Old woman in the room we are standing in is moving. Small small. So small I am not knowing that Xifeng is seeing, but old woman moves and small small river is running from her eyes. I am thinking that maybe the remembering is belonging to her grandson.
There is another part of the remembering. We are seeing from the person’s eyes that they are piloting mech and zoom zooming through the air, and there is much shouting and katakata, then explosion and static and nothing.
The remembering stops, and the room is being like night again.
The man with dandelion beard is being quiet for long time and water is coming from his eye too, and then he is telling Xifeng thank you in small small voice, and then he is hugging her and he is making hand sign to old woman, who is slow slow turning to Xifeng and smile is crossing her lips.
My head is beeping, and I am seeing with small Enyemaka’s eyes that boat is disturbing the water outside. Police.
“We must go,” I am warning Xifeng in quiet voice. I am speaking in Xifeng’s language so that man and older woman who is smiling through the water on her face are not understanding what we are saying.
Xifeng is wanting to linger and spend more time with family but I am pulling her through door and wishing I am having pistol with me. But Xifeng is telling me that it is bad for me to be walking with gun on me, even though I am telling her it is to protect her and I am not bad person.
We are leaving the home, and I am careful not to just throw Xifeng into water. She is picking up small Enyemaka and holding her in her arms, and I am looking down to see that boatman who bring us here is gone. He is leaving with all of our money.
I am pulling Xifeng with me, and we find bridge connecting to another house, and we are walking fast over it.
“Uzo, please slow down,” Xifeng is whispering to me. I am wanting her to not be speaking at all. We cannot be slowing down now. Bridge is bending too far beneath our weight.
We arrive at another platform and we run to another bridge, but it is just plank of wood and Xifeng slips, and the only thing that is keeping her from falling in water with small Enyemaka is my hand wrapped around her wrist. Bridge is bending beneath me and almost snapping. Creaking, creaking, and creaking. I am swinging Xifeng back and forth.
“Wait, wait,” Xifeng is hissing, scared.
But I am ignoring her as I use all my strength to throw her onto next platform as plank is snapping beneath me and I am falling into water with loud splash.
Lights are moving over me like circles, and at first I am thinking this is moonlight, then I am realizing there are too many circles and it is police on boats, and I am staying underwater hoping Xifeng is not looking over ledge trying to find me.
When the circles pass, I swim up and poke my head above water.
They are stopped at the house where Xifeng is crouched. They will be finding her.
I swim fast, and when I get to the stilts holding up the house’s platform, I climb. Xifeng is hiding at the back of the house, and when she is seeing me dripping with lagoon water, she is nearly making sound but I am putting my hand over her mouth and telling her shush.
Then I am going around house and finding first police, and I am seeing the skin of his neck where it is showing beneath his helmet, and I am not knowing why this is important or what it means but I am fast fast putting my fingers there hard, and he is crumpling like he is losing his legs.
I drag him back to where Xifeng is sitting, and I am taking his gun and I am feeling good with gun in my pants again. Then I am taking Xifeng and saying, “Climb on my back.”
And she is doing this, then I am sliding over the edge of the platform but hanging by my fingertips. And like this, I am moving along the edge of the platform, and when I need to, I am moving to underside of platform and clinging to it while Xifeng is having her arms and legs wrapped around me.
Like this, we move from house to house, platform to platform, until we get to Third Mainland Bridge and I am climbing over and we are blending into crowd again.
I am dripping, and my shoes are making squishing sound when I am walking, and Xifeng is breathing heavy, then she is looking at me and she is giggling and I am giggling too, and I am wondering if it will be like this every time we are delivering rememberings to families.
* * *
■ ■ ■ ■ ■
It is nighting outside and I am sitting on the steps to Xifeng’s trailer. We are on an empty span of shoreline, and some of the Enyemakas are coming with us to make sure to be keeping people away from us. I am not sure if this is to be protecting us or to be giving Xifeng privacy and a chance to be being alone. But I am sitting on the steps to the trailer, and I am drawing in the dirt with a stick I am finding on the beach. Stars are making the water shimmer, and I am drawing and stick is making scritch scritch sound until door is opening behind me and splashing light on what I am drawing, and I am actually seeing it for the first time when before I am not even paying attention to what I am doing.
And Xifeng is standing in doorway and staring at thing I am drawing in the sand, and I am looking at it too and I am seeing face. It is meaning something to Xifeng. Maybe Xifeng is having rememberings.
“Are you knowing this girl?” I am asking Xifeng. I am thinking maybe there was being one like me before me. A someone who Xifeng is holding and who she is telling you are good person.
“Where did you see that face?” Xifeng is asking me, ignoring my question. She is not speaking her language to me anymore, so I am switching to my own language too.
“When I am having epileptic attack. I am smelling sulfur and I am tasting metal and I am seeing her face. Not all of the time but many times. My body is telling me I am loving this girl. In my dreams, I am calling this girl Ify.” I am not knowing why, but air is choking in my lungs and my arms and legs are feeling heavy and I am wanting to know if this person is real. It is want that is deep deep inside me. “Are you knowing Ify?”
After long silence, Xifeng is nodding her head. “I did. Once upon a time.” There is softness in her face, but then the light is changing and she is being lit from behind and is only silhouette in the night and I cannot see her face and what expression it is making. “But she died in the war. You should rest. We have more work to do tomorrow.”
She is closing the door and taking the trailer’s light with her. I think she is wanting to hear me cry at news that Ify is dead, like what red-blood human is doing. Like woman whose loved one I am burying or like man and old woman who are seeing remembering of person who they are loving who is dead. She is wanting me to cry, but it is wasteful to cry for this. I am remembering how Xifeng is standing and holding herself when she is telling me about Ify, and I am remembering what my brain is telling me about how her body is talking to me when she is telling me words, and I am knowing that when Xifeng is telling me that Ify is dead, Xifeng is telling lies to me.