They’re all here: Nuo, Wen Kei, and Yin Yu. The girls from the other halls. Fewer than twenty in all, blinking and shivering and gaping in the blue, blue light. Even Mama-san hovers at the fringe of the group, where the reach of the streetlight fades—her face one part shadow, the other part shame. They don’t recognize me at first, all bound up in a jacket and boots. When I step forward, they shy away, a single, shirking creature that’s seen too many fists.
Wen Kei is the first to realize who I am. She pulls out from the pale, withdrawn faces, throws herself into me. “Mei Yee! You’re okay!”
The other girls shift and start at the sound of my name. Nuo comes to my other side, buries her face into my shoulder. I hold them both tight, let myself breathe. All of us are shaking.
Even Yin Yu. She’s trying to be unseen, slipping against the corner of my vision, but she doesn’t go far enough. I can still see how her lips wrinkle against her face, trembling like the edges of my imperfect ceiling stars.
“You got us out,” Wen Kei squeaks when she finally unburies her face.
Out. The other girls shift again. The word is not as holy to them; it doesn’t settle well.
“It wasn’t me.” I look over my shoulder, over Nuo’s stray wisps of angel hairs. My sister is still bent over on the ground, looking like a drop of blood in that serving dress. My window-boy is crouched next to her, and even from this distance—even through his pain—those eyes shine.
“What happens now?” Nuo asks.
I turn back and stare at the group. Nineteen faces. Nineteen beautiful, torn, needing faces.
What happens now? I spent so long thirsting, yearning, dreaming for this freedom. And now it’s here and the streets are very dark and we’re not the police’s problem.
“I-I’m not sure.”
“You’re not sure?” The pierce of Yin Yu’s voice is a needle of its own, filling me with fault and rattle. “Where are we going to sleep? What are we going to eat?”
Nuo and Wen Kei have pulled away, but they’re still looking at me. They’re all looking at me, waiting for answers I do not have.
And then, a presence. A heat next to me and a hand sliding into mine. Fingers meeting fingers. Warmth against warmth. The feel of Dai is so vastly different from anyone else I’ve ever touched. It makes my insides burst and soar, and I know, somehow, that things are going to be okay.
“Thank you for the keys,” he says to Yin Yu. “And your silence.”
She blinks at him, tilts her head so she’s staring at him through her bangs. The way she does when she wants to watch without being seen.
Dai looks to me. His fingers are so gentle, threading through the empty spaces between mine, filling the gaps. “Are all the girls here?”
I look over their faces again. Only Sing is missing. The thought makes my heart ache and bloat. I nod anyway.
My window-boy clears his throat. His voice is so solid, so clear without the glass between us. “I know none of you really know me—besides Mei Yee and Yin Yu. But I wanted to let you know that if you want somewhere to stay tonight, somewhere safe, you can come with me. There will be food. And tea. And mats for sleeping. If you want.”
The girls all stare at him as if he’s a wild thing. I wonder if this is how my face looked that first night he tapped on my window and I saw another life stretching out, calling me into a different chamber.
I think of the tiny room with the tiles colored like a smoker’s teeth. How just Jin Ling and the cat and I felt like a crowd. “But your apartment isn’t big enough for all of us.”
“We’re not going to my apartment,” Dai says. “We’re leaving Hak Nam. We’re going home.”
Home. He says the word like a song. Something different from wilting rice fields and knuckle-laced nights. Something worth singing about.
“You trust him, Mei Yee?” a girl from the south hall asks.
I stare back at this boy whose hand I’m holding. Whose hair is mussed and whose eyes are lined with tired gray. Who’s smiling in a way I’ve never seen before. It looks the way his home sounded: safe and whole and full of warmth.
This answer comes easy: “With my life.”
Dai’s fingers tighten in mine. His smile grows and he looks back at the other girls. “If any of you want to come, then follow me.”
Wen Kei steps out first. Then Nuo. The rest of the girls wash after them—a wave of color and timid steps. In the end, there’s only one left. She stands alone in the island of lamplight.
“Mama-san.” My fingers slide from Dai’s and I walk back to her. “You can come, too.”
“There’s no room.” The old woman sounds different out here in the open air. The dragoness has vanished from her voice. It’s so soft, almost lost.
“You heard Dai. We can all go,” I tell her.
Mama-san shakes her head. Her tight, tight bun is coming undone, wisps of hair falling free into her face. She pulls them back with fingers like rakes.
“There’s no room out there,” she says again. “It’s not our world. People like us belong in the shadows. I’m staying in Hak Nam.”
I know the look—the way her shoulders are hunched, the way the whites of her eyes go wide. She’s been caged too long. It’s the open, unknown door she fears. Just like my mother.
I reach out my hand, will her to take it. “Mama-san—”
“Go.” She cuts me off, edges farther from the streetlamp. “You’ll find out soon enough.”
Dai and the girls are waiting for me, and Mama-san keeps shrinking. Away from my outstretched hand, away from the light and into the shadows she thinks are her own. And the dark keeps coming, envelops her until she’s gone.
Now I’m the one who’s alone. Adrift under the lamp, in the blue pool of light.
Dai’s next to me again. “Are you okay, Mei Yee?”
“I can’t—” I swallow back the sick helplessness in my gut, keep staring into the darkness. “I don’t want to just leave her here.”
“This is her choice,” he says softly, “and thanks to you, she’s free to make it.”
My window-boy is right. No matter how much I want to grab Mama-san by the wrist and take her to a safe place, I can’t. The choice is hers alone.
“Are you ready to go?” he asks.
Our hands come back together, tight. I can’t tell if I’m the one clinging to him or if he’s the one holding me. I think—maybe—it’s both. I look over to the girls and my sister. To the road that’s folding open—ready to take us out and away.
I choose not to stay in the dark.
“Let’s go home,” I say.