Page 86 of The Girl with a Thousand Faces
What is it fucking called!
This is ridiculous; it is on the tip of her tongue, just out of reach. Yet the name has fallen out of her head, disappeared like a wild rabbit through an unlocked gate, and she cannot seem to summon it back.
Bandaged Woman is still waiting, expression unreadable beneath the gauze.
“A friend,” Mei Chi concludes lamely, and hopes the flatness of her tone sounds evasive rather than distressed. “She is a friend.”
“So you said.”
The fading of her memories is not a good sign. The flesh that encloses her seems heavy, like she’s stepped into a pit of wet clay. She has a terrible sense that if she does not get out of this skin very soon, it will be too late to ever leave it.
Especially since she has, apparently, already been wearing it for over two days.
Guilt clamps down. Her life is a disaster. All she has ever done is make trouble, anger other people, get her cat killed. (Wait, where is her cat? Doesn’t his ghost usually follow hers?) And now she has killed her only friend. (Who? What was her name?)
She needs to go back. Somehow. She can’t recall exactly where that is, only that she feels sure she’d remember it if she saw it again. First, though, she needs to make sure she does not forget the things that are important. Before her disintegrating memory takes even basic details from her.
A tiny fragment of glass glitters on the ground next to her pallet, where someone has dropped a vial or a syringe. Mei Chi picks it up and presses the jagged edge to her skin. She chooses the arm that doesn’t have a lightning scar, since that one is still sore and healing.
“What are you doing?” Bandaged Woman says, uneasily.
“Mind your own business.” Mei Chi scratches her name into the skin, deep as she dares. The characters ofChen Mei Chiare shaky but readable, already welling up with blood. Got to have your own name.
The vessel rocks suddenly, caught by a high swell. Everything in the room rattles. The other patients groan with pain or fear. From somewhere outside, thunder booms.
“That doesn’t sound good.” Mei Chi clutches the edges of her bed, blood dripping along her arm.
“Typhoon season,” Bandaged Woman agrees, and she looks troubled, too. “The storms have been bad this year.”
More thunder as the ship lists again, and men shouting orders from other levels. Mei Chi does not speak Japanese, but she can detect a hint of rising panic in their voices. She is in the midst of wondering whether this could be used to her advantage, when the silhouette of boots from under the door moves away abruptly; whoever was stationed outside has left.
“Are you coming?” She looks at the bandaged woman.
“Are you crazy? It’s dangerous out there! Soldiers, storms, oceans—”
“Fine, stay here. Thanks for answering my questions.” She doesn’t have time to stay and argue. Besides, the other woman is right: it’s dangerous out there. Only a fool would try to leave.
Or someone with nothing to lose.
“Wait for me. Forgive me,” Mei Chi whispers. “I’m coming back!”
But she can no longer recall quite whom she is talking to. Her memories are like a pool of water, drying fast under a midday sun.
The door is locked. Mei Chi finds a metal ruler and jams it into the crack, leveraging it open; the lock is cheap and gives quickly. An empty hallway greets her, the floor wet with sodden bootprints. She can hear shouting, though she can’t see anyone yet. Ahead of her are stairs, leading up to another landing.
Her body is weak, injuries still aching. Every step is a trial, especially as the ship begins pitching steeply from side to side. On the next level, men in uniform are scurrying down corridors in all directions, shouting and wild-eyed. Few seem to notice her, and none care enough to stop. Their vessel is in trouble, and so are they.
The ocean. She needs the ocean.
She keeps going. Another set of metal stairs, and now she is out in the open air.
Chaos dominates up here. Wind and rain lash the deck, making it slippery as dolphin skin. Men scream orders and counter-orders while thunder is one continuous roll above them, the sky illumined by sheets of lightning. As if the gods are flicking a light switch repeatedly.
Mei Chi clings to the railing, unable to stand on that rolling deck without assistance, unsure what she should do. For a moment, she is convinced that this is a terrible mistake. If the storm doesn’t kill her, these soldiers will, once it calms down. There is no hope of swimming in these seas, let alone getting back to the island whose name now eludes her.
And then a wave as tall as a cliff knocks their vessel up and over, and it’s too late to worry about anything else.
Picture a girl, floating in a storm-churned ocean.
