Specks of dust dance in shafts of yellow light. The projector produces an audible click underneath its low, buzzing drone. Black and white images flicker across the screen behind the lectern.

To blend in with the past, Elsa didn’t bring the latest equipment. She went back in time in disguise of a peasant. Hats off to her. What a brave girl. She never lets me forget my ancestors’ evil deeds. Japan’s genocide against the Chinese during a military conflict prior to World War II.

Today China remembers it as the War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression. Japanese textbooks whitewash it. Block after block of charred buildings reel out. Severed heads stare vacantly into space, blood dark and crusted on pale chins. The next photo appears, and I mentally pat myself on the back for not wincing. A bayonet penetrates a pregnant woman’s belly. Her lifeless body sprawls in the midst of rubble. White ashes. A flurry of soot falls. Fear forever frozen on her face. A gleeful soldier stands over her and poses in triumph.

As one image of death and destruction replaces another at a mechanical pace, collective gasps and murmurs fill the room. Heads turn and my classmates whisper. Japanese soldiers methodically gun down unarmed civilians and dump their bodies into a makeshift ditch.

A blow-up of a grinning soldier fills my vision. Time slows to a crawl. Yasuo? Grandpa Yasuo? I gasp and avert my gaze. It can’t be. It’s not possible. The air sticks in my throat, and I can’t breathe. Cold sweat runs down my back. The chair legs screech against the linoleum floor as I push back, sprint out of the classroom, and dash toward the restroom.

As I puke up my breakfast into a stained porcelain bowl, my grandfather’s smile comes to me. His eyes disappear into wrinkles. I was his favorite granddaughter. He was my namesake. On the Buddhist altar back home, a stern-faced young man in his soldier’s uniform stares back from a framed sepia photo. It was him.

“It can’t be. No, it’s not him.” I shake my head as mucus and saliva mix into strings. A knock comes to the stall door, startling me.

“Are you okay, Yasumi?” Elsa comes in and rubs my back.

“I’m sorry,” I mumble.

* * *

I’m six. My mom drops me at my grandparents’ house in the suburbs. I wave at her as her white van drives away. As I step inside, a balmy air wraps around me. A faint smell of tobacco tickles my nose.

“Yasumi-chan? Is that you?” Grandpa’s voice reaches from the living room.

“Yes, Grandpa!” I dash along the hallway like a puppy chasing a rolling ball.

Grandpa did his best to cut down his smoking when he learned I was asthmatic. Now he rarely reaches for a cigarette. Instead, he incessantly chews his nicotine gum, baring a few golden teeth. I drop my backpack, hug him, and slip into the kotatsu. Grandpa grabs a mandarin from a basket on the kotatsu and tosses it across the table. I know it’s as sweet as his smile.

“So how’s my favorite granddaughter?”

“Swell, Grandpa.”

“How are your grades, baby girl?” He looks serious for a moment. “Show me your report card.” Even though he retired from teaching years ago, he still carries a teacherly air.

I reach into my backpack and hand my report card to him.

“That’s my girl!” Grandpa slaps himself on the back of the neck. “Another excellent report card! You’ve got an A in history!” His eyes narrow into a smile.

“Grandpa, read me a story!” I say.

“Well, let’s see.” He reaches for his reading glasses and puts them on. He looks at me as if to gauge my mood. I’m pretty much an open book. He grabs a book from the shelf and opens it to a page with an illustration depicting soldiers carrying an elongated bomb. The caption reads “Patriotism. Sacrifice. War Heroes.”

“Let me tell you about the three brave bombers,” he begins.

* * *

“Should we interfere with history?” Dressed in a grey pants-suit, Dr. Nakai looks around the classroom with a motherly gaze. She wears her salt-and-pepper hair in a tight bun at the nape of her neck. “Would you go back in time and stop a young Hitler from becoming who he was? Is it ethical?” As she walks up and down the aisle, a fragrance of incense lingers.

“I think it’s justifiable.” Emily says, her pale cheeks flushing. “But I don’t think I would personally. I support the idea, though.”

“Thank you, Emily. What are the consequences of such an action?” Dr. Nakai pushes back her glasses. “The risks?” We’re trained to never interfere with the past. We go back in time only for research. That’s been the golden rule of time travel. We’re mere observers. Nothing more, nothing less.

Rather than coherent answers, more questions bubble up and fade away before I can articulate them. Still, Dr. Nakai’s questions haunt me as I walk to the parking lot. I text to Jimmy to let him know I’m on my way home, and he texts me back a heart emoji. Is there an emoji for undying love? Because my guy deserves it.

I stop at a downtown pawn shop. The recent surge of anti-Asian violence has made me feel jumpy.

“Show me your ID.” A pimple-faced man of indeterminable age says.

I hand him my driver’s incense in silence.

“Yasumi Kawashima? So are you some kind of Asian?”

“Yes, I am.”

“Oh, that’s cool.” He sneers as he hands me a used revolver. “You should get together with my girlfriend sometimes. You guys can talk in your own language. She’s from the Philippines.”

“Sure,” I say. Never mind that our respective languages aren’t mutually intelligible. I remind myself he means well and maintain a polite smile. It’s not my job to enlighten everybody I meet. Who knew it was so easy to purchase firearms? It’s crazy. I slip the gun in my backpack and hide it at the bottom.

Back in my one-room studio, I stand in front of the sink and rinse vegetables with tap water. I glance across the room and catch Jimmy’s blank gaze. He usually smiles at me, but not this time. A dark shadow creeps across his smooth face.

“Your mom called,” Jimmy says.

“What did she want?”

“Can’t say.” His voice becomes a bit tense. “She doesn’t really talk to me.” There’s a wounded tone in his voice. “You know that, sweetie.”

My mother used to ask me why I didn’t find myself an American boyfriend. Annoyed, I kept reminding her that Jimmy was American. But in her eyes, he wasn’t American enough. And I know what she meant by American. “But she seems to be coming around—she wished us a happy Chinese New Year. She wants you to be careful with firecrackers.”

“Jimmy.” I give him a protesting frown. “Stop making fun of her. She’s my mom.” We used to joke we both had momzillas. Ever since we lost his mom to COVID-19 last year, I can’t bring it up. It was a thorny issue early in our relationship, but it’s just too painful now. Sometimes I even suspect he wishes it were mine who passed away.

“Hey, sweetie. Did you know this?” Jimmy shouts from the couch. He grabs the remote control off the coffee table and raises the TV’s volume. Occasional flickers from the screen light his face.

I shut off the water and pause. A newscaster’s voice reaches me as she reads out what sounds like an obituary. The word “suicide” leaps in my mind and triggers dread, and I can make out only bits and pieces of what she says. I look at Jimmy.

“Self-inflicted wounds… A revolver,” the newscaster continues, and Jimmy frowns. “A best-selling author.” I avert my gaze as a grimace of pain contorts his face. A lot of Asians like Jimmy looked up to her. “Investigated Japanese war crimes. Suffered from depression. On medication.”

“Some say she was out of line. Overly involved. Lost her objectivity along the way. Some even think she exaggerated things,” I say and regret immediately the way my words came out. But it’s too late to take them back.

“What do you mean, sweetie? You’ve gotta take a stand.” Jimmy raises his voice, presumably to be heard over the noises I make in the kitchen. “You can’t be objective in the face of sheer evil. Looking away is complicity. Don’t tell me you sympathize with those denialists?”

“No, of course not. You know me, Jimmy. I’m a history major, for Pete’s sake. What I mean is she was too emotionally involved. It’s too much to take in. You lose your faith in humanity.” The images I saw earlier today flood back. I flinch and push back the nausea surging again. “But I’ve got something to tell you.” I wipe my hands with a towel hung under the sink and step toward Jimmy. I sit on the coffee table in front of him.

“What’s up, sweetie?” he asks, deepening his frown. “Shoot.”

“I love you, Jimmy.” In spite of myself, I plead. I feel everything hangs on this relationship. I need to salvage it. “You know that, don’t you? I know things haven’t been all roses lately, but it’s normal. Every couple goes through rough times. We just need to work things out.”

“I know, sweetie.” He looks at me and nods. “The world has gone haywire,” he spits out his words. “Hell, things got really shitty the last four years, and the last year has been a waking nightmare.” He sighs.

“I know, Jimmy.” I lean in. Cupping his face in my hands, I try to smile. I run my fingers through his hair. “I think I saw him. My grandfather.” My voice trembles. “He was in Elsa’s images.”

“Did you tell anyone?” Jimmy stares at me, and I feel his gaze.

“No. If they find out, they’ll kick me out of the project.”

“What are you going to do about it?” He leans toward me.

“I don’t know.” I look down, feeling self-conscious.

“You don’t know?”

“What am I supposed to do? Righting the wrong is not my job. Just recording it.”

“That’s not what she thought.”

“Who?”

He points his chin at the TV screen. A picture of a woman in her thirties flashes across the screen. Dressed in somber suit of dark blue, she wears a faint smile. Her eyes are shaped like mine. Her long, smooth hair cascading over her shoulders. “She tried to intervene. Tried to change the past. That’s why she’s dead. She planned to go back to save her people. And somebody—”

“Are you serious?” I gasp. “You think she did—”

“No, I don’t think. I know.”

“How do you know?”

“Because we care about our people.”

“Your people? And mine don’t? What’s that supposed to mean?”

“I’m stating a fact.” Jimmy frowns. “This is the fundamental difference between us.”

“Seriously? My people are murderous thugs. And your people are pacifists? Then what about Uyghur women and children? Tear-gassing Hong Kong activists? It’s happening right now! Don’t tell me you hold ancient history against me. I wasn’t even born yet.”

“Ancient?”

I nod, trying to calm down.

“Many of us were never born because of people like your grandfather. We had no chance.”

“I know, but it’s not my fault. What am I supposed to do? Go back in time and kill my grandfather? Give me a break. It has nothing to do with us, Jimmy!”

“You’re still complicit. You choose to ignore it. She chose another path. This is why our relationship is complicated.” Jimmy mumbles. “We carry so much cultural baggage. Your government hasn’t even owned up to any of this. You guys flatly deny any wrongdoing. Many of you still claim Japan waged a just war to save Asia! Now you say your beloved grandpa was part of this? How can you do this to us?”

“Oh, Jimmy. You know I’m on your side. What does it have to do with me? With us? Am I responsible for my grandfather’s sins?”

“You even suggested her claims were blown out of proportion.”

“No, that’s not what I said. I don’t care what online trolls say. They don’t mean a thing. They don’t make me doubt even for a second. I know what I’ve seen. Those images. They’ll get to you and bring you down. But no, we can’t just pretend it never happened.”

* * *

The following day, I arrive on campus earlier than usual and lock myself in the lab. The projector hums when I switch it on. Once logged into the system, I type in the date and location before hitting the return key.

Bright lights flash and blind me temporarily. I open my eyes and blink a few times. A desolate city in ruins spreads before my eyes. I take out the revolver but feel naked. Peasants pass by. Some shoot strange looks my way. After a while, I reach a two-story nondescript building guarded by Japanese soldiers.

A hand-painted wooden sign hanging over the entrance informs the visitor that he’s about to enter an ianjo —“comfort station” in Japanese. What they mean is a military brothel. It’s another reminder that my fellow countrymen excel at coming up with euphemistic misnomers. On the outside, the building looks like an ordinary residence. Inside, girls and young women are sexually enslaved.

Evil lurks even in such a seemingly banal everyday landscape. The Japanese have efficiently normalized horrific abuse and violent deaths. A numb sadness fills me. A rickshaw comes to a halt, and a young soldier climbs down. He refuses to pay the driver and shoos him away like a stray dog.

“Lt. Kawashima?” I call. “Lt. Yasuo Kawashima?” My knees tremble.

The soldier looks up. In the flesh, he bears an uncanny resemblance to Uncle Takashi, Mom’s baby brother. Our gazes lock, and his face shows no sign of recognition. I’m a stranger to him in this timeline.

I pull my revolver out and cock it. I hesitate. My mouth moves without producing any audible sound. He becomes blurred through my tears. A gunshot rings out. The soldier falls to one knee. His mouth moves as if to ask why. I silently scream as I empty my barrel. Bloody bubbles foam from his mouth, and his body thrashes like a steel whip.

Growing up, history was my favorite subject. Little did I know then history would haunt me later on. But I should have realized. We were taught that history repeats itself, after all. At least, until somebody steps in and messes with it. As the soldier takes his last breath, my body slowly evaporates into sparkling lights, which linger in the air a few moments before fading like wisps of mist before the morning sun.

“I love you, Jimmy. Now you’re free.” I mumble before I cease to exist.