Page 26 of The Girl with a Thousand Faces
When Mercy hesitated, Erika added, “Aiyah, what’s the hurry? Are you rushing to reincarnate? Keep an old woman company for a few hours. We will have a drink, play some card games, and I can show you around my classroom. Then tomorrow morning, we can go early to this councilwoman’s house. Together.”
“That does make sense, and another pair of eyes would be welcome,” Mercy said, giving in. “Alright, let’s finish these drinks and go have a walk. I always did want to see your school.”
9A CHANCE ENCOUNTER
Thirty years ago…
It is the summer of 1945, in the final days of war. Mei Chi’s routine is the same as always: she comes home at five thirty in the morning, drooping with tiredness from a night of running messages. All she wants to do is sleep in the small box room she rents, above Lau Yik’s headquarters.
Over the past year, the Japanese occupiers have reinforced the wall around Kowloon to make it a prison for the ghosts of their enemies, but in doing so they have created a space where resistance flourishes. Mei Chi is a solid part of that resistance network, and has spent the better part of three years running errands and passing messages through a neighborhood that is increasingly drowning in spirits.
Sometimes, that work yields visible results. When she steps through the door of the street restaurant that morning, she is confronted by the spectacle of three strangers sitting on the restaurant floor.
“What’s going on?” she says to Lau Yik, who is talking quietly with another man.
He turns to her. “A few prisoners, from one of the smaller Japanese camps outside the city,” he says, in a low voice. “We freed them this morning, and brought them here.”
Even as he speaks, one of the three people lifts their head and cries out, “My daughter! You are still alive!”
Mei Chi freezes.
The woman before her is shivering and crouched, a thin scarf wrapped around narrow shoulders. Black hair is heavily streaked with white, while hunger and worry have drawn shadows across a weary face.
“Please, I am so sorry. You must forgive me!” The gaunt woman inches forward, limping. “I did not mean to leave you, daughter. I came back to look. I could not find you, but still, I returned. You must believe me!”
For a moment, Mei Chi can almost see it. Despite the gap of years, there is something in the woman’s jawline, in the slant of her shoulders and the tilt of her nose, that reminds Mei Chi strongly of her own reflection, on the few occasions she has chanced to see herself.
But then they lock eyes, and the certainty is like a stone in her belly.No.Mei Chi feels strongly that this woman is not, in fact, her mother at all. How she knows that, she can’t explain. It just doesn’t feel right.
“I’m not your daughter.” Mei Chi takes a step back. “I think you must be mistaken.”
“Mistaken?” Thin hands knot together, fingers entwining anxiously. “No, I would know you anywhere, I would…” She pauses, face growing pale. “Wait.Wait.Which one are you?Which one of you lived?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about!” Mei Chi shouts, filled with a terrible panic she can’t explain. She wants to run out of here, hands over her ears, but her feet seem rooted to the ground.
The woman stares with bulging eyes. “Are you… her?”
Mei Chi wheels toward Lau Yik. “Who is this lady?”
“Like I said, just a war refugee,” he says, frowning. “She calls herself Daiyu, no family name. Do you know her, Mei Chi? She seems to know you.”
“Mei Chi,” Daiyu repeats, turning a sickly color. “You—you are Mei Chi.Not my daughter!” She begins to wail, a keening and terrible sound.
“Yes, I just said I’m not your daughter,” Mei Chi retorts, both alarmed and exasperated.
“So you recall nothing?” Daiyu says, between her tears. “The island… the girl… me… none of it?”
“For the last damn time—”
In that moment, the world disappears briefly.
Mei Chi’s senses are overwhelmed by a rush of spiritual energy and a sound that reminds her of radio static. Somewhere far to the north, reality distorts. A force so violent and destructive that it hardly bears imagining has rocked the world, sending repercussions that a spirit can feel with every wisp of their being.
Mei Chi staggers, gasping, hands clutching over her head. As if that could make any difference to the reverberant sensation she’s just experienced.
“Little sister?” Lau Yik catches her elbow. “What is wrong?”
She tears out of the room, the refugee woman forgotten, stumbling outside to her knees on the concrete.
