Lies We Tell ✔

The Thirty-first Dance

     Robert's house didn't have a doorbell. Only a door knocker, which was painted red and shaped like a dragon. I'd only seen stuff like that in those old-timey Chinese dramas Mom loved to binge-watch. This boy took his obsession with Chinese culture to the next level.

We knocked. Once, twice, three times. A minute passed. Three. No response. I prayed to the powers above that Robert wasn't so excited about doing—whatever with Olivia—that he'd forgotten I was coming.

Jessica and I both rattled the doorknob, but for all the good it did, we might as well have been trying to break into a vault.

"What the hell's this creep up to? He invited me here," I snapped.

"Maybe they're in the basement and can't hear us," Jessica said, stepping back from the door, eyes scanning the front of the house.

The basement. Like in every horror movie ever. Fantastic.

"You think there's some way we can get down there from inside? A small window or something?" Jessica hopped over the side of the front porch, landing gracefully on the grass. I followed suit, except much less gracefully. Banged my knee into a plank of wood.

"Ow!"

Jessica and I skirted around the side of the house, heading around to the back. Bushes lined the walls, blocking off almost all possible routes leading to the inside. There was a back door, but one jiggle with the doorknob told me that it was locked, too.

Jessica looked at me, her brow furrowed in concentration. She was staring at the door as if her glare alone could force it to open. "Olivia sounded like she really needed help, right?"

I swallowed. Recalled the characters she'd typed. Jiu ming. Even though my cousin had a strange sense of humor, I doubted even she would joke about her own life. "Right."

"If Robert's not coming, we might have to break and enter." The tiny girl suddenly appeared fierce. Her eyes were sharp, determined. There was an authoritative ring in her voice that hadn't been there before. "You're sure this is his place?"

"It said his name on the mailbox outside."

"You okay with breaking and entering?"

"Um..." I swallowed back my hesitation and threw all caution into the wind. "Sure, why the hell not?"

"Cool. So am I. Let's get this show on the road, then." Jessica whipped a bobby pin out of her her, letting her bangs fall over her eyes, and straightened out the pin. She inserted one end into the doorknob and began jiggling it. Slowly at first, as if testing the waters. Then faster, as precious seconds ticked by with no progress.

Just as Jessica's face contorted into a mask of frustration, the lock gave away. The back door slid open. We looked at each other. I'd just noticed that my body was quivering, and a sheen of sweat had broken out across Jessica's face.

We were breaking and entering. Add that to the list of crazy new things I'd done since coming to college.

"Where'd you learn to do that?" I whispered, looking at my friend in a whole new light.

"Dad's a police officer. He showed me a few tricks. More importantly—where are they? Your cousin and her boyfriend?"

There wasn't a sign of life in the apartment. I followed hesitantly behind my friend as she stepped foot through the doorway and into the house. The inside was quiet. Too quiet. Too neat and tidy, too. I never would've guessed that a college boy lived here. The brown coffee table in the living room hosted a two foot tall ornate white vase with intricate, Oriental-looking blue swirls on it. A pile of magazines was stacked in the middle of the table. Editions of The Economist and The Atlantic, mixed in with Vogue China and China Today. Textbooks of all shapes and sizes had been arranged into neat rows along the bookshelf, with more titles like China Through the Ages and Demystifying the Chinese Economy. If I had to guess, I'd say this was some Chinese Studies professor's home.