The Kunlun Files

Chapter 12: The Big Black Thing

Lu Feng had spent weeks scheming to meet me, and with Master Wu's help he finally got his dinner. I wasn't looking forward to it. He was — he had a mountain of things to say, and all of it boiled down to two heaps: strange things he'd read online or heard from someone, and dreams he'd had.

I'd barely said three sentences before he launched in, and he talked for the better part of an hour.

"The kid just talks a lot," Wu said, by way of apology.

"Jie, so what's the deal?" Lu Feng said at last.

Somewhere between the texts and this dinner, he'd dropped the "Miss" and promoted me to Jie — big sister. I let him.

"What's what deal?"

"Come on, Dajie. Everything I said — don't tell me you weren't listening."

"You said a friend of yours saw a ghost in a parking garage at night, and afterward he crashed his car. The sports car was totaled on the spot, and he walked away without a scratch."

"Right. When he told people, everyone said the ghost did it to him."

"And what do you think?"

"What everyone says sounds right. But I keep wondering — what if the ghost saved him? Otherwise, the car gets crushed flat and the driver doesn't get a scratch? How does that work?"

"Maybe so."

He leaned closer. "Jie, look at me. Is there anything unclean hanging on me?"

I looked into his eyes — sincere, with a slight glaze of foolishness — and said, "Spend less time thinking about these things."

"Jie, can you tell me what bond we had in our past lives?"

"No."

"Why not? Did I do something awful to you in my last life?"

"Let's talk about something else."

"Jie, I keep dreaming about a big black thing. A huge one. I read online that it might be some kind of giant obstacle — is that true?"

When he said *a big black thing*, I glanced at his soul.

Ever since I'd walked in, that great black soul of his had been watching me without moving. Its face showed nothing. But deep in its eyes there was something that stirred.

I knew the soul was studying me. Maybe it had already half recognized me, and didn't yet dare be sure.

I told Wu I was done eating and had things to do. He'd half risen to see me off when Lu Feng said, "Jie, you're leaving already? Where are you going? I'll drive you."

"I drove myself."

"Where are you going after this?"

"Is there something you need?"

"I have a feeling we'd be going the same way."

Wu laughed. "If it's nothing important, take him with you. He's been hanging off me like a keychain for days, talking nonstop. Get him out of here. Let my ears rest."

I couldn't politely refuse after that. Wu's family and Lu Feng's had business dealings; the kid's father had shoved him at Wu as an intern assistant mainly because he couldn't stand another day of strange theories being poured into his own ears.

I needed daily necessities from the big supermarket nearby. On the drive over, Lu Feng gave me an impassioned lecture on the prophecies flooding the internet this year — and mid-sentence, his phone rang.

"Son," he answered, "what do you want from your dad?" Then: "Ah. When did it happen?"

His face had gone grave when he hung up. I teased him on purpose: "So young, and already a father?"

"Come on, Dajie, it's my classmate." He exhaled. "One of my classmates tried to kill himself at noon today. Over a girl. He's in the hospital — they're still working on him."

"Love is not a good thing," I said. "It isn't to be touched carelessly."

"I don't understand those people either. What's the point of dating? It sounds completely boring."

"Right. With that much free time, you'd be better off watching that goat-and-wolf cartoon."

"I don't like the goat cartoon."

"You like prophecies."

"Yeah!" He perked right back up. "This year there are tons of them online. Some say this summer will bring a terrible drought. Some say the whole world order changes this year. Some say an island nation is going to sink."

"Go dig up the prophecies from two years ago."

"Jie, are you trying to say they're all the same predictions, and people swap in whatever year it is?"

"Glance at them now and then. Don't take them seriously."

"Jie, do you think any of them are right?"

"Calamities come every year. Partings and deaths happen every hour."

"That's so true, Jie. So — what exactly was our past-life bond?"

"Why do you have to know?"

"Dajie, how badly did I upset you? You deleted me at the drop of a hat. Do I owe you money? How much? I'll pay you back right now."

"I was your mother in a past life."

"WHAT! Dajie, you can't joke about that. There's no way. How could you be my mother?"

"Then you feel I should be your big sister?"

"Forget it, forget it." He waved both hands, then rallied again. "But a lot of the prophecies really do seem solid. There are the old prophecy books everyone studies, and the Mayans, and Atlantis. And aliens — Jie, do aliens exist?"

"Are you thirsty? If you want a drink, we'll buy one in a minute."

He was unstoppable. "A lot of people say this is a seven-dragons year for the rains — a huge drought, a real crisis. Should we stockpile grain ahead of time? If the drought hits, we could get relief to people fast. I've been thinking about this for weeks."

"What a fine child, worrying about the nation and its people."

"Dajie, Wu says you can see people's past lives. Can you see what happens in the future? Give me some advice."

"We're here. Get out."

In the supermarket, Lu Feng kept dropping snacks into the cart.

"Whatever you put in there," I said, "you're taking home yourself."

"My classmates buy snacks for their girlfriends all the time. Don't you eat snacks?"

The words came out of nowhere, and something about them felt wrong. I looked at his soul — and it was watching me with a meaningful little smile, an expression so exactly like the beast in my chest that for a second I couldn't tell them apart.

*Birds of a feather,* I thought. *Of course.*

"I'm vegetarian."

"Huh? But at dinner I literally saw you eat meat."

"We're done. We're checking out. You're taking a cab home."

"Ah? ...Okay."

Driving back alone, my feelings were hard to name. When Lu Feng talks with me one-on-one, there's always something tucked inside his words — hints, little feelers. The kid's mind runs in strange loops.

I was still thinking it over when he called.

"Dajie, I want to go see my classmate at the hospital. Is there anything I should watch out for?"

"If you want to go, go."

"What if I run into a ghost? Do you have a talisman, or a spell or something, to protect me?"

"I'm no exorcist. I don't have those things. But if you're going, go in the morning. Don't go at this hour."

"But I already told my classmates I'd come."

"Then go."

I hung up and sat with my hands on the wheel.

Do people say things they don't mean in anger? I've never believed it. The words that wound are the words that were already there.

There are omens before everything that happens — small ones, easy to miss, easy to brush off. People have a mysterious confidence that little signs never lead anywhere bad.

I told myself he was only visiting a classmate. What could happen at a hospital?