I don’t want to scare him.
But maybe I should.
“He might know where we are,” I say. “And he might be able to get to us.”
His face pales, but then he licks his lips and leans in. “Can’t you and Nai Nai put some…protections up? Something?”
I didn’t realize Zixin believed in this stuff. I’ve never revealed my power to him.
I nod. “I have been.”
Along with wards against interdimensional cockroaches the size of a Saint Bernard, but that’s probably more than he needs to know.
“It might not be enough. And if you’re not home…I suppose Nai Nai could make you a protection amulet. You’d have to wear it all the time.”
Why didn’t I think of this before?
“If that’ll make you feel better, I’ll wear it. Shower with it, too. But please, jiejie, stop blaming yourself for what happened to them.”
Self-hate spikes through me. I try to shrug it off. “Yeah, okay.”
“What would you have done if you’d been there? You saw the wuguan. They foughthard.”
“I know,” I say, dropping my gaze to my notebook. The words scrawled in blue ink start to blur.
“Why do you keep thinking you could’ve done something?”
“Maybe one more fighter would’ve made the difference,” I snap without meaning to, then shake my head. “I’m sorry.”
He sets his laptop aside and comes closer. “You would’ve been taken, too. You’d be in China now, who knows where, laboring off their debt.”
“Still laboring off their debt,” I murmur, wiping my nose with a sniffle.
“I would’ve gone to a group home. Nai Nai…she might not be here anymore.”
I don’t want to think about an eleven-year-old Ace trying to make his way in the foster care system of Boston. I don’t want to consider a desperate Nai Nai, unable to pay rent on her own, nowhere to go, trying to see Ace.
And still…
“I’d said I would be there,” I whisper.
“What if it was fate, or something? You have experience with that kind of thing that I don’t. Couldn’t it be fate?”
“What a cruel fate it would be.”
He scoots closer, grabbing my shoulders. “You not being there savedus.And as far as we know, Mom and Dad are okay. Overworked, limited communication, but okay. And when the shop is running, I’m going to do what I can to help make more money so we can pay their debt faster and bring them home.”
My eyes burn again and I nod. “Thanks, buddy.”
He smiles. “Plus, I’ve got a plan.”
I breathe away my tears. “Oh, yeah?”
“A delivery service! There’s this beat-up scooter I saw on the way home at the pawn shop and I bet I could use it to bring coffee and snacks to people. We could charge a deliverypremium, and it would be super easy to manage orders through the website.”
I tsk. “You and what driver’s license?”
“I’m gonna apply for it! Will you help me?”
