Chapter 1

Ever since I told my best friend Aves Mitchell about it, she called me four or five times in a single day.

She was dead serious.

According to her, in ancient China, people used jade cicadas on the dead to keep “life essence” from leaking so the body wouldn’t decay.

I almost laughed myself into a hernia.

“What nonsense are you even talking about?”

My boyfriend—Henry Collins—a living, breathing man—being a corpse?

Come on. I’m not stupid enough to confuse the living with the dead.

Every night, when we lay in bed together, the warm breath from his nose blew against my cheek like a tiny electric fan.

And she still insisted, “If you don’t believe me, hide his jade cicada tonight. See if he changes.”

Her confidence came from her grandpa, who ran a small Chinese spiritual/ritual supply shop in Chinatown selling joss paper and incense for ancestral offerings. She always acted like that gave her ancient, mystical authority.

But I knew superstition when I heard it.

There are no ghosts, no walking corpses—none of that is real.

“If you don’t do it,” she added, deadpan, “I’m cutting you off.”

She actually threatened our friendship over this. And thinking about the years we’d spent together… I caved.

That night, while Henry Collins showered, her words circled in my mind like gnats.

If I hid his jade cicada, only two things could happen—

One—she was right. Without it, he turned into a rotting corpse.

Which would scare me to death.

Two—he was normal, fully alive—and he’d be furious I messed with something so weirdly important to him.

After a long hesitation, I decided to do it. Just once. Just to shut her up.

I had just reached for his clothes when he stepped out of the bathroom, steam still clinging to him.

He spotted me holding his shirt, confusion flickering across his face.

“Babe… what are you doing?”

“Your clothes fell on the floor,” I said calmly. “I was just picking them up.”

I shook the shirt like I was dusting it off, acting all sweet and considerate, then set it neatly on the couch.

He turned off the lights.

In the dark, we tangled together, bodies warm, everything soft and breathless between us.

When it was over, I heard the faint rustling of him going through his clothes.

I knew —

he was looking for his jade cicada.