by Celeste Lim
“Baba, Mama, zao,” he said and went over to hug his parents. As Mrs. Guo started to fuss over her son, Mr. Guo got up and left to check on the fabric factories out of town.
“Now, Jun’an,” began Mrs. Guo, turning her son to face me. “This is Jing, and she is your wife.” Then she looked at me. “You will address him as Master Jun’an.”
I nodded and bent over. “I’m happy to meet you, Master Jun’an. I do think we’ll become the best of friends,” I promised him and myself.
Jun’an obviously liked the idea, because he chuckled shyly and dimples appeared on both of his cheeks. But Mrs. Guo cleared her throat sharply, a gesture that I would soon learn indicated she wasn’t happy with something.
“Do not confuse your place in this household, Jing,” she said. “A friend would have the same status as the master of the house, but a wife doesn’t. And especially not a tongyang xi.”
Before I could decide how much I disliked her statement, two girls came sauntering into the hall. I didn’t need anyone to tell me they were Guo Yunli and Guo Yunmin, my sisters-in-law. The girls were both wearing exquisitely beautiful hanfu—one in silken sky blue covered in glossy lavender brocades and swirly motifs, and the other in a gauzy, powdery pink material with elaborate embroideries of peach and plum blossoms. Typically, only the very rich could afford such hanfu for everyday wear, but were the Guos truly rich, or just pretentious? It was, after all, easy to own a lot of hanfu when you were in the dressmaking business.
“Jing, you will call Yunli, Da Jie,” instructed Mrs. Guo, and turned to her other daughter. “And Yunmin, Er Jie.”
Those meant “eldest sister” and “second eldest sister” respectively. I liked the sound of these better than Master and Mistress, so I inclined my head with a smile. “Zao an, Da Jie, Er Jie.” When my gaze met Yunli’s, I almost blushed.
She was a rare, exotic beauty. I couldn’t help but notice her resemblance to Mr. Guo. Those sharp, catlike eyes and slender nose especially stood out from her perfectly sculpted features.
Unfortunately however, Yunmin was as plain as her sister was beautiful. She was slightly bucktoothed, had a face as round as a prune, and eyes that took after her mother’s tiny ones. Even the sweet, pink hue of her lovely dress failed to conceal how unattractive she was, whereas Yunli could have looked breathtaking even in a farmer’s tunic.
She was smiling at me, which made her look even more stunning than she already was. But it was the kind of smile that rang alarm gongs in my head. She looked like a cat that had found an interesting new toy.
“So…” She circled around me. “Is this the little huli jing we picked up from the dump?”
I almost sighed out loud. Would I never be rid of this name? Behind me, Yunmin chuckled and pretended to hold her nose. “The dump! Oh, no wonder she smells like garbage.”
I had figured out by now the sisters probably liked me as much as the dandruff in their hair, so I needn’t waste effort on first impressions. I’d love a good comeback, but it wouldn’t be wise to show off too much on my first day here.
I inclined my head slightly. “I beg your pardon, Da Jie, Er Jie, but I am not from Xiawan. I came from Huanan village.”
To my amusement, only Yunli seemed to have gotten my ingeniously subtle jab. Compared to the slightly bemused looks on her mother’s and sister’s faces, she looked as though I had just emptied a bottle of calligraphy ink over her head.
My new life was drastically different from the one I’d had, but at least I was familiar with all the expected chores. After my briefing with the stone-faced butler, I managed to gather that my standing in this house probably ranked a little higher than rice weevils. Definitely lower than Mr. Guo’s pet nightingale, Koko, for at least the bird got to sit on its perch all day and sing.
Also, I had one daily mission that was as vital as any other, and that was staying out of Yunli’s way. Though it wasn’t an easy task when she was set on making my life miserable.
One thing that came as a pleasant surprise was my little husband. Three years old and extremely eager to please, Jun’an turned out to be a delightful child, and babysitting him became my pleasure as much as his. We did almost everything together, and I grew to love him as dearly as I did Wei and Zhuzhu. He became one of my few sources of solace in my new home. And yet, perhaps home wasn’t the most appropriate word, for even with all its luxury and comfort, I was never allowed to feel like I belonged, which was why this was the year I spent my first Mid-Autumn Festival alone.
As I sat on the wooden landing that opened into the garden, gazing at the full moon, I could see myself and Wei and the village children, playing all day in our hanfu after a visit to the Huli Jing shrine. We made colorful paper lanterns and showed them off in the evening. I saw Pan, and remembered how he loved to watch the burning candles that flickered like fireflies.
I remembered the mooncakes Grandmama made—fragrant baked crusts stuffed on the inside with sweet lotus-seed paste and salted egg yolks. And then there was always chicken for dinner. Although the food was nowhere as good as what I now had every day, at least everyone ate together as a family.
Here, I was not included at the dining table. I had my meals in the scullery, and sometimes, as I picked at the leftovers from dinner, tasting as well the saltiness from my tears, I couldn’t help but wonder: Did my family know, before sending me away, the kind of life that awaited me in Xiawan?
The Mid-Autumn Festival wasn’t the only time that made me especially miss home. My first Ghost Festival away from Huanan had to be the scariest I had ever experienced in my life and was also the first time I actually saw jing with my own eyes.
The annual Ghost Festival was a day in the seventh lunar moon when Guimen Guan, the gates of hell, would open so that the souls of the deceased could surface to the realm of the living for one night. People set up altars and prepared offerings of sanctified food, incense, and joss paper to appease the wandering spirits and to receive their blessing. This was perhaps one of the quietest days on the entire lunar calendar, because everyone stayed indoors to avoid running into evil wandering souls or any malevolent jing that might be lurking around.
Well, almost everyone.
Just before midnight, the mistress had me set up an elaborate altar just outside the front gate, piled high with offerings—sweet mantou buns, mandarins, hard-boiled eggs, and even a roasted piglet. But the real surprise came after that.
“You stay out here and keep a good lookout. Be sure to replenish the candles and incense. Keep the food coming for the spirits and jing; that way we’ll receive more blessings than anyone in town,” said Mrs. Guo.
I glared at her back as she retreated indoors.
Nonsense hulu-sticks! Never had I heard of such a ridiculous thing. Back home, Baba always made sure everyone stayed strictly indoors after setting up our altar. All night, we would hear sounds from outside, but we wouldn’t even be allowed to look out. And by morning the next day, the candles and incense would’ve burned out and all the food would be gone. Some said that they were jing, some said they were wandering souls, but no one really wanted to find out firsthand, because if you encountered a netherworld being, it could latch on to you and follow you home, where it would haunt.
Underneath the altar, I wrapped a blanket around myself and curled up into the tiniest ball I could manage. My blanket and the yellow tablecloth on the altar were the only things between me and whatever lay outside.
Would the jing decide I made a better feast? Would I see a headless ghost or a hopping zombie? What if something evil possessed me?
There was no sound at all. I could not even hear the wind, and it made me feel as though I couldn’t breathe. It was so quiet. I dared to lift a corner of the tablecloth and poke half of my head out.
There was the slightest breeze in the air. All along the sides of the street we lived on, each family had set up an altar. The white candles that burned on the tables made the street brighter than it was on normal nights. But th
ey were like beacons, calling out to the spirits. Come one, come all, dinner is served.
My heart almost stopped when the ring of the time keeper’s gong signified that midnight—the darkest hour of the rat—had come. I had to hide. I had to go back under the table. But as the reverberating ring of the gong receded, I couldn’t move. The breeze had disappeared, and the silence took on a sort of thickness that made it almost tangible, pressing against my sweaty forehead.
Something moved out of the darkness farther down the road.
It was a person.
Two.
No, three.
And more were appearing out of the dark. Through walls. From the ground. Out of thin air.
And they had no feet.
My breath caught. I couldn’t even scream. I scooted back under the table and pulled my blanket over my head. My heart beat so hard that even my ears throbbed. And for the longest time, I stayed where I was. I could hear munching sounds and the occasional jolt of the table right over my head, but I could only stuff my mouth full of fabric so I didn’t whimper out loud.
Goddess of mercy, Great Golden Huli Jing, help me!
At one point, I thought I did hear a whimper. But it didn’t come from me. I strained my ears. The other sounds had stopped, which probably meant the feast above was over for the night, or at least until I gathered enough courage to go out and refill Mrs. Guo’s stupid altar.
There was the whimpering again. Something was out there. Something that actually sounded more like a small animal than some hungry ghost waiting to pounce on an innocent girl under an altar. I lifted the edge of the tablecloth. As I had suspected, sitting in front of the altar, gazing at me with a set of curious green eyes, was a most adorable golden puppy, no bigger than a cat.
With its pointy ears and bushy, white-tipped golden tail, it actually looked more like a fox cub. It had such a familiar gaze, as though it knew me, that I couldn’t help picking it up. It did not struggle or try to lick me, and I buried my face in its warm, prickly fur. My chest heaved. It reminded me of home, this little creature. Of my guardian, the Great Golden Huli Jing.
“What brings you out on this horrid night?” I took a few deep breaths and straightened up. “Did our Golden Huli Jing send you, perhaps?” My answer was only another oblivious whimper.
Oh, it must be hungry! I reached into my bag and brought out a steamy meat bun. The puppy wasted no time and the food soon disappeared between two rows of little teeth. My own stomach grumbled, so I divided a few more buns between us. When we had had our fill, it was time for work.
Somehow, with the company of my new friend, being outside felt less frightening than it had been. The street was empty, and Mrs. Guo’s altar looked as though a typhoon had swept through it—dishes were overturned, the incense holder upset, all the food gone. Even the food spilled all over the tablecloth had been eaten clean, leaving only stains behind. I worked as quickly as I could, removing the candle stumps from the holders and replacing them with new ones. After lighting them, I straightened up the table and refilled the dishes and incense holder.
Then it was time to burn joss paper. A small fire was burning on coal inside a metal bin just beside the altar. I reached into my bag and pulled out a piece of yellowish rice paper with a silver-colored center. The joss paper had been folded into a shape similar to a Chinese gold ingot called the yuanbao. When burned, they were supposed to turn into a kind of hell currency that the spirits and deities could use. Mama used to call it “ghost money.”
I squatted in front of the metal bin and tossed the joss paper into the fire. It caught immediately, starting from the edges, then burning to a crisp.
“This is for you, Mama,” I whispered. I didn’t know whether she would receive this, or if there was a chance I would meet her tonight. But I wouldn’t be scared if I did. I would have so much to tell her…
I felt a heaviness on my lap and looked down to see the puppy settling itself on my crossed legs. That was when something else occurred to me.
“This one is for my spirit guardian,” I said, and tossed in another piece of ghost money. I scratched the puppy behind its pointy ears. “Did you know? My baba said that the Great Golden Huli Jing of Huanan is a handsome fox jing with green eyes and a coat of golden fur, just like you.”
The little thing puffed up its snowy chest, looking almost proud of itself. I would’ve laughed out loud if the atmosphere hadn’t abruptly changed. The air around us felt like fog…I knew they were coming. And also what they were coming for.
I gathered the puppy into my arms. The spirits were again emerging out of the gloom, growing more solid as they neared, but never growing any feet. That was how one could tell apart spirits and jing.
I tried to swallow but couldn’t. I needed to hide, but my legs wouldn’t move. But for some reason, my puppy friend did not seem perturbed by the newcomers at all. It sat sedately in my lap, gazing at the apparitions as they drifted past. And somehow, borrowing courage from my new friend, I was able to stay where I was. I kept my eyes firmly on the ground and continued to burn offerings.
Nothing bad seemed to be happening to me. My heartbeat went back to normal, and eventually, I could keep my hands from shaking. Perhaps the Ghost Festival wasn’t as dangerous as people made it out to be after all. I dared to look up and saw three apparitions drift past, none of them paying us any attention. Could they actually see us? One paused in front of our altar—an old woman with such a wizened face that she must’ve died of old age. She gazed blankly at the offerings as though pondering what to do with them, then drifted right through the entire table and disappeared.
That night, I learned a little-known truth about the Ghost Festival: that the true things consuming the offerings were not spirits, but something else.
Every now and then, the puppy would become alert, and I would hear something slinking along the shadows in the street. And when it came close enough, I would see an animal emerging warily out of the darkness, sniffing out the food on the altar. The first one we saw was a weasel jing, who regarded us with a wary eye before deciding that a girl and a puppy were no threat, then leaped onto the altar to begin its feast. Then came two raccoon jing, side by side, and a raven.
From the outside, they looked no different from normal animals. The differences they possessed, should they choose to reveal them, were humanlike intelligence, the ability to speak, and, sometimes, great power.
Therefore, I shouldn’t have been able to tell whether these animals were jing, but something else happened to affirm my suspicion.
A woman ambled down the street toward us. Her skin was paler even than the moon in the sky, but her features completely blew me away. It would take a hundred Yunlis to compare with her beauty. But that wasn’t the most intriguing part about her, for she had a mop of long, flowing hair that could’ve been spun out of the purest silver. Dressed in a simple hanfu of white, the woman could’ve passed as a ghost herself if not for the sound of light footsteps that came from her feet treading softly on the gravel path.
Like the rest of the jing, the lady paid me no heed as she approached the altar, but when the other animals saw her, they bowed, then hastily leaped off the table to give her passage.
As though they’re afraid of her.
My mouth felt abnormally dry, and I couldn’t look away.
Stopping in front of the altar, the woman slowly reached out for the food, and what slid from within the long silken sleeves nearly made me scream.
Bones.
The skeleton of a human hand.
I stumbled backward, holding the puppy close as I realized whom, or more accurately, what I was beholding.
This was a jing of white bones—a baigu jing, but not just any one. This was the White Lady—the tutelary spirit of Xiawan.
All of a sudden, the baigu jing turned around and fixed a pair of cold gray eyes in our direction. Then a thin smile crept across her red lips as she spoke in such a sweet voice that it could’ve dripped with honey.
“Fancy seeing you here, darling.”
My mouth opened and closed a few times. I tried to inhale but the atmosphere felt like it had been drained of air. It took me a few moments to realize that the baigu jing did not seem to be talking to me, for she was looking directly at the puppy in my arms.
“And in such an adorable form,” said the jing as she brushed away a stray lock of her snowy hair and leaned closer. The silver-rimmed lapel of her hanfu slid dangerously low on her shoulders, revealing her pearly white skin. The skeleton of her hand slid out again from underneath her sleeves, reaching slowly toward us. The remains of a hand that was once human.
My puppy friend was no longer calm and quiet. A low growl was rumbling deep in its throat, and its hackles were rippling. Not impressed, but looking as though she got the idea that she wasn’t welcome, the White Lady pressed her lips together and straightened up.
“Well, if you are too petulant as usual to exchange pleasantries.” She turned the other way, taking a large pear from the altar.
When the baigu jing had completely disappeared, I looked down at the puppy in my arms.
“Are you a jing?” I whispered.
It could be a dog jing, or maybe even a young huli jing. And if it were, it should be able to speak. But the puppy did nothing I expected. It literally did nothing besides gaze at me solemnly, wag its bushy tail, and lick my hands, as though telling me: “Do not be disappointed that I am not what you think I am!”
I chuckled and stroked its fur. “I shall call you Saffron.”
I had been convinced then that I was being overimaginative, for Saffron had done nothing out of the ordinary. But I was no longer so sure in the morning when I woke up underneath the altar and found him gone. And the peculiar thing was, even after days of searching the town, I could not find a single trace of him.
The Ghost Festival wasn’t the only time that I had encountered those normally elusive jing. One afternoon very early in spring, I was passing by the sisters’ bedroom when I heard squeals and a loud crash.