“It’s plenty of my business, Kuen,” Dai says, interrupting him. His manner is sharp, cold. Like a razor’s edge. “Believe me. I’ll shoot you if you don’t get out of here.”
Kuen slinks away. His elbow stabs the air like a bird’s broken wing, trying to stop the blood. His followers give Dai a wide berth as they disappear down the street. Bon is the last to leave the alley. He darts out faster than a dragonfly.
My knife hand is shaking. Haunted by the possibilities of what could’ve happened if Dai hadn’t shown up. I’m glad, so glad, I didn’t have to stab Bon. But this feeling is short-lived. Kuen’s not finished with me. And the city’s boundaries are tight enough to guarantee I’ll see him again. Soon.
Dai stands, looking down the street. He clutches tight to his gun, every knuckle painfully white. His hands are shaking, too.
“You okay?” When he looks up, I realize that I’m still crouched at the edge of the sloping tin sheet. I slide off slowly.
Test each limb to see if anything hurts. An angry red line throbs through the crease in my palm. I must have cut it on the edge of the tin.
“I’m fine.” I wipe the blood onto my tunic. Another smear. Another scar.
Dai has moved to the middle of the alley. He’s poking the tarp’s tattered carcass with his foot. My throat squeezes when I see the gun, still there, in his hand. “What are you doing here? Were you following me?”
“Just checking up on you.” Dai glances up from the rubble. His eyes are so dark, like tar. The adrenaline of the moment swirls behind them. Something like terror and… sadness?
“Look who’s being protective now.” I slip my knife back into my bindings. Cross my arms. “I was doing fine on my own!”
“Were you?” He glances at the outcast roof. Something about his face seems raw. Shaken. “It was a good plan. But I’m not sure how long you would’ve lasted up there.”
I swallow when he tucks the revolver into the waist of his jeans. It disappears. A skeleton of danger, power, buried under fabric and denim. I never would’ve guessed what Dai was hiding there. There are plenty of guns floating around these streets, but they never belong to vagrants. Guns are expensive. Impossible to steal. It’s usually members of the Brotherhood whose fingers pull the triggers.
But Dai can’t be Brotherhood. Can he?
No… No one in the Brotherhood would feel bad about firing a bullet. Their hands wouldn’t shake as Dai’s do now.
“Where’d you get that?” Dai seems different now that I know he has a gun. He looks a few inches taller.
“Mr. Lam’s shop.”
“How’d you get past him and those bars?”
“I bought it. With money.”
My lids narrow. Not even all the cash stuffed into my orange envelope could buy me a gun. Where did Dai get the money?
He knows I don’t believe him. “I’ve been making runs for a while now, Jin. I’ve got stuff saved up from over the years.”
Something doesn’t sit right. It doesn’t fit together. The gun, the nice meals. His clothes without holes. Dai shouldn’t have as much money as he does. Not if he’s just a drug runner. Not if he’s telling the truth.
Questions edge my crooked teeth. Ready to sink into the meat of Dai’s lie. Rip it apart. Hound the truth out of those cornered fox eyes. I open my mouth to attack.
But the questions don’t come. I think of the gun in his jeans. The one he just fired to save my life. Pumpkin porridge sits heavy in my belly, still warm. A reminder that I haven’t been hungry for days.
Dai might not be telling the truth. But he’s given me every reason to trust him.
I breathe deep. The bindings squeeze against my budding chest. The girlhood I keep hidden to survive.
Everyone in the Walled City has secrets. I might want the truth, but I need my sister more. I can’t risk losing my only way into Longwai’s brothel. Not over this.
I exhale. My breath turns to steam, clouds the air between us. “You’ve had a gun this whole time?”
“I don’t want people to know. But I guess all that’s gone to shit now.” He sighs and grabs a fistful of hair. The clump is so black it’s almost blue. His hands still shake. “I’ve never fired it before.”
“Guess I should feel special,” I mutter, and kick at a lone tarp piece. It flops on the alley floor like a dying fish.
The older boy gives me an odd look. The blue plastic shred licks the edge of his shoe. He kicks it back to me. “They didn’t leave much, huh? You should come stay at my place.”
“I can’t.” My reply is automatic. Ever since the night I rolled off the bamboo mat I shared with Mei Yee, I’ve slept alone. Too much can happen when you’re asleep. Dead to the world.
Dai shakes his head. “Don’t be stupid, Jin. You saw the look on Kuen’s face — he’ll be looking for you.”
Dai’s right. It’s exactly the kind of thing someone like Kuen would do. He didn’t strip me of my tarp to use it. He destroyed it. Took away another piece of my armor for survival. And now that I’ve gone and messed up his pretty face…
Chma settles in the slight break between my legs. His bushy tail twitches back and forth like the hands on those fancy fake watches the street hawkers sell.
“We’ve got a good thing going over at Longwai’s,” he goes on. “I don’t need you getting cut to pieces in some alley.”
“I can take care of myself.” I bend down and pick up my cat. My hurt hand throbs against Chma’s fur. I don’t even have a blanket to wrap it in.
“Stubborn, aren’t you?” There’s no humor in the way he says this. “What do you suggest I tell Longwai next time I see him? That you got knifed in the back because you were too proud to sleep somewhere safe?”
He’s right. I am too proud. Too proud, too tired, too cold. I can’t save myself. Not this time. I have to follow Dai back to his shelter. If I want to live the night, I have to trust him. Let him protect me.
I let out another cloudy breath. “Fine. I’ll go to your place.”
I squeeze my cat tighter. Holding him helps keep me from shaking. Chma seems to know this, because he doesn’t try twisting his way out of my grasp. He lies as limp as a dead thing on my shoulder while I follow Dai to some mysterious corner of the city.
DAI
The gun in my jeans weighs tons. My hands are in my pockets, trembling like a dog spooked by a foghorn. Shivering and burning from the power of the metal.
I’ve carried the same gun for two years, but this is the first time I’ve pulled the trigger. The first time I’ve fired a weapon since the night that changed everything. I had no choice. I had to fire it. Unleash a shot that tore the air apart, unraveled every nerve in my body at once.
My emotions are like pounds of overcooked rice noodles. Spilling everywhere. Impossible to gather back together again. I blame them for my split-second decision to bring Jin back here.
Of course, if I were following my old rules, I would’ve stayed out of the alley altogether. Kept walking with my head down. Let nature run its course, the way it did when Kuen pounded Lee’s face in.
But, like Jin said himself, he’s special. I need him.
Questions are all over the kid’s face when we stop at the gated door. Of course he always thought I was a vagrant, surviving on drug runs and luck. A persona I’m now shattering by pulling oil-stained keys out of my pocket.
The door to my apartment building is identical to almost every other door in this city. It’s barred, crammed between a seafood restaurant packed with smoking diners and a dimly lit noodle-maker’s shop. First I unlock the gate, then the door behind it.
“This… this is your home?” The boy blinks.
Home. The word fills me with an ache. I shove the door open with a rusty squeal. The stairwell behind it never really grows less ugly. Its walls are soaked with water, crumbling like a sand castle on its last legs. A few years ago someone decided to paint them green, but only patches have lasted. Even those are peeling off in rot and curls, like a snake shedding dead skin.