The best thing about sharing a house with a chef, Sophie decided, was the leftovers. She’d spied crispy skin duck in the fridge earlier. It would go down a treat with some salad once she’d ushered Joy Lin out the door.

The schoolgirl slipped her mountain of a bag onto her shoulders. ‘I’ll write the essay again, another two or three times,’ she said.

Sophie snapped to attention. ‘That sounds a bit much.’

‘I want to get it right.’

She had to give the girl points for stamina. Joy Lin had a voracious appetite for study. Already a whiz with numbers, she also maintained a B+ average across the humanities; she hoped to push this to an A, with Sophie’s help. They’d spent the last hour analysing Monet’s House Among the Roses.

‘It doesn’t always pay to practise things too often,’ said Sophie. Joy Lin stood lopsided, the heavy schoolbag dragging one shoulder down.

‘Practise makes perfect, don’t you know?’ she said as Sophie adjusted her straps.

‘Some things have to come from the soul.’

Joy Lin snorted like a horse. ‘That sounds like something from the horoscopes!’

Sophie laughed. ‘I think the best writing happens when you forget all the rules,’ she said. ‘The question is asking you to interpret a particular painting series. You can know the technical and historical details, but if that’s all you include in your writing, it won’t be very interesting, will it?’

Joy Lin frowned. ‘It will be interesting to people who don’t know those details.’

‘But your examiners do. You need to give them something more. You need to convey emotion and passion. How can you express these things in your writing if you’ve planned every word before you even begin?’

Joy Lin shook her head. ‘I couldn’t write an essay without planning.’

‘I’m not saying don’t prepare,’ said Sophie. She turned to the bookshelf, an idea sparking. ‘Know how you plan to proceed, but you don’t need to memorise every word.’ She scooped a pair of earrings from the dish on the bookshelf and held them in her palm: roses, perfect red buds. Perhaps a little quirk would catch Joy Lin’s inner spark.

‘Here.’ She held the earrings out to Joy Lin. ‘I never wear them. Take them on loan as a good-luck charm.’

Joy Lin picked the earrings out of Sophie’s hand. ‘They’re pretty,’ she said. ‘Cheers, I’d love to borrow them. But good-luck charms are as useful as reading tea leaves. I prefer facts.’

Sophie smiled and opened the bedroom door. ‘Which is why you’ll probably make a very successful scientist.’

Joy Lin grimaced, slipping the earrings into her pocket. ‘Couldn’t think of anything worse,’ she said. ‘Sitting in a lab all day, peering through a microscope stinking of mould and chemicals for hardly any money? No thanks.’

Sophie followed the girl down the stairs. ‘Career plans, then?’

Joy Lin stopped by Sophie’s bicycle. ‘My parents want me to do medicine,’ she said. ‘They are the ultimate Chinese cliché.’ She ran a hand along the ridge of one busted tyre. Her fingers brushed the jagged flaps of split rubber. ‘Be careful, Sophie,’ she said, her voice husky. ‘I think someone has it in for you.’

A chill snaked across Sophie’s shoulders. She pulled her cardigan tighter. ‘Pardon?’

The faintest trace of a smile played on Joy Lin’s lips. ‘Your tyres got slashed,’ she said. ‘I’m doing what you said. Interpreting the facts.’

Sophie tugged at the latch on the front door. The heavy wood swung open. Outside, rain fell. She picked up a polka-dotted umbrella from the coat rack and handed it to Joy Lin. ‘Your interpretation is very creative, Dr Watson. But I think it’s more likely this tyre attack was random.’

‘Probably,’ said Joy Lin. ‘But that wouldn’t be very interesting.’

Sophie leaned against the doorframe and watched the spotted umbrella bob down the street, tightness in her shoulders, a circus in her belly, a sudden urge to drink something stronger than tea. She’d dismissed the slashed tyres as a piece of random vandalism, a case of rainy-day bad luck. But both Jin Tao and Joy Lin had seen something sinister.

Sophie climbed the stairs to her bedroom. She stood quietly on the carpeted step, her eyes drawn to the wooden shrine in the corner. The small boy in the photograph smiled at her. What was it about the missing? No matter where she ran, they haunted her still.

It’s all connected. Li Hua had taught her that and Su Yuan had echoed it, her hand clutching Sophie’s fingers like a clamp.

Sophie lay down, closed her eyes. In a moment she was back in Beijing.

Neither of them spoke as Li Hua drove through the construction site that would one day become the Olympic Village. Sophie watched the shop-fronts of her neighbourhood slip past the window: a shoe store next to a shop selling guitars; a kebab stall next to a barber; a merchant selling sixty varieties of cigarettes.

The sky billowed grey and blended into the concrete. And then they were at the underpass that turned onto the fourth ring road. Sophie had watched the underpass birth itself. In Australia, construction projects moved slowly, took months or years. But China had felt like a living time-lapse movie. Whole freeways, skyscrapers and transport terminals could appear in a matter of weeks. The pace was frenetic, the air choked with dust. But things got done.

Li Hua drove east along the ring road. She slipped a hand onto Sophie’s thigh, stretched her fingers wide. Sophie leaned back into her seat, tried to settle the pounding in her head and heart. They travelled in silence, Li Hua’s hand on Sophie’s leg, until they reached the airport.

At the baggage check, Sophie fought hard not to crumble. She fumbled through the check-in, dropped her passport, blurred her signature with tears.

Li Hua rubbed her back. ‘Breathe,’ she said.

They walked together to the departure gates. ‘I hate goodbyes,’ said Sophie, a rock in her throat.

Li Hua took Sophie’s hands in her own. ‘It’s not goodbye,’ she said, her own voice soft with emotion. ‘You and I, we are connected, we have a guanxi. Even though you will move, the connection will not break. It will change, but it will not break. Distance may even make it stronger.’

Li Hua released Sophie. She held her right palm in the air. ‘Hold up your hand,’ she said.

Sophie held her left hand up, so that her palm faced Li Hua’s.

‘Closer,’ said Li Hua. Sophie followed. Their hands floated, only millimetres apart.

‘Close your eyes,’ said Li Hua. ‘Feel the energy, think about your hand and mine. Feel the energy between us.’

Sophie tried. She felt nothing.

And then, a gentle warmth, soft but electric. It pricked Sophie’s nerves, like the faint tingle of Sichuan pepper on the tongue. Sophie concentrated. It felt as if their delicate, shared energy created a bridge between them.

‘This is our connection,’ Li Hua said, her voice even. ‘Keep your eyes closed and focus on it. I will move my hand – try to follow.’

Sophie concentrated on the warmth between her palm and Li Hua’s. She felt a magnetism as Li Hua moved her hand slowly backwards. Eyes closed, Sophie tracked the movement and her hand moved forwards. She imagined a tangible object, thin as a sheet, separating their cells. It was true. She could feel it. They were connected.

‘Open your eyes,’ said Li Hua.

Sophie raised her lids. She saw her hand moving in fluid motion, as if connected to Li Hua by a thread. If Li Hua pulled back, Sophie’s hand followed. When Sophie’s wrist flipped under, carrying the weight of the energy, Li Hua’s palm floated on top, caressing the space between them with her fingers. Sophie watched. The energy they carried felt strong enough to see. She strained. What was that?

Li Hua brought her hand closer to Sophie’s. Their palms met. The electricity faded, leaving a warm glow.

‘You see,’ Li Hua said, ‘there is a connection between us. It doesn’t matter where you go, no distance can break it.’

She leaned forwards so that their foreheads touched. For a moment they stood there, breathing in each other’s scent. Calm pulsed through Sophie like a slow-moving river. She knew that the time had now come.

She picked up her cabin bag and walked towards the departure door, turning once. Like Mrs Lu against the cabbages, Li Hua stood motionless – stoic and strong.

Sophie lifted her hand in a wave. Li Hua raised hers. They stood like that, distance between them, hands in the air, an imaginary string binding them tight. Then Sophie lowered her arm.

She walked through the doors to the departure lounge without looking back.