“Thanks, girl.” Rainie flashes me another one of her perfect Insta-model grins, then adds, almost as an afterthought, “Oh, and don’t tell anyone about the auditions, yeah? Just in case I don’t get the part—wouldn’t want people to get excited over nothing, you know what I’m saying?”

Her voice is light and airy, but there’s an odd tension simmering beneath her words, the slightest waver at the end of her sentence, like a news anchor trying to keep their cool while a volcano literally erupts behind them.

Or maybe I’m just imagining it.

Either way, I mime zipping my lips before I turn to leave, wondering what she would say if she knew of all the other secrets I’m keeping locked up inside me.

The rest of the school week passes by in a nauseating, anxiety-inducing blur.

I feel that same telltale chill on Thursday, forcing me to sprint out of history class before I’ve written down a word of Mr. Murphy’s lecture on the Taiping Rebellion, and watch my shadow disappear halfway down the corridor. Then it happens again during Friday lunchtime, effectively snuffing out any last hopes I had about this all being some kind of spontaneous occurrence.

So when I find myself hiding in a locked bathroom stall for the third time since school started, my choked, uneven breaths audible over the sounds of the toilet flushing in the neighboring stall, I’m forced to admit the truth:

This is an issue.

For obvious reasons, involuntarily turning invisible at random is an issue, but it’s an even bigger issue because of all the classes I’m missing; the very thought of the red marks on my once-perfect attendance record makes my stomach twist like those braided, deep-fried mahua snacks they sell at the school café. If this continues much longer, the teachers are surely going to start asking questions, maybe even start emailing the principal and—Oh god, what if they tell my parents?

They’ll probably think I’ve been worrying myself sick about the whole leaving-Airington-situation. Then they’ll be worried sick and want to have another talk about Maine and Chinese public schools and insufficient scholarships and my future...

As a fresh tide of panic sweeps over me, my phone buzzes in my pocket.

It’s a WeChat message from my aunt.

I click onto the app, expecting another one of those articles about treating excessive internal heat with herbs, but instead it’s just one line of text, written in simplified Chinese:

Is everything okay?

I frown at the screen, my pulse quickening. It’s not the first time my aunt has sent me a perfectly timed message out of the blue; just last month, she wished me luck on a test I hadn’t even told her about. I’ve always attributed it to one of those inexplicable sixth senses only adults develop, like how teachers somehow always manage to set important assignment deadlines on the exact same day without discussing it beforehand.

But this time it feels different, somehow.

Like a sign.