Push the Broken Edges Straight Into—

Content warning: discussion of physical abuse

I see her outside one of the many clubs lining the shadow of Beijing’s business district. Another foreigner like me. She has a bruise growing around her left eye. 

She smiles casually, seeing where my gaze lands. “Had a bad time.” 

"What happened?"

Black tinted cars drop off more attendees. Row after row of black cars and their glittering people, most of them falling into our line.

"Ah, one of the fuerdai hit me," she says over the spilling music, unflinchingly declaring that a member of Beijing's young, wealthy elite had punched her in the face. The glittering people turn around.

Brave woman.

"Just now?" I ask.

"Yeah. Inside. I'm outside to get air." A trio of black dressed partiers stumble from between the many security guards standing by the double doors. That was my goal, to party into oblivion, but now I’m not so sure.

"Jesus." I pause. I push back the swell of rage. "No security guard saw?"

"Oh, they saw." She laughs. She sweeps her strawberry blonde hair behind her ear and I see the full bruise outline turning a dark purple. “Wouldn’t leave me alone, so I gave the guy a fake number in front of his friends. He called it while I was still standing there. Got embarrassed when the call didn’t go through. And then punched me in the face. Security guards inside watched the whole thing."

I’ve seen this story before, in nearly every place I’ve stayed long enough to learn better, but I am flooded with the same red-tinted overwhelm. Punch up with my palm to drive his nose into his brain. Break a beer bottle and push the broken edges straight into—

“Don’t. He has friends. And powerful parents, obviously.”

“Nothing we can do?” I ask.

“Not worth it. Not now.”

“Fuck.”

“Yeah. Fuck.”

She pulls out a compact and presses powder along her cheekbone. Her fingers tremble. “I’m not letting it ruin my night.”

I don’t know where she gets her courage, but I gesture for the compact and gently turn her face to me. “Do whatever you need to do.” I dab at the injured skin around her eye and her soft gaze lands on mine.

She lets out a long, steadying exhale. “We’re friends now?” I study the abuse to her face, and the angry tears pooling at my edges spill over.

“Yeah.” I whisper.

“And we’ll make them pay.”

“We will make them pay.”

Author's note: This is part of my Postcards Series—snapshots of human connection in unexpected moments and places. This story is posted under the "fiction" genre so I might edit details for privacy. Thank you so much for reading this draft.