My bubble tea shop is a little strange.
By day, I sell seven-yuan pearl milk tea. At night, once I pull down the shutter, the world outside becomes a thousand-year-old wilderness: the An Tang Dynasty.
Ancient folk in coarse cloth press against the glass door, staring at the “Pearl Immortal Dew” on the electronic menu and swallowing hard.
“Miss, could I trade three wild dates for those moving little pearls?”
“I’ll buy that sweet, steaming drink, cocoa, with rusty copper coins!”
At first, I thought it was just a business across time. That was until a doctor, eyes red, pressed dried meat into my hands. “Please, could I have a fever reducer?”
Disaster victims knelt, holding moldy grains of wheat. “Living Bodhisattva, please give us clean water!”
I stared at the ibuprofen in my drawer, and a chill suddenly crept down my spine. The history books clearly said, “An Tang falls.”
But when the drums of a sacrifice to Heaven sounded from the water station, I touched the antibiotics that had just arrived.
Whether or not I can change their fate, first I’ll make sure our ancestors get something hot to drink.
