OUR

I watch a picture of myself appear like magic, warping and wobbling under chemical ripples as I swirl it around with tongs.

Except it’s not really a picture of me, but a picture of Other Me – a portrait I made of him when we had hot pot in the canteen the other night.

And this, this is straight-up proof that I am not imagining this guy, or going crazy.

I hang the picture to dry on the line, flip on the lights.

It’s not a candid picture, I asked him if I could make his portrait. And unlike me, he didn’t arch his eyebrows to make his eyes look bigger – which has the effect of making me look surprised all the time – or throw out a cheesy grin to avoid the probability of looking awkward in a photo.

In this picture, he’s just staring straight into the lens. Eyes smiling. A slight upturn at the corners of his mouth.

No lie, I am still creeped the hell out.

But on the flip side, this guy, this other me, he’s like…

A better me.

In every way.

The perfect me.

Like I’m the prototype, he’s the polished, finished version.

The whole thing is bizarre, fucked-up, fascinating. But where does that leave me?

I think about Mia, and I think about Tanner, and I think that maybe if I was more like Other Me, then I’d still be in London, still with Mia.

And we’d be happy. Or happier than we were.

And Tanner would be an insignificant stroke of slug slime that would never have streaked its way across our path.

Probably.

I think that maybe I would not have to be a surly douchebag everywhere I go.

Seriously though. What kind of name is Tanner?

Portrait now dry, I unpeg it and look down at the image in my hands, this off-kilter version of me that seems to have the answer to the question I’m asking.

I pour the chemicals in the tray away, flip the lights off, and walk out the darkroom.

F

ORTY

-F

IVE

We’re in a barbecue joint, neon signs for American beer companies buzzing next to my head, my arse squeaking on the cushy, deep-red leather of the booth.

Other Me, he has a forkful of burnt ends, closes his eyes, chews and says, Oh boy. This, this is just ridiculous. Here, you’ve got to try some of this.

Before I can decline, he spears another chunk of meat and holds it in front of my mouth, and the intimacy is so shocking that all I can do is open up like a baby and let the choo-choo train in.

The meat is juicy, and tender, and good, but right now I find myself wanting the small and varied flavour bombs that you get from dim sum. The soy sauce, the spring onion, the ginger, the garlic, the vinegar, the rice wine.

Umami for days.

Wait, you’ve got a little sauce there, he says, and he leans forward to wipe the corner of my mouth with his napkin.

So, am I right? he says, eyes on mine, waiting for me to break down the meat enough so I can swallow, and for the surely enthusiastic response.

No playing, you are right, I say.

Over the course of the evening, we’ve shot the breeze. We’ve talked about growing up, photography, this crazy, ugly beautiful city that is an all-out assault on the senses.

I sip my microbrewery bottled beer and I say, Have you heard of the 228 incident?

He puts his knife and fork down, nods while he chews. Of course I have, he says.

What’s that all about then?

Well, it’s pretty long and complicated, he says. But in a nutshell?

In a nutshell.

He pulls on his beer and signals to the waiter for another one.

So, it’s the end of World War Two. Japan surrenders to the Allies, and Taiwan is now in the hands of the Republic of China after fifty years of Japanese rule.

He says, But the Taiwanese people? They’re pissed, on account of the Kuomintang – the new ruling government – taking their property for no reason, stopping people from getting involved in politics. The Kuomintang are bad with money, so there’s mad inflation, unemployment, food shortages, a huge black market. Corrupt shit.

One day, it’s 27 February 1947, state Tobacco Monopoly Bureau agents beat on a forty-year-old widow because they think she’s selling contraband cigarettes. The Bureau, it deals with tobacco, booze, tea, stuff like that, so pushing non-state-sanctioned product is very non-cool for them. The people who see this on the street, they’re mad because, well, wouldn’t you be if you saw government officials giving a defenceless person a beat down?

The waiter comes back and deposits another bottle of beer on our table. Other Me, he doffs an imaginary cap and he says, Gracias.

So the next day, he says, on the twenty-eighth, you’ve got people rising up in front of the Bureau building, raging at the way they treated this widow, raging at the way they’re being treated themselves. And then a bunch of soldiers roll in and start shooting.

News of the rebellion gets out and the whole island gets in on the action. At this point, the governor, Chen Yi, he starts freaking out, calls in more military backup. And before you know it, the National Revolutionary Army is everywhere, murdering people left, right and centre. Around 28,000 people die in the massacre.

Twenty-eighth of February, I say. That’s why it’s called the 228 incident.

Bingo, says Other Me.

I say, Then what?