Year of the Tiger. Lisa Brackman

with LED billboards and the latest weird-shaped mirror glass high-rise that resembles some gargantuan star cruiser squatting on a landing pad; practically everything they’ve built in Beijing the last ten years looks like part of a set in the latest big-budget science fiction movie.

      Matrix Game Parlor takes up most of the ground floor of a six-story white-tile storefront that’s probably slated for demolition in the near future, since it must have been built way back in the eighties. It’s a maze of navy blue walls, computer terminals, and arcade games, and though most of the serious gamers are wearing headsets, a lot of the casual players aren’t, so there’s this cacophony of cartoon explosions and thumping bass lines and corny synthesized orchestras. Plus everybody’s cells are going off all the time with these loud polyphonic ringtones, and nobody talks quietly into their cells; they yell, like they don’t trust that the person on the other end will hear them otherwise, and I’m already thinking I want out of here. And even though they’ve passed laws in China against smoking in public places, everyone smokes in this place, so I’m following Chuckie through the maze and this blue smoke haze that’s lit up by neon screens and intermittent strobe lights, and I’m starting to cough. I always have a little bronchitis from the pollution here, and I just can’t handle the smoke any more.

      I used to smoke. Everyone around me did back then. That’s what we’d do, me and my buddies, we’d smoke cigarettes and crack jokes to keep each other loose, just laugh at shit, you know? You had to laugh at all the shit sometimes.

      Embrace the Suck, we used to say.

      ‘There he is!’ Chuckie hisses.

      I recognize Ming Lu. He’s this short, fat guy shaped more or less like a dumpling with limbs and a head. Right now he’s sitting in front of a terminal littered with junk food, using a fancy joystick, probably his own, to manipulate his avatar. I figure he’s probably either killing or fucking someone, from the exultant expression on his face.

      Chuckie grabs Ming Lu’s T-shirt by the collar and slaps him upside the head.

      Ming Lu whirls around blindly, glasses askew, scattering his shrimp chips.

      ‘What –? Who –?’

      ‘You mother fucking dog’s bastard!’ Chuckie screams.

      As I start to form a mental picture of that scenario, I lose track of the argument entirely. For one thing, the two of them are talking way too fast for me to follow, and Ming Lu has this Sichuan accent that gets pretty thick when he’s excited and being slapped around by somebody. For another, I glance over my shoulder and see, dimly through the smoke haze, two guys heading in our direction. Foreign guys in suits.

      ‘I’m sorry, I’m sorry,’ Ming Lu is babbling, ‘but I had to!’

      I don’t think. I run.

      I duck down an aisle, bumping into a couple of giggling teen girls with Go Gaiyuko backpacks. I turn a corner, slipping and sliding past a cluster of Dance Dance Revolution games, and I don’t even know why I’m running; I just don’t want to get caught.

      Up ahead there’s a little hall where the bathrooms are. At the end of that, what looks like an exit. I run as fast as I can, praying under my breath that this isn’t one of those places where the emergency exits are locked so we would all die horribly if there were a fire, and hit the release bar on the door.

      I’m blinded by daylight. I blink a few times. I’m in a little courtyard that serves mostly as a trash dump and a place to park bicycles and mopeds off the street. A few sad trees in crumbling concrete planters. An old-style six-story apartment building across the way. Laundry hangs from the cramped balconies; random wires crisscross limply from roof to roof. It’s oddly silent, except for a couple of chittering sparrows.

      Then I hear a burst of dialog and music from one of the apartments; a guy bellowing about revenge against the Emperor, some cheesy historical soap on TV. ‘I’ll drink to his death!’ echoes in the courtyard.

      That unfreezes me. I plunge into the apartment building, down the narrow corridor that leads past the stairwell, and out the other side.

      I’m on a little street with no real sidewalks, a few small cars shoved up against the buildings amidst a tangle of bikes. An old man sits on a tiny folding stool by the nonexistent curb, mending a pair of pants, a few odds and ends for sale spread out on a blanket next to him: a fake Cultural Revolution clock, a couple DVDs, a blender. ‘You want?’ he says to me, holding up the clock, winding it up to show me how the Red Guard waves her Little Red Book to count off the seconds. ‘You want buy?’

      ‘Buyao,’ I say. I don’t want. I run down the street.

      I don’t run that well because of my leg, but for once I’m hardly feeling it. I keep running. I pass more high-rises, Tsinghua University’s new science center, billboards, animated LED ads: giant stomachs, pills, and cars. Here’s the Xijiao Hotel. Okay. I know this place. I’m breathing hard and sweating. Now my leg really hurts, and my shoulders feel bruised from my bouncing backpack, which I should’ve cinched up, but I’ve gotten out of the habit. I slow down, wipe my forehead. I don’t see any foreigners in suits.

      I’m by this little street leading into the Beijing Language & Culture University campus from the Xijiao Binguan that has small shops, restaurants, and stalls that live off business from students – places where you can buy cheap electronics, pirated DVDs, school supplies, tours to Tibet. And phone cards.

      I stop and buy a hundred-yuan card for my phone, dial the number, scratch off the silver, and punch in the voucher code. I’ve got a string of messages waiting for me.

      I’m still feeling exposed out here on the street. I decide to go onto the BLCU campus. I’m almost young enough to be a student. Besides, I dress like one: I’m wearing high-top sneakers, a long-sleeved snowboarding T-shirt decorated with flowers and snowflakes, and jeans, and I’m carrying a backpack. I blend in here, unlike foreigners in suits. I could be just another foreign student trying to better myself by learning Chinese. That’s what I was doing, not so long ago.

      I head over to the Sauce, a coffeehouse that’s been on campus forever. It’s not bad. I stand in line behind a skinny white boy chatting up a cute Chinese girl, order myself a regular cup of coffee, and take a seat by the window. I stare down at the street, at the egg-shaped orange phone booths, at the newly green trees, and I check my messages.

      British John, asking me if I can cover Rose’s shift for Karaoke Night. A bunch of text-message spam in Chinese, which I can’t read. Delete, delete, delete.

      Then a message from Lao Zhang. ‘Yili, ni hao. I’m leaving Beijing for a few days …’ A pause. ‘I wanted to let you know.’ Another pause. ‘Anyway, see you later. Man zou.’

      Go slowly. Be careful.

      I start to delete the message, but my finger hovers over the key for a moment, and then I hit save instead.

      Next message.

      ‘Hey, babe. It’s me.’

      My heart starts to thud, and the bottom falls out of my gut.

      ‘Listen, I need to see you,’ he continues. ‘Right away. It’s important. Call me as soon as you get this. Okay?’

      I stare at the phone. Fucking Trey. Why does he do this to me?

      CHAPTER THREE

      I call him, of course. I know I shouldn’t, but I do it anyway. I’m pretty sure I know what he wants, and I’m not going to give it to him. But I still call.

      I hear that rich caramel voice in my ear. ‘Hey, babe.’

      ‘Hey,’ I say, trying to keep my voice flat. ‘What’s up?’

      ‘Listen, I need to talk to you. Can we meet someplace?’