chapter 25

Girl

"OKAY,"JINGSAID,pacing up anddown in Suraya's little room. "The

first thing we need to do is find out his origin story." Shejerked her

head in Pink's general direction.

"What?" Suraya stared at her. "We have no time for stories. We

need a plan."

Jing stopped pacing and sighed. "Have you learned nothing from

Star Wars? The only way Luke could defeat Darth Vader was by

knowing how hebecameDarth Vader. When he knew that, he could

figure out howto defeat him, by tapping into the person he used to

be." She coughed. "So we need to know where . . . Pink . . . came

from."

You must know my past to determine my future?Pink rubbed his

chin thoughtfully. Spoken like a philosopher.

"He says you sound like a philosopher." Suraya was sure Pink

could speak directly to Jing if he really wanted to. He just didn't want

to.

"Or someone who watches alot of movies." Jing flopped down

hard onthe bed, making Pink jump. "So spill, little demon. Tell us

how you were made, and who made you."

Tell her to kindly not address me as "little demon." I have a name.

"His name is Pink, Jing."

"All right, Pink." Jing rolled her eyes. "Stop being such a nerf

herder and just answer the question."

What is a nerf herder? Why does she speak in tongues?

"Pink." Suraya shut her eyesand massaged her aching temples.

"Please just tell us."

Tell you?

"Tell us where you came from."

There was the tiniest of pauses before he replied.I came from

your grandmother, of course. She made me.

Suraya regarded him with narrowed eyes. "What did he say?"

Jing whispered. "You're making your level ten angry face. The last

time you made this face it was because Shuba tried to copy you

during the geography test, remember or not? That scolding you gave

her! I think her right ear was almost about to fall off. . . ."

"Shush, Jing." Suraya kepther gaze steadily on Pink, who

seemed to be working very hard not to look at her. "Pink, I know

what it's like when someone is trying to avoid telling me something. I

live with my mother, remember? Now talk. Where did you come

from?"

It was along time before Pink spoke again. To make a pelesit, he

said finally, one would need to dig up the corpse of a recently

deceased child and place it on an anthill.

Was it Suraya's imagination, or was the air suddenly weighed

down by a sudden chill?

Then, when the scurrying feet and sharp teeth of the ants make

the dead child cry out, you would bite his tongue from his mouth, say

a special incantation, and bury it where three roads meet, for three

nights.

By the time Pink's story ended, Suraya's tongue felt like

sandpaper, and her mouth was so dry that it took her a minute to

form the words for Jing's benefit.

"That's how that thing wasmade?" Jing's eyes were wide.

"Someone BIT a dead kid's TONGUE out of his MOUTH?"

"He's not a thing. He's a . . . he's Pink. And yes, that's how he

was made."

"AWESOME."

Suraya turned back to Pink and took a deep breath. "And it was

my grandmother that made you?"

Pink's voice was gentle. Yes. It was the witch.

It felt like someone had wrapped her chest in metal bands and

was squeezing them tight, so that she could hardly breathe. "You

told me that was whatshe was. But you never told me this was how

she was."

You never needed to know.

Jing was peering closely at Pink, her face alive with horrified

excitement. "A dead kid's tongue," she breathed.

"Coooooooooooool."

"Jing!"

"Sorry!" She straightened up, her expression apologetic. "Sorry. I

know this is a lot for you to take."

Suraya tried her best to take a deep breath. There was no time

for this;no time for confusion and racing thoughts and taking apart

her entire family history. "Enough of that. Now that we know, how do

we use that to help us keep Pink out of that pawang's slimy

clutches?"

Jing frowned in concentration. "Well, if it . . . I mean he, sorry,

he .. . if he came from the grave, maybe that's where he needs to

go. You know. Back."

"Back?" Suraya frowned. "You mean, like, bury him?"

"Ya!" Jing pushed her glasses up from where they'd slipped down

her nose in her enthusiasm. "If you think about it right, he's like . . . a

missing piece. Maybe reuniting him with the rest of his old self will

give him peace. What do you think?" She turned to Pink, her

eyebrows raised.

You would return me to the grave?

"You'd be safe there. Nobody would be able to hurt you.

Maybe . . . maybe you would like it?" Suraya turned to him, her face

unsure. "Maybe it would be like going home?"

There was a pause.

All right, he said softly. All right. Let us try.

And then the doorbell rang once again.

Nobody had gates or fences marking the borders of their gardens in

Suraya's village; since everyone was friends and neighbors, nobody

saw any reason to keep visitors out instead of welcoming them in.

So there was nothing to stop the pawang from marching up to

Suraya's homeand ringing the bell, and nothing to prepare Suraya

for the shock of seeing his face looming near one of the small slivers

of windows oneither side of the door, trying his best to peer through

the multihued panels of stained glass.

In her pocket, Pink froze.

The pawang's roaming eyes met hers, and he smiled, showing

rows of perfectly straight white teeth.

"Assalamualaikum," he called. "Won't you open the door?"

Suraya's heart began to pound. "I can't," she managed. "My mom

isn't home and I'm not supposed to open the door to strangers."

The pawang laughed, a strangely high, light sound that carried

through the glass window and grated on Suraya's every nerve. "I'm

hardly a stranger, child," he said. "I've been in your home and eaten

your food. I'm your friend. Let me in." The stained glass distorted his

smiling mouth so that it looked like a wide, gaping maw.

In her pocket, Pink shook hishead frantically. Suraya wished her

heart would stop beating so loud.

"It's hard to talk to you through this barrier, my dear," the pawang

continued, his voice silky and wheedling. "Why don't you open it?

Just a little? All I want is to have a little conversation."

Suraya squeezed her eyes shut and remembered a thousand

wicked little eyes, staring straight into her soul.

Outside, the pawang sighed."Very well then. I suppose I'll come

back when your mother is home." He leaned forward then, so his lips

were right against the crack where the door met the wall, so that his

voice, when itcame, was whispering almost directly into Suraya's

ear.

"You should trust me, you know," he said softly. "Everything I do

is for your own good. And trying to defy me won't help you at all."

Suraya stood frozen to the spot, her hands cold and clammy, her

heart racing as if it would explode straight out of her chest.

The pawang straightened up. "All right then," he said, his tone

cheerful. "Seeyou another time!" And he walked off without a backward glance.

Jing crept out of Suraya's room, where she'd stayed for fear of

being found playing hooky. "Who was that?"

Suraya wiped the sweat fromher brow and tried to pry loose the

cold fingers of fear that clenched at her heart. Pink hopped up from

her pocket to her shoulder, nuzzling his tiny head against her pale

cheek. "He's the reason we need to figure out a plan as soon as

possible."

"Okay," Jing said, fishing her phone out of her bag and carefully

avoiding Suraya's gaze whileshe called up the search engine. Jing

rarely used her phone or even talked about it in front of her friend.

Long ago, when Suraya had been pouting about not getting the

same golden-haired Barbies the other girls spent hours dressing and

undressing, her mother had sat her down and explained to her that

the world was divided between the Haves, the Have-Nots, and those

who Have-Enough-to-Get-By. "That's us," Mama had said. "We have

just enough to live. Not enough for the luxuries others have.

Understand?"

"Understand," Suraya had said then. And she did understand.

She understood that a phone was a thing only Haves could really

afford, and that Jing was a Have, and that knowing how much more

she had compared to Suraya made her uncomfortable—maybe even

a little guilty—even though Suraya herself didn't care. What she did

care about right now in this moment was finding the best way to help

Pink, and if Jing's phone could help them do that, all the better.

"The first thing we need to do is figure out where you come from,

Pink. Sooz, do you know where your grandma lived?"

Suraya shook her head, a hot flush creeping over her cheeks. "I,

umm, didn't even know I had a grandma until I was, like, five. My

mother never talks about her." She couldn't help but read a thousand

different judgments in the lines of Jing's frown as she stared at the

phone, waiting for her app to load.

"Okay, okay, never mind," Jing said. "Small matter. We can still

figure it out. Does the thing have any clues?"

"Stop calling him that! His name is Pink."

Suraya watched Pink thankfully ignore the jab from Jing and

instead mull over her question. It took a while. Finally he spoke, It's

been so long since I last thought about the witch, longer still since I

set footin any of my formerhomes. The witch moved about often.

She was not one to stay in one place for long, nor wouldshe have

been welcome. But at the last village, in the place she drew her last

breath . . . there were jambu trees in the garden, and a round pond

with tiny fish flitting in its depths. And we were close enough to the

mosque to see the blue dome and the minarets from the kitchen

window, and to mark time by the call to prayer.

Suraya relayed this to Jing, who sighed as she tapped away on

the phone screen. "O-kay, thank you for that. I mean, I was hoping

for something more along the lines of, like, the name of atown, or a

state, or even a landmark besides, like, fruit trees and a mosque with

a blue dome, since I'm 99 percent sure that every other kampung in

Malaysia has one of those. . . ."

"Maybe my mom has someold letters lying around," Suraya

suggested. "I could go poke around her desk."

"It's a start," Jing said. "Let's see."

The door to Mama's room was closed. It was always closed, whether

Mama was actually in the room or not, whether Mama was even

home or not. It had been this way for as long as Suraya could

remember. The closed door, as far as she was concerned, sent a

very clear message: DO NOT ENTER. THIS PLACE IS NOT FOR

YOU.

She'd never considered ignoring that message until now.

"Well?" Jing, who bounded in and out of her own mother's room

as and when she pleased—sometimes without even knocking—

didn't understand Suraya's hesitation. "Open lah."

"Hold on."

"What's wrong?"

Suraya couldn't explain how much of a struggle it was to even

touch the doorknob, much less turn it. THIS PLACE IS NOT FOR

YOU.

"Is it stuck? Come I try." And before she could say a word, Jing

reached past her and wrenched the door wide open.

For a moment, Suraya felt asif she couldn't breathe. She'd only

ever caught glimpses of her mother's room before; to havethis much

access all at once was like suddenly being given ten Cokes to drink

when she'd only ever been allowed sips of it her entire life ("Too

much sugar," her mother would scoff when they passed those

enticing red cans in their local supermarket). She didn't know

whether to give in to the urge to drink in every little detail in huge,

painful gulps, or to turn her back on it altogether and just walk away.

Fortune favors the bold, a little voice whispered in her ear. Behind

her, Jing waited, as if she understood that the one to take that first

step into the room had to be Suraya.

She took a deep breath.

"Well," she said over her shoulder. "Are you guys coming or

what?"

And then she stepped over the threshold.

The windows were closed in Mama's room, and the curtains

drawn shut, so that the sunlight struggling valiantly through its brown

cotton filter cast the room indim, sepia light. Between this and the

stale, still air, it was as if time had stopped here years ago.

Suraya hadn'tbeen sure what to expect, but if anything, she

thought Mama's room might be spare and painfully neat, much like

Mama herself. But this room was nothing like that at all. Instead,

every inch of available spacewas covered in piles of . . . stuff. Books

stacked precariously in piles that came up to Suraya's waist; papers

peeking timidly out of the drawers they'd been shoved in; clothing in

a crumpled heap on one side of the bed, where the only unoccupied

space was marked by a dent in the mattress and a rumple in the

sheets. The clothes Mama had worn and discarded the day before

marked a trail across the room, like an adult Hansel or Gretel,

leaving garments instead of bread crumbs to find their way home.

THIS PLACE IS NOT FOR YOU.

"Woooooooooow," she heard Jing breathe out beside her. "I

mean, um. Where do we start?"

Suraya wasn't sure.

As if he understood, Pink spoke up. Jing looks in there,he said,

nodding toward the closet. I'll start on this shelf. And you will take

those piles over there. Yes?He looked up at Suraya questioningly, and shenodded, grateful for the chance to catch her breath, to have

the weight of making decisions taken off her shoulders for once.

Having received her orders, Jing began rummaging around with

enthusiasm, muttering under her breath as she went. "Wah," Suraya

heard her say, and then "Like that also can?"

I'd tell her not to make a mess,Pink said, but I'm not sure it

makes any difference. He turned to the high shelf that stood against

one wall, filled with books and papers jammed in every which way,

and Suraya sank to the floorbetween piles of yet more books and

papers and began to sift through them.

It seemed to take forever. They found all sorts of things—

romance novels with lurid covers that Suraya would never have

expected her mother to read, clothes with outsized shoulder pads

like relics of a bygone era, several pairs of high heels in bright colors

—reds and blues and yellows and purples—covered in dust, their

faux leather peeling off in strips and scraps.

By the time Suraya was done with her piles, Jing was still making

new discoveries in the closet, and Pink had moved on to astack of

cardboard boxes that stood beside the shelf.

The chest of drawers,Pink told her, looking up from a pile of

mismatched playing cards—Old Maid, Snap, Uno, all shoved into the

same deck. Over there.

Suraya turned to look at the chest that stood right up against the

wall, a nondescript thing of dark wood, with four rows of narrow

drawers and a rattan basket on top that held an assembly of jars and

bottles: Vicks VapoRub and Tiger Balm and minyak cap kapak and

curling old blister packs of ibuprofen with only one or two pills still

encased in their plastic prisons.

The first three drawers held nothing but reams and reams of

paper—bills; cuttings from old newspapers, soft and yellowing;

catalogues that had come in the mail still in their plastic wrappers,

their covers promising unbelievable deals on Tupperware, dresses

you could wear five different ways, and amazingly absorbent

cleaning cloths; empty junk food wrappers stuffed in the spaces in

between as if Mama was ashamed of consuming their contents.

Suraya shuffled through all of these silently, as Jing rustled and

banged in the background.

The last drawer would not open.

Suraya pulled and tugged, but all it did was reveal a couple of

dark, tantalizing centimetersof itself before refusing to move any

further, stubborn and unyielding. "What's in this thing?" she

murmured, wiping the sweat from her brow.

"Come, let me try," Jing said, materializing by her right elbow.

I'm not sure .. . ,Pink began. But it was too late. With an

almighty tug and a deafening crack, the drawer broke free from

whatever had been holding it back, sending Jing tumbling to the

floor.

"Are you okay?" Suraya asked, hurrying to her side. Jingsat up

and winced, rubbing her cast.

"I'm fine lah," she said. "Now what's inside?"

The clutter that dominated all the other parts of Mama's room had

been kept far away from this tiny drawer, and it was curiously empty

in comparison. There was a plain, pale blue envelope nestled at the

bottom. Wicked-looking shards and splinters of wood shedding from

the lockthey'd apparently broken. And one other thing—a marble,

large and perfectly round and shot through with swirls of blue and

green and hints of gold.

Suraya picked it up. It was strangely warm in her hands,as if it

had nestled in someone else's palm recently and absorbed the heat

of their skin.

"Aiya, did I spoil it?" Jing's voice, high with panic, broke the spell.

"You think your mom will notice? Dam—"

"Don't swear," Suraya admonished her automatically, still staring

at the marble in her hands. There seemed to be something almost

familiar about it.

What is in the envelope?Pink asked. His eyes too were on the

orb in Suraya's hands, but if he knew what it was, herevealed

nothing.

"What's in the envelope, Jing?" Suraya asked and Jing reached

in.

"There's just a bunch of papers here . . . birth certificates for you

and your mom, Sooz, and . . . some dude. Your dad?" She flashed

Suraya an apologetic smile before she went on. "There's something

else too. His . . . his death certificate."

"Oh." Suraya turned the marble over and over in her hands,

concentrating hard on its smoothness and trying not to think about

the piece of paper that made her father's death Official with a capital

O.

"Sooz," Jing said quietly.

"What?"

"There's this bundle of letters in here."

Suraya looked up, suddenly alert. "From my grandmother?"

Jing frowned as she scanned some of the papers, each covered

in the same slanting blue handwriting.

Not from your grandmother,Pink said suddenly. To your

grandmother. They were from your mother. I remember seeing them

at the witch's home . . . our home . . . tucked away in a drawer.

At the same time, Jing spoke. "These look like they're from your

mom."

"They must have sent them back to her when . . . when my

grandmother died."

Jing nodded. "There's an address here, we can . . ."

It was then that they all heard it: the unmistakable click of the

front door handle.

Mama was home.

Quickly,Pink hissed, bounding from Suraya's shoulder to the

door to keep watch. Move. We must not be seen in here.

Suraya's heartpounded so hard in her chest that it actually hurt,

and with every beat she heard the same refrain: THIS. PLACE. IS.

NOT. FOR. YOU.

Jing fished her phone out of her pocket and quickly snapped a

photo of the paper in her hands—it seemed to Suraya that a camera

had never sounded so loud before, and she was sure her mother

would hear them—and shoved the whole bundle back in the bulging

envelope. "Let's go, Sooz,before she catches us," she said

breathlessly.

"Right, I'm coming," Suraya said. But as they crept quietly out of

the door, she turned back and in one smooth motion slid the drawer

open, grabbed the marble, and quickly tucked it into the deep pocket

of her top. Then she closed the drawer as quietly as she could and

left the room, pulling Mama's door shut behind her.

She didn't know why she couldn't leave that marble behind. But

she knew that she couldn't.

"Suraya?" She whirled around to see Mama staring at her, her

brow creased in irritated furrows. "What are you doing?"

How long had Mama been standing there? How much had she

seen? Was this question a trap? Suraya's palms were damp with

sweat, and she could feel her heart begin to race.

"READY OR NOT, HERE I COME!" Jing's voice boomed through

the walls as she came barreling down the hallway, stopping short

when she saw Suraya and Mama. "Hey, you're not hiding!" Then she

stuck her good hand out andsmiled her most winning, gap-toothed

smile. "Hello aunty, I'm Jing Wei, Suraya's friend from school, just

came tovisit because I heard she wasn't well, don't worry, I have my

mom's permission, how are you? We were just playing hide-and

seek, you want to play too? Suraya isn't very good and she keeps

losing, but I keep telling her she just has to try a bit harder, she isn't

really using her imagination lah when it comes to hiding, you know?"

Mama no longer looked irritated, just slightly shell-shockedat this

barrage of words. "I'm . . . fine," she said finally. "And it is nice to

meet you, of course. But shouldn't you be heading home? It will get

dark soon, and your mother may worry. There is a bus back to town

in about fifteen minutes; if you hurry, you can make it."

"Oh sure, sure," Jing said. "I'll just get my stuff."

Mama nodded stiffly. "Good. And in the meantime, I will start

making our dinner." She turned and swept back down the hall toward

the kitchen.

"Phew!" Jing said, making anexaggerated show of wiping sweat

off her brow. "That was a close one!"

The marble seemed to grow heavier in Suraya's pocket, and she

shifted uncomfortably as they walked back to her room. "That was a

close one," she echoed.

"Okay, so we have the address on the letters, which should be

the last place your grandmother lived—" Jing squinted at her phone.

"Some village near Gua Musang. Sound familiar to you?" She poked

her finger at Pink, who jumped out of the way.

Not at all.And get yourfingers away from me. Do you never

clean beneath your nails?

"He says no." Suraya decided to leave out that last bit.

"Well, it's where we're going." Jing shrugged and turned back to

her screen, jabbing away at it intently. "I can get us bus tickets there.

Not too expensive. I still have my mom's credit card number from

that time she couldn't figure out how to buy shoes online and I had to

do it for her before she broke her phone. . . ."

"Won't your mom find out?"

Jing shrugged. "I mean, she'll find everything out eventually.

Might as well make sure she has plenty to get angry about."

Suraya took a deep breath and nodded. "Do it. We'll leave

tomorrow morning. Dress for school as usual and make a run for it

as soon as we're dropped off at the gate."

Jing nodded and turned her attention back to her phone.

Suraya turnedto Pink, still staring out of the window. "Do you

think this is going to work?" It was only now dawning on her, how she

was about to lose Pink forever, how harsh a word foreverreally was.

"I need you tosay it," she whispered. "I need you to tell me we're

doing the right thing. That we have to try."

What choice do we have?Hisvoice was resigned, and a little

sad.

Jing came to stand beside her, reaching down to clasp Suraya's

hand in hers. "Do or do not," she murmured. "There is no try."