The Astonishing Color of After(67)

Then I start to think about the possibility of other dimensions. Maybe they’re layered together, stacked like the thin pages of a book so that you can’t see them unless you’re looking from a specific angle. Dimensions between realities. Dimensions between life and death.

Maybe those are the places where ghosts live.

Waipo sighs and slowly, carefully, makes her way down off the step, heading back toward the road.

“Wait,” I say, the word automatically coming out in English.

My grandmother turns and gives a sad shake of her head. She’s tired of waiting.

Everything in my body is heavy and disappointed and the color of dust as we walk down the alley and round the corner. I draw in a deep breath, tasting the air.

“Leigh?”

The sound of my name like the cold blade of a key turning in a lock.

“What are you doing here?” Feng stands behind us, half of her carved in shadow, half of her pale beneath the streetlamp. Even in the dark I can see the pattern of bluets on her blouse.

Waipo’s gaze yo-yos between us.

“We came to find you,” I answer.

For once, Feng seems at a loss for words. “Why don’t we go get something to eat?” she says finally. “There’s a night market nearby.”

We wind through the alleys, walking in silence, listening to the cars and mopeds rolling past. The occasional conversation leaking through screen windows. The hiss and pop of a wok sizzling with oil.

In the next alley, a large family has set up a line of tables, laden with tall red candles and freshly cooked food. Cellophane stretches over the tops of dishes. Fried rice, eggplant, a mix of bamboo and mushrooms. Three whole fish in a puddle of sauce, draped with scallions. Bean curd and pot stickers and fluffy white buns and more.

Every plate stabbed through the center with incense. A stick through the breast of a chicken, through the rounded meat of a peach. Sticks piercing the cellophane windows, standing upright in mounds of sticky rice, in clumps of noodles.

And off to the side, a metal barrel, swollen with flames. Children race around the table, gathering pieces of paper that are bright with red ink and gold foil, and tossing them to the fire.

“Ghost Month offerings,” Feng explains. “The joss paper is ghost money.”

“Offerings? Like, that food is cooked for the ghosts?”

“Of course. Ghosts want to eat, too, you know. They’re the hungriest of anyone.”

We know we’ve reached the night market by the crowd. The colorful signs and lights. The smoke of foods being grilled and fried.

Waipo grabs my elbow and points to a stand where a man is brushing sauce onto a rectangular treat on a wooden stick and then rolling it in peanut flour.

“Pig’s blood cake,” Feng explains, and at first I think I’ve heard her wrong. “Have you tried it?”

My grandmother nudges me again and moves to get in line.

I shake my head quickly. “Uh, that’s okay.”

“Hao chi!” says Waipo. Delicious!

I shake my head again.

Feng smiles a little. “Come on. Let’s go over here.”

Through smoke, through the throngs of people, past stalls selling fried foods, past the next intersection, where blockades cut off the cars—we finally stop again before a large barrel of soup crowded with fat, snowy pearls.

“It’s a sweet fermented rice soup,” says Feng. “With rice balls.”

“It’s fermented?” I raise an eyebrow.

“It’s really good. Trust me.” She puts in the order, and we sit down at a table on the side.

Two bowls immediately appear before me and my grandmother. Grains of rice and cloudy wisps of egg float around balls of white and pastel pink. Waipo hands me a spoon.

“What about you?” I ask Feng.

She shakes her head. “I’m actually not hungry. I just thought it would be a nice snack for you to try.”

I set my spoon down and swallow. “I’m sorry.”

Feng looks down.

“I shouldn’t have said those things to you. I was way out of line. You’ve done nothing but help.”

“It’s okay,” she says.

Beside me, Waipo slurps at her soup, either oblivious to the tension or purposely ignoring it.

“People who are grieving often can’t help themselves.” Feng’s words come out in a tone that says she knows from personal experience.

I wait to see if she’s going to say more.

“I know what that’s like,” she says slowly. “I’ve… well, I lost my family, too.”

The smoke from a nearby stall gusts toward us. In the street, a dog without a collar wags her tail, hoping someone will drop some food. The mother at the next table over chides her toddler, who’s knocked over a bowl.

“I’m so sorry,” I say. “I didn’t know.” There’s that awful curiosity, and I try to imagine what she means. My family. Her entire family? Is she the only one left? It feels rude to ask.

“It’s okay,” she says. “It’s fine.” Her expression is hard to read.

Then I remember how she said she’s been away from home for a long time. I wonder if that has something to do with it.

“It just makes me think about the few threads left that keep me tethered to them. I take a lot of comfort in seeing the Ghost Month offerings—it always helps me feel like there’s still that connection to my family. You know, because ghosts are still here.”