On her first day in the new apartment, the young wife sensed something was wrong. She kept thinking she heard faint sobbing; she would strain to listen, but hear nothing. That night she woke to a strange sound. Thud, thud. The sound of a fist meeting flesh. The sound of a forehead striking floor. The sound of meat being chopped on a cutting board. She couldn’t tell them apart. She nudged her husband. Half-asleep, he mumbled, “Mm... pick up eggs after work...” She moved closer to him. Perhaps he had set the air conditioning too low. She was drifting back to sleep when the sound came again; the next time she woke, there was only a distant rhythmic sound. 

By the seventh day, these small anomalies had become impossible to ignore. While showering, hot water poured over her head with her eyes closed, and she smelled iron rust. The instant she opened her eyes, a woman was using iodine to clean a wound on her forehead in the mirror. But the water on the tiles was clear. Stir-frying pumpkin with the exhaust fan running, she heard the sound of a slap; in her peripheral vision, she saw a man striking a woman across the face. Under the living room’s harsh fluorescent light, she glimpsed an extra segment at the edge of her shadow; when she looked down, the shadow lay obediently at her feet once more.

She told herself it was all in her mind. With property prices so high these days, they were lucky to buy this apartment at thirty percent below market rate. Poverty was scarier than ghosts.

One day, taking out the trash, a woman glanced at her. “Someone just died a horrible death. Best find someone to perform a ritual, to release the wronged soul.” The young wife wanted to say they didn’t believe in ghosts. She didn’t dare say aloud, that she felt that man had it coming. That girl had been forced.

One day, stepping out to collect a delivery, the middle-aged woman next door paused mid-stride, as if weighing her words. “That girl,” she whispered, “was a good person. Her husband...” Her husband shouted for her from inside; she flinched, turning her head. The half of her face not covered by her hair was swollen. She wanted to ask if she needed help. Before it closed, she caught half a phrase: “...talk nonsense again and I’ll beat you...” She touched her own throat instinctively. The foundation she had applied that morning was still there, covering the bruises.

One day, she heard it again: thud, thud. Steady. Heavy. Thud, thud. She couldn’t tell whether it came from within her own body, from her abdomen, or from somewhere in the house. Her hand slid down to her lower belly. Two months. Would there be a heartbeat yet? Her body seemed to be answering a rhythm.

That night, her husband said the newly planned Line 5 subway was about to open, and property prices had already risen thirty percent. “Let’s wait a bit longer,” he said. “Sell at the peak. We’ll make at least a million.” She nodded. With this money, she could leave him. With property prices climbing steadily, who had time for superstitions? The living room light stretched their two shadows long across the floor. She turned her head, trying to separate from her husband’s shadow, but the shadow on the floor didn’t move. She couldn’t tell which one was hers.

Her hand rested on her flat belly for a long time.

Then, she smiled.