City Lights

Cindy Liang, Del Norte High School, graduating in 26' May 3, 2023

"a fairytale ball" artwork by Yuri "Ticket" Lee, Del Norte High School, '26

She wanders the alleyways at night, where the stray cats scatter like shadows in the dark, hiding from misted moonlight. The city never sleeps, but she does, on occasion. Crammed with a hundred other kids, each flinching at the brush of fingertips, and starved of emotion, black hair pillowed like a spiderweb, with a flimsy nightgown that did nothing to keep out the cold. She glides over cracked asphalt, stained with greed and guilt, perhaps with a hint of misery and blood. The traffic lights are shining like stars in the dark. Perhaps some god up there is watching, or maybe the stars are. Watching, waiting, laughing at this absurd sky that lies buried in the land. She’s never really seen the stars before. The sky is too clouded, the buildings too dark, eyes too blurred by tears to look up and wish for something better. The scars on her wrists tell stories of pain and loneliness. Perhaps there is something in the way a blade slides over rough-hewn skin, the way blood oozes into that hole where her heart once was.

She stumbles past the tastefully decorated cafes, the bookstores on the fringes of the streets. The city unravels before her like an elaborate tapestry, but perhaps the buildings laid out before her are simply reflections of the underworld beneath. The crowd thickens as the lights get warmer, and a red glow to the lanterns strung up over the streets. Too many people die on those streets, but the drivers never care. Why should they?

Waiguoren, "foreigner." Like her mother never bore her, never bled her essence from her flesh and bones to make a miracle. How many hits does it take to die? Someone once told her it took four, because it was a homonym to death. Four times she walked this street and each time the laughter and warmth were alien only to her. Each time it hit her like a punch to the gut because she had never grown up listening to stories of Sunwukong or tasted homemade dumplings before she became of age. Perhaps it was because her skin never shone white, like hope in the dark, or perhaps it was because of the way her tongue never fit right in her mouth. That is how the world ends. With the first syllable of Bei, and the mangled consonants of jing.

Funny how even New York has a bit of her “home”. That stone bridge, with the only clear water in the city gurgling beneath it. She once followed the river, hoping to find the sea, but it simply went on and on. Perhaps the fish swimming there weren’t alive, but the souls of the dead, headed for the underworld. Everyone knows the stepping stones are death traps in the dark, but she sidesteps them as if they shine as brightly as stars. The bridge leads to a little pagoda, like someone had too much money and didn’t want to spend it on the homeless, starving children because they didn’t have enough space in their hearts. Or maybe they had already spent enough, and simply didn’t want to see the suffering anymore. There are no lights on the bridge, only starlight and misery. Yet, she perches on the moss-covered railing, lighter than a bird, staring up at moonless skies, letting the first signs of frost dust her cheeks. Her tears shone silver like the trail of scars down her forearms.

She was smiling, I think, as she fell towards the water, barely making a splash in the river. How peaceful this night is, silent and still and devoid of love.