Trade Me (Cyclone #1)(76)

I start on the descent.

The road lies before me like a skein of snarled yarn. I untangle it the way I untangle everything else: at thirty miles an hour.

When I first started on this road, its contortions felt comforting—a reminder that it was okay for me to go slowly when the conditions demand it. As it goes on and on and on, it begins to feel like a cage.

Maybe that’s why, as I descend past pinyon pines, as the land flattens out into wide meadows, I let myself accelerate.

Thirty gives way to thirty-five; thirty-five slides into forty. The car is utterly silent; only the tires make noise as we move forward. It’s shockingly easy to get used to speed. So easy I can’t believe I’ve never done it before.

It feels like an act of defiance to watch the speedometer go up, like I’m flipping off the entire universe. Maybe I can’t have Blake—but just for a little bit, I don’t have to play it safe.

It’s still dark, but the brights on the car illumine the road on the way down. The car grips the road, turning without a single squeak of complaint.

I don’t have to play it safe.

There’s something powerful about going fast in a car that’s built for speed. Instead of feeling out of control, I feel like I’m finally in charge. The car whips around a turn, and then another. Gravel spits up on the side of the road, but I don’t care. The turns are getting broader as we head down. The foothills give way to long lazy curves, barely even descending, and then, finally, the road spits me out onto an empty highway, a long, straight shot heading into the dark.

I pass through a silent town in a matter of minutes and find myself on a wide road, vacant this early in the morning.

I’m going to give up this life in a few days. Why not let it all go? Why not find out now, after all these months of being careful, what I can really do?

There’s nobody around to hurt, nothing nearby. Nothing but orchards, fields green with plants reaching tentative leaves skyward toward lightening skies.

It’s a straight road, a road that was made for sixty-five.

Hell, sixty-five doesn’t hurt. In fact, it seems natural. So natural I almost feel angry. All this time, I’ve been going thirty when I can do this instead?

Sixty-five turns into seventy and then eighty. Orchards whip by. There’s a single railroad track running parallel to the road. I push harder. If this car had wings, I think I could lift off.

With no vibrations from the engine, I can’t even tell how fast I’m going. I whip by a speed limit sign; it accusingly reminds me that I shouldn’t be going above seventy miles an hour. I’m at ninety-five.

Fuck it. You only live once. I’m out of that cage of a road. I’m never going to have the chance to live this way again. And suddenly, I’m so goddamned sick of being safe.

I slam my foot on the pedal and the car surges forward smoothly, as if everything up until now has been mere child’s play. The acceleration slams me back in my seat; the world whips by. At this speed, I don’t have to think. I don’t have to feel. I don’t have to hesitate or wait. I don’t have to be a good daughter or a good student. I don’t have to be good at all. I can just be me, whoever that is.

You need to be careful, Xingjuan. There are some words that are embedded in me, like a fishhook stuck in my heart. I can tug at them, but they don’t come out. I shake my head, trying to deny it.

But I know the truth. I’m only speeding down this unknown road because I’m trying to escape the truth. I’ve been falling in love with Blake, and I don’t know how to do it. I don’t know how to be careful with him, and I’m scared of getting hurt. I couldn’t even open my mouth tonight. His dad had a heart attack; he’s taken on a burden so tremendous that it’s been eating him alive this last year. I knew how much he needed me, but I couldn’t even speak up. That’s how scared I was.

You need to be careful, Xingjuan.

Those tears I’ve pushed away come back in full force. I’m tired of being careful.

It’s funny that I hear my mother’s voice telling me to be careful, because my mother is the least careful person I know. She throws her heart into her work. She loves every person she assists. She believes them with all of her heart, works with all of her soul, weeps when she fails and rejoices when she wins. She’s the opposite of careful, and I don’t know how she ended up with me as a daughter. My mother has never told me to be careful in her life. She just laughs and tells me to make my boyfriend wear two condoms.

And yet: You need to be careful, Xingjuan.

That’s when I remember where I heard those words—the one and only time my mother ever spoke them to me. The memory hits me so hard, it’s almost physical. I can feel it. Her hand on my wrist, yanking me close. The air is dry with a hint of sand on it. Her mouth hovers down near my ear, my heart beating fast.

Don’t say those things out loud, my mother is saying. You need to be careful, Xingjuan. You don’t know who will report you.

And with that piece restored, other bits come floating back. I’d been playing with other children. I’d mentioned—unthinking—that my dad had gone to the park to practice after the government had banned Falun Gong. I was just six, too young to understand what I was saying.

My mother grabbed me by the hand and told me to be quiet, that someone could hear. That if they did, they might take my father away.