Hell to Heaven (17 page)

‘She is a lucky girl,’ Cheung said.

‘I don’t know whether I should hug her or punish her when I do see her,’ I said ruefully. ‘I thought she was better behaved than this.’ I sat at the table in the interview room and put my head in my hands. ‘I’ve failed as a parent. Sleeping with boys and smoking pot—how could she do these things?’ I sat up and wiped my eyes. ‘This is all my fault.’

Bravo!
the stone said, the hint of sarcasm in its voice made all the more cutting by its British accent.

‘How is the boy?’ I said. ‘You said they found them both?’

‘The boy is dead,’ Cheung said. ‘Head injury from the blast.’

The boy was Jade
, Gold said.
The real Bevan was yinned, gone completely. Jade won’t be back for a while; she’s in the tenth level of Hell now.

I rested my head in my hands again. ‘Oh no, that’s awful. What am I going to say to his parents?’

‘Worry about that when you get there. Right now,’ Cheung opened a folder and pulled out some forms, ‘I need you to give me a statement. So why weren’t you on the boat?’

Repeat after me
, the stone said:
I was at the Immigration Department…

‘I was at the Immigration Department,’ I began, and followed its coaching for the next forty minutes.

Finally, after he’d grilled me on my movements four times, Cheung closed the folder. ‘I’m sorry to have to put you through this, Miss Donahoe,’ he said, and smiled. Smiling made him seem much more human and approachable, and I relaxed slightly. ‘I think I’ve been mistaken. You obviously do care for Miss Chen and you’re doing your best to look after her. I will have to
pursue this further when the boat is raised, but in the meantime please go visit her in the hospital. If there’s anything else I need, I’ll be in touch.’ He rose and held out his hand; I rose too and shook it. ‘I wish you good luck in talking to Miss Chen,’ he went on. ‘She will probably need counselling after this.’

‘I’ll arrange it. I just want her to recover and be happy again,’ I said with feeling. I nodded to him. ‘Thanks so much for being understanding, Lieutenant. I hope you see that I really do care for Simone very much.’

‘Oh, I do,’ he said, and opened the door for me. ‘This way.’

Is he lying as much as I think he’s lying?
I asked the stone.

Twenty-four-carat lies. He’s after you; he’s convinced you and Leo have been picking them off for their money, Leo being the brains and you the muscle. Watch your face!

I carefully controlled my expression. Leo the brains and me the muscle. Yeah, right.

Oh, well done, Emma!
the stone said, even more sarcastic now.
Way to go, he didn’t miss that triumphant smirk!

Geez. And I was doing so well.

Emma, do me a favour, dear, get that demon essence cleared out of your system so you can go live on the Celestial Plane…

I know. Where I won’t have to deal with overzealous police officers.

Exactly.

And what about Simone, who wants to live on the Earthly?

The stone was silent at that.

Fortunately, the parents had left by the time we returned to the reception area. Monica and Marcus were sitting on the plastic chairs waiting for us.

Gold didn’t speak until we were some distance from the station, walking through the pedestrian overpass that would take us across Gloucester Road to the car park under The Centre. ‘Marcus, take Monica and Emma home. I’ll take Emma’s form and drive Leo up to the hospital—’

‘No!’ Monica and I said at the same time.

‘Emma, you can’t touch Simone. If you don’t rush up there and give her a huge hug, it will look very bad,’ Gold said. ‘Let me do it, and then I’ll bring her home.’

‘I want to go too!’ Monica said.

‘My Boxster is only a two-seater,’ Gold said ruefully, ‘and neither you nor Leo can drive it.’

‘I’ll drive Marcus home in the Boxster, and you three can go…’ I stopped. ‘Okay, that won’t work. I would definitely wreck the love of your life, Gold. We’ll do it your way.’

Gold let his breath out, obviously relieved.

‘How about we all go?’ I said. ‘You take my form, Gold, and give me your form.’

‘Yes!’ Monica said. ‘We can all go and see her!’

Gold shrugged. ‘That would work.’

We arrived at the car park, and paid at the shroff office before taking the lifts down. I hesitated before walking out of the lift.

‘What, Emma?’ Leo said.

‘This is where I was attacked by that Mother and put into the hospital,’ I said.

Gold hesitated for a moment, checking. ‘No Mothers here.’ He grinned. ‘Except for Leo.’

‘Damn straight,’ Leo said, and wheeled himself to the car.

‘You still here, stone?’ I said.

‘I’m here.’

‘Contact Lok. Tell him about Jade.’

‘Why?’ the stone said.

‘Because she has
three children.
’

‘I will take them, ma’am,’ Monica said. ‘We can look after them.’

‘They’re dragons, Monica.’

‘They’re children first, ma’am.’

‘Can’t do anything underground, Emma,’ the stone said. ‘It will have to wait until we’re out of the car park.’

‘I’ll do it,’ Leo said. ‘Lok says it’s under control. Jade arranged for them to go stay with their father. He came and collected them from the Folly an hour ago.’

‘Their father?’ I said.

‘Qing Long.’

T
he hospital complex in Pok Fu Lam was enormous. We parked in the multi-storey car park near the entrance to the main building. Gold got out of his Boxster, then changed into me. He concentrated on me and the world around me grew a glimmering pearly halo as I took on his form. Gold walked ahead of me to the lifts to the hospital’s main entrance.

‘I need to work out more,’ I said as I followed him.

He turned. ‘Ma’am, you’re nearly forty. You’re allowed some spread. Besides, you know more than anyone that appearance means nothing. Nobody can match you with a sword.’

‘Oh, come on, Gold,’ I said as we waited for the lift. ‘Just about anyone can take me down—I’m a human. I might be a match for another human, but against a Shen I’m usually overmatched.’

Gold gave a resigned shrug.

‘And tidy up your hair,’ I said. ‘I never have it all coming out like that—you’re exaggerating!’

‘He’s an exact copy,’ Leo said. ‘Stained shirt and all.’

Gold proudly displayed the T-shirt I was wearing, which had an oil splatter along the bottom.

‘I spilled some oil on myself last time I oiled my weapons,’ I said, the excuse sounding feeble even to my ears.

‘That’s why we have aprons for that sort of thing,’ Gold said, turning back to the lift and giving me a discomforting view of my growing behind.

The hospital’s main lobby was tired and worn from the passage of so many people through it. There were about twenty bored-looking people sitting in chairs on one side, and a few patients wandered around in plain white cotton pyjamas.

We went to the reception desk, which was heavily barred with a small vent at the bottom to talk through. Gold leaned in to speak to the receptionist in Cantonese. ‘Chen See Mun, please. Simone Chen. We’re her family, to pick her up.’

The receptionist stared at Gold in shock, and Gold started, then grinned. ‘I’ve lived here all my life.’

The receptionist turned away, frowning, and entered the details on the computer. She leaned into the vent to speak to us, still frowning. ‘Third floor, wing F.’

Gold nodded. ‘Thank you.’

We looked around for a sign that would show us the way. Nothing. Gold turned back to the receptionist, whose frown deepened. ‘Follow red arrows!’ she barked, and turned away.

The floor was marked with arrows set into the worn linoleum, and we followed the red ones to the lift. A few people were waiting in the lift lobby, next to a collection of abandoned gurneys and wheelchairs set to one side. The lift arrived and those waiting rushed inside before those inside could get out. There was some grunting and tussling, and those inside managed to fight their way out of the lift as Gold and I held the
doors open for them. We went in and Gold pressed the third-floor button.

On the first floor, the doors opened and someone at the back of the lift, who’d rushed to get in first, elbowed his way to the doors to get out.

On the third floor, the corridors spread from the lift lobby in all directions and we stopped, confused. There was a nurses’ station nearby and Gold walked to it, the rest of us following. A couple of harassed-looking nurses sat there fiddling with paperwork. Both of them ignored us for a moment then one of them came up to us.

‘Visiting hours seven thirty. Family only; maximum two people. Wait until then,’ she said.

‘We’re here to take Simone Chen home,’ Gold said.

She sat at the computer terminal, flipping through the records. ‘Simone Chen.’ She pointed down the corridor without looking away from the screen. ‘Third room along. F3.’

‘Thank you,’ Gold said, and we all headed in that direction.

‘Two people only!’ the nurse snapped. She gestured in the other direction. ‘Waiting room there.’

‘Me and Gold,’ I said, Gold’s voice sounding strange in my ears.

Monica handed me a shopping bag with a change of clothes in it for Simone.

The ward room was grey and grimy, with stained painted walls and four chipped metal beds, two on each side of the room. The bathroom reeked of urine and damp as we passed it. The furthest bed on the left had the curtains pulled around it; the closer bed on the left held a middle-aged woman, asleep. Simone was sitting on the closer bed on the right, dressed in her
hospital pyjamas, talking to a policeman who was making notes in a folder. It was Lieutenant Cheung, getting her story before we could coach her. In the far bed on the right was an elderly woman, also in the regulation pyjamas; she was sitting up and listening to every word Simone said with an expression of deep concentration.

‘Oh, guys, thank goodness you’re here,’ Simone said. She hopped off the bed and ran to Gold who was still in my form. They held each other for a while, Gold patting Simone on the back and Simone clutching him.

‘This little girl, very bad behaviour!’ the old woman said loudly in English, waking up the sleeping woman. ‘You teach her wrong! Need to punish her, she is very bad girl!’ She nodded and settled into the bed, then waved her finger at us. ‘You should spend more time correcting her, make sure she does right thing! Study more, be good girl, find
nice
boy!’

Simone turned in Gold’s arms to speak to the old woman. ‘Oh, go die in a fire.’

‘Humph!’ The woman crossed her arms and looked away, then released a torrent of abuse in Cantonese. ‘Bad girl! Treats elders with no respect!’ She glared at Gold. ‘You teach her right way.
Chinese
way. Treat elders with respect, do as she is told. She very bad girl!’

Simone released Gold and turned to speak to Lieutenant Cheung. ‘Are you done with me?’

Cheung held out the clipboard with the paperwork. ‘I need you to sign this please, Miss.’

Simone stomped to him, grabbed the clipboard and scribbled a signature on the bottom of the form. ‘I can go now?’

Cheung nodded and Simone came back to us. I handed her the bag of clothes and she went into the
bathroom to change. She wrinkled her nose as she came out. ‘It’s clean; they say the smell is from a faulty drainage system.’

A nurse with a kind face came in. ‘You are going now?’

Simone’s expression softened. ‘Thanks for looking after me, Lydia. I’m going home.’

The nurse touched Simone’s arm. ‘Take care, Simone. Talk to a counsellor, okay? That was a terrible thing that happened.’

Simone nodded, took Gold’s hand and led him out of the room with me trailing behind.

‘Why, of all the stories that you could have made up, did you have to decide on
that
one?’ Simone growled under her breath as we returned to the nurses’ station. ‘You really do hate me, don’t you? Having sex, smoking pot—dammit, Emma, do you
want
me to get up to that sort of stuff for some reason?’

‘The stone and I made up that story,’ Gold said. ‘Emma had nothing to do with it.’

Simone stopped and put her hands on her hips. ‘It will take me a long time to forgive you two for this. You’ve destroyed my reputation at school—I don’t know how I’m ever going to go back there! They’ll all think I’m a
slut
!’

‘“They” being the same people who tried to drug you and date-rape you,’ Gold said.

Simone raised her hands with exasperation and continued towards the nurses’ station. ‘It was just a couple of them.’ When we reached the station, she leaned on its ledge and covered her face with her hands. ‘And I
killed
someone. I
killed
him!’ Her shoulders shook as she lost control, weeping into her hands.

Gold put his arm around her and concentrated. Monica, Marcus and Leo came rushing from the waiting room. Monica bundled Simone into her arms and held her as she cried, and Marcus patted her back.

Gold went around the counter to see the nurses and I followed. One of them held out a clipboard with a stack of paperwork on it without speaking. Gold picked up the pen that was chained to the station and signed my name at the bottom.

The nurse checked the papers. ‘No medication, you can go.’ Her expression softened. ‘I hope you’ll be all right, Chen See Mun. That was bad.’ She sat and started to key the details into the computer.

We went down in the lift, Simone still clutching Monica. She continued to hold her tight as we walked back to the car park.

Monica stopped when we exited the car park lift. ‘I smell gas!’ She looked around, concerned. ‘The smell is very strong, ma’am!’ She spun back to the lift and pressed the button. ‘We need to get out of here right now!’

‘I don’t smell anything,’ I said.

The rest of the group smelled the air and then shook their heads.

‘Why only Monica then?’ Gold said.

‘We need to get out of here, it’s very bad!’ Monica said.