CHAPTER TEN
There has to be a better way to get in my exercise for the day than sprinting to catch the bullet train, my vision half-obscured by my bangs, while my luggage bumps violently along the pavement behind me and Wang Laoshi yells at everyone to move faster because our tickets are nonrefundable.
Many better ways. As we all pile into the train car mere seconds before the doors slide shut, sweating and panting so hard that the other passengers turn to stare, I manage to think of at least ten examples just off the top of my head, including but not limited to: Getting chased by the ghosts from the haunted teahouse. Washing a full sink of dirty dishes by hand. Wrestling a bear.
But I can’t help laughing with Daisy and Oliver when we finally collapse into our seats, our bags dumped gracelessly into the space beneath the footrests. I’m not sure if it’s the relief of catching the train in time, or if it’s the unexpected happiness bubbling beneath the exhaustion and stress of the morning. That unique camaraderie that I imagine forms only when you’re traveling in a tight-knit group like this, away from home and old haunts and clinging on to these half strangers who have suddenly become more familiar to you than anyone else.
And in casual, unremarkable moments such as this one, I’m gripped by the novel idea that the people around me actually like me , for some bizarre reason I’m still trying to figure out—if only so I don’t mess it up and make them stop.
“That was way too close,” Daisy says as a jingle ascends over the train speakers.
A pleasant, prerecorded female voice plays in the background, sounding throughout every coach. “Nü shi men, xian sheng men, huan ying nin cheng zuo gao tie dong che …” I don’t even register that it’s in Chinese at first because I’m shocked to find I actually understand what she’s saying. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome aboard the bullet train … It’s not the first time this has happened since I landed in Shanghai. It’s as if something in the back of my brain has been unlocked, allowing the Chinese words floating around me to settle in.
“Unnecessarily close, might I add” Cyrus is saying. “Some buffer time would be nice.”
We’d been right on schedule when we gathered down in the hotel lobby this afternoon, but then one of the sporty girls, Krystal, had to use the bathroom, and as if they were all biologically synced through the power of friendship, the other girls in her trio needed to go too. Then, just as we were about to head out, Sean had reported with the highest urgency that his phone was missing. The case was only closed when he thought to check his left coat pocket half an hour later, by which point Wang Laoshi had already helped conduct a thorough search of his room. And all of that could possibly still have been fine, because we’d budgeted for extra time, but then the bus had broken down halfway to the railway station.
“No, really. I’m not even exaggerating when I tell you that was the second most stressful experience I’ve ever had,” Oliver says, rotating his seat in the row ahead so that it’s facing me and Cyrus. Our group has taken up the front of the car: Daisy’s curled up by the window next to Oliver, and Krystal’s friends are lounging in the seats across the aisle, kicking their legs out on the footrests. It’s surprisingly spacious inside, with more than enough room to walk up and down, and cleaner than I would expect any form of public transport to be—at least based on appearances. Even Cyrus looks only moderately disgusted as he sanitizes everything within a four-foot radius of him.
“The second most stressful experience?” I ask Oliver. “What was the first?”
“Other than being birthed into the world and just, like, general human existence? Probably when we had to shut down my father’s winery in Australia because of the possum problem,” Oliver says with a shudder. “The baby possums were having baby possums.”
“Hey, I wouldn’t mind keeping a baby possum as a pet,” Daisy muses.
Oliver snorts. “Of course you wouldn’t. I bet you’d even throw it a tea party.”
“Sorry, are we meant to ignore the fact that your father owns a winery?” I demand, leaning back the same time the train eases forward, accelerating so smoothly and quietly that I don’t even realize we’ve left the station until I see the trees flashing by the window.
“Fourteen wineries,” Oliver clarifies. “But this winery was way bigger than the others. We were going to spend our summer break there last year, but after the possums took over, we had to change plans last minute and stay at one of our resorts in Sanya instead. Not even my favorite resort with the pony farm; just, like, a regular five-star resort. The sea views weren’t bad though.”
I stare at him as I digest this alarming information, and then press my fingers to my temple like I’m trying to remember something vital. “Oh my god, what is it called again?” I ask.
“The name of our winery?” Oliver says, confused.
“No, that word for when you feel bad for someone but also, at the same time, can’t bring yourself to feel that sorry for them at all.”
Cyrus releases a breath of laughter, then immediately hides it by pressing a fist to his lips.
“It’s okay, you only need to feel slightly sorry for me,” Oliver tells me, unbothered, and grins. “Just sorry enough to go out with me.”
I raise my brows. Every time I let myself entertain the idea that Oliver and I could become actual friends, he’ll say something like this, leaving me to try and figure out just how serious he’s being, and whether he’ll join the list of guys who stopped being nice to me the second they realized I wasn’t going to hook up with them. It would be a serious shame, because despite his bad jokes and severely bourgeois tastes, Oliver Kang’s kind of been growing on me. “Are you asking for a pity date?”
“I’ll take whatever I can get. A pity date. A pity kiss—that’s what you offered Cyrus, wasn’t it?”
“Yeah, I don’t really do those anymore,” I inform him, with a meaningful glance at Cyrus, who’s stopped laughing. “As you might be able to tell, it didn’t end well the last time.”
“It would be different with me,” Oliver says, gesturing theatrically between us. “I can’t be the only one who feels this connection we’ve got going on. As if our souls are bound together—”
“We barely know each other.”
“We can get to know each other better right now,” he says without missing a beat. “Like, for starters, what’s your thing?”
“What’s my thing ?”
“You know, everyone has a thing.” He shrugs and begins to point at the other members in the group, picking each of them out. “Lydia’s thing is being smart and organized. Krystal’s thing is volleyball. Sean’s thing is—well, sleeping, and forgetting he has pockets … ”
We all take a moment of silence as we remember the intensive search from earlier today.
“Daisy’s thing is knitting—and probably also dancing in a field of sunshine or donating to charity or something,” Oliver continues as Daisy pulls out a half-formed scarf from her bag, the pink wool unspooling over her lap, and starts finger-knitting. “And Cyrus’s thing is being attractive in a cold vampire way.”
Cyrus sends him a sharp, affronted look.
“What? You should be flattered,” Oliver says. “Daisy, tell him I’m right.”
Daisy lifts her head and nods. “Um, he’s right. The vampire comparison is definitely a compliment.”
“So what’s your thing?” Oliver prompts.
All of them turn to me, and my thoughts nose-dive off a cliff. Because what is my thing? What am I meant to be? Without modeling, there’s nothing special about me anymore. But that’s the kind of thing you confess to your therapist after at least ten sessions together, not in the middle of a casual conversation. Plus, if I tell them the truth, they’ll realize how unbearably boring I am, how my whole confident persona might as well be propped up by a few weak tentpoles, threatening to cave in under the slightest pressure.
I swallow, ignore the low, tumbling feeling in my gut, and—in an act of true desperation—glance out the window for ideas. There’s not much to go off of. The sprawling compounds rush by in dark gray and brown blurs, the mountains curving in the horizon, their shapes softening with distance until it’s difficult to tell where they blend in with the clouds … “Clouds,” I say, before the silence can drag on long enough to become suspicious.
Oliver blinks. “Huh?”
Cyrus’s brows furrow, and I feel my stomach twist nervously in response. He’s the only one here who knows enough about me to see straight through my lie. The only one who’d expect me to talk about modeling.
To stop him from questioning me outright, I rush to elaborate: “Cloud drawings, I mean.” Like this is a very real hobby that real people most definitely have. “I just find that they’re so peaceful, and there’s so much you get out of drawing them. Like, artistically. And emotionally.”
Cyrus stares at me for another beat, clearly trying to figure out where I’m going with this. I make myself stare back, cleanse my face of any panic, as if my palms aren’t sticking to my skirt with sweat right now. Don’t say anything, I will silently, drawing upon any mind-control powers that might be lurking dormant within me. Don’t ask about the modeling. Just accept that I love drawing clouds.
“Remind me, what kind of clouds did you like drawing again?” Cyrus asks me, resting his chin on one hand.
This is so not the follow-up I was braced for, and I don’t know whether to feel relieved or to start searching for the closest emergency exit on the train. Despite the utter nonchalance of his tone, there’s a dangerous glint in his eyes.
I clear my throat. “Well, you know. High clouds, low clouds, medium clouds, semi-medium clouds, storm clouds …” Dammit, I’m running out of clouds. “I’m not picky.”
“That’s a real niche interest you’ve got there,” Oliver comments good-naturedly, and for some reason, my relief at him buying my ridiculous lie is chased away by guilt. It’d be nice if I didn’t have to choose between being myself and being liked.
“But she’s really good at them,” Cyrus jumps in, turning to smile at me. Abruptly, I remember that phrase my mom always says, one that never made sense until now: Don’t be afraid of a crying owl; it’s the laughing owl you should fear. I can handle Cyrus with his regular poker face and general air of suffering, but I have no idea what to do when Cyrus is smiling at me like that. “Leah, you have to show them your cloud drawings.”
I freeze. “Oh, I mean—I didn’t bring any with me. They’re in my special cloud sketchbook—”
“You can draw them right here,” Cyrus says, smiling still, his features positively angelic, concealing his diabolical schemes. It’s middle school all over again. He just wants to see me make a complete fool of myself and laugh at my expense. “It’s not like we’ll be getting off this train anytime soon.”
“But I don’t have my art supplies,” I counter, smiling back through clenched teeth. Never mind the dormant mind-control powers. I’d give anything for the power to kill with just my eyes.
“You can use this,” Cyrus says at once, reaching into his bag and pulling out a black ballpoint pen with our last hotel’s brand name on it. “And you can draw on my hand. I’d be honored.”
I want to refuse, but Oliver’s watching me with keen interest, like a child waiting to see a fireworks show for the first time.
Fighting the vicious urge to use the pen as a weapon, I snatch it from Cyrus and turn toward him. He extends his hand, his palm held open. He has the long, elegant fingers of a pianist, his skin smooth and so pale on the underside of his wrist that it’s almost translucent, the purplish-blue veins as visible as creeks running through snow. I grab his arm to steady it against the movement of the train, my nails digging in with a little more force than necessary, but he doesn’t flinch. Doesn’t pull back. His attention remains sharp on me as I tighten my grip on the pen and press down, outlining the wobbly shape of a cloud in the center of his palm.
“There,” I say. “Done.”
Oliver and Daisy both peer over.
“That’s so cute,” Daisy says very generously, and I feel a sharp surge of affection for the girl. She’s one of those people who is kind solely for the sake of being kind.
“It has personality,” Oliver agrees. “Personal style is important when it comes to art.”
Cyrus lifts his hand and stares down at the cloud for a long time, his lashes shadowing his eyes, focusing hard as if I’ve really drawn something worthy of critical analysis. Even his breathing seems to still. Then his fingers furl around the doodle. “Your art holds such potential,” he tells me. “If you just added horns to it, you’d have a sheep.”
If I just added horns to you, we’d have your true form , I can’t help replying inside my head.
He glances past me as an attendant pushes a snack trolley down the aisle toward us, the wheels rumbling under the weight of all the bottled drinks and instant noodles. I immediately forget about him and perk up. It’s only been a few hours since our last meal, but I still crane my neck to scan the trolley. This was one of my guilty pastimes when I’d force myself to go hungry for a shoot—I would stand in the middle of the grocery store aisle and simply browse through the shelves of ready-made cakes, imagining myself eating all the things I couldn’t.
“You shenme xuyao de ma?” the attendant asks in Chinese, slowing down near our seats, and again, I’m surprised at how the words—which would’ve been a nonsensical jumble to me when I was in LA—actually clarify themselves inside my head, only because I’ve heard the words spoken by so many waiters and hotel staff by this point. Is there anything you need?
The top layer of the trolley is covered by an assortment of lemon iced tea, grape juice, and milk tea; the layer beneath it dedicated to beef jerky and sesame candy and the Choco Pies I used to crave all the time, with the soft white marshmallow filling and the crumbling cake layers.
I’m about to say yes, but Oliver turns away with a look of complete disinterest, and Daisy has already returned to her knitting. I bite my tongue, feeling stupidly self-conscious at being the only one so eager to try out a bunch of likely overpriced snacks.
Cyrus’s gaze flickers in my direction, and then he tells the attendant something in Chinese. Apparently, he’s asked to buy half the trolley, because she brightens and starts handing over a packet of almost every item, until Cyrus runs out of room on his lap and has to spread the mini mountain of snacks out on his tray.
“Here,” Cyrus says, tossing one of the Choco Pies to me. He doesn’t make any move to eat the food himself.
I stare at the pie, waiting for him to spring the trap. “What’s this for?”
“You looked like you were ready to run away with those pies.” He shrugs. “It would have been cruel to keep you apart.”
“I was not —”
“It’s the same way you were looking at the lettuce seller,” he says. “There was a lot of intense squinting going on. I was expecting you to start twirling your hair and smiling unnaturally again.”
I choose to ignore him as I tear open the red wrapper and take my first bite of the pie in years, the thin chocolate casing cracking under my teeth.
“This is so good,” I say, closing my eyes with a blissful sigh.
Still, I can just imagine the look on Cyrus’s face when he says, “Maybe I should give you two some time alone.”
I take another slow, luxurious bite as if I’m one of those upper-class people partaking in a wine-tasting competition to prove how cultured my taste buds are, inhaling deeply and letting the marshmallow dissolve on my tongue. “You sound jealous.”
“I definitely am.”
“I can tell you’ve been single too long,” I remark, matching his dry tone. “Just so we’re clear, this isn’t enough to get you a pity kiss from me either.”
He goes quiet at that, and I feel a small thrill at having effectively shocked him into silence.
“But I will pay you back for the pie,” I add, opening my eyes and dabbing the corner of my lips. “How much did it cost?”
“Three million yuan,” he answers right away.
I stare at him. “Okay, I’ll be honest: I always figured you’d become a scammer, but I didn’t think it would happen quite so soon.”
“You don’t have to pay me back, Leah,” he says, shaking his head. The train rattles through a tunnel, the darkness briefly transforming the window into a mirror, so I can see the reflection of his profile even with his face angled away from me, his gaze heavy and almost sad. “You don’t owe me anything. You never will.”
That must be why he’s started being nice to me—or at least nicer, compared to before . Because while I’ve been discovering new Chinese words on this trip, Cyrus Sui has discovered a new little emotion called guilt .
Anger rushes down my throat, vicious and stronger than the taste of chocolate. He doesn’t get to do this. He doesn’t get to ruin my life and then attempt to assuage his conscience by offering me a few free snacks and vague sentences. Not after all those times I sobbed myself to sleep after I was expelled, all the dirty looks my classmates shot at me across the room, all the lunches I spent eating alone.
I don’t care how guilty he feels. It’ll never be enough, not without me getting my revenge.
***
It’s almost midnight by the time we stagger into our new hotel in Anhui Province.
“I’m so tired I feel seasick, which doesn’t make sense because we’re on land,” Oliver says with a groan, slouching against the side of the elevator, his head rested against the digital signage offering special discounts on massages. I would pay double the price for a massage right this moment.
“I’m so tired it sounds like someone’s whistling off-tune in my ear,” Sean complains.
“Oh, sorry—that was me,” Lydia says, yawning. “I like to whistle to keep myself awake.”
I’m so tired I don’t have the strength to say anything. My eyes are almost as heavy as the bags weighing down on my shoulders, and my knees keep wobbling, even though I’m standing still. When the elevator arrives on the eleventh floor with a shrill ding , I’m ready to doze off in the middle of the corridor.
“Come on,” Daisy says, tugging at my arm. She looks more alert than any of us. But then, I don’t think I’ve ever seen her not alert before; it’s like she’s constantly braced for something to happen, even if she doesn’t know what. “You can shower first.”
I shake my head. Remember how to open my mouth. “You always offer for me to shower first. You go. It takes thirty minutes just to blow-dry my hair.”
We walk past countless identical doors, the sound of our rolling suitcases muffled by the maze-patterned carpet, until at last we reach our room. Daisy swipes our key card, the tiny light flashing green before letting us in, and I half drag, half kick my luggage through the entrance. I feel a little seasick too—or at least like I’m tipsy, the beige walls swaying around me. I seem to be moving on autopilot as I tug off my boots, grab a new bottle of water from the bedside table, downing half of it in a few gulps, and sink onto the couch by the balcony.
“I’ll be quick,” Daisy promises, pulling out her polka-dot bag of toiletries.
“No rush,” I mumble. The cushions are so blissfully soft, the temperature pleasantly warm enough to forgo any blankets; maybe I could just sleep like this. Forget blow-drying my hair, or brushing my teeth. That can wait until morning—
But my eyes have barely fallen shut when Oliver’s and Cyrus’s voices travel from outside the room.
“… think that I would want to marry you?”
“Obviously not—”
“Because I’m in very high demand, Cyrus. I shit you not, there are at least thirty people I can name who would love to be married to me. Hell, there was a literal prince who proposed to me when we were both only fifteen, and I was promised an extravagant wedding on a private island.”
“That’s hardly the point here—”
“No, but I feel like I need to make this clear to you. You shouldn’t sound so disgusted—”
“You sounded disgusted too—”
“I was still polite about my disgust—”
I sit up, disoriented, and creep back over to the doorway. I remember hearing somewhere that exhaustion can produce vivid hallucinations, but even for a hallucination, this conversation is bizarre. Slowly, I push the door open and find Oliver and Cyrus standing apart in the dull yellow wash of the corridor, arms crossed, expressions tense.
“What’s going on?” I ask, sticking my head out.
“They gave us the honeymoon suite ,” Oliver bursts out, his handsome features twisting in horror while I fight back the overwhelming urge to laugh. “It looks like Cupid hosted a massive party, got drunk, and threw up in there. Everything is all romantic and sensual. Sensual ,” he emphasizes with a shudder, like the word contains within it a whole realm of unspeakable horrors. “There are rose petals covering every surface. The towels are folded into the shape of hearts. And there’s only one king-sized bed for the two of us. I need to sleep before my brain melts, and I can’t—”
“So do I,” Cyrus cuts in. “But your idea was terrible—”
“What’s wrong with sleeping face-to-feet?” he demands. “Would you rather we fall asleep staring deep into each other’s eyes, my dude?”
“I don’t want your feet anywhere within a five-foot radius of my face,” Cyrus says tightly.
“You see?” Oliver says to me, throwing his hands out like a defendant appealing to a jury. “This shit’s impossible. And don’t even get me started on that cursed bathroom wall—”
“It’s made of glass,” Cyrus says, also speaking to only me. “Pure glass. You can see everything on the other side of it. There might as well be no wall at all. The hotel simply doesn’t seem to believe that newlywed couples would care for something as frivolous as privacy.”
I’ve aborted any attempts to suppress my laughter by now—I double over, wheezing until my vision blurs with tears and the lines of the carpet start wobbling, my hysteria bubbling over my exhaustion.
Both of them stare at me, unamused.
“Sorry,” I choke out, clutching at my stomach. “Sorry, guys. I mean, if you look at it as an opportunity to really understand each other on a deeper level …”
“I think we already understand each other well enough,” Cyrus says. “In fact, I would argue that we understand each other a bit too well.”
“So do I,” Oliver tells me. “I could take a whole trivia quiz on him and ace it. Like how he’s allergic to small talk, and refuses to drink anything except boiled water, and how he can’t stop talking about you—”
Cyrus cuts him a look I’m unable to decipher, and Oliver goes quiet.
I sober up at once, leaning forward with a kind of morbid curiosity, my heart beating oddly in my chest. “He talks about me?” I ask. “What does he say? Bad stuff?” It must be. I mentally fill the sudden silence between the three of us with long lists of criticisms. Even though I’ve never hated myself, there are plenty of things I hate about myself, things I wish I could cover up with concealer like a stubborn blemish: my lazy streak, my vanity, my real laugh, my fake laugh, my inability to contribute anything interesting to a conversation, the one side of my face that’s slightly wider than the other. Sometimes, it feels like I’m just waiting for other people to catch up on my flaws.
But then Oliver shakes his head. Clears his throat. “No, good stuff.”
Surprise dances through me. My attention swings to Cyrus, but he’s rooted to the spot, wearing such a brilliant poker face that he could win any game of cards.
“Like what?” I ask.
Oliver’s gaze flickers to Cyrus as well, then back to me. “Yeah, uh, he’d kill me if I told you.”
I wouldn’t believe him. I wouldn’t dare believe that Cyrus Sui—Number One Enemy from my childhood, Stealer of Scrunchies, Destroyer of Lives—could have anything nice to say about me to my face, let alone behind my back, except he isn’t protesting outright.
Maybe it wasn’t guilt alone that was making him act so weirdly nice to me, then. Maybe my plan’s working already. Maybe he’s actually started to like me.
“You know what?” Cyrus says abruptly, turning toward their honeymoon suite with more eagerness than even a real newlywed. “I’ve decided that I don’t mind sleeping next to your feet, Oliver. Let’s just go back inside.”
“Oh, so now you have no problems with my feet—okay, bye, Leah,” Oliver says in a rush as Cyrus seizes his elbow mid-sentence and starts guiding him away.
“Good night,” Cyrus tells me without quite meeting my gaze.
Daisy’s finished showering by the time I return to the room. I expect my body to call it a day and collapse on the couch again, but it feels like I’ve taken an extra-strong shot of espresso. All my nerves are buzzing, my mind zapped awake. It didn’t mean so much to me in the moment, yet I keep going back to what Oliver said, turning it over, dissecting it:
He’d kill me if I told you.
I don’t manage to fall asleep until four in the morning.