The minute she came up on to the main road, who should she see across the street but the hapless victims of her curses, Tak-Wing and Emily themselves. Did those two laughing grannies conjure them? Of course not. It was a coincidence. She could still hear them under the bridge chuckling.

“Hey,” said Emily, “there’s the girl who helped me when that drunk man attacked me. The one who paid for our breakfast on our wedding morning, after the first breakfast was ruined. Hey!” She realized she didn’t know the girl’s name. “Miss!”

Tak-Wing turned. “Oh no. That’s Ting-Yan. Don’t you recognize the demon that nearly wrecked our wedding? Just keep walking.”

But Emily had recognized only her benefactor, and not the demon. “Hey!” she cried. “Siu jie! Miss! Missy Miss!”

Ting-Yan, still not entirely sure their presence was real, had no desire to actually talk to them. But Emily ran up to her and grabbed her arm. “Don’t you remember me? I’m the one you helped the other day with breakfast. I’d like to pay you back.”

“Please,” said Ting-Yan. It had been a day of so many awkward moments. She couldn’t handle yet another. “It was nothing. You would have done the same if the shoe were on the other foot.”

“I probably wouldn’t have had the wits or the generosity,” said Emily.

“Hm,” said Ting-Yan, wishing herself a thousand miles away.

Tak-Wing crossed the street after Emily, his reluctance palpable.

“Ah Yan,” he said. “Lei ho?” How are you.

“Ah Wing,” she said.

“Wait,” said Emily. “You two know each other?”

“Do you not recognize her?” Tak-Wing said.

“Of course, my love, I told you, she helped me the other day after that drunk man attacked me,” Emily said.

“This is the dead demon that nearly ruined our wedding,” Tak-Wing said. “Who cursed our first-born child. How can you not recognize her?”

“That was an awful moment,” Emily said, “but this not the same girl, not the same at all.”

No one spoke for several long seconds.

Then Ting-Yan said, “I’m afraid I am the same girl.” She bowed her head.

“Nonsense,” said Emily.

“It’s true,” said Ting-Yan. “I cursed you, then I helped you, then I cursed you again.”

Emily stared, taking Ting-Yan’s words in. Finally, she said, “Well then you’re mad.”

“She is,” said Tak-Wing. “She’s mad.”

“Don’t you dare judge me,” Ting-Yan snarled at Tak-Wing. “Betrayer.”

“I don’t understand,” Emily said.

Tak-Wing and Ting-Yan stood silent, feeling very awkward and not remotely sure where to begin.

“I—” they said, in unison.

There was another long pause.

Tak-Wing waited for Ting-Yan to speak.

Ting-Yan waited for Tak-Wing to speak.

“We—” they said, again in unison.