“I need ten minutes,” I said, then shut the door in his face.
For once I was glad I didn’t have much to pack. I changed into clean clothes, shoved everything I owned into a torn backpack, and gathered my books. Tattered library copies with bent spines and yellowing pages I couldn’t bear to leave behind. Most were due months ago. I would return them...someday.
In minutes, the flat looked as if no one had lived in it for months. It had that empty, breathless feel of a room abandoned mid-thought. Which was somewhat true. Torn between two jobs, most days I barely came home for more than a shower and a few hours of sleep.
The wallpaper peeled like sunburnt skin, exposing old plaster beneath. A leak in the ceiling had left a stain shaped like a heartthat had bled too long. The heater hadn’t worked properly in years, unless you kicked it just right. Even then, sometimes it only groaned.
The kitchen was barely a strip of counter wedged beside the bathroom. One cupboard sagged on its hinges, held together with duct tape, and sat just under the only source of light. A small, round window. A starling flew through it once and couldn’t get back out. Its small body thudded again and again against the glass until my mum caught it in a tea towel and released it back to the sky. I could see her now. Standing there, humming for the bird. To calm it.
I stood at the centre of the room, my eyes tracing the outline of things I wouldn’t miss and the one thing I would. The old chessboard table sat in the corner; its edges worn smooth from years of our nightly matches. I ran my fingertips over the grooves, tracing the carved squares my mum once etched with my penknife. I remembered her smile when she beat me in five moves. I remembered the soft melody of her voice when she told me to think like the queen, not the pawn.
I should’ve given the table to Anhe Fei. Should’ve told her goodbye. Should’ve said something more meaningful to the place where I grew up. But the flat didn’t ask for sentiment. It never gave any, so I offered none in return. But Anhe Fei did. I reopened my backpack and pulled out a notebook and a pen and started writing.
Nothing too soppy. It wasn’t goodbye, it was see you soon.
When I was done, I ripped the paper out of the notebook and folded it in half before swinging my backpack over my shoulder. I stepped toward the door, but froze, my eyes landing on the table once more. I sighed and walked back, taking hold of it. Except, it was a lot heavier than it seemed.
I groaned. It felt like someone had stabbed me in the lower back. Not that I knew what that felt like, but I imagined the painwas somewhat similar. I made my way back to the entrance and stepped out, the door slamming behind me. The driver startled upright, straightening away from the wall.
His gaze flicked between me and the table I was clinging to before he moved.
“Let me take that.”
For a moment, I contemplated saying no, then realized I couldn’t possibly carry it downstairs. Not alone at least.
“Thank you,” I said, following him in the dimly lit hallway without glancing back.
Anhe Fei’s flat was just under ours.
“Here’s fine.”
The chauffeur boy put down the table in front of the door, and it landed with a loud echoing thump. I tensed in fear of Anhe Fei coming to investigate the sound, and quickly squatted down, sliding the paper I wrote under the door. I couldn’t do goodbyes. Not even if they weren’t meant for forever.
“We can go now,” I said shortly, brushing past him and hurrying down the stairs into the cold bite of morning.
Outside, a black Rolls-Royce gleamed like an oil slick against the cracked pavement. It looked as misplaced as a chandelier would in a prison cell.
The chauffeur opened the back door for me, and I slid inside, gazing at the small, circular window of our flat one last time. Was I certain? The question rippled in my head as the car door closed on me. Did it matter? The green glass stared back.
I hadn’t grown up with choices laid at my feet like petals. If I wanted a road, I’d have to carve it with my bare hands for it to be walkable. And this—this strange offer wrapped in secrecy—might be the only shortcut I’d ever get.
My gaze flicked to the window under ours. Anhe Fei watched me from behind the clear glass, like an old tree watching the storm gather. Still and knowing.
I, on the other hand, felt blind, alone in the dark. I hated this uncertainty. This unknowing.
What’s the worst that could happen?The thought tasted metallic.
Murder. Sacrifice. People with too much money and too little soul. I’d heard stories. The ones people only whispered when the lights were off.
Anhe Fei gave me the smallest of smiles, then disappeared behind the light blue curtains. The car engine rumbled to life beneath me. I closed my eyes and told myself it would be alright.
One year. I could do one year. For that amount, I would even do two. Just so I could sleep in a warm bed instead of a lonely mattress, and live a life that didn’t require knives and late-night shifts. And maybe it won’t be bad at all. Maybe my mum had it wrong.
Something shifted at the edge of my vision. A familiar flicker just beyond the car window. Dark and slow, like oil spreading in water. Shadows gathered by the brick wall of the building. Curling, watching, as the car pulled away.
My eyes poppedopen as the car lurched. The road beneath us narrowed into a winding path flanked by bald trees. Their twisted limbs clawed at the slate sky, dark fingers reaching as if to tear open the clouds. I shifted upright, rubbing the side of my neck, before glancing down at the old watch on my wrist. Just past four. But in late November, nightfall came early, creeping in like rot through the cracks.
The car slowed. We turned another bend, and?—
