E
IGHTEEN
I’m walking back to the hotel to pack my stuff up. In the morning, it’s time to fly back home.
After rain, the night air is fresh – the first time since I arrived that it hasn’t pressed on my skin and invaded my nostrils and lungs.
It’s a relief. And with the relief, comes some kind of un-smogging of my brain.
Here’s what I know:
I have no clue what I’m doing out here, really.
I have been a shit boyfriend, and I need to fix things with Mia. Apologizing would probably be a good start.
I think I have just dodged me a massive bullet by not agreeing to do another job for Charles. Whatever is going on between him and the movie star, it’s not just friendly banter between two old pals.
To be fair, he didn’t hold it against me. He even gave me this expensive bottle of whisky to take home with me, wishing me safe travels.
This place feels less alien already, though. I’m even finding the girls here cute, which would never have happened before.
And look, this girl walking towards me is super cute in her blue miniskirt and black knee-high socks, and as we pass, we turn our heads to smile at each other, she’s got these mad contacts that make her eyes look huge, it’s a little interaction that makes me feel pretty good, and then there’s a loud, blaring HONK in my left ear, and a car has just screeched to a stop literally fifteen centimetres away from me, the guy at the wheel bashing on the horn, honk, honk, honk, he’s screaming at me, so I step back onto the pavement as fast as I can, and off he zooms down the street in his ninja-silent Toyota Prius.
I look at the stream of people behind me, but the girl is gone.
Just across the street from the hotel, just minutes before nine.
There’s Akemi, coming out the revolving doors, putting on her jacket.
I shout out her name, but she doesn’t hear me. So I start running—
—And then the world flips upside down.
I’m in the air.
I’m tumbling over something hard.
And then I’m right-way round again, and I can feel the cold, hard ground on my cheek.
And my hand is kind of hurting, so I lift it to my eyes, and I see that there’s blood all over it.
And in front of me I see red taillights, glowing in exhaust smoke. The bottle of whisky Charles gave me, it’s smashed into little shards all over the ground.
And above the lights, a cartoon picture of a smiling cow, a tall glass of milk in its hoof.
And I hear a voice, close and then far, call out, Guo lai!
Seductive and singing and sly.
And a little giggle gurgles its way out of my mouth, before everything goes dark.
N
INETEEN
In the corner of the living room, there was a CD player.
Naaamooooo aaaaaaaamiiiiituoooofoooooooo…
Naaamooooo aaaaaaaamiiiiituoooofoooooooo…
Naaamooooo aaaaaaaamiiiiituoooofoooooooo…
The monk drone from its speakers went on and on, all day and all night.
And my dad, well he was lying on his back in the middle of the room, raised up.
And me and my mum, we’re on our knees side by side.
The sick-sweet smoke from the joss sticks swirling, snaking.
My throat is scratchy from all the chanting.
I’m a fifteen-year-old kid with no idea what I’m doing. I mean, I know what I’m doing, I just don’t know why I’m doing it in the place I sneakily play Street Fighter in the middle of the night.
My parents don’t pray, they don’t meditate. I go to a Church of England school, and this is all like some sort of mystical nightmare.
My mum, she’s crying and her chanting’s all broken and choked.
