I flicked the screen with my thumb, and brought up the picture of the woman, the picture of Shuang Po I’d trolled off the wire from her profile on Channel X. I hated that I’d done it, and I hated even more how goddamned pretty she turned out to be. She wore a neo-punk style, with twin wet drives sprouting from behind a half-shaved head. She had high cheekbones, gorgeous eyes, and a much better body than mine. I stared at her image, hating this woman I’d never met, then wiped her off the screen.
He’s hooking up with her, I thought, and even as hurt and anger started to twist around in my chest, I realized the unfairness of it but that just made me feel even worse. Vamp had made his feelings toward me pretty clear, but I’d always kept him at a distance. I kept him just close enough to keep him from leaving me altogether, just enough to leave that door open, and no more. He’d been really patient for a long time, but I found myself really afraid that his patience had run out.
I stared down at the pipe. Ash covered the top but it still had two good hits in it. I stared, and tried to push the idea out of my mind. So what if it was Shuang? He’d just finished telling me he’d been working with her, it didn’t mean anything. He wanted to run the blackout test soon, so it made sense they’d be working together tonight. He was doing all this for me….
She asked if she could smoke, though, so they had to be at his place.
On the screen behind the counter, I saw more footage of Ava from the other night. Her and LeiFang, together, shaking hands. The ticker that scrolled underneath them advertised the upcoming ceremony, and the old man in the booth scowled.
“Too soon,” he muttered.
Some old instinct flared up, almost prompting me to remind the guy it had been over fifty years, and that the haan weren’t going anywhere. They were citizens by default, no matter whether some fancy ceremony got held. They were part of our world, now, and they couldn’t leave if they wanted to, which they probably did.
I didn’t say any of it. I just watched the two on the screen. They cut a great picture, the two of them. LeiFang looked regal in her full uniform, strong, while Ava looked like some ethereal princess from a far-off land. They kept their hands clasped, their faces close so that the glow from Ava’s eyes bathed LeiFang’s face.
…and something flickered there, just for a second, some electronic glitch. A flash of static gray near LeiFang’s head.
I looked at the man behind the stall. He hadn’t seemed to notice. I leaned a little closer, waiting to see if it would happen again.
I sensed her before I saw her, a figure that broke from the sidewalk’s flow and began to drift my way. Her crisp, clean clothes stood out from the sea of damp colors and sweaty skin around her. She wore black slacks and a stylish paisley blouse, and her black hair hung down around her shoulders. She looked different enough that it took me a moment to realize it was Qian, the nurse who’d taken care of me in the hospital. Her heels rapped as she approached, and when she saw me she smiled and waved.
I found myself glad for the distraction, and the thread of smoke stopped jittering quite so much as she sat down in the seat next to me.
“Wow, you clean up nice,” I said.
“Thank you.”
“Qian, right?”
“I’m flattered you remember. Hello, Sam.”
“What are you doing in this dump?” The old man threw me a look.
“Heading home. I saw you, and thought I’d join you for a moment if that’s all right with you.”
“Knock yourself out.”
She ordered a drink, some kind of hot tea that I got the sense the old man had served to her before. She lifted the drink to her full lips, and sipped.
“Sam,” she said. “Is that a European name?”
“Kind of. My real name is Xiao-Xing. Everyone just calls me Sam.”
“Should I as well?”
“Sure.”
“You know, opiates, even the synthetic ones, can cause long-term health problems.”
I looked down at the pipe, which had almost gone out. “Yeah, I know.”
“Sorry,” she said. “I worry. It’s in my nature, but it’s none of my business.”
“It’s okay.”
“How are your friends? The ones who visited you?”
“Fine.”
She looked me over.
“You look upset, is something bothering you?”
“It’s nothing.”
She leaned in. “Boy troubles?”
I laughed, and it turned to a snort. “Boy troubles? Really?”
“Well,” she said, still smiling, “if it involves the young man who you asked for that night in the hospital, I think it fair to say you have him in the palm of your hand.”
“You don’t know the situation.”
“Maybe not… but I’ve been around a few years longer than you have. I know men.”
“Well, thanks,” I said. I watched the pipe fizzle out. Ten yuan up in smoke and me just as close to the edge as before, but I felt a small relief, a small victory, just the same. “He told me you said I remind you of your daughter.”
“That’s true.”
“I hope she’s not as much of a mess as me.”
Something in her expression changed, some emotion that bubbled up and was hidden just as fast.
“Don’t be so hard on yourself,” she said.
“I’ll try.”
“So… what have you and your friend been up to, since we last saw each other.”
“Not much.” I looked at her warily. That weird expression appeared on her face again, and then disappeared. A moment later, I felt a jab of pain in my temples.
“Are you okay?” she asked, noticing.
“I’m fine,” I said, rubbing my forehead. A scalefly flitted in front of my face, and I waved it away.
Her eyes moved to the poster for the missing boy, and turned sad. The kid couldn’t be any older than Alexei.
“It’s too bad,” she said.
“Yeah.”
“I hope they find him.”
“They won’t,” I told her. The old man shot me another look.
“You don’t think so?” Qian asked.
“Not where he’s gone.”
Qian shifted in her seat, curious.
“And where do you think that is?”
I turned back to her, and felt that shooting pain behind my eyes again. I felt like just saying it, just blurting it out to anyone who would listen. Something about her made me want to say what I thought, but I stopped short of doing it.
“The haan know,” I said instead.
I thought she’d question me on that, but she didn’t. She just sipped her tea.
“You know the haan have a proverb,” she said. “‘When you can eat a problem, you solve two.’”
She smiled, and her face flickered. Just for a second, but long enough. I felt my stomach begin to drop.
“Look, I’ve got to go,” I told her. I started to get up, and she put one hand on my wrist to stop me.
“You know, you really do remind me of my daughter,” she said.
“You said that.”
“It makes me feel a connection to you. I can’t seem to help it.”
Something appeared on the front of her blouse, a stain that I felt sure hadn’t been there a second ago. When she moved, it seemed to almost hover in front of the material, a red splotch, a squiggle surrounded by five frantic drops. It was the blood stain, the same one that had been on her uniform’s lapel in the hospital.
“I’ve got to go.”
She curled her fingers around my forearm, her grip gentle, but insistent. When I tried to pull away, she squeezed tighter, and leaned forward to speak into my ear. As she did, I caught movement from the corners of my eyes, something wet, and black, ropy strands of something that peeled away from her body, moving with a life of their own.
“I know you can see,” she said.
The world seemed to slow down around me, and the sweat on my neck turned cold. I tried to pull away again, and again she stopped me. Her grip had become like iron.