As exams loom closer, I keep waiting for Mr. Murphy to find me.
Alice, I imagine him saying at the end of class, his expression unusually stern. Maybe he’ll have his folder ready by his side, a secret recording device I failed to notice, all the incriminating evidence he needs. Would you care to explain this?
Each time I enter his classroom or pass by him in the halls, I feel violently sick. My palms go all clammy and I have to swallow back the nausea, barely mustering the energy to return his smiles and occasional nods of greeting.
The paranoia is so bad that I start having nightmares about it: strange, disturbing nightmares where Mr. Murphy faints before me and I rush over to help him only to be tackled to the ground, police sirens screeching around me until I wake up with a start; or I’m about to enter the examination hall when I realize I’ve forgotten to put clothes on, and Jake Nguyen leaps onto the teacher’s desk, declaring that being naked is a sign of guilt, all while Henry catches my eye from across the hall and whispers: Have you no shame?
Needless to say, my sleep quality hasn’t been great.
“I feel like Lady Macbeth,” I mutter to Chanel the morning before our first exams. “You know, like after a bunch of people die and she starts hallucinating about all the blood on her hands because it’s a super not-subtle manifestation of her guilt—”
“Alice, Alice,” Chanel interrupts, putting a hand on my shoulder. “First, it’s really bold of you to assume I have any idea what you’re talking about, because I haven’t read Macbeth yet—”
“But—but the English exam’s tomorrow—”
“Exactly,” she says. “That gives me a whole twenty-four hours to get the gist of it.”
“I think you’re severely underestimating the complexity of Shakespeare’s work.”
She ignores me. “Second of all, I still don’t know what your little mission with Henry was since someone won’t tell me, but I’m sure it’s going to be fine. You haven’t been caught a single time so far, have you?”
“No,” I admit. “But still. I just… I have a bad feeling.”
“You always have a bad feeling,” she says with a wave of her hand. “Your body like, functions on bad feelings. In fact, I’d be very concerned if you weren’t high-key stressed about something right now.”
“I guess,” I say, not entirely convinced.
But then exams come and pass in a blur of late nights and last-minute revision and adrenaline, and nothing out of the ordinary happens. Mr. Murphy thanks us all for our hard work with a round of Kahoot on ancient Chinese history (it gets a little intense; pencils are thrown, angry fingers are pointed, and Henry and I end up tying for the lead) and promises he’ll mark our exams within the next week. The teachers start handing us forms and brochures for our upcoming Experiencing China trip to Suzhou, and soon it’s all that anyone can talk about. The leaves on the school’s wutong trees turn gold, then a withered brown, falling and scattering over the courtyard like shredded notes, and such a pervasive cold creeps in by mid-November that even the Year Thirteen guys stop playing basketball outside during lunchtimes, hogging the limited space in the school café instead.
And through it all, the Beijing Ghost tasks keep coming.
More pregnancy scares and sex scandals and embarrassing photos taken drunk at an exclusive party in Wangjing. More instances of unrequited love and friendship worries and panic attacks and crumbling families. More messages detailing stories of exes and vigorous competitions and bribery and secret insecurities. This is the unexpected side effect of the app: the tasks feel like more than business opportunities now.
They feel like confessions.
Of course, I’ve always known that my classmates at Airington lead completely different lives from mine. But I’ve never looked beneath the shiny, polished surface of their million-dollar condos and private drivers and wild shopping sprees. Never considered that the people I’ve bumped into countless times in the corridors, made vague small talk with about upcoming tests, are people I might’ve actually been friends with. Exchanged secrets with. Reached out and comforted.
Instead, I’ve spent my five years here completely oblivious to everything outside my own studies.
Henry, on the other hand, doesn’t seem surprised by anything.
“Hmm,” is all he says when I show him the latest request at the end of our social ethics class.
“Hmm?” I repeat, incredulous. “Did you even read it?”
His eyes shift from the phone to my face, a gel pen twirling around and around between his long slender fingers. “Yes, of course. In its entirety.”
“And you—you knew about this?”
“No,” he says calmly, voice low enough for just the two of us to hear. Everyone else is busy pretending to jot down Julie Walsh’s board notes on Discrimination in Developing Countries, their hands already reaching for their bags and laptop cases, ready to run out of here the second the bell rings. “But I find it rather plausible. Her artistic statement for her final project last year doesn’t align at all with her coursework this semester. Either she underwent a drastic change in world views over the summer, or those views weren’t hers to begin with.”
I shake my head in disbelief. Even by the usual Beijing Ghost standards, the anonymous message currently loaded up on my phone is…well, shocking.
Apparently, Airington’s favorite art prodigy, Vanessa Liu, has been buying all her art ideas and designs from some older university student. The source wants me to follow her to Shimao Tianjie, or simply The Place, tomorrow—one of those high-end, inner-city places I never visit—where she’s meant to be meeting up with the student for another little exchange.
“But I’ve seen her draw,” I insist, keeping my voice down too. “She’s—I mean, she’s talented. I don’t understand why…”
“Talent isn’t the same as genius,” Henry replies, with all the secure, unaffected ease of someone who’s spent his life in the latter category and knows it.
A familiar thorn of envy—of want—digs into my side.
I set the phone down. “Well. I guess I’ll find out tomorrow night.”
Henry glances up, and for the first time since I brought up this subject, he looks interested. When he speaks again, he seems to choose his words with care. “Would you…perhaps like some company?”
“From who?” I say, confused. The whole point of Beijing Ghost is that I’m meant to operate alone: undetected, unseen.
He raises his brows. Waits.
“What, you?” I say it like a joke, but his expression remains completely serious.
“Why not?” He holds up the pen he’s been spinning. “Exams are over. We’ve both got some extra time on our hands. And I go to The Place all the time. I could be of some help.”
“But. But if someone sees you—”
“We can go there early,” he says readily, shrugging. “I’ll show you around a bit, then head back on my own when you find her.”
“But you—I just—”
The pen stills in his grip. He cocks his head a few degrees, his gaze steady on me, sharp and assessing and intensely black beneath the classroom lights. “What?”
And I don’t know what. Only that the idea of meeting him alone outside school at night makes my stomach dip as though I’ve just tumbled from a great height. I mean, sure, we’ve been walking to class together and I’ve even been inside his dorm room, but this…with only the two of us…this is—
“I won’t be able to focus with you there,” I blurt out, then realize exactly how that sounds.
His lips twitch. It’s the same half-suppressed smile he wears when he’s making his grand closing statement in a debate tournament, or when he knows the answer to a particularly hard question in class, or when he’s making an impressive business pitch. It’s the smile he wears when he’s about to get what he wants. “Are you saying you find my presence distracting, Alice?”
“N-no. That’s not at all what I…” I clear my throat just as the bell rings, drowning out the rest of my half-formed protests. When the loud buzzing finally stops, Henry speaks up before I can.
“I’ll see you tomorrow night then.” For some reason, he sounds weirdly excited.
The Place looks like something straight out of a movie. The high-budget kind.
It’s an absolute behemoth of a road, with multilevel luxury brand stores and futuristic, glow-in-the-dark signs and rooftop restaurants crowded together along the sides, and a massive outdoor screen stretching from one end of the road all the way to the other, blocking out the hazy evening sky above it.
A clip of a dragon swimming through pools of gold is playing on the overhead screen when Henry and I step out from his driver’s car. The light is so bright it casts a golden sheen over everything, from the smooth pavement tiles to the rich midnight fabric of Henry’s button-down coat and the knife-edged angles of his face.
He’s dressed even better than usual today; his hair is all soft and freshly combed and falling just above his eyes, and he has on a crisp white shirt underneath, the collar strategically undone, the sleeves peeking out every time he moves his arms around. Maybe he’s heading off to a big event after this. A tech convention or something.
Then again, everyone here looks awfully stylish. Half the girls we pass on our way down the road could very well be models, with their velvet thigh-high boots and designer belts and bouncy, curled hair.
I run a self-conscious hand over my own plain shirt and leggings, then shake the thought away.
I’m not here to walk a runway; I’m here to complete a task and get my money.
Besides, if all goes according to plan, I’ll be invisible soon anyway.
“So. Where do you want to go?” Henry asks, his steps falling in line with mine. Our shoulders are just close enough to touch, which, I realize, isn’t something I should be noticing.
I shoot him a strange look. “Wherever Vanessa is. Where else would we go?”
“We could grab dinner first… Maybe walk around a bit—”
“And possibly miss out on our target?” My voice rises an octave with incredulity. Henry’s always been annoyingly cavalier about all the Beijing Ghost tasks, but even for him, this seems a frivolous suggestion. “Or risk bumping into her before we gather our evidence? All for a—a meal? I don’t think so. Plus, I ate a granola bar before coming here. I’m good.”
He makes a small, exasperated noise with the back of his throat. Stops walking so abruptly I almost trip. “Alice.”
“What?”
But whatever he’s about to say is lost to the swell of orchestral music in the background. The screen above us flickers, and the brilliant wash of gold light is replaced by vivid hues of red and pink. Projected roses bloom over the giant screen’s corners, magnified to the size of the outdoor dining table we’ve stopped beside, and images start flashing over the center.
Couple selfies. Shots of a pretty girl in her late twenties clearly taken by someone who knows her on an intimate level: pictures of her posing at a beach, smiling from the opposite end of a dinner table, hugging a cat and teddy bear in the comfort of her kitchen.
Then snippets of text pop up on the screen as well, written in pretty, enlarged italics.
You’re beautiful…
I’ve loved you ever since
we met in high school…
Gasps and cheers arise from the many onlookers around us as they realize the same thing I do—
It’s a proposal.
“This seems very unnecessary,” I mutter as I scan the rapidly gathering crowd. People are running—actually running—to some distant spot outside a Guess store, where I can vaguely make out the shape of a man bending down on one knee. As cheesy as the proposal is, if Vanessa happens to already be here, she seems like the type who’d join the crowd. Maybe I could spot her from here, and follow her…
“I think it’s rather romantic,” Henry says lightly, while more roses threaten to take over the entire illuminated screen.
I whip my head back to stare at him. “If this is your idea of romance, I’m somewhat concerned for your future girlfriend.”
Girlfriend.
The word hangs in the cool evening air between us, and if I had the energy and resources and brainpower to invent a time machine just so I could go back and retract that one sentence, I would without hesitation.
Henry and I have spoken about plenty of things over the past few months. Exams. Criminal activity. Bribery. The Boxer Rebellion. How we both achieved the same perfect English test score in Year Ten but I received more praise.
But we’ve never touched upon the topic of relationships. Of romance.
It’s not as if I haven’t thought about it in his presence, haven’t occasionally wondered about things I shouldn’t, dwelled a little too long on the shape of his lips, but to speak it aloud and acknowledge it feels like a kind of surrender.
It doesn’t help that Zhang Jie’s hit ballad “This Is Love” is now blasting at top volume from the speakers.
Or that Henry’s gazing intently down at me.
“Anyway,” I say, raising my voice over the music, praying he can’t distinguish the reddish glow of the screen from the heated redness of my cheeks. “I’m happy for the couple and all, but we should really, uh, focus on finding Vanessa…”
To both my disappointment and relief, Henry doesn’t say anything else as he follows me down toward the crowd. The girl must’ve accepted the proposal, because people are clapping wildly and wolf whistling, and off to the side of all the commotion is—
“Shit,” I hiss under my breath, grabbing Henry by the sleeve and dragging him behind a nearby pillar with me.
“What—” he starts to say, but I clamp my hand over his mouth, forcing him farther back against the stone, out of view, my own body pressed up to his. Close enough to feel the heat of his skin. The warm tickle of his breath on my cheek.
My heart thuds louder in my ears.
Vanessa was there. Is there.
Carefully, one hand still pinning Henry in place, I sneak a quick glance out at the crowd again. Vanessa doesn’t seem to have spotted me. She’s standing next to a tall wiry guy maybe a few years older than she is; someone I’ve never seen before. The university student.
It must be him.
The two of them linger a few beats longer before turning in to the French-style bakery café on their left, their figures soon obscured by the colorful display windows.
I release a small sigh.
All I have to do now is turn invisible and follow them inside. I’ll need close-up evidence; photos of the exchange taking place, pictures of the university student’s face, and the artwork involved.
“Er… Alice?”
Henry’s voice comes out muffled through my palm, and only then do I realize how close we still are. How easy it would be, in our current position, to stand on tiptoe and tilt my head just so and—
I lurch back. “Sorry,” I apologize hastily, bringing my hand back down. “I was scared she’d see us.”
“No worries.” His tone is equally dismissive, nonchalant, but the tips of his ears are a deep pink.
Or maybe, in his case, it really is just the effect of the glowing screen.
“I should turn invisible now,” I say out loud, more to fill the silence than anything.
“Indeed.”
An awkward beat passes. Then another.
Nothing happens.
I keep waiting for the familiar chill to descend over my body, wash over me like a bucket of ice water, for the hair on my arms to rise, but all I feel is…warm. Whole. Flushed from my proximity to Henry, from the way he’s looking at me, his lips red in the places I pressed my fingers to; from the ballad still playing in the background, the soft piano notes tangling together, the vocalist singing throatily about love and loss and want and how it feels to be truly seen.
And I’m just standing here, as blatantly visible as ever, my shadow falling firm over the pavement at my feet.
“Perhaps you can try again later,” Henry suggests after about fifteen minutes of this. “Take a break and whatnot.”
“I can’t.” I shake my head fast. “There’s not enough time—for all we know, she’s probably already taken the art—”
“Then let her.”
I gape up at him, uncomprehending. “But that means—then I’ll fail the task—I can’t just fail—”
“Well, it seems like this isn’t something you can control at present.”
He’s right. He’s right, and it’s horrible. My powers have never been the most reliable, I know that, but to have them abandon me at a time like this, when Vanessa is right there in that café and I’ve traveled all the way here, feels like the worst possible betrayal.
“Come on.” Henry waves a hand. “Even if you do turn invisible in time, we might as well walk around while we wait.”
But I don’t turn invisible that night. What I end up doing instead is following Henry down the length of the crowded road, watching the screen glow and change scenes every few seconds, from a vast stretch of ocean to an ancient Chinese palace to a phoenix unfurling its fiery wings. He buys this inflated disk-like toy thing from one of the vendor carts parked outside a busy Zara shop, and even though I’m half-convinced he only wants to see me fumble with it and laugh at me, I try throwing it up in the air. It flies much farther than I thought, carried along by a mild breeze. We take turns with the disk afterward, until it inevitably becomes a ridiculous, intense competition to see how far we can throw, and soon I’m yelling at him to mark out the exact spot the disk hit the ground because I swore I won that last round.
And I almost forget about Vanessa and the art scandal and turning invisible at all.
I’m too busy watching the screen’s green-blue light move over Henry’s skin like water, the challenge set in the sharp line of his jaw as he makes his way back to me.
Is this how it feels? I wonder as I throw the disk up high again and watch it soar, weightless, over the heads of happy families and giddy teenagers, friends drunk on a wild night out. To be someone like Chanel, like Rainie, like Henry? To come to a place like this on any old weekday and just…have fun? Just live, without worrying about opportunity costs and paying out school fees?
I’m still thinking about this on the quiet car ride home, my fingers poised over my phone, a half-finished message typed out on the screen.
Unfortunately, I was unable to fulfill your request for Beijing Ghost…
I read it over, tasting the bitter failure in those words, and sigh. Delete everything. Tonight’s assignment should’ve given me 25,000 RMB, but all I have now is an unwritten apology and one fewer client and a pressing need to make up for all the lost money whenever and however I can. I squeeze my eyes shut briefly, go over the calculations inside my head until my chest tightens, stuffed full with panic and flashing numbers. Even with the 160,000 RMB in my bank account now, I’m still over 80,000 RMB short. And the next deadline for our school fees is due in less than three weeks.
80,000 RMB.
The tightness in my chest suddenly feels a lot like exhaustion. Like despair.
I’m yanked from my spiraling thoughts when my phone buzzes. Not a Beijing Ghost alert, but a WeChat message.
From Xiaoyi.
Yan Yan! Have you eaten yet?
I’ve attached a link on best foods to help counter excessive han energy in women… I think you should find useful—you can share with friends too. Most important is to drink ginger and brown sugar water while on period (I sense yours is starting soon)
And how is your little situation going? Is all under control?
I’m so mortified by what she’s written above that it takes me a moment to register which “little situation” she’s referring to.
My chest tightens. It’s been a while since my invisibility powers felt so completely beyond my control. I might as well be honest about it.
Not really, I type out.
She replies right away, as if she’d sensed this answer was coming as well. Ah.
Then that means you have not seen the light yet.
Don’t worry, Yan Yan. You will get better soon.
I stare at the message for a long, long time and decide that I have absolutely no idea what she means. I can only assume she’s alluding to some Chinese proverb.
Still, it’s nice to have an adult tell me everything will be okay. Even if I’m not so sure that’s true.
