The handcuffs are too tight. I can’t feel my fingers anymore, but my shoulder is a different story. It’s like the end of an unknotted rope: fibers twisting, pulling, fraying, coming apart. It doesn’t really help that the cop behind me is shoving and jostling like a half-rate taxi ride. I know better than to complain, though. I had my chance. I had more than my chance.
I can only imagine what my father will say, if he ever comes to see me. I can just picture him, sitting with his flawless business suit and mostly gray hair. He’ll stare through the inches of Plexiglas. All those years of masking his emotions at business meetings and cocktail parties won’t be enough to hide the disappointment on his face. He’ll lean close to his microphone and say, “You should have run.”
I’m beginning to think that myself until I see Mei Yee. Her face is flushed, like she’s been running. Even though she’s dressed in my clothes, hair pulled back, everything about her seems brighter. More alive.
She doesn’t even blink when Tsang calls me a murderer. She’s still looking at me with her nautilus stare. Dusting the sand off my soul and seeing the best parts. The ones that Hiro saw. The ones he tried to tell me about.
And then I see Jin Ling behind her, hobbling desperately to be with her sister. Together again after so many years.
I see them, almost side by side (the way Hiro and I used to walk when we scoured the seashore), and there’s no room for doubt.
It was worth it.