If Found, Return to Hell

by Em X. Liu

Amidst all the temp staff (not you, mercifully) and summer students (not you any more, fucking blissfully) and worn down interns (alas, this is you now), Nathaniel actually looks the part. That is, magical. Uncanny. Auspicious. Her eyes shadowed and brows heavy, her fingers clever, a heavy silver ring twisted on her thumb. A goddamn wizard. The rest of you just look tired.

Your muscles slide into position for the expression too easily, which is a depressing thing to learn about yourself. Too used to this, even if you’re behind a phone most days. It’s just easier to sound happy when you look happy, and, well, fuck—that’s certainly the worst thought you’ve had all day. It’s not even ten o’clock.

The two of you mill out of the room, grabbing shares of what turns out to be cold falafel wraps (again) before heading upstairs, and you think, dear lord when will this be over when will I be free of this hell is this job what I actually want to do no one told me what it would be like when will I get to help people like I thought I was signing up for instead of being yelled at all day is this what the rest of my life is going to look like I don’t want that I don’t want this I

What you’d want to say is that it’s hard to sit by and feel like you don’t know what the fuck you’re doing, to be totally unable to offer up even your meagre help when the rare distress call comes in and you’re floundering on the line.

Thankfully, you don’t live far enough from work that a commute dragging a half-feral snake creature possessing your client’s body is too much of a hassle. Wang Ran still hisses at a passing dog on the train, though, which is awkward, but the dog is well-trained enough to ignore him, and he quiets with an annoyed little flick of his tongue when you elbow him sharply in the side.

Maybe this is how your life ends. Wang Ran’s glare could be venom. His lip is curling back, his face shimmering like hot air over pavement, like a radiation spell gone badly wrong, the force of him too much for this physical body to contain. Shine’s whole body glitches. His skin looks too thin. Unreal. The edges of him blurring in real time as something else shifts beneath the surface. Your eyes cross. Reality stretches, like hot strings of sugar, translucent and twisting. Wang Ran looks at you, and the soft brown of Shine’s eyes shrinks, encroached by dilating pupils, and then by a circle within, a deeper black wherein something stirs. Great coils, flashes of gold. You are struck with the simultaneous urge to grab him to make sure he’s still solid and to scramble off the bed and get far, far away.

“Aren’t you supposed to be warm-blooded?” Wang Ran cries, eyes suddenly widening. “Shit, was I supposed to sun this body?”

Her voice drops, and she does the thing you’ve never known how to deal with, when she gives you her full and undivided attention, all dark brows and downturned mouth and handsome planes of Nathaniel Feng. She’s put little winking gems at the corners of her eyes today, glittering in the sharp light. Her hair is freshly cut, shorn ends tucked under the easy styled sweep of her fringe. Her button-up is unbuttoned nearly all the way down her sternum. She has to look up at you, sitting in the chair, and you fight the urge to drop down to your knees so you can look her in the eyes properly.

ough. pride flag question mark emoji

Your parents ran a laundromat, not a restaurant, but dirt is dirt. It cakes the same.

Shine mumbles something that sounds like ‘sure,’ then wanders away to the couch, losing himself in another conversation with Wang Ran. This is perhaps the strangest part of their co-existence and the thing you had to get used to at first. They sit, lotus-legged, staring up into the ceiling, obviously not seeing it. Their eyes flit back and forth, occasionally flashing a dull gold, pupils constricting too fast to look natural. Whatever conversation they have, you are not privy to this level of intimacy, and you wonder what that must be like. Your whole person cast open for someone else to read, embodiment and thought both shared with another being. Occasionally, their mouth mumbles, low things that gives you enough sense of the conversation for you to know you’re grateful you can’t hear any of it, actually: embarrassing, just say what you mean, but Sunshine, you’re sweet.

While you stand there floundering like a badly spelled marionette, Nathaniel Feng bums a cigarette off the grim reaper standing outside your apartment building. Well, then. Fuck!

There’s a price to pay for those who defy Heaven or Hell or management. Someone was going to come calling eventually. Between the three of you, you’ve cheated enough. But.

You won’t miss One Wizard, but you’ll miss her. You’ll miss the mundanity of stealing bits of her lunch, bickering with her over stupid phone calls, being dazzled by her outfits every day. “Shut up,” Nathaniel says. “You don’t have to justify anything to me. I know you.” She stills. “I do,” she clarifies, her voice dragging lower, something in her eyes shifting, the corners softening. It makes her look plaintive. Hesitant, for once in her life. She rubs her thumbs over the jut of your knuckles, a slow, rhythmic motion that hooks you to her like an anchor. You find yourself listing forward, tipping the two of you forehead to forehead.