Black Water Sister

by Zen Cho

  Jess had resolved to be patient, but this annoyed her enough to make her incautious. She withdrew her arm from around Mom’s shoulders.

  “I mean, it’s not like you’ve been super open with me,” she said. “Like, when were you going to mention the fact your mother was a spirit medium and a gangster?”

  Jess wasn’t sure whether Ah Ma had actually been a gangster or if it was just Ah Ku and his associates. Ah Ma had certainly had enough murderous intent to suggest she’d been accustomed to criminal activity in life, but maybe ghosts had fewer inhibitions about killing people.

  But Mom’s answer confirmed it.

  “What for Ah Ku’s going around telling people things like that?” she said sharply. “He should learn to keep his mouth shut. Ah Ma’s passed on already.”

  So Ah Kim hadn’t told her about the ghost. You could call Ah Ma a lot of things, but “passed on” wasn’t one of them.

  Mom was clearly wondering herself what Jess knew. “What else did Ah Ku tell you? He’s not doing any funny business, right? He told me all that no more already.”

  It sounded like she hadn’t heard about the run-ins with Ng Chee Hin’s men at the temple. Maybe she didn’t even know Ah Ma and Ah Ku were quarreling with Ng Chee Hin. It wasn’t like the dispute about the temple had been in the news recently.

  “Why didn’t you tell me about this stuff?” said Jess. “It’s kind of a big thing for me not to know about my own relatives.”

  “Why you want to know for what? This kind of thing, better not to know,” said Mom. “I also don’t want to know. You think it’s easy ah, moving to US? But I have to think about you. You are my daughter. If I don’t look after you, who else will do it?”

  It sounded like a non sequitur, but Jess knew how Mom’s mind worked. It made strange-seeming leaps, devised unexpected connections—but the connections were always present. This time, it wasn’t hard to work out what she meant.

  “Hold on, are you saying we emigrated because of Ah Ma?” said Jess.

  “I don’t want you to get involved,” said Mom. “Ah Ma’s life is like that, she has to be tough. But why should you suffer? You know or not, the police went and caught Ah Ku’s son Ah Ping? Lucky thing he didn’t go to jail.” She looked at Jess. “You went to Ah Ku’s house for what?”

  Jess had had enough time to construct a story by now. It came out smoothly.

  “Ah Ku said since I didn’t go to Ah Ma’s funeral, I should pay my respects,” she said. “He took me to pray to her. He’s having some trouble with his business or something. I think he thinks Ah Ma’s, like, cursed him from beyond the veil.”

  “Choy,” said Mom. “Don’t simply talk like that. This Ah Ku is too superstitious. Ah Ma is his own mother, where got she’ll curse him?”

  She was frowning, but the story must have seemed plausible. She didn’t question it further. “Next time Ah Ku tries to contact you, you let me know. I’ll deal with it. Why you didn’t tell me about him?”

  Jess shrugged. “I didn’t want to worry you. I know you’ve got issues with Ah Ku. It didn’t seem like a big deal, praying to Ah Ma.”

  “Issues? I don’t have issues with Ah Ku. He’s my brother.”

  “I don’t know, I think it’d be fair to have an issue with the fact he’s a ga—an ex-gangster.” Jess glanced at Mom. “So were you a gangster before you left Malaysia?”

  Mom had calmed down a little. The question didn’t seem to offend her. “No lah. Do I look like I can be a gangster?”

  “No,” agreed Jess. It was hard to imagine Mom with a rusting length of pipe, or looking tough in any way. “But maybe you did their bookkeeping or something. How am I supposed to know?”

  “I was lucky,” said Mom. “After Ah Ku came along, Ah Ma couldn’t cope. She had to go out to work, so she put me with my grandmother, Ah Chor. I didn’t live with Ah Ma after that, stayed with my grandparents until I went to uni. Ah Chor didn’t like Ah Ma’s lifestyle—the spirits business, and the other things. She kept me away from all that. Taught me to study hard, behave myself.”

  Mom had never said so much about her family before. Feeling like a National Geographic camerawoman approaching a famously jumpy animal, Jess said, “What about Ah Ku, did he stay with Ah Ma?”

  Mom nodded. “He’s the son mah.”

  So that was what Dad had been talking about when he’d said Mom needed to forgive Ah Ma. It had to have been hard, being the child who had been given away. “Is that why you weren’t close to Ah Ma?”

  Mom sighed. “You know, Mom was a good girl. From young also I was scared of all these spirits things. I cannot see and I don’t want to see.

  “Ah Ma was different. From the beginning she was wild. Ah Chor was so strict, but even she couldn’t handle her. If you knew Ah Ma, you’ll understand.”

  Boy, do I, thought Jess.

  “You cannot blame her also,” said Mom. “For you and me, why should we go and do this kind of thing? We can find a decent job. Don’t need to carry heavy things, burn under the sun. Ah Ma was not educated. Eight years old already she had to leave home and work.”

  Jess blinked. “What, really? What kind of work can an eight-year-old do?”

  “A lot. Jaga the stall at the market, clean the house,” said Mom. “You don’t know only! Your life is so comfortable, but not everybody is as lucky as you. Ah Ma wanted to change her fate. Of course if she can become a clerk or a teacher, she’ll do it. But what can she do? She cannot read or write, how to find an office job? Some more she lived in a small village, didn’t have the chance to meet anybody. She only met people like the man who sold scrap rubber.

  “When she’s young she’s very pretty, you know,” Mom added. “Dark only, because she had to work outside in the sun. But pretty. All the men liked her. I’m not saying it’s right, but she was so young when she got married. Not like she married because she loved the man. The parents chose for her. Last time it was like that, arranged marriage.”

  This was opaque even to Jess, but after a moment comprehension dawned.

  “Wait, wait, wait,” Jess said. “You’re saying Ah Ma cheated on Ah Kong with the scrap rubber guy?”

  “She was only eighteen when she got married,” said Mom. “Younger than you. Ah Kong was so much older than her, he was in his thirties already when they met. When they fight he can beat her one, you know! Ah Ma beat him back, but he’s stronger than her. Aiyoh, sometimes after they quarrel, her face become like pizza like that.”

  Jess thought of the dreams Ah Ma had given her—the squalling baby, the smell of rubber trees in the morning, the unending round of tasks to be done. In the dreams she had rushed to prepare dinner once she got home, because something was going to happen at night.

  Ah Ma had never shown her what it was that happened at night. It appeared there were some species of suffering she wasn’t willing to share.

  “But what’s the scrap rubber boyfriend got to do with anything?” said Jess.

  “He’s the one who dragged her into that world,” said Mom. “The gang world. This guy, his business made enough money that he had surplus, so he can make loans to people. Charged high interest. If they cannot pay back, his men will chase them. He’s a powerful man in their village, even though he’s so young. Younger than Ah Ma some more. But she’s pretty and her character is something different. Not many people you can meet like her.”

  “Grandma was a gangster moll,” said Jess. “It sounds like the title of a movie.”

  “What? What is ‘moll’?”

  “So did Ah Ma divorce Ah Kong?”

  “Back then there’s no such thing as divorce,” said Mom. “But after Ah Kong passed on, Ah Ma went to live with the man. That’s when she sent me to Ah Chor. Ah Chor was so angry. I remember when Ah Ma took me to her house, she won’t even speak to Ah Ma.” She shook her head.

  “What, because Ah Ma le
ft Ah Kong?” said Jess. “Even though he was abusive?”

  “That one not so much,” said Mom. “If Ah Ma went back to Ah Chor’s house, it won’t be so bad. But to go and stay with the boyfriend . . .” Her voice dropped. “Ah Kong died when Ah Ma was pregnant with Ah Ku. She didn’t even wait to give birth first. Pregnant and she went to the other man’s house!

  “Ah Chor was right,” she added. “This kind of relationship cannot last one. Short time only she stayed with the boyfriend, then he kicked Ah Ma out. After that she lived by herself with Ah Ku.”

  “She didn’t take you back then?”

  “No,” said Mom. “She didn’t take me back.”

  Maybe it was the effect of the dreams Ah Ma had given Jess. Somehow it was easy to imagine the little girl Mom had been—straight black hair, skinny legs and wary eyes.

  Jess touched her arm. “Did it bother you, being sent to live with Ah Chor?”

  “Yes.” Mom rubbed her eyes. “But it’s OK. I have you and Dad now. I don’t need any other family.”

  This was touching, but also like having an executioner tighten a noose around Jess’s neck. She looked down to avoid betraying her reaction.

  “Min?” Mom’s voice changed, no longer wobbly.

  She looked ghastly, the bones standing out on her face. It was as though Jess had been vouchsafed a glimpse into the future. This was how Mom might look on her deathbed.

  It was a horrific thought, unthinkable. Jess pushed it away, burying it beneath all the other things she wasn’t allowed to think or feel.

  “Mom, are you OK?” she said.

  But Mom was reaching out, touching the back of Jess’s neck, pushing the hair out of the way. Her fingers were trembling.

  “What’s this?” she said. Her voice was resonant with dread.

  “What?” said Jess, but some part of her already knew. When Mom brought a mirror and showed her what was on her neck, she felt no surprise.

  There were five welts in a semicircle, the skin red and raised. They looked like fingerprints, marks someone might leave if they had been holding Jess by the neck.

  Bile rose in Jess’s throat.

  “What did Ah Ku make you do?” said Mom.

  * * *

  • • •

  FOR A SHORT time Jess had been freed from the horror of the night before, distracted by her conversation with Mom. But now the dream rushed in on her again—the hunt through the forest, the knife opening her flesh. She put a hand to her throat.

  “Min?” said Mom. Her voice sounded like it was coming from a great distance away. “You OK?”

  “I’m fine,” Jess heard herself saying. She wanted to crawl away and hide herself, like an injured animal.

  “What did Ah Ku do?” said Mom. “See lah, you keep secrets from Mom. If you told me, I would have warned you. I should have told you, stay away from Ah Ku. But how I know he’ll contact you without asking me? I’ve been patient, you know. Not like he does so much for me. When Dad was sick also he didn’t call me. Didn’t offer to help out, even though I gave him so much money over the years. I don’t mind. I don’t expect him to give me money. But he cannot even leave my daughter alone! My poor girl! What did he do?”

  “It’s not him,” said Jess. She was getting a grip on herself. Mom’s ready flow of words was helping. Irritation cut through the haze of terror, bringing Jess back to the mundane world. “It’s not Ah Ku. I saw him at the garden temple, but—”

  “He took you to that temple?” said Mom, her voice rising.

  Jess looked up. “He didn’t take me there. I—”

  It might all have come out then, Ah Ma and the whole improbable nightmare. But that was when Jess saw the god.

  The Black Water Sister stood outside the glass sliding doors, framed by Kor Kor’s bougainvilleas, sickeningly real against the vivid-hued blooms.

  Jess froze, her voice drying up in her throat. She tore her gaze away, but she had looked now. There was no taking that back.

  “You what?” said Mom.

  “I, uh—” The instinct to hide descended on Jess. She needed to keep talking or Mom would realize something was wrong. “I went to the temple myself. I saw an article about it online.”

  She barely knew what she was saying. Her thoughts were scurrying around in her head, frantic. What should she do? She needed to get Mom out of this room, away from the god. But would the god follow them?

  “You shouldn’t have gone there!” said Mom. “Why you didn’t tell me? I would have warned you . . . Let me see your neck. Don’t know why Kor Kor likes this old light, even when it’s on, you cannot see anything. Come, come to the window.”

  Mom tugged her toward the glass sliding doors where the god stood. Jess resisted.

  “I don’t—Mom, no!”

  Mom reached out to the curtains, apparently intending to let the early-morning sunlight in.

  For the first time, the god took her eyes off Jess. She looked at Mom.

  Jess’s body moved without the intervention of thought. She threw herself at Mom, dragging her away from the sliding doors.

  “What are you doing?” said Mom. “What’s wrong?”

  “Don’t freak out, OK?” said Jess, giving up on discretion. She could keep lying or she could cope with the fact that the god was standing outside their house staring at them, but she couldn’t do both at the same time.

  She moved to put herself between Mom and the god so she could form a barrier, however inadequate, and lowered her voice. “The god is over there.”

  Mom’s forehead wrinkled. “What?”

  “Ah Ma’s god is at the window,” said Jess.

  She watched the emotions chase themselves across Mom’s face: bewilderment, followed by understanding—and horror.

  “You can see?” whispered Mom.

  You think you can run from me? the god had said.

  “She’s following me,” said Jess, heartsick.

  “Following you? Why?”

  Jess remembered the dark night of her dream and how it had ended, with her blood soaking the forest floor.

  The dream had been a lesson. The dangers of this shadow-world of spirits Ah Ma had drawn her into were not merely spiritual, but horribly tangible. If you offended a god, they wouldn’t stop at cursing you with some vague form of bad luck. They would fuck you up.

  And Jess had offended a god.

  “I destroyed her shrine,” she said.

  “What?”

  “I had to,” said Jess defensively. “She was . . .” But a lifetime’s habit of caution clamped down on her, pushing the words back down her throat. Did she really want Mom to know the full extent of what had been going on? Best to portion it out. Jess needed time to think, and they had better things to worry about just then anyway. “I’ll tell you later. What do I do, Mom? She’s still there.”

  “She’s doing what?”

  Jess wasn’t going to attempt a second inspection, but she didn’t need to look at the god to know the answer. “Waiting for me.”

  Mom stood looking at her for a moment. Jess braced herself for a meltdown, or a reaming out, or a combination of the two.

  Instead Mom turned and shouted, like a waiter in a kopitiam yelling out orders to the kitchen, “Ah Yit ah Ah Yit!”

  She had to shout again before Kor Kor came bustling down the stairs. She was wearing black leggings and a baggy pink T-shirt with the words California Dreamin’ on the front. “What’s the matter? I was Skyping Ching Yee, didn’t hear you.”

  “Min collided with a spirit,” said Mom.

  Kor Kor’s eyes widened. “When?”

  “My brother took her to his temple the other day.”

  Mom and Kor Kor exchanged a look that was the equivalent of several involved conversations.

  “Kor Kor knows about Ah Ku and Ah Ma and everything?�
�� said Jess, with dawning indignation. “And you didn’t tell me?”

  Mom ignored this. “Is the god still at the window there?”

  “The spirit is here?” said Kor Kor. “In my house?” They were both speaking in whispers.

  They needn’t have worried about attracting the god’s attention. As far as Jess could tell without looking directly at her, the god had gone back to gazing fixedly at Jess.

  “She’s outside, by the sliding doors,” said Jess, but Kor Kor was already striding to the dresser in the hallway, her face set with determination. She snatched up an olive wood cross, a souvenir from a Holy Land tour she and Kor Tiao had gone on a couple of years ago.

  “Which window?” she said. She was pale.

  Mom pointed.

  Jess said, “Kor Kor, I don’t think you should . . .”

  But Kor Kor went over to the sliding doors, holding the wooden cross aloft in one hand. The other hand was pressed against her chest, clasping the silver crucifix she always wore around her neck.

  “Kor Kor, come back!”

  Jess might as well have kept her mouth shut for all the effect this had. Kor Kor went right up to the glass.

  “In Jesus’s name, I command you to leave this place!” she proclaimed, waving her cross.

  Jess hung back at first, uncertain. But then she saw the god’s head turn, her eyes falling on Kor Kor and her little cross.

  Jess darted after her aunt. “Kor Kor, let’s not . . . let’s go back there, OK? We can talk about what to do.”

  “Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name,” chanted Kor Kor. She slid open the glass, sticking the cross out through the grille. “Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.”

  The god raised her hand.

  It came to Jess that she could not bear for the god to touch Kor Kor, or Mom, or anything Jess loved. She wouldn’t let the god have a single petal off a single blossom on the bougainvilleas. Jess might have betrayed herself into the Black Water Sister’s keeping, like Persephone recklessly swallowing pomegranate seeds, but her family hadn’t done anything to deserve the god’s vengeance. None of them belonged to the god. They belonged to Jess, and the god had no right.