Black Water Sister

by Zen Cho

  Jess couldn’t recall anything of the conversation they’d apparently had. It was strange feeling out the gap in her memories, like probing the space left by a missing tooth with her tongue. “What did we talk about?”

  “Nothing much,” said Kor Kor. “Talked about what is it like, working for Kor Tiao’s company. How much is this house, all that.”

  Jess gaped. “I asked you how much your house cost?”

  Kor Kor looked into Jess’s face. “You really don’t remember, hah? You must have been sleepwalking. All this stress sure will have some effect on your system.”

  She had come a little too close to the truth. Jess felt herself withdraw. She forced a smile.

  “What stress?” she said. “I’m staying in my generous aunt’s house with nothing to do but enjoy myself.”

  The charm assault always worked on Mom and Dad. Jess had forgotten she wasn’t talking to them. Kor Kor patted her arm.

  “You really know how to talk after you live in US,” she said indulgently. “Don’t need to worry so much. Your mother and father can handle themselves, you know. You’re a good girl, but you don’t have to think about them only. I always tell people, let the children live their own lives! But they don’t listen to me.”

  Jess hadn’t expected this, or the reaction it elicited from her. She looked down at her mug, blinking back sudden tears. She tamped down on the flare of unreasonable fury—the feeling both that she’d been found out and that Kor Kor had gotten everything completely wrong.

  “I’m not worried about Mom and Dad. It’s me I’m most worried about,” she said lightly.

  Kor Kor nodded, as though Jess had agreed with her.

  “Correct. Better to think about yourself,” she said. “We all older people give advice is because we want to help, but sometimes it’s too much also. You have to stand up for yourself. You must say, ‘Kor Kor! I don’t want to open my own business. Keep your silly ideas to yourself.’”

  Jess said, with a genuine smile this time, “I don’t think my parents would be impressed if I talked to you like that.”

  “That’s how Ching Yee talks,” said Kor Kor, with a mix of disapproval and pride. “She didn’t grow up in US also, but she’s so clever to talk back. If it was her, she would have said to me in front of everybody, ‘Haiyah, Mom, don’t need to talk so much about this Ng Chee Hin’s son. If you want your child to be like him, you should have married Ng Chee Hin!’”

  Jess laughed. “I should’ve thought of that.”

  “When I told you about this Ng Wei Sherng the other day, it was just an idea only,” said Kor Kor. “Uncle Hui says better not copy him. The Ng family are mixed up in all this funny business. How I know? Ng Chee Hin is one of Kor Tiao’s big customers. Kor Tiao says he’s very decent now, but last time, who knows?”

  She shook her head. “Hai, Malaysia is like that. Cannot make money if you’re completely straight. That’s why. You must make your own decisions. You studied at Harvard what. I am just a kampung girl. Who am I to tell you what to do? Even helping Kor Tiao with his business, if you don’t want, you must tell us.”

  They had evidently covered a lot of ground in this conversation that Jess had forgotten. She felt adrift.

  “Don’t worry, I wasn’t planning on copying Ng Chee Hin’s son,” she said. “Uh, when you say ‘helping Kor Tiao,’ what exactly do you mean?”

  “Good,” said Kor Kor, talking over her. “You asked me so many questions about this boy, I thought, ‘Cham liao, I make Min worried only.’”

  “Wait, what?” said Jess. “I asked about Ng Chee Hin’s son? When?”

  “When we were talking at two a.m. that time. You forgot ah?” said Kor Kor. “You asked how many cafés does Ng Wei Sherng own, what property does the father hold. Must be you’re really stressed, until even in your sleep you can ask this kind of thing. You must let go. It’s OK one. Your father has recovered already what. I will pray for you all.”

  Jess put her mug carefully down on the table. Her hand shook slightly as she did it. She hoped Kor Kor didn’t notice.

  “Right,” she said. “Thanks, Kor Kor.”

  * * *

  • • •

  “YOU WIN,” SAID Jess. “You’re real. You’re haunting me. Now what?”

  There was no answer. In normal conditions this wouldn’t have been surprising, since no one else was there. Jess had locked herself in the bathroom because that was where the voice who claimed to be Ah Ma had last spoken to her.

  She looked at herself, pale and sweating, in the mirror. She definitely looked like she was going crazy. But who wouldn’t, with a ghost talking to them?

  Part of her was still resisting the idea, holding out for a world where ghosts weren’t real. So she’d had vivid dreams of places she had never seen, rich with intimate details of things she knew nothing about. They were probably things she’d absorbed when she was young, said the rational part of her brain. Impressions and experiences that had been stored in her subconscious without her realizing it.

  As for the fact she’d had a whole conversation with Kor Kor and couldn’t remember a word of it, there was nothing uncanny about that, said this part of her brain. She’d been sleepwalking. People could have conversations when they were sleepwalking that they had no memory of later.

  There was no need for a supernatural explanation for the fact she had been asking Kor Kor about Ng Chee Hin’s son. Jess had looked Ng Wei Sherng up online after hearing about him. He was only four years older than her, and he was everything she wasn’t—straight, successful, certain of where he was going in life. He had degrees from Oxford and Stanford. Sure, his family was rich, but he was legitimately making money from his cafés—Malaysia’s business press was clear on that. Plus he was dating a gorgeous heiress who was equally accomplished and glamorous, according to the several features Malaysian Tatler had done on them.

  Admittedly it wasn’t like Jess aspired to any of this—though she wouldn’t have said no to the heiress. But Ng Wei Sherng had been held up to her as a model. It was natural that her sense of inadequacy should have fixated on him.

  Yet even as her brain reeled off all the reasons why everything that had happened wasn’t caused by her being haunted by a ghost, she tilted the mirror toward herself.

  “Come on,” she said aloud. “I said I believed in you. Stop hiding.”

  Something weird was going on. Jess wasn’t imagining it. The voice in her head wasn’t caused by stress; it was real. The certainty of it lodged in her gut.

  Wah, can order her grandmother around, hah? I told you, no need to talk so loud. Talk in your head enough already.

  Jess started. It was like the voice had spoken in her ear. She was still the only person that she could see in the room, but she wasn’t alone anymore.

  The new presence was unmistakable. She could almost feel the warmth of its body. A smell that was a mix of cigarette smoke and talcum powder rose in her nostrils.

  I said I believe you exist, said Jess, ignoring the terrified lurch in her chest. Not that I believe you’re my grandmother.

  You want Ah Ma to prove who I am? It was hard to tell whether the voice was amused or irritated. Why you didn’t ask your mother about your dreams?

  Disjointed images from the dreams came back to Jess. Worn clothes hanging on a line, the cool air of early morning among the rubber trees, the baby wailing as she chopped vegetables for dinner . . .

  The baby was Mom? said Jess.

  I only had one daughter, but she doesn’t know how to give back to her mother, said the voice. You saw what. Ah Ma’s life was not easy.

  You gave me dreams of your life, said Jess slowly. It explained the vivid specificity of the dreams, how foreign they were and yet familiar. Why?

  So you can understand Ah Ma, said the voice. Your mother didn’t know how to be filial. Even before you all went off to US,
she didn’t want to bring you to see me. I only had chance to go to your full moon because Ah Ku brought me. If it was left to your mother, hah! She won’t even tell me she’s having a celebration.

  Ah Ku was Jess’s mom’s brother, the one who was always trying to borrow money from her.

  The story sounded legit, from the little Jess knew of her mom’s family. It hadn’t seemed necessary before to know any more than Mom wanted to share. For the first time, Jess found herself wishing she’d pushed Mom harder for answers.

  Why didn’t Mom want to see you? she asked. Did you guys fight?

  Fight? The voice dripped with contempt. Why should I fight with my daughter? Who is she to fight me? I am the mother. It’s for her to listen, not to talk back.

  This definitely sounded like what an asshole would say. Jess felt a brief flush of vindication. I told you, Sharanya!

  She pulled herself together. The voice hadn’t proved itself yet. For all Jess knew, she was being haunted by some random spirit, assuming the guise of her late grandmother for nefarious ghost reasons.

  What would her grandmother know that a spectral rando wouldn’t?

  Start with the basics.

  If you’re my grandmother, when did you die? said Jess.

  The voice laughed. Except that it was hoarser and older, the laugh was eerily similar to her mom’s.

  After you die, it’s different. Not like when you’re living. No clocks, no calendars. What day, what time, I cannot tell you. Ah Ku brought me to hospital in the seventh month, Hungry Ghost Festival that time. After that, I don’t know.

  Ah Ma had died last September, so she could have been admitted in August. That had coincided with the seventh month in the Chinese lunar calendar. Jess knew that because they’d been going through an especially rough patch in August and she’d blown her fee from a corporate shoot on a spa day with her mom, as a much-needed treat.

  It hadn’t been a great success. Mom didn’t like being hot, so she hadn’t used the sauna or steam room, and she’d refused to go swimming in the fancy pool because it was the Hungry Ghost Month, when it was apparently bad luck to do anything that might—for example—carry a risk of drowning.

  OK, then, said Jess, racking her brains for another question. What did you die of?

  I don’t remember, said the voice. But what is surprising about an old woman dying? Actually my fate is not to have a long life. I should have died long ago. When I was your age, I got snake disease. You know what is snake disease? You get red spots all over. Very painful. The red spots spread around your waist and when they meet, you will die. I was like that.

  The voice had to belong to an old person, given how much it liked rambling about the past.

  But you lived? said Jess.

  The god saved me, said the voice.

  So the ghost was religious, thought Jess. Could the ghost hear the thoughts that weren’t deliberately addressed to it? It didn’t seem like it, or presumably it would have jumped on Jess calling it an asshole in her head.

  Of course, there was some counter-evidence. Jess remembered the first thing the voice had said to her. Does your mother know . . . ?

  It was strange how hard it was to put the thought into words. The ghost already knew. And yet Jess felt hideously exposed. Her heart pounding, her palms damp, she said, My grandmother wouldn’t know that I was—that I’m gay.

  That one I didn’t know before I died, said the voice. I found out when I looked at the photos on your phone. Got a lot of you and that Indian girl.

  You looked through my phone? said Jess.

  It was ridiculous to feel violated by this. The voice was in Jess’s head. But she found she’d nevertheless been assuming a space sacred to herself, a locked room in her soul to which the ghost had no access. To have this belief ripped away made her feel as though the floor was buckling beneath her feet.

  Get a grip, Jess told herself. The ghost didn’t know everything she knew, or it wouldn’t have had to ask what the uncles and aunties had been saying about Ng Chee Hin.

  That was important to the ghost. It claimed to be Ah Ma, but it hadn’t bothered trying to talk to Jess’s mom, Ah Ma’s own daughter whom she hadn’t seen in years. Instead the ghost had used Jess to interrogate Kor Kor about the Ngs.

  There was something there. But first, Jess needed to work out how much the ghost knew and what it was capable of. It had to be able to see and hear at least some of what she saw and heard, or it wouldn’t have overheard the conversation about Ng Wei Sherng’s hipster cafés. And it was able to assume control of Jess’s body, even talk as Jess, without Jess’s knowing it. There had been that lost two a.m. conversation with Kor Kor—but had the ghost talked to anyone else? What else had the ghost been doing with her body that Jess couldn’t remember?

  Panic surged inside her. She stamped it down. Whoever the voice belonged to, it was a person she had to have a clear head to deal with.

  When did you see my photos? she said, as neutrally as possible.

  When you were sleeping, said the voice.

  Maybe the ghost was only able to take over when Jess was asleep. That would make sense. The past few weeks had been so busy that she would have noticed if she’d lost any blocks of time during the day.

  If you don’t want your mother to know about this girl, you must be more careful, the voice was saying. Ah Ma is so old and even I knew how to find your photos. If I can do it, your mother sure can one. You better get rid of them.

  Jess was trying not to offend the ghost before she could find out what she needed to know, but she couldn’t help an icy note creeping into her reply. I’ve been a little busy. I was going to delete them anyway.

  Why? The voice sounded interested. You and the Indian girl no more already, is it?

  It was actually because Jess had already decided she should start taking cybersecurity measures, now that she was living with her family without a job or an external social life or even a car to get her out of the house. Her parents were no great respecters of privacy. Jess could imagine them picking up her phone for some innocuous reason and stumbling onto her photos all too easily.

  But she wasn’t about to explain that. Sharanya was not something Jess was willing to discuss with any member of her family, living or dead—much less a ghost of dubious provenance.

  The ghost drew its own conclusions from her silence.

  Well, these affairs are like that, it said. Woman going with woman, it won’t last long. It’s not like you’re not pretty what. You should be able to find a boyfriend, no problem.

  Nothing you’ve said proves you’re my grandmother, said Jess sharply.

  The ghost lost patience with her. You ah, if your head got chopped off, you’d ask Tai Su Yah to prove you’re dead! If still need proof some more, why don’t you ask your mother how old is she? Call her to show her IC. Then you’ll have your proof. Such thing! If you don’t want to layan me, just say. I am not the kind to go where I am not welcome.

  Jess could point out the flagrant untruth of this, but it would only piss off the ghost further. Instead she said, with the ingenuousness that always took authority figures off their guard, What do you mean, her IC? What’s an IC?

  IC also you don’t know? It’s a card. Got your photo, your name, address all that. If you’re a citizen, you will have. America don’t have meh?

  Jess wasn’t about to be drawn into a discussion of American identity documents. I’ll ask my mom about her IC, she said. I’ve got another question.

  You asked so many already, said the voice sullenly. Ah Ma is tired of answering. You should talk less, listen more.

  Why do you want to know about Ng Chee Hin? said Jess.

  After a brief pause, the voice said:

  He is the enemy of the god.

  Something in the voice made Jess shudder. It was as though a window had opened, letting in the chill a
ir of the underworld.

  What god? said Jess.

  There was a silence, going on for long enough that Jess began to wonder if the ghost was sulking, or had gone off somewhere. Could it go off somewhere? Or was it in Jess’s head all the time?

  Jess tried again.

  What happened to make you want to stay in this world? she said. Why are you haunting me?

  So we can settle that useless bastard lah, said the ghost, sounding faintly surprised. What else?

  FOUR

  Jess didn’t manage to extract an explanation from the ghost of what it meant by “enemy of the god.” She was left to undertake her own investigations.

  It helped that the ghost hadn’t chosen just anybody as the object of her undead grudge. Dato’ Ng Chee Hin was the fifth richest man in Malaysia, according to Forbes. Typing his name into a search engine brought up a ton of hits, even more than when Jess had stalked his son online.

  You had to have a net worth of $250 million to even be on Forbes’s list. The first thing Jess had done after finding this out was check if there were any vacancies at Ng Chee Hin’s company, but there was nothing she was qualified for, and everything required three to five years of experience anyway.

  After this, she would not have been displeased to find evidence of the company’s being shady. But as far as she could tell, Sejahtera Holdings had a clean slate. There was extensive coverage of the corporation and its owner in the press, but no trace of the funny business Kor Kor’s gossipy uncle friend had mentioned. Ng Chee Hin seemed to spend most of his time cutting ribbons at charity events. He made a lot of donations to Buddhist and Taoist organizations. It didn’t really seem like “enemy of god” behavior.

  The gossipy uncle had been right about one thing. Ng Chee Hin was close to the government. Jess could have made a decent-sized collage with all the photos of Dato’ Ng shaking hands with various politicians. He didn’t appear to have suffered from the regime change. When you were that rich, probably every political party wanted to be your friend.

  It was only when it occurred to Jess to try searching Sejahtera Holdings together with the keyword “god” that she turned up something promising—a brief article dating from the previous year, with the headline “Appeal to Halt Temple Demolition.”