The night is long and hot. Acid burps upward the length of my esophagus, putting a fist-sized weight in the middle of my chest. The mango doesn’t agree with me. Hair itches at my collarbones while I sweat right onto the bedding.
Sleep paralysis has happened three nights in a row now, and I dread waking up to that helpless stillness so much I can’t relax. Scrolling through Florence’s website code, I lose track of time. She’s brilliant, and I’m kind of mad about it, as well as all the comments she keeps leaving for me in the CSS style sheet.
/* u into hover animation? no kinkshame in this house just ur house */
/* if u were an airhead what flavor would u be */
/* me id choose strawberry does that make me basic bitch */
/* ok what do you think of putting some 300x300 pics here */
/* WAIT I FORGOT GRAPE IM GRAPE you’re green apple so sour */
I bite back a grin. I’m in the middle of texting her, since it’s widely available and not obscured by a thousand syntax lines, when the hallway squeaks under the weight of small feet. Rats, maybe. My theory is that they come out to eat the wires. Ba had to reconnect the Wi-Fi again before breakfast. None show in the day, but they could hide in the walls. Like some insects, they might prefer the dark.
At least a rat would choose a better place to die than my mouth—which is enough of a reminder that my mortal, closeted body exists and I should not be flirting.
With heat burning my throat, I need to hydrate in other ways. Water bottle’s empty, so I have to check downstairs. I don’t bother being quiet when I pass Ba’s room. He hasn’t fixed the windows, so this is partly his fault. I get it more now though, how stressed he must be with Alma and Thomas over his shoulder.
The fan whirs on the other side of his door, left open a crack. Of course, he sleeps fine in this house. Clothed in night, Nhà Hoa is a different animal. Every shadow is one that shifts, and air caresses the back of my neck—a dancer moving their partner along.
It’s not easy to follow someone in this house without being noticed, I think.
My steps take me through the sitting room, where the fireplace’s black insides menace me by snapping unlit logs. Sleep deprivation’s running my imagination wild, but that isn’t comforting. Large potted hydrangeas stand guard on either side, their blooms swaying in a breeze I no longer sense.
I rush toward the kitchen’s artificial glow. Maybe Lily is awake and needs a snack. I should’ve told her earlier about how a warm water bottle can ease some of the cramps. I can bring one to her, I can—
The cold stops me, since this house has only ever been hot.
The refrigerator door is open, a woman’s slim hand on its edge. Her flowery robe is thin enough that her body’s dark lines can be seen through it. Hair cut from midnight falls in a sheet, in the space of her leaning down to look inside the refrigerator.
He’s bringing people home. The hallway noise, the random thumping, the evasiveness, it makes more sense. My jaw tightens. When does he have the time?
“Hi,” I say because I have to. I can’t believe I’m meeting more of his guests in my pajamas. “I’m getting water.”
She doesn’t reply. I reach for the carton on the counter. The bottle’s warm, but I don’t really want to reach around Ba’s date (girlfriend? sleep buddy?) for cold water. At least it isn’t Alma.
Drink aside, I ask, “You need help?” I peek at the fingers pressed so hard on the metal that they are grayish white. At this point of rudeness, it’s tempting to be a little shit and offer an iron supplement. I wait a beat, then another.
I’m kind of freaked out now and about to leave when her spine stiffens. She abandons all stillness, reassembling straight and tall in sharp motions. Her body makes me think of a wire hanger—long, thin lines and easy to twist. She turns around slowly.
Above eyes that aren’t surprised to see me, blunt bangs slash a forehead in half. Her robe has slipped open, revealing a stretch of smooth skin. She’s not much older than me. Her face doesn’t shift in embarrassment or apology. We stare at each other, and it’s like she’s drinking me in.
This is a dream.
I must’ve fallen asleep after all, to absurd fantasies about noble houses and beautiful girls, where anything is possible. I really, really need to stop texting Florence before bed. Lust is an unfortunate human condition, directly after (1) caring about other people and (2) indigestion. I don’t fight my nature; I surrender.
The tiles are fiercely cold on my feet when I step closer. Light wavers as she lets the door go. Heavy rhinestones gleam from her delicate ears. An utter absence of smell clouds my senses. Strange how it cloaks the oil that had seeped into everything, the curry we simmered right into the walls, and the spices dusted on the cabinets, but what I’m really wondering is what she smells like.
The beautiful girl offers me her hands. In her fine palms are maggots squirming in a bed of thick white noodles. The writhing sets them apart in the dim lighting. I stumble back, tailbone knocked against marble countertop. What the fuck.
She touches her pale chest, smearing their guts downward. “Đừng ăn,” she says.
This is actually a nightmare. Okay. Okay. I pinch myself on the arm.
She smashes the maggots and noodles harder on her porcelain skin. “Đừng ăn.” Don’t eat, she says, when any thought of a meal has long fled my mind.
“Wake up,” I command myself, pinching harder and willing my voice to find its way back to the real world. I can sometimes escape a dream when I know it’s false, but I remain stubbornly here, where she moves close. Fingers claw toward her belly button, leaving a procession of dead white things.
There’s no scent of decay at all, only nothingness, a void ready to swallow me whole. I can’t escape. My nightmare should put on more clothes because maybe I’ve reached some depraved state where I can’t look away from a face that promises sweet pain.
On her next step, instincts drag me back into the darkness. It could be real, but no, no, no, this is a nightmare, the stuff that almost makes sense until it doesn’t. The few details that stray out of place, such as a person I can touch but she’s not what she seems. Like the cliché, she’s different from other girls. She’ll change me. She’ll make me brave. She’s dead.
This is a nightmare.
Humidity makes the hardwood floors sticky under my feet. My room is a shelter with a door that locks. I rush back into it, my nails pinched on the handle.
Wake up wake up wake up.
The floorboards squeak outside my door, and I imagine soft feet on them, risen on the slight hill from the house settling. I know exactly where you should walk to not make noise, but the nightmare does not.
Nothing else moves. Blood thrums too wildly in my skin. I am hot and sweaty and dizzy.
I listen at the door, ear pressed to wood. There’s a noise like pincers clicking.
Wake up.
There are moments between dreaming and waking that blur together in bright flashes. They are the source of déjà vu for me. I often open my eyes when my body is still heavy with sleep and wonder: Had I really seen that?
This morning is no different. Bone-tired weariness rather than sleep paralysis slows my movements down. I’m so tired of being afraid of myself. The monsters I create. The anxieties I conjure. If I could reason with myself, maybe I can feel better.
I slip downstairs, searching for the same cold from last night. Rain beats on the house’s roof, sliding off in rivers right outside the windows. In the kitchen, it’s Ba who stands by the refrigerator, swiping the shelf with a rag.
“Damn thing,” he curses. Under the bleach, there’s that rotting smell again.
The floor glistens as if he’d just cleaned that too.
Did you see maggots?
The words never taste air. The day before, we’d caught fish together at the lake. Now he doesn’t even look at me. There’s too much in this house to fix.
“Morning!” Lily has overturned a can of condensed milk in a small bowl. She watches the slow dripping in complete devotion. Dessert-aligned food’s the only thing she breaks her vegan diet for.
Our stomachs growl at the same time.
I don’t have much of a sweet tooth, but I do have a penchant for sweet people. It’s a little bit like: Halle was the pastry to my black coffee or Lily is a butter cookie to my matcha. Yin and yang, or some other Asian shit people would read too much into. Condensed milk reminds me of Mom and the spare loaves of bread she toasts on lazy mornings. Even when she isn’t here, it’s comforting. From the cabinet, I pick the least stale baguette before joining Lily at the breakfast table.
I sneak a glance at our dad. “Did it ever work?” The question comes off judgmental, because there must be a rational explanation for the rotting food. My subconscious has internalized the uselessness of our electrical appliances since Ba and Lily are determined to downplay the house’s flaws, that’s all.
I do not question from which mental depths my perfect girl emerged.
Ba sighs and throws the rag aside, grabbing his phone from a shirt pocket. “We need to replace the fridge, again,” Ba says. “Yeah, I know it’s new.” Ông Sáu’s voice booms from the other end, blending in with the workers’ conversation as Ba disappears out back.
My bread dings against the table surface as Lily drags her bowl away, asking, “What’s that about?” Her giddiness over yesterday’s progress has dimmed.
It’s my turn to sigh. The fridge hums innocently. “Lil, it’s all right. Everyone has cranky days.” Reaching across the table, I dunk the bread into the condensed milk.
Her eyes narrow in suspicion before she pulls on the bowl.
“And I like to antagonize Dad when he’s wrong,” I admit, swirling some condensed milk on top. “It’s my weakness.” I bite into the loaf.
The bread forms a sticky lump in my throat as a thought slips into my mind. Don’t eat. Led astray by my own lust-induced stupidity, I’d forgotten the nightmarish warning altogether. Anything can rot with enough time. There’s no fuzzy mold, but I’ve lost all appetite. It had been hard to pay attention to the girl’s words, with everything else going on.
“He’s been having major headaches over this reno,” says Lily, “so go easy on him.”
I abandon my bitten-into breakfast on her plate, guilt rising over how I haven’t noticed his weariness goes beyond just tired muscles. “I’ll work on it.”
“You better,” she grumbles.
I stop by the altar, a haven where my worries can be put aside or, rather, put forward. I speak my mind and throw anxieties to one place. Incense calms me in a way smoking doesn’t; I’ve tried a few times. It isn’t spiritual, not in the same way other people burn incense for the dead to feed them or to honor their religion. Standing there I can suspend the belief that no one is listening. It’s probably selfish to use the altar as therapy, but I pretend incense can burn unwanted thoughts down.
Dad told me your mom lived here. Did you ever get to see this place? Something’s wrong here, and I don’t know what. Sleep is terrible, I had a bad dream, I can’t wait to leave. Keep us safe, and healthy. Watch over us, Bà Nội.
Then, I remember the moment I stepped closer, hoping to catch a scent on the girl’s skin, and add: Not too closely though. That part of the story is for me.
This is the sort of thing I’d share with Halle. Instead, I return through the dining room and click on my chat with Florence, someone I’ll leave behind at the end of all this. I scroll past our recent messages on how to set up a reservation system on the site. It is decidedly less spicy than her asking me what Airhead flavor I would be.
SUNDAY 9:50 a.m.
Me: do you believe in ghosts
9:53 a.m.
Florence Ngo: aliens are real, y not ghost? see one?
Me: Maybe. But probably not. This house is creepy af.
9:57 a.m.
Florence Ngo: a house needs a ghost plan like a fire plan ok
Me: What the hell is a ghost plan
9:58 a.m.
Florence Ngo: Step 1. See ghost
Florence Ngo: Step 2. Confirm location
Florence Ngo: Step 3. Run the other way and always DOWN the steps!!
It’s hard to decide in a dream what the right thing to do is. Still, with all the horror and true crime Halle and I watched, I shouldn’t have lost my shit as I did.
10:00 a.m.
Me: strawberry 100% makes you basic
Florence Ngo: I said IM GRAPE NOW
I’m wearing that silly smile again, so I put my phone away. Without a distraction, that distinct feeling of being watched returns. No specters or hidden eyes are among the pines on the surrounding wallpaper. Why am I so paranoid?
Dreams are private, unknowable to others. The girl in mine didn’t do anything to me. Her heart-shaped face had tilted curiously as her hands smeared insects over delicate ribs. Alone, I can unspool the dream as memory. Erase away those rotted parts until only her motions remain. She had the graceful showmanship of someone who knew my deepest secrets. I’d been scared, but enthralled too.