Calculated

by Nova McBee

  On any other night, I’d be searching individual faces in the square. I’d notice the smell of spicy pork barbequing across the street and the kids buying bubble tea at the brightly colored street vendors. I’d comment on the red glow polluting the Shanghai skyline and how we should do something about it, but tonight I don’t do any of those things. Instead I inwardly curse the humid night and my choice of attire.

  “Where are you taking me?” I ask him. “And why are you dressed like that?” When I met him downstairs, he had changed clothes. His shiny black hair is now tucked under a New York Yankees baseball cap. He’s wearing jeans and a white v-neck tee-shirt. It’s a far cry from his usual slacks and tie.

  “I told you,” he says playfully, “a place my father won’t find us.” His dark eyes narrow as he smiles. “And tonight, I am American, just for you.”

  “Thanks. The clothes change everything. Really, I can’t tell you’re Chinese anymore.”

  “Good, because I can’t tell you’re American anymore,” he says lightly and takes my hand. What he says has truth to it and it hits me hard, but I’m too distracted by him taking my hand to think about it clearly. I don’t know who I am anymore.

  What I do know is his hand is hot and sticky from the heat but strong, making me feel secure. I don’t let go.

  We stroll down the Waitan, staring across the water. Advertisements light up the sky, replacing the stars. The icon for China Generation blinks along with the rest of them. With each blink, I remember how different our worlds are.

  “This way,” he says as we cross the street. He redirects my gaze towards a small alley, dark and dirty. The kind of street that haunts my dreams.

  We stop in front of two young boys squatting on a curb. A pile of sunflower seed shells and cigarette butts litter the ground in front of them. I notice a small sliding glass door tucked down a few steps into a cement wall. A pungent smell of smoke, oil, and red chili peppers slips from the cracked door, causing me to cough.

  “We made it,” Kai says, looking at the glass door. “Lucky Noodles.” He points to the Chinese characters stuck on the window in red.

  The misspelled English sign is next to the Chinese. “You mean Luoky Nocdles?” I say, laughing. “You’re right. Your father wouldn’t be caught dead here.”

  The restaurant is nearly empty. An assortment of multi-colored plastic patio furniture decorates the small room. Three men with red faces are smoking cigarettes in the back corner. They have finished eating but their bottle of baijiu is still half full. They are talking so loudly that they don’t seem to notice us at all.

  “How did you find this place?” I ask him. Nothing about this hole-in-the-wall joint bothers me after being in the Pratt, but a city boy like Kai?

  “Shanghai’s best kept secret,” he answers. “Best fried noodles in town.”

  “So you weren’t forced to come here?” I ask sarcastically, thinking of the exclusive restaurants where Kai usually dines. There, multiple people stand at attention near his table, awaiting his every need as they serve a banquet fit for a prince. Here, we’ll be lucky to walk away without E. coli.

  “I am not my father, Phoenix,” he says, his face becoming serious. “There are more important things to me than money. I thought I proved that to you already.” His hand grips mine harder. The look in his eye is the same one I saw the day I watched him and his martial arts masters sparring. Calculated, determined, confident.

  A small Chinese lady with a red apron who is wiping down tables looks up. A man in white kitchen clothes comes out with a mop. They are closing, but after looking us over they wave us in anyway.

  The golden statue of the Money Cat sits blankly on the counter, its paw mechanically swinging up and down welcoming the spirits of wealth to enter. I wonder if it can sense who is beside me.

  We walk across the slick white tile, choose a table, and sit down. The walls are empty except for four signs of the Chinese character fu for ‘blessing’, one hanging on each wall.

  “It’s too hot tonight,” I complain, fanning my neck to stop my hair from sticking to it.

  “I don’t know a lot about girls,” Kai says, “but that handy hairband has been around your wrist for as long as I’ve known you, and you’ve never used it. If you did, it’d make you a lot cooler by getting all that hair off your neck.”

  How is it that Kai notices things that other people don’t, like un-used hairband? But if he saw my scar, he’d be sure to ask questions. “Nah,” I say, shrugging. “I like my hair down.”

  Our menu is located under the plastic table covering. “Convenient,” I say, taking a napkin to wipe away the smudges so I can read it. I choose qing tang mian with tofu. Kai decides on chao mian with beef. We call the waitress over.

  At the table beside us, a child and his mother slurp noodles but stop long enough to stare at us for a good minute. “Laowai,” his mother says to him, assuming I can’t understand her. “White people can’t use chopsticks well.”

  There’s a visible change in the mother’s face as she hears me order my noodles in Shanghai slang. Later when our food arrives, she continues to critique my use of chopsticks and my choice of the Chinese traditional dress.

  “See, Kai,” I say, finishing my soup, “your baseball hat and my dress don’t change anything. We are who we are.”

  “We are who we say we are. Not them.” He takes off his baseball hat, running his fingers through his black hair.

  “I don’t know anymore.”

  “The sun and moon are different, but they both bring light to the world, right? Listen,” he says quietly, “I know something else is going on with you. I can sense it. You’re planning something besides the Asia Bank stuff. I want to help you, but first there is something you need to do.”

  “What’s that? Learn to fight like you?” I ask. “I don’t need weapons to win this one. I have all I need.”

  “No, not fight. You have already learned to survive. I can see that much.” His eyes become gentle, and he takes my hand again. “It’s time to learn a new lesson.”

  “Oh yeah?” I slip my hand from his.

  “Yeah. Open up. Let people in. Trust me.” He tries to take my hand again. I pull it back. Kai stares at me. “If you don’t talk, how else can I know you? Help you?”

  My throat tightens. What he’s saying makes sense. Even Red told me I must do this. But I can’t let go. My own grip on my heart is too tight. I fear if I let go, I’ll completely unravel. I can’t let that happen now.

  “You are helping me,” I say.

  “I’m not talking about the economy. I’m talking about you.”

  “You know enough,” I answer weakly.

  “What’s that? One day you show up out of nowhere. Good with math, directing my dad’s company? Then somehow you discover the next Great Depression before anyone. And you like old buildings, so you buy my dad’s factory and don’t forget that night at the port—it was just a fluke.” He shakes his head. “After all this, I still don’t know who you are or where you came from…or how long you’ll stay after you finish whatever you say you’re not planning. Can’t you tell me these things?”

  “Why should I?” I ask.

  “I’ve been trying to be a friend to you. Don’t you see that? As far as I can see, you have no one else to tell. You have no other friends.”

  A hard knock lurches in my stomach like I’ve been punched in the gut. Sadly, it’s true. I don’t have any other friends. But is he really my friend? A part of me wants to believe he is, and the other part warns me to protect myself from more pain. My dad said he loved me, but I couldn’t trust him. So why give Kai a chance? Normal people won’t understand.

  I wish there were numbers when it came to feelings but there aren’t. Red told me to follow where my heart would lead me, instead of my mind. The numbers, he said, would teach me. But they aren’t helping now.

  Red said I’d have to take the next step towards a new beginning, which requires trust. But my calculations are mak
ing me dizzy and when I look at Kai the numbers fade somewhere around his eyes. I blink several times and they return, but this scares me more. It must be the stress, and Kai is making it worse.

  Maybe I’ll tell him later, but not now. Now I need to escape. “Thanks for dinner,” I say, standing. “I’ll walk home.”

  Kai reaches for my arm, but I jerk it away.

  “Listen, I didn’t mean to upset you. I only want to be your friend,” he says. “Please let me take you home.”

  “No. I’d rather be alone,” I say, against my gut. “See you tomorrow. Ze Wei.”

  Outside, I accidentally kick over a bowl of cigarette butts. The stale smoky air catches in my nose.

  I leave Lucky Noodles feeling flustered. I know he’s right.

  Stupid! Why is my mouth locked up so tight? I’m helping others when I can’t even help myself. I would have given up by now, seeing all the brokenness around me, if it weren’t for that small chance of beating the odds.

  A simple equation tells me that risk, even if it is small, is behind every great change, a big part of beating the odds. If I take that step, I really can change, and the world can too. Opening up to Kai was that small risk and I just missed it.

  Emotion swirls inside like a tornado. I walk faster. I don’t want to go home. I need to clear my mind. I want to make the wrongs right. At the next intersection, I realize where I am. It dawns on me that it’s Friday.

  Maybe I’ll make something of my night yet.

  I head in the direction of Golden Alley.

  30

  Present: Phoenix

  GOLDEN ALLEY, SHANGHAI, CHINA

  The equation running through my head is negative as soon as I arrive. Golden Alley has a vehicle parked on it for the first time. A van, blue and shiny. The license plate is not from Shanghai. I walk next to it slowly.

  Just as I get behind the van, another van pulls up in the alley, same kind of license plate. A girl stumbles out, landing on her knees. Her face is bleeding. A man follows—the one who shoved her out? This could be the ticket in, the door into Golden Alley.

  I watch them as he drags her across the street until he reaches a grey door. He taps on it three times. The girl is pleading. The repetitive word, please, slips past her bloody lips, past the man who is hovering over her, directly to me. He waits for her to lift her head and when she does, he slams a fist into the side of it.

  As her body collapses on the cement sidewalk, a splash of dirty water sprays the man’s pants. With a vulgar curse, he kicks her in the ribs. Another please, this time nothing but a whisper. The man seems upset that no one is answering his knocks, but I’m glad. I know where the door is and there is only one man to deal with regardless of the ominous equation telling me to run.

  I have gotten myself into a real mess this time. It’s clear this will not work out to my advantage. The man is twice my size and by the look of it, he has had lots of practice. He is scarred on his left cheek, his fists are large, and even in the dark I can tell his eyes are soulless.

  But can I just walk away? The word coincidence is a childish thought in my mind. No. I chose to walk down this street. The girl doesn’t know it, but she is talking to me when she pleads—the only witness to this brutality on what they thought was an empty street.

  But the numbers in my head tell me there is absolutely no way I can help her. All equations are negative for us both. We can’t out-run him or out-fight him.

  If I proceed, I will be hurt, or killed, or worse, captured. I can’t go back to Madame. I won’t. I’m trembling now.

  Leave, Phoenix.

  I should call the police.

  No, there’s no time. I tap my leg, calculations hailing like a dark storm. I need to make a choice.

  It’s clear I can’t help this girl. If I walk away now, I could help more girls in the future and stop Madame from poisoning this world. This is the better option and yet…there’s something stirring in my gut.

  Cocking my head forward, I scan the doorways. A little light comes from the streetlamps. The smell of garbage and urine fills the street. Leave.

  I step backwards and the girl’s small voice calls out again. Another step back. I’m against the wall in the shadows. They cannot see me. I can escape unseen. Around the corner is a main road. I’ll call the police. Solicit someone’s help. This stupid dress! I left my phone because it has no pockets. I’m walking away. Possibly the first smart thing I have done in a while.

  “Please.”

  It’s the only word that comes out of the girl. Each time she says it, the man hits her. Why won’t she stay quiet? I know why. She won’t give in.

  I can’t shake the equation in my head. If you walk away, she dies.

  Although the numbers are negative, I focus on the 1% chance that a small risk can change the odds, and my heart begins the leap forward.

  An empty beer bottle is in the gutter. A new variable. Still low odds, high stakes. But it’s all I need to turn back.

  I move in with all my force and speed, sweeping up the bottle on the side of the road. The man turns, sees me coming, but doesn’t have enough time to defend himself. I smash the bottle against his head with all my strength. It hits hard but bounces back in my hand, unbroken.

  He gropes for his head and gives me a look of surprise. I’m surprised too. I expected the bottle to break, but it didn’t.

  With a surge of adrenaline, I choose my next move. I’m not a fighter, but I know where to kick a man. And I do, hard. He drops to his knees. As the bottle is still in my hand, I smack him again, this time harder. He finally collapses down onto the pavement. I toss the bottle aside, hearing it smash into pieces.

  He is down, at least for a moment. I go to the girl. She has bruised legs and arms. Cheap jewelry. Her shirt is ripped open and her skirt barely covers her underwear. But then I see it—a small X on her neck and a red diamond birthmark below it.

  A Madame girl! Her eyes are swollen, and her lip is still bleeding. Hurry, Phoenix, you can’t help her if she’s dead.

  “Can you hear me? You need to get up,” I say. We only have seconds before the man recovers.

  She looks up, afraid of me too. She’s already slipping into unconsciousness. Wrapping my arms around her, I try to get her to her feet. Her body goes limp. She can’t be more than a hundred pounds, but I can’t lift her.

  The man rouses, grunting like a rabid dog.

  “Wake up!” I yell to the girl and frantically look around for anyone to help me. There’s no one else around. I should have listened to Kai when he told me not to go out alone.

  The man stands, still gripping his head. A blank stare veils his face. He is injured but not incapacitated. He reaches in his pocket, pulls out a cell phone.

  I can run away, be safe within minutes, but my feet won’t move.

  “Help!” The word slips out instinctively. Slipping my hands under the girl’s armpits, I drag her slowly away. If I can just make it to the end of the street, I can find help. Forty more feet.

  The man is talking to someone, but I’m too focused to listen. She’s heavy and slipping. I don’t want to hurt her more by dropping her. I adjust my arms. I move faster. Twenty more feet.

  The man hobbles down the road. Slowly, but on his way.

  I won’t leave her.

  I’m almost to the end of the road. I think I can make it when the door he knocked on earlier opens. Two men in shabby black suits race out.

  “There!” one of them shouts, pointing in our direction.

  I drag her faster, but the men close in around us. The girl is ripped from my fingers. What Kai taught me about self-defense runs through my mind, but it’s too late for me to act. One of them is already on top of me. Something harder than bone rips across my forehead. A metal ring? The side of my face burns. I taste blood in my mouth.

  I join the girl on the cold wet cement. A boot goes into my gut. My lungs grasp for air. My stomach surges with pain but what’s worse is that they are misting her. I hold my b
reath and turn away, but I smell that unmistakable scent of oranges and bleach. The mist they used to drug me on Madame’s boat.

  I can’t pass out. I frantically spit it out onto the ground but it’s too late. A bit of it is in my mouth. I’m not hallucinating, but there’s enough that the numbers fade.

  The man I hit is cursing but my ears ring too loudly to follow it. They pick up the X girl and walk her to the alley door. I’m next. He’ll mist me. I’ll be out and it’ll all be over.

  I get to my knees and crawl away. If only I could calculate, I could buy myself some time. A hand shoves me to the ground. I flop on my back and extend my foot, kicking at his face as hard as I can. He raises his hands and I cringe at what’s about to happen next.

  Then a figure, fast and lean, runs up towards the man. In one fell swoop, the newcomer takes the guy down. The other two men run to help but the stranger is too quick. With swift strikes of arms and legs, the man from the door moans loudly and falls on top of the first guy, and soon the one I hit with the bottle joins them.

  A face leans over me, and I smile.

  Kai. But he isn’t smiling back.

  “What are you doing?” he yells, angry. “This street is not on your way home!”

  All I can get out is a moan.

  “What was all that talk before about you being able to take care of yourself? You are lucky someone is watching over you.” He checks the girl’s vitals and body for any major damage.

  He helps me up. The pain is unbearable, but I have been here before. I’ll survive. I’m more worried about the girl. I hobble over to her, drop to my knees, and check her pulse. She is alive.

  Kai doesn’t say anything but he’s already lifting and carrying her to the main street in his arms, in silence. I’m close behind him. He hails a cab. “We need to get her to the hospital.”

  “No. Take us to the factory,” I say, holding my head, which spins and fizzles like a coming migraine. There’s mist in my system. The numbers are gone, just like last time, but it’s not enough to knock me out. Kai looks at me, ready to protest, as if I have a concussion too. “Trust me,” I say.