Second Sister Page 11
“No rush.” He smiled. “I’m spending a whole month here and won’t be heading back to the States till mid-July. As long as you get it to me before I leave, that’s fine.”
Chung-Nam nodded and smiled, then glanced at Mr. Lee, who was attempting an ingratiating smirk. Everything Chung-Nam had just said was completely improvised—GT had no plans of this sort whatsoever. He’d realized that the only way to grasp this golden opportunity was a Hail Mary pass, and he was happy to spout utter nonsense as long as it gave him a chance to meet Szeto again and continue impressing him. He wondered if he’d gone too far and revealed his ulterior motives. On the other hand, Americans seemed quite proactive, and Szeto surely wouldn’t think any less of Chung-Nam for seizing the moment.
“Let’s call it a day, seeing as we’re going to meet again,” said Szeto, taking one last look around the room. “Your office is very clean. I didn’t expect that either.”
“We tidied up because we knew you were coming,” said Mr. Lee awkwardly.
“Tech companies shouldn’t be too neat. Back when Satoshi and I were developing software in our college dorm, our room was a disaster zone. Satoshi could code only if he had rock music blaring, so he kept turning the volume up as far as it would go. We fought over it hundreds of times.” Szeto grinned.
“Don’t you like rock, Mr. Szeto?” asked Mr. Lee.
“I’m more of a classical guy,” said Szeto, waving his right hand like a conductor. “The Hong Kong Philharmonic has a concert tomorrow with the famous Chinese pianist Yuja Wang—in fact, that’s one of the main reasons I decided to vacation here.”
“The Hong Kong Philharmonic … I can’t say I’ve heard of them. Can you really earn a living playing classical music in Hong Kong?” Mr. Lee asked woodenly.
“Of course!” Szeto chuckled. “The Hong Kong Phil is one of the most famous in Asia—it has quite a few world-class musicians. At the same time, the conductor, Jaap van Zweden, is Dutch; the principal guest conductor, Yu Long, is from Shanghai; and the concertmaster, Jing Wang, is Chinese-Canadian. There does seem to be a shortage of local talent.”
Szeto Wai’s words planted an idea in Chung-Nam’s head, but he kept his face blank as Mr. Lee and Szeto chattered away. After another ten minutes of small talk about Hong Kong’s delicious food, scenery, and weather, Chung-Nam had gleaned quite a bit of information: Szeto was staying at a service apartment in Wan Chai, he had nothing else on his plate apart from GT, and the Eurasian woman with him was his personal assistant, Doris.
“Let’s leave it here.” Szeto stood up. “Great to meet all of you. When you have the report ready, get in touch with Doris and she’ll set up a meeting time. Looking forward to working with you.”
Szeto Wai shook everyone’s hand again, and he and Doris left.
“Whoo!” After Mr. Lee and Joanne had seen the visitors off, everyone let out a sigh of relief, as if they’d all been holding their breath the whole time.
“Char—I mean, Chung-Nam, those ‘financial products’ you mentioned—do you have any idea what they might look like?” asked Mr. Lee, loosening his tie.
“Of course not. That was just the first thing that popped into my mind.” Chung-Nam shrugged.
“In that case … Hao, you’ll spend the next two weeks helping Chung-Nam put this proposal together.”
“Huh? Why me?” Hao yelped.
“Because you’re our customer experience designer,” Mr. Lee chuckled. “Chung-Nam, it’s on your shoulders whether our company gets this investment or not. The stakes are high, so don’t mess this up. Ma-Chai will take over all your projects so you can focus on this proposal. If there’s anything urgent, make sure you hand it over to Ma-Chai in the next day or two.”
“Okay.”
Chung-Nam rolled his chair over to Ma-Chai’s desk and prepared to talk him through the work, only to find Ma-Chai scrolling through SIQ’s website.
“What are you looking at that for?” he asked.
“I noticed something earlier,” said Ma-Chai.
“What?”
“Satoshi Inoue isn’t in their organizational chart.” Ma-Chai moved the mouse, scrolling the page this way and that. Satoshi’s picture was nowhere to be seen, not in tech nor investment.
“I guess that’s just the business side. Satoshi’s strength is software development. He probably doesn’t like interacting with people.”
“That may be true. I enjoy coding, but if you asked me to be a consultant, my skin would crawl,” said Ma-Chai.
“Close that. I need to tell you about these modules I’m compiling.”
As Chung-Nam ran through the work with Ma-Chai, his mind was on something else: how to win over Szeto Wai and get onto SIQ’s Portfolio page.
This was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, and only a complete mediocrity would let it pass by. He recalled how his classmates and professors had rolled their eyes at him and teased him for being ambitious and impractical. Here was his chance to show them all.
2.
Tak-tak-tak-tak-tak-tak-tak-tak-tak. Nga-Yee jabbed at the doorbell like a madwoman, but apart from the sharp ringing inside the apartment, nothing stirred. When she was finally convinced that N was out, rather than just ignoring her, she got out her phone and called the number he’d given her. Again, it went straight to voice mail.
“This … This is Nga-Yee. I’ve found something important. Um, it’s important. Uh. Please come back soon.”
Having left that garbled message, Nga-Yee sat down on N’s doorstep, scarcely noticing how filthy the ground was. The stairwell was dark, but she didn’t have time to be scared. Her mind was too occupied with that awful email she’d found on Siu-Man’s phone. On the bus to Sai Ying Pun, she hadn’t looked at the phone once—partly because she was afraid of deleting the email by accident, partly because she couldn’t face the truth: before killing herself, Siu-Man had been in touch with the person who’d written the post and started the cyberbullying.
Are you brave enough to die? The first line of the message might as well have been an invisible hand pushing her out the window.
The longer Nga-Yee sat thinking in the gloom, the more agitated she grew. It was as if the murder weapon were hidden in her handbag, as if a cloud of evil were emanating from that red phone and would swallow her whole.
Distracted, she pulled her sister’s cell phone from her purse. By the time she realized what she was doing, she’d already entered the password. Because she hadn’t closed the email earlier—in fact, she had no idea how—the first thing that flashed up were those poisonous words. At least this time she was prepared, able to stay calm enough to look closely and try to understand the interface. She jabbed at the screen the way she’d seen other people do, accidentally tapping on a circle with a 5 in it.
The message expanded, and she understood that 5 meant the number of emails between the first and last one. In other words, Siu-Man had had a dialogue with this person before her death.
Despite her lack of experience with anything but the library’s outmoded email program, Nga-Yee was getting the hang of this. She tapped on the first message.
From: kid kit
To: Siu-Man
Date: May 5, 2015, 05:57 pm
Subject: (no subject)
Au Siu-Man,
I’ve been watching you. Don’t think people will feel sorry for you because you’re fifteen. I’ll expose your true face to the world, and everyone will know how hideous you really are. You haven’t been punished enough. I’ll make sure you never smile again.
kidkit727
That was the first message. Kidkit727 had initiated the exchange. Breathing rapidly, Nga-Yee read the words helplessly.
I have to keep calm, she said to herself. Panicking wouldn’t help. Only by keeping her cool would she be able to scrutinize every detail for clues to find the killer.
Of course, she didn’t know whether this message came from the actual culprit. She remembered N saying that
on the Popcorn board, kidkit727’s email address was some Russian company staring with a Y. Although this was a different address, its contents were very similar to that post—exactly the same venomous tone.
When Nga-Yee noticed the time stamp, she felt dizzy—5:57 p.m. on May 5.
Ten minutes before Siu-Man killed herself.
From: Siu-Man
To: kid kit
Date: May 5, 2015, 06:01 pm
Subject: RE:
Who are you?
Why do you have my email?
What do you want?
Nga-Yee could sense Siu-Man’s terror even in those few short lines. And now, six weeks later, she could only watch from the sidelines as her little sister, all alone, tried vainly to battle the figure hiding in the shadows.
From: kid kit
To: Siu-Man
Date: May 5, 2015, 06:01 pm
Subject: RE:
Attachments: IMG_6651.jpg
Au Siu-Man,
Are you scared? So you can get scared too? Heh heh. You ought to be scared, because I’m about to make this photo public. You’ll be a disgrace to your classmates, and everyone around you will know the post I wrote was all true.
kidkit727
That last sentence made it clear that this was no copycat, but the instigator of the wave of cyberbullying. Distracted by this, Nga-Yee forgot to wonder what the “photo” was, so she was unprepared for the attachment that confronted her when she scrolled down.
There was Siu-Man, on the tiny screen.
The picture was taken somewhere dark, maybe a karaoke lounge or nightclub. On a low table were several beer bottles and glasses, packets of instant coffee, two bowls of peanuts, a dice cup, and a microphone. Nearby were cigarettes, a lighter, and a little black box.
But Nga-Yee barely noticed this; her attention was on the two people in the frame: Siu-Man, not in her school uniform, and a spiffily dressed older teenage boy with dyed red hair. They were on a couch. The boy had both arms wrapped around her, and his lips were close to hers. His hands were all over her, one wedged in her armpit, reaching toward her breast. Siu-Man’s eyes were half shut, and she was smiling vaguely as she looked at something behind the camera. Her expression was somewhere between intoxicated and seductive.
It shocked Nga-Yee to see her sister hanging out with such a slimeball. She and their mother had often warned Siu-Man against predatory guys, and she’d never shown any signs of rebelliousness. And here, on her face, was a womanliness Nga-Yee had never seen.
Suddenly she recalled a line from kidkit727’s post: Outside of school, she was hanging out with scumbags and drinking, maybe even taking drugs and sleeping around, who knows.
Impossible! Impossible! Nga-Yee kept repeating to herself, trying to rid her mind of these filthy images.
There was no way to tell when the photo was taken, though Siu-Man was in cold-weather clothes. Last winter or the one before? Had her sister been thirteen or fourteen? Impossible to say. The girl in the picture was unquestionably Siu-Man, but Nga-Yee felt as if she were looking at a stranger. Trying to rid herself of these uneasy thoughts, she went on to the next email.
From: Siu-Man
To: kid kit
Date: May 5, 2015, 06:02 pm
Subject: RE:
How do you have this photo?
It’s not true!
It was an accident!
Nga-Yee felt a million warring emotions. This response was as good as an admission of guilt—Siu-Man did know that awful boy. But her mention of an accident suggested that there was more to the story. In any case, it was clear the sender meant to do her harm. Worst of all, it wasn’t a threat—there were no demands, just a desire to hurt her helpless sister.
From: kid kit
To: Siu-Man
Date: May 5, 2015, 06:02 pm
Subject: RE:
Au Siu-Man,
Whatever we do, the gods see. I can answer to anyone on heaven or earth for what I’ve done, but can you? You only know how to make up stories and falsely accuse other people.
kidkit727
That was unexpected. Nga-Yee had thought the sender was malicious, but this message seemed to stake out the moral high ground, as if Siu-Man were being punished only in the name of justice.
Could this person really have done all this because they believed Shiu Tak-Ping was innocent? Nga-Yee’s head was spinning.
From: Siu-Man
To: kid kit
Date: May 05, 2015, 06:04 pm
Subject: RE:
Do you want me to die?
Nga-Yee’s eyes filled with tears. In context, these seemed like angry words in an argument, but she could sense the true meaning behind them. This was no retort to the barrage of abuse, but a final despairing cry for help as Siu-Man stood on the brink of a precipice.
From: kid kit
To: Siu-Man
Date: May 5, 2015, 06:06 pm
Subject: RE:
Au Siu-Man,
Are you brave enough to die? Aren’t you just up to your usual tricks, trying to make people feel sorry for you? Your classmates won’t be fooled again. Scum like you have no right to go on living.
kidkit727
This was the first message Nga-Yee had read, and also the last one Siu-Man saw in her life.
Reading this exchange left Nga-Yee exploding with hatred for the culprit. If the tone of that final email had been even slightly different, if it had said something else, Siu-Man might have been saved. Or if it had arrived a little later. If Nga-Yee had been home, she’d have noticed something wrong, Siu-Man might have cried on her shoulder and let it all out, and the danger would have passed. But this demon hadn’t given her a chance to breathe. Just as she was at her most psychologically fragile, he’d cruelly twisted the knife.
No right to go on living. The words were branded on her pupils, stabbing every one of her nerves.
“Hey, what are you doing here?”
Those gruff words brought Nga-Yee back to reality. She looked up, and there was N, disheveled as ever in a ratty T-shirt and cargo pants.
“Where were you? Why didn’t you take my calls? Didn’t I tell you I was coming over? Why didn’t you wait for me?” She fired the questions so rapidly, he didn’t have a chance to answer. She wasn’t actually upset with him, but reading the messages had left her so enraged, she couldn’t help but let her fury spew out.
“I got some lunch and went to the supermarket,” said N, unflustered. He held up a shopping bag, holding it open so Nga-Yee could see that it was full of beer, frozen pizza, ham, snack bars, and instant ramen.
“I said I would come and see you after work! Why didn’t you stay home? Why did you make me sit here and wait?”
“My god, it’s only four in the afternoon. You don’t get off work till seven today. How could I have known you’d be this early?” He shrugged off her rage.
She was about to retort when she realized that she’d never told him when her shift ended.
“Calm down, young lady,” said N, taking advantage of her momentary pause. “You’re all agitated, and you skipped out of work to come see me. I guess you’ve found something new?”
She thrust the phone at him. “During my lunch break I suddenly remembered Siu-Man’s password. Then I read these messages—”
She traced the sequence in the air, and N’s thumb mimicked her, unlocking the phone.
“Interesting.” N grinned craftily. He stuffed the shopping bag into Nga-Yee’s hands as if she were his servant and kept scrolling with his left hand while the right fished a heavy ring of keys from his pocket and unlocked the door.
“Put the groceries in the fridge,” he said. His eyes remained fixed on the screen as he stepped over the threshold. His rudeness annoyed h
er, but she did as he said. The kitchen was much cleaner than she’d expected—at least it wasn’t covered in used cartons and plastic bags like the living room—and the fridge was completely empty. He was probably the sort of person who ate every single scrap of food in the house before he went shopping.
Back in the living room, N was already at his desk, studying Siu-Man’s phone intently.
“I don’t suppose you know her Google password?” he asked abruptly.
Nga-Yee shook her head. “But you can read those messages. Why do you need the password?”
“This app has limited info. I’ll be able to find out much more if I can get into her account on my computer.” He set down the phone and turned on his laptop. His fingers danced lightning-quick across the keyboard.
“Can you hack into her account?” Nga-Yee asked.
“Of course I can, but you don’t need a sword to kill a chicken.” He pointed to a chair by the desk, indicating that she should sit, and he turned the screen ninety degrees so she could see it.
“Now that everyone’s concerned about web security, quite a few services require two-factor authentication and make users change their passwords regularly. Yet there are still plenty of loopholes—maybe even more than before.” N was on a browser Nga-Yee had never seen, pulling up the Google home page. “Services like Google and Facebook allow you to reset your password yourself rather than calling a help desk and waiting for days.”
N clicked on Help, then selected Forgot Password from the drop-down menu.
“When users can’t log in with their passwords, they need to verify their identities by other means, usually—”
Ding! Siu-Man’s phone let out a crisp sound.
“—by text message.” N showed Nga-Yee the screen, which had a six-digit number on it. He entered this into a box on the home page.
“Just like that?” Nga-Yee gaped.
“Yes. It’s the same with Yahoo or Facebook or most other services. You just have to get hold of someone’s phone, and you can become that person. The internet might seem convenient, but when everything’s connected like this, you only have to find the weakest link to smash the entire chain.”