18
Stumbling out of her office in a daze, I suddenly felt disgusted with myself.
I was so petty.
At some point, the Water Ghost had silently emerged from the darkness.
He followed silently behind me.
Only after a long while did he say, “You did well.”
My eyes stung. “But it doesn’t feel like enough.”
I was still seething inside, unable to let it go.
19
That lasted until I got home and found the landlord there to demand the rent.
All right. Now I’d let it all go.
My heart turned to ice.
I threw myself into the glorious cause of wage labor.
I worked overtime without sleep or rest for the extra pay. After a whole month of overtime, I found out there was no overtime pay. Hilarious.
I really was born to suffer. And worse, good deeds go unnoticed while bad news travels a thousand miles.
Somehow, word got around that I could help ghosts let go of their obsessions.
A whole crowd of wandering ghosts came flocking.
Good grief, what a misunderstanding! Some vengeful ghosts even tried to force me to work for them.
Buddy, did you think my peachwood sword was just for show…?
The Water Ghost was going to help me kill those ghosts. But when he saw me finish them off with one strike, he silently slipped back into the darkness.
“Sorry to bother you.”
I thought things would be quiet after that. I didn’t expect someone else to be so unreasonable.
The crying ghost sobbed even harder.
20
It was fine; I’d just pretend I couldn’t hear it. But it blocked my way and cried. It even cried in my dreams.
It really put all its effort into these wicked tricks!
After three straight days of going to work with dark circles under my eyes, I couldn’t take it anymore.
As soon as I drew my sword, it begged, “I have money. Don’t kill me!”
“A whole lot of money!”
I stared at it. “Why didn’t you say so sooner?”
Then it handed me a stack of ghost money.
?
Look, I’m only so poor I’m practically dead, but I’m not actually dead. Understand?
Seeing my expression, it pleaded, “You’ll need it someday.”
Me: “...Thanks, but no thanks.”
It dropped to its knees with a thump. As it pulled stack after stack of ghost money from its pocket, it begged, “Please, I’m in so much pain. I can’t bear it anymore… Could you help them—and help me, too?”
I looked at the knife embedded in its head, blood still pouring out.
In front of me was a small mountain of ghost money.
With this much ghost money, it must have been loved by a lot of people.
But I still refused. “I won’t help. If I helped everyone, how would I make a living?”
It snapped, “But you helped them!”
I snapped back, “They were cats and children!”
The crying ghost suddenly fell silent and stared at me in a daze.
Tears as big as beans kept spilling from its eyes.
“I’m pregnant, too. Could you help me?”
I froze.
21
The crying ghost had been hacked to death while six months pregnant.
It was laughable, really. It had kindly played matchmaker for a coworker.
The match worked out, and the coworker thanked it with 200 yuan.
A year later, the coworker said his girlfriend had cheated on him and broke up with her. Then he took a knife and hacked the crying ghost to death.
“This is all your fault for setting me up with the wrong person!”
It died bewildered and confused.
It had been happy in its own life, with a loving family. It felt that love had made its life more complete, so when its coworker was single, it insisted on setting her up with someone.
It didn’t understand. That man had seemed so open and generous at work. Why, after they got together, did his girlfriend say he’d controlled and beaten her until she became depressed?
But he claimed they’d broken up because she cheated. They argued constantly, and amid all the rumors, the man accused her.
In the end, he lost control and slapped her. She finally left him for good.
Word was that the slap had ruptured her eardrum. The crying ghost wanted to apologize, only to discover it had been blocked.
It wanted to hate that man. But it hated hatred itself.
A trace of resentment briefly appeared around it.
But before it could become a vengeful ghost, its kindness once again enveloped its heart.
Red nails grew from its fingers, and it tore them off one by one with its own hands. And so the pain piled up, all of it laid on itself.
The child that had never been born.
The pain its friend had suffered.
Even the pain its parents felt at losing it.
It laid all of it at its own door.
It wouldn’t allow itself to be set free.
It wanted to live in its own personal hell.
I asked, “How long have you been dead?”
It thought for a moment. “Seven years? Eight?”
I was quiet for a moment, then said seriously, “That’s enough.”
Tears welled in its eyes again. “Really?”
“I’ve committed so many sins. Is it really enough?”
It wept bitterly, its voice choked with sobs. “But I did wrong. I hurt my friend, I hurt my child, I hurt the people who loved me. Is what I’ve suffered really enough?”
It looked at me as if begging me to forgive it. But I knew my forgiveness wasn’t what it needed.
I asked, “What’s your lingering wish?”
“I… want to apologize to my friend.”
I said, “All right. Once you’ve said it, forgive yourself and be reincarnated.”
22
Its friend wasn’t easy to find.
She’d not only moved, she’d changed cities.
So the crying ghost couldn’t find her on its own.
I asked a lot of people to help look, and in the end, the Water Ghost used some connections in the underworld to find her.
That man had left a deep shadow over her. When I went to visit, the crying ghost didn’t dare go inside; it just stood outside the door.
Its face was deathly pale, and its eyes held even more tears than usual.
It said, “I can’t face her.”
I knocked, and after a long while, someone finally opened the door.
The face that appeared before me was just as deathly pale.
“You are…?”
I tried not to wear my usual deathly expression and said gently, “Are you Tầm Âm? I’m a friend of Tiểu Vũ’s.”
She froze, her pale fingers gripping the doorframe.
I thought she would turn me away, but to my surprise, she stepped aside and let me in.
The house was dark, the curtains drawn tight.
She switched on a dim floor lamp.
“Sorry, I don’t like the light.”
I didn’t mind. My gaze swept across the room, then suddenly stopped.
There was a small altar in the middle of the living room.
A black-and-white photo of Tiểu Vũ sat on it. The incense, not yet burned down, curled in the air.
Beneath the altar was an iron basin, with the last glow of the freshly burned ghost money still in it.
So among all that seemingly endless ghost money, some of it had been burned by Tầm Âm, too.
I turned and looked at her seriously. “Tiểu Vũ has something to say to you.”
She drew a sharp breath. “Tiểu Vũ… has something to say to me? But hasn’t Tiểu Vũ been gone for nine years?”
I looked at the lingering sorrow in her eyes. Even Tiểu Vũ couldn’t remember how long she’d been dead. But she remembered it clearly.
“Yeah. I happened to find her last words from back then. She said… she was really sorry, and had always wanted to apologize to you.”
Tầm Âm held her breath, then smiled bitterly. “Apologize to me? I’m the one who should be apologizing to her.”
She opened her mouth, but for a long time, no sound came out.
Suddenly, she buried her face in her hands and sobbed like a little animal. “I… I’m the one who should apologize to her. Tiểu Vũ… died because of me… That bastard was trying to kill me. He must have taken his anger out on Tiểu Vũ because he couldn’t find me…”
Her tears ran between her fingers.
“I’m the one who should’ve died… Tiểu Vũ was six months pregnant…”
I didn’t know if it was because she was crying so desperately, but my heart grew heavy, too.
Was the ghost haunting her that man, or Tiểu Vũ, whom she couldn’t face?
Just as I was about to speak, the crying ghost suddenly shoved the door open and rushed in. Tears streamed down its face. It was frantic to say something, but it was too worked up to make a sound.
“Ah… ah!”
It frantically waved its hands in front of its friend, its throat hoarse from crying as it tried to scream, “No… it wasn’t you!”
“Ah…!” Pain filled its eyes like blood and became a groan in its throat.
But the person in front of it couldn’t see or hear it.
Tầm Âm stared blankly at the empty space before her. “What’s wrong with this door…?”
Tiểu Vũ suddenly stopped.
I looked at her and spoke for her. “Tiểu Vũ doesn’t blame you. If anything, she feels she dragged you into this by introducing you to that bastard.”
Tầm Âm fell silent. After a long while, she said, “I resented her once. But… only a little.”
“I was just a little mad, but I knew she only wanted me to be happy… I’d get over it soon, and then we’d be friends again.”
“That’s how it should’ve been! That’s how it was supposed to be… How could Tiểu Vũ have died?”
Her voice choked up again. “Before she died, I even deleted her from my contacts… What was I doing? What was I doing!”
It turned out that Tiểu Vũ wasn’t the only one imprisoned by that death.
I asked her, “So have you forgiven Tiểu Vũ?”
Her voice seemed thick with tears as she gazed blankly at the black-and-white photograph. “Forgiven her? I forgave her a long time ago. But she’ll never forgive me.”
“She will. She’ll forgive you.”
As soon as the words left my mouth, a golden light flashed across Tiểu Vũ’s form as she wept silently beside us.
I looked toward the invisible space and asked the vengeful spirit who was about to disappear, “Tiểu Vũ, will you forgive Tầm Âm?”
Her form had grown faint and translucent. But at that moment, I saw her summon all her strength and rush toward Tầm Âm.
She threw her arms around Tầm Âm. The wind stirred Tầm Âm’s hair.
Only I could hear her say, “Tầm Âm, I forgive you. In our next life, be my friend again, okay?”
A moment later, her form and tears vanished, leaving Tầm Âm standing there, crying in bewilderment.
“Just now… was there something?”
I looked at her and didn’t explain. I simply said seriously, “In all this, the one who deserved to die was neither her nor you. That bastard was executed a few years ago. But you still have to live.”
“All Tiểu Vũ ever wanted was for you to be happy. You don’t need to atone or punish yourself. You did nothing wrong. You have to live well and keep moving forward.”
She suddenly burst into sobs.
“But it isn’t fair… It’s so unfair for me to be the only one who’s happy…”
Fairness… but the world is never truly fair.
“Tầm Âm, if you aren’t happy, then Tiểu Vũ’s death will have been meaningless. She told me she forgives you. I heard her.”
23
I don’t know if Tầm Âm truly believed me. But after that, she began leaving the house and taking her mental-health medication regularly.
She returned to the old city and moved into the floor above Tiểu Vũ’s parents’ home.
Every day, she went to care for the two elderly parents.
Though the three of them often hugged and cried together.
Still, in the end, life went on.
I, too, prepared to start over and live better.
I’d shut out the outside world and devote myself wholeheartedly to working like a beast of burden.
Though there were more and more ghosts in the house, it wasn’t all bad.
Property prices in this neighborhood had dropped.
If I just stopped eating and drinking, worked another twenty years, I might have a chance of buying a house.
—THE END—