China! She imitated him, her voice bratty and whiny. I thought again of how he had touched her face.

Is China your real name?

Yeah, right! Sometimes I say Bali or Tahiti. Men love that shit. China usually goes over good. I like it. It’s exotic.

I wished I could keep her in the bathroom with me, discover what it was that Justine had done. But the sailor knocked again. Not really a knock. He slammed his fist against our door.

Come on, she said. She stood above me now, and her fingers dangled down like a rope. I let her lift me, lift me from the floor.

My father would be home soon, puttering around the kitchen in his overalls. I had no curfew, but still I always came home after school. I’d make sure he had deposited the day’s earnings. I’d go over the bank balances and bills, because lately he was forgetting all kinds of things. Then he’d scream at the news while I did my homework on my bed because I could think better lying down, with the warm breeze drifting through the window, smelling like lilacs and willow trees.

I always used to go home right after school. Because I never would want my father to worry about me.

Maybe I’ll meet you later, I said.

She spat on the mirror, and the spit fell down so her reflection was like a painting of a girl with a tear.

I’m feeling a little feverish, I said. Where will you be later? I’ll find you. I promise.

I don’t know where the fuck I’ll be. I’ll be at work, man.

Where do you work?

She sighed. She seemed to lose interest in me. She gave me The Look. The look meant: Go Back to High School. You’re Not Tough Enough for Me.

I’ll be at the King’s, she said. Room fucking two thousand. Room goddamn eight million and seventy-three!

And then she was outside. I could hear the sailor saying, Good girl, and I could hear her giggling—a softer, desperate laugh so completely unlike the way she had laughed when she was with me.

MY LOVER, THE DIRT

I ROLLED over onto my stomach and moved my hand under my shirt to see if my skin was still warm. My father’s garden was a mess. There was no lawn, just patches of herbs and weeds underneath the wild flowering trees. Still, when I came home from the Day and Night, I went into the garden and thought there was nowhere I would rather be.

My body was warmer than it had ever been before.