a jacket that was too thin for the weather and lipstick that was the wrong colour, and she looked exactly as tired as he felt. "What do you want me to say?" he asked. "I don't know. Say something. Anything. Just don't sit there looking like a rock." Dave opened his mouth. Closed it. Opened it again. Nothing came out that wasn't stupid, so he kept his mouth closed. Linda sighed and leaned her head back against the pallet stack. The rust dust fell from her hair like snow. A man appeared in the doorway. He was maybe forty, wearing a leather jacket that had cracked with age and jeans that were too tight. His face was blank in the way that men from small towns often are—not empty, exactly, but uninteresting, like a page that had been written on and then written over until the original words were gone. "Hey," he said. "You two playing a game?" Linda sat up. "What game?" The man smiled, and it was not a nice smile. "A throwing game. You see that pile over there?" He pointed toward the far end of the factory, where a heap of broken concrete and rebar had accumulated over the years. "You throw a stone at it. Whoever throws furthest wins." Dave stood up. "We're not playing games." "Everyone plays games. It's what people do when they're bored. And you two look bored." Linda stood up too. "What do you get if you win?" The man shrugged. "Nothing. That's the point. It's just a game." Dave looked at Linda. She was looking at the man with an expression he couldn't read—curiosity, maybe, or defiance, or just the kind of stubbornness that made her do things she didn't need to do. "Let's just go," Dave said. "No," Linda said. And then, to Dave's surprise, she walked toward the pile of stones and picked one up. It was heavy, roughly the size of a fist, and covered in the same orange rust that coated everything in this place. "Hey," the man said. "You're first." Linda looked at Dave. "You go after me." Dave shook his head. "You go first." They stood there for a moment, looking at each other across three feet of rust-stained concrete, and Dave understood something that he would think about later and never fully understand: they were both trying to make the other person go first, and neither of them would admit it. Linda threw the stone. It flew through the air in a shallow arc and landed maybe twenty feet from the pile, bouncing once and coming to rest in the dust. Dave picked up a stone. It was heavier than the one Linda had thrown, or maybe he was just tired. He threw it anyway, and it landed maybe twenty-two feet from the pile. Two feet further. Not much. But enough. The man clapped, and it was a slow, mocking sound. "Not bad. Not bad at all. But the game isn't over." "What do you mean?" Linda asked. The man reached into his pocket and pulled out a cigarette. He put it in his mouth but didn't light it. "Your friend over there—he told your dad you two were fighting. Said you were about to break up. Your dad sent me to see if that was true." Dave felt something cold settle in his stomach. "What did you tell him?" "I told him I'd watch you two play a game. And I'd report back. That's all." Linda looked at Dave. "Is that true? Were you fighting?" Dave looked at the ground. "I don't know." "That's an answer." The man took the cigarette out of his mouth and examined it. "Here's what I told your dad: I watched two people throw stones at a pile of concrete. One threw it two feet further than the other. And then they stood there looking at each other like they didn't know what to do next." He smiled. "That's what I told him. That's what I'm going to report." Linda picked up another stone. "What happens now?" "Now you go home. That's it. That's the game." Linda stared at him for a long moment. Then she threw the stone. It flew through the air and landed maybe eighteen feet from the pile—shorter than her first throw. She picked up another stone and threw it. Seventeen feet. Another throw. Sixteen. Dave watched her throw stone after stone, each one shorter than the last, until her arm was shaking and her face was red and there was a line of stones on the floor that looked like a countdown to nothing. "Stop," Dave said. Linda didn't stop. She threw another stone. Fifteen feet. "Stop," Dave said again, louder. Linda stopped. She was breathing hard, and her hands were shaking, and there was rust dust all over her jacket and her hair and the front of her shirt. "Let's go," Dave said. They walked out of the factory in silence. The sky was the colour of wet concrete, and it was going to rain. They walked to the bus stop together, standing three feet apart, and neither of them said anything. The bus came twenty minutes late. Dave and Linda got on, sat next to each other without touching, and rode in silence while the rain started to fall. Dave's shift at the warehouse started at six in the morning. Linda's shift at the supermarket started at seven. They went to their respective homes, and neither of them called the other. The next day, Dave was stacking boxes in the warehouse when his boss called him into the office. "heard you've been hanging around the old factory," his boss said. He was a small man with a big voice, and he sat behind a desk that was covered in papers he never read. "Yeah," Dave said. "Your girlfriend's dad called me. Said you were causing trouble. Said you were messing with his daughter." Dave looked at the floor. "I'm not messing with anyone." "Your girlfriend's dad is a retired cop. He doesn't call people unless he has a reason." Dave didn't answer. There was nothing to say. "Look," his boss said. "I don't care what you do outside of work. But if you're causing problems, I can't have that here. Understand?" Dave nodded. "Understand." He went back to stacking boxes. Linda was ringing up groceries at the supermarket when her manager came over. "heard you've been hanging around the old factory," her manager said. She was a woman in her fifties who wore her hair in a bun and her disappointment like a uniform. "Yeah," Linda said. "Your dad called me. Said you were hanging around with a guy who doesn't have a future. Said you needed to grow up." Linda scanned a can of beans. "I'm twenty-nine. I grew up a long time ago." Her manager didn't smile. "Just be careful. Your dad's not wrong about everything." Linda didn't answer. She rang up the next customer—a man in his thirties buying beer and frozen pizza—and watched him leave without making eye contact. That evening, Linda went home and sat in her kitchen and stared at the wall. Her son was at his father's, and the house was quiet except for the refrigerator humming and the occasional car passing on the street outside. She thought about the stones. About how she had thrown them shorter and shorter, like she was trying to prove something to herself. About how Dave had watched her without saying anything. About how she had wanted him to say something—anything—but he hadn't. She thought about her father. About how he had sent a man to watch them play a game that had no point and no prize. About how he thought he was protecting her when really he was just making things harder. The phone rang. Linda stared at it until it stopped ringing. Then she went to the kitchen table and sat down and stared at the wall some more. The next morning, Dave was stacking boxes in the warehouse when he saw Linda through the window. She was standing across the street, holding a cup of coffee with both hands, looking at him through the glass. Dave put down the box he was holding and walked to the window. Linda was still there, still looking at him, still holding the coffee with both hands. Dave opened the door and walked outside. The air was cold and smelled like rain that never came. Linda set the coffee down on the hood of her car and looked at him. Her face was blank in the way that women from small towns often are—not empty, exactly, but uninteresting, like a page that had been written on and then written over until the original words were gone. "Hey," she said. "Hey." They stood there for a long time, saying nothing. The factory was behind Dave. The supermarket was across the street. The bus stop was two blocks away. The factory was the only place in town that didn't ask you what you did for a living. "Your dad called me again," Linda said. "I know." "He says if you don't straighten up, he's going to make you regret it." Dave looked at the ground. "I figured." Linda picked up her coffee and took a sip. It was cold. She didn't seem to care. "What are you going to do?" she asked. Dave looked at the factory. Then he looked at Linda. Then he looked at the road that led out of town, past the factory and past the bus stop and past everything that had ever asked him what he did for a living. "I don't know," he said. Linda nodded. She set the coffee back on the hood of her car and got in. She started the engine and drove away, and Dave watched her go until she was just a pair of taillights in the grey morning. Then he went back inside and started stacking boxes. © 2026 - Authored by Z R ZHANG ( EL9507135 -- パスポート番号[ちゅうごく] 중국 여권 번호 Номер паспорта หมายเลขหนังสือเดินทาง Passnummer رقم جواز السفر CHN Passport) The aforementioned Author hereby grants to OXFORD INDUSTRIAL HOLDING GROUP (ASIA PACIFIC) CO., LIMITED (BRN74685111) all economic property rights, including but not limited to the rights of: reproduction, distribution, rental, exhibition, performance, communication to the public via information network, adaptation, compilation, commercial operation, authorization for third-party use, and rights enforcement. Such grant is exclusive and irrevocable. The term of such rights shall be 49 years from the date of publication. To contact author, please email to datatorent@yeah.net Based on the pending patent application document (202610351844.3), creationstamp.com has calculated the tensor feature encoding of this article: TENSOR ENCODING (OTMES v2): DIR-2000-RUST-TRUTH-4ACT-1300W-NO-SUP-PER-1PL-LIM Style: Dirty Realism | TI: 30.0 | θ: 315° Location: Rust Belt Town | Theme: Everyday life and meaningless choices Structure: 4-act (20%-30%-35%-15%) | Perspective: 3rd person limited