“No. I see the way you are with them, always hiding. You’re holding something back. Some secret.” Wai-Mae’s expression was resolute. “If we are to be friends, you must tell me everything.”
Ling hugged her knees to her chest—a simple action in the dream world, impossible when she was awake. “A few months ago, I got very sick. When it was over, the muscles in my legs and feet had stopped working. I need leg braces and crutches to walk now. But sometimes, just before I’m fully awake, there’s a moment when I’m still holding on to the dream. And I forget. I forget what happened to me. I forget about the sickness and my legs. For those few seconds, I think that the infection was a bad dream, and I’ll get up and walk out of my room and run down the stairs as if nothing ever happened. But then the truth creeps in. The only place I’m free is in dreams.”
“Dreams are the only place any of us is free,” Wai-Mae said, turning Ling’s face toward hers with just a finger. Wai-Mae’s hands smelled earthy, like moss on the hillside. “There was a boy in my village like you. Every day, they massaged his legs to help with the pain. You have to work fire back into the muscles, Little Warrior.”
Gently, Wai-Mae lifted the hem of Ling’s skirt and trailed her fingers down Ling’s shins. Then she began to work the muscles, kneading with surprisingly strong fingers. Ling suppressed a gasp. In the hospital following the infection, the doctors had immobilized her legs in plaster, then splints, then braces. Her legs felt separate. A caged exhibition. No one touched them. Even Ling touched her own body as little as possible.
“Do that every day,” Wai-Mae commanded. She leaned her head back, toward the sun, gazing out at the golden hills. “I, too, want to stay here always. In dreams. No pain, no strife.” Her face settled into sadness. “I will tell you a secret of my own. I don’t like Mr. O’Bannion. He is not a good man, I don’t think. He lies.”
“What do you mean?”
“I heard gossip today on the ship about one of the other girls he brought over. They say that when she arrived in America, there was no husband to greet her, no marriage. She had been tricked. Instead of a husband, the girl was forced to work in a brothel,” Wai-Mae whispered. “They say she is broken now. She cries all the time. Oh, sister, I must trust the judgment of my uncle, but still, I’m afraid.”
Ling wondered whether she should tell Wai-Mae about her own misgivings. But she didn’t want to worry her unnecessarily. She’d wait until she could speak to Mr. Lee. And she would redouble her efforts to find this Mr. O’Bannion. If necessary, she’d have Uncle Eddie speak to the Association so that they could make sure a similar fate wouldn’t befall Wai-Mae.
“Don’t worry. I’ll look after you,” Ling said.
Wai-Mae smiled at Ling. “I am so grateful that I have you.”
Ling looked into Wai-Mae’s endless brown eyes, and she felt the dream stirring inside her, shifting her molecules, rearranging her atoms, transforming her into something new and beautiful. It made her dizzy.
“What is it, sister?” Wai-Mae asked.
“Nothing,” Ling said, catching her breath. “Nothing.”
“Soon I will be in New York,” Wai-Mae said, a smile lighting up her face. “We will go to your uncle’s opera, or perhaps even Booth’s Theatre. And on Sundays, we can promenade like fine ladies in our very best bonnets. Oh, such fun we’ll have, Ling!”
“No one wears a bonnet,” Ling said, trying not to giggle.
“My village is very small,” Wai-Mae said, embarrassed. “You will show me what’s fashionable.”
“If I’m showing you what’s fashionable, you’re in trouble,” Ling said, feeling chastened for teasing Wai-Mae.
“We will be like sisters,” Wai-Mae said.
“Yes,” Ling murmured. But what she wanted to say as the pearl-white flowers shook down from the low branch of a blooming dogwood tree was No. We will be friends. True friends. Best friends.
“Come, dear Ling,” Wai-Mae said, jumping up and offering her hand.
And they passed the hours dancing under skies so shimmery blue it hurt to look up.