She doesn’t seem to notice. There are tears in her eyes as she stares at me. “Why did you come back?”
That’s not the question she’s really asking, because the answer is obvious. It’s splattered on my shirt and stretched out in my parents’ guest suite, trying not to bleed to death. What my mother can’t understand, what she really wants to know, is why I would risk it.
I don’t think I can tell her. Partly because I can’t cram it into words, but mostly because I’m not so sure myself. The morning’s adrenaline is gone — taking with it all the sharp clarity of emergency.
All I know is that I couldn’t, wouldn’t, let Jin die. I’m not the ruthless criminal Tsang thinks I am, the one I’ve pretended to be. I won’t add another body to my count.
“Is the doctor here yet?” I have no idea how much time has passed in this steam-filled washroom.
“He’s with the boy now.”
“Good.”
“I’ll go get some clothes from your old room.” My mother slides the door open wider. Steam slips out, reminding me that the world outside is clear. Cold. “And I’ll ask Emiyo to bring you some tea.”
She walks away before I can answer. Before I can remember and remind her that my old clothes won’t fit anymore. Too much time and too many inches have stretched out since I last lived here.
This revelation echoes through me. Painting every corner of every room I walk through. I’m changed. I don’t belong here anymore. This isn’t my world.
All my time in Hak Nam — all those years standing on the edge of the rooftops, standing and staring — I’d been wishing, longing, striving for this place. Or so I thought.
Coming home isn’t the answer. It doesn’t bring me peace.
So what is my freedom? My escape? What will fix me?
The door to the guest suite is shut. Emiyo has already mopped up the blood. The floorboards are still slick with wet. I never knew what clean smelled like before Hak Nam, but now I can’t ignore the sting of chemicals and lemons in my nose.
I stand in the last spots of wet and listen. For words, sounds… anything that might tell me if my friend is alive or dead. My ears are rewarded with a mess of footsteps and sharp orders. I can’t make sense of them; they’re jumbled, full of terms I don’t understand. They never slow, the frenzy leaks under the door, mixes with the lemons. I can’t stand still, so I pace, start walking circles around the sitting room. My fingers drum anxiously over the dark stains on my jeans.
My mother never comes with clean clothes, but Emiyo appears after a bit. A tray of green tea balances in her practiced hands.
“Master Dai?” She clears her throat and the teacups rattle. It’s the set Mother brought from her home country. Fired in kilns, painted with visions of lily pads and lotus blossoms.
“Please, just Dai,” I correct her. Even when I was younger, the term master set me on edge. Now it just feels like an absurdity.
Emiyo simply smiles at me, like she knows better but won’t dare to say it. “Your mother sent these down.”
Tucked under her arm is a set of clothes. A white button-down dress shirt and slacks. Clearly my father’s.
The maid places the tray down and holds the bundle of clothes out to me. Her eyes flick away and I follow them. In all my pacing, I streaked up the floor again.
“Thanks, Emiyo.”
“It’s good to have you home, sir.” Our maid bows. “We missed you.”
She’s being so nice. They all are. With their hugs and smiles and fresh clothes. Acting like nothing ever happened. Forgotten and forgiven. I wish I could look at myself with the same rose-colored glasses.
Emiyo bustles out of the room before I can manage a reply. I finally allow myself to stand still, hands clutched tight around the expensive dress shirt. I’m just contemplating putting it on when the door to the suite slides open. The man striding out is immediately familiar: Dr. Kwan, our family physician. His sleeves are rolled all the way above his ashy elbows. The rest of the shirt is almost as stained as mine.
Dr. Kwan pauses in front of me, doing a double take before he asks, “Where is your father?”
“I don’t know.” I hadn’t seen him since he rushed away to dial Dr. Kwan. But right now that’s the least of my concerns. “How’s Jin?”
He sighs, like he’s inconvenienced by the question. “She’s doing better. Lost a good deal of blood, but I got her stitched up. The knife missed all her major organs. It was a clean cut. I’ve already called the hospital for some blood bags. She’ll need transfusions.”
“Oh good. I—" The doctor’s pronoun choices catch up with me. Barrel over, drill into my thick skull. “She?”
I realize my mouth is hanging open, but I don’t care enough to shut it.
She. Her. It takes another minute for the words to sink in.
There’s no way…
Maybe I say this out loud. Or maybe the doctor reads my face. “You didn’t know? She went to pretty good lengths to hide it. But yes. She’s definitely a female.”
Jin’s a girl.
And here I was thinking I was the one with all the secrets.
9 days
MEI YEE
I cannot sleep. Every fiber, every muscle of my body, is still full, floating high with window thoughts. When the boy left, my mind went with him, dashing through imaginary streets, all the way home.
I’m running down the dirt road, past fields and fields of grass as bright and green as a liquor bottle. Past the stray dogs that beg at farmers’ steps for clumps of dried rice. Past the distant violet ridges of the mountains. I pass my father — back bent and splotched with sweat — knee-deep in the rice field’s murky waters. I pass my mother — hanging laundry to dry under the breadth of her ginkgo tree, arms mottled dark with storm cloud bruises. I go all the way until I reach my sister, so we can be together again. Just as she wished.
Would I go home if I found a way to get past these bars? Or would I go see the sea? The expanding-chamber possibilities are terrifyingly endless, just like its waters. The thought of being out in the world — alone — is enough to make me stop breathing.
But would I be alone? There’s the boy and what he said: I want you to see it, too. Something about his voice, his eyes, makes me think I’m not the only one whose insides are smoldering.
But I don’t know. I don’t know for sure. And the longer he’s gone, the more these things start slipping, the way a dream fades with each waking hour of the morning.
My restless body is twisting, turning under every one of these thoughts when the humming starts. It’s like the noise a spirit would make — soft and keening. It curls under my door, calls me to where she is.
The hallway is wrapped in dark, its lanterns hanging dim and smokeless. The sound — a thin, waiflike song — slips through the cracks of Sing’s door, slides through Mama-san’s lock. It brings bumps like small mountains over my flesh.
When I draw close, the wailing stops. There’s scrambling, the sound of slippers on floorboards, and the heavy thud of palms against wood shaking the door.
“Please! Please, give me more.” Sing’s voice is loud. Too loud. “I’ll be good! I promise!”
I’m frozen in the hall, looking at all the dead lanterns. They hang in rows, still and bulbous, like crimson moons that have been harvested and strung up to dry.
“Just one more! Please!” Sing screams. “I’ll do anything! Anything you want!”
The door shudders again. The rage behind it grows as if there isn’t a girl there anymore, but a wildcat that’s hissing, spitting, snarling to get to her cubs. But there are no cubs. There’s only me, and somewhere in this maze of lanterns and dark there’s a needle waiting to slide into Sing’s veins and give her another few hours of relief.