Jackal by Jeff Stone

and huge bouquets of flowers. It was really cool. The whole place buzzed with excitement.
    I grinned.
    Ling smiled back. “Welcome to Shanghai. I think you’re going to like it here. We are very warm people.”
    “It sure seems that way,” I said.
    I followed Ling outside to a waiting minivan, where there was a young guy seated behind the wheel. The weather was warm, just like Indiana, and it was getting dark out, which was very odd because it had been getting dark when I’d boarded the plane. Shanghai time was twelve hours ahead of Indiana time, plus I’d been in the air fifteen hours. I’d lost twenty-seven hours of my life on that flight. I was trying to get my head around this when I suddenly realized that we’d forgotten something—my luggage.
    “Wait!” I said. “We need to go to baggage claim. I checked a suitcase.”
    Ling shook his head. “Already taken care of.” He pointed to the back of the minivan.
    I peered through the window. Sure enough, there was my suitcase.
    The minivan’s driver got out and opened the large rear door, and Ling reached for my backpack.
    I reflexively jerked away.
    Ling frowned at me. “I was just going to put your pack alongside your suitcase for you. Why the extreme reaction? Are you hiding something from me?”
    “No,” I lied. “My, um, wallet and passport are in there. So is my tablet. I guess I’m just a little jumpy about it. Phoenix once told me how somebody tried to steal his backpack when he was in China.”
    Ling raised an eyebrow. “Is that all? Okay, then.”
    I handed over my backpack, and Ling put it into the back of the minivan without looking inside it. The driver closed the back door. I climbed into one of the backseats as Ling and the driver got into the front seats. They exchanged a few words in Chinese, and the driver pulled out into the approaching night.
    We were soon on a major highway that looked a lot like the multi-lane highway leading away from Indianapolis International Airport. If I hadn’t just seen and heard all the Chinese people in the terminal, I would have guessed we were back in the States.
    Ling turned around and handed me a cell phone. “You should call your parents and let them know that you’vearrived safely. Your mother’s number is already on the screen. Just hit
send
.”
    I hit
send
. My mom picked up a few seconds later.
    “Hello?” she said. “Ling?”
    “No, Mom,” I said. “It’s me, Jake.”
    “Baby! You made it?”
    “Yep.”
    “How are you?”
    “Great.”
    “No problems?”
    “Nope. It’s kind of weird that it’s getting dark here, but I know it’s just a time zone thing.”
    “You’ll adjust to it,” my mom said. “Do you need anything?”
    “No. Ling is taking care of me. I didn’t have to wait in a single line at the airport. He’s the man.”
    “I’m so glad that you’re in good hands. Enjoy yourself, baby.”
    “For sure,” I said. “I’d better go, so I can give Ling back his cell phone.”
    “Okay,” my mother said. “Goodbye for now. I’ll let your father know that you’re well!”
    “Thanks. I’ll call you in a couple days.”
    “You do that. We’ll call Ling if we need to reach you in the meantime. Have fun!”
    My mom hung up, and I handed the phone back to Ling. “Thanks,” I said.
    “Don’t mention it,” Ling replied. “So, how much do you know about Shanghai?”
    “Not a lot.”
    “You didn’t research the city to which you were traveling?”
    “No, but my mom sort of did. She told me that it’s big.”
    “It’s the most populated city in the world. More than twenty-three million people live here.”
    “No way,” I said. “That’s
huge
.”
    “It is. It doesn’t always feel big, though. There are two main halves, Puxi and Pudong, which are separated by the Huangpu River.”
    “Isn’t one old and one new?” I asked.
    “Yes. Puxi is to the west, and it’s the historic trading and banking center of Shanghai. The east side of the river is