by Gish Jen
She was crying.
LIZZY / — Poor Mom, Wendy said.
But I said: — You see? She was never that close to us, even when we were babies. Not like she was to Bailey. Face facts, it was different.
WENDY / Though maybe Mom is going to be exactly the same with Bailey as us when he grows up, that’s what I think. Maybe with Bailey she’s going to be like, We’ll talk about it after supper, okay? And, I’m sorry, pumpkin, I know this was our special time, but this is the life of a working mother. And maybe Dad is going to be like, Tell me again, I’m listening, it just takes time to open a heart. Because first you have to stop. Like this. And he’ll take a big breath. Whew. Now tell me again, no laughing. What is it?
LIZZY / Or maybe they won’t.
But anyway—the diaper bag.
WENDY / — Can’t you lighten that thing up? Dad says.
But Mom says, squinting: — With what time? And you’re welcome to clean out the refrigerator while you’re at it.
So that Dad has only just taken the bag from Mom’s shoulder and is still mushing it into the mesh thingy under the stroller when she starts hurrying. Bailey is bouncing and her boobs are bouncing, and her white shirt is flying all around her like there’s a big wind, and she’s turning pink in the face. It’s like her lips and her skin are matching, so that her eyes are as blue as this special-effect laser beam.
— She’s here already, Mom says. Early! In the fog! Whoever would have thought she would be early?
— Early! we yell. Early! Her plane must have special instruments!
And we are running down the halls, running and running.
CARNEGIE / Selected preconceptions, wholly inexcusable:
1. That she would have an unfortunate perm.
2. That she would cook better than Mama Wong but require education as to the horrors of cholesterol.
3. That she would be reliable.
4. That she would look half her age.
5. That she would mend.
6. That she would speak Chinese.
7. That she would eschew center stage.
8. That she would favor hot-water bottles.
9. That she would wear sweater vests.
10. That she would root for both sides of ball games.
She was indeed capable, as it turned out, of rooting for both sides of ball games.
And she did indeed speak Chinese. Mandarin, of course, as well as selected other dialects.
And she did indeed look half her age. No gray, and nary a wrinkle, thanks to that Asian predisposition toward subcutaneous fat. You could easily have taken her for a slightly older cousin of the girls, though I knew her to be forty-six. Seven years older than me, a year older than Blondie.
What a surprise, though, that she moved as arrestingly as she did. When we first spotted her—or what we at least thought was her, from her picture—she was proceeding along ho-hum with the stream of other passengers from California, headed past the arrival gates toward the public waiting area. A medium-tall figure in black, slim. Low ponytail, long neck, Modigliani-like shoulder slope.
There was a clog and ensuing backup; some geezer’s shopping bag had lost its bottom. Sundry people helpfully chased down the surprising array of rolling items, while others looked on. Lan alone began then to disappear, then reappear, slipping calmly through the confusion. Let others mill; she wove and sidestepped with quiet aplomb. Accustomed to crowds, it appeared. Disappearing, reappearing, disappearing, reappearing. Stopping just once, disconcertingly, to spit into an open trash can. A quick, perfect little shot; compared to expectorations I’d seen in China, this was positively elegant.
She disappeared again.
Then materialized out past security, a few yards from us. A plainish woman, neither pleasing nor displeasing. Face on the long side, eyes on the large side, nose on the flat side, mouth on the full side. High cheekbones, one on either side. Haggard, and yet somehow on the alert, as if in a war zone. Nothing dangled from her. How dangly everyone around her by comparison, how idiotically overaccessorized. And how she held herself; with what sweetly intimidating posture. There was nothing Chinese about it. Only Lan held herself this way, as if bent on disconnecting her head from her feet.
— Lan! we called. Lan!
She suspended, briefly, her travel.
What was it that crossed her face then?
Maybe she was simply jet-lagged. Maybe she was taken aback by Lizzy’s nose ring and tattoos, or by her blond hair. Or maybe it was the all-blond lineup of Blondie, Bailey, and Lizzy that surprised her. (It so happened that black-haired Wendy and I stood a little in back of the others.)
Later we learned too that though we’d sent her a picture of us, thanks to some semi-predictable postal vagrancy she hadn’t received it. In any case, there ensued some manner of small-scale system failure. You could see her hit RESET.
— How do you do, she said, a moment later, recomposed.
She clutched her purse as if it was full of contraband she had managed to sneak through customs.
— Welcome to America! How was your flight? we said.
— Hello, she said again. Smiling a smile we would soon recognize, a certain lopsided half smile.
— Are you Lan? I asked, suddenly wondering.
— Nice meet you. She bobbed her head.
Blondie resurrected her Chinese: — Nin shi bu shi jiao Lin Lan?
Lan relaxed her grip slightly and said in Chinese: —You speak Chinese!
— I do, said Blondie.
— You speak very well.
— I studied for several years in college, said Blondie.
A long pause; Lan receded a bit. That half smile.
BLONDIE / Perhaps I was supposed to say, Nali, nali—meaning ‘Where? where?’—when she said that about speaking well. That was the Chinese script, after all. Perhaps I should have denied being able to speak, or insisted I spoke badly, terribly, at most one or two words.
Or perhaps I should have said something that started with you. She had said something you; perhaps instead of starting with I, I should have answered, likewise, You. You are too kind.
CARNEGIE / — Don’t forget the blond thing, I said. A blonde speaking Chinese. That might have thrown her. Or maybe she thought you were putting yourself above her.
BLONDIE / — Why in heaven’s name would I do that? I said.
CARNEGIE / — I just know that’s what my mother would have thought, I said. She was very binary in that way. Always looking down on someone, or else convinced someone was looking down on her. As if all the world was a ladder to her, and we but poor climbers on it.
BLONDIE / He said: — Lan might have wondered too whether she was a family member exactly—if by ‘nanny’ we didn’t mean ayi. A servant. And what did it signify that she was being brought over on a student visa when she wasn’t a student per se?
— But wasn’t that just the easiest kind of visa to get? I said.
She was dressed, in any case, all in black, like Lizzy, yet with entirely different effect. Everything Lizzy wore was torn or altered in some way—in-your-face clothes. Lan’s clothes, in contrast, seemed gotten together with care. Everything looked new—her thick nylons, and high-heeled, leatherette sandals; her narrow skirt, and V-neck sweater. The sweater was pointelle, with a flame-stitch bottom. The skirt matched. Neither fit very well. Even her undergarments seemed not quite hers—her bust preceding her in an odd way.
CARNEGIE / A distinctly cold-war affair, that brassiere, suggesting advanced industrial engineering and projectile menace.
BLONDIE / You could tell—even we could tell—that she was not exactly from Shanghai. You could tell that she was not even from a city proper, but from the outskirts of a city—the sort of town where people have more than they used to, but can hardly be called rich.
She appeared an inch or two taller than Lizzy, who was a good five-four. And yet how similar they seemed. All in black, as I’ve said, and willowy, though Lizzy was longer-waisted. Or no, mayb
e Lan looked more like Wendy—so I thought when Wendy walked up. Wendy hadn’t started developing yet. You could see, though, what a slender thing she was always going to be—a wonder to someone of my shape. Though shorter than Lan, she had similar torso-to-leg proportions. They both had too that shiny black hair.
Wendy, thankfully, was not wearing black. Wendy still wore, then, what I bought her. A flowered shirt, and flowered shorts. Flowered sandals. One thing good about her being a somewhat shy child was that she was, at nine, still mine.
Still mine, I say. And yet from the first moment I saw the three of them together, I thought they seemed, despite their differences, a set. Was that racist? Like kitchen canisters, I thought. S-M-L.
Carnegie and Lan chatted awkwardly by the luggage carousel. Then no one said anything. Then Lizzy said something and, amazingly, Lan smiled and said something back—about Michael Jordan, of all things, and about somebody else—a Yao Ming?—her manner surprisingly warm. There was another exchange I didn’t catch. How ringed, still, Lan’s person with vigilance; and yet her face, as she began to relax, flickered with quiet life.
— Such beautiful skin, you have, she told Lizzy. You must know how to eat. Have good water too.
Lan said this smiling gently, gesturing gently. Her movements like a murmur—not making a big positive point, as Lizzy always claimed I did. Lizzy in turn beamed, tilting her head down shyly, so that a roll of fat appeared under her chin. I hadn’t known she still had that roll of fat; suddenly I saw her, a toddler again, demanding I follow her around and around the patio. I engine! You caboose!
— How clever you are. I can see by your eyes, clever, she told Wendy, a little while later. — People should listen to you.
— I like to play chess, said Wendy, looking at the floor.
No fat roll under her chin. Though she had been a fat baby in China, she’d thinned out almost as soon as she got to America.
— Will you teach me to play? asked Lan.
— I’ll teach you right away! said Wendy. I’m a good teacher! I take lessons! You can practice on the computer! At school I have to play with the boys because none of the girls will play, but on the computer there are these websites.
— You teach me, said Lan. I practice with you.
It was impossible not to like her. I tried to smile at her, and to gauge whether she was smiling back. And sometimes I thought so. Yet still, as the luggage snaked around, I remained outside the circle of her charm. Perhaps this was because I was occupied with walking Bailey. Hunched over him like some newfangled plant support, I helped him step step step his way to the stairs—Bailey loved stairs. He wore his brand-new white leather tie-up shoes; his hot fists gripped my fingers.
— Look what you can do! Lan cooed at Bailey as, on one tour, we slowly passed her way.
Right, left, right, left.
— Such a big big boy, said Lan on the next round.
She touched his cheek—her nails were beautifully groomed, oval and pink. Bailey, shy, motioned to be picked up. But once in my arms he cooed back, showing off his teeth. He batted his lashes and clobbered my upper arm, mysteriously emphatic.
— Why everybody talk to baby instead of talk to big girls? she asked Lizzy and Wendy. — Have you ever notice that?
Bailey’s face crumpled then—at what no one could say. He wailed; the girls showed Lan his pacifier. They showed her the stroller too, and how it folded up. They let her try it once herself. She folded it perfectly, without coaching, the first try.
— In China, this kind cart, many people have it, she explained.
— Really? said the girls.
— How do you call it?
— Stroller, said Lizzy. Strol-ler.
— Stro-er, said Lan.
— Strol-ler. Strol-ler.
Her one suitcase arrived damaged. Lan squatted gracefully, placing the suitcase on the floor. The girls squatted beside her as if they did this every day. The suitcase had been wrapped in plastic. She opened this, not by tearing the wrapping, but by slicing it neatly on the diagonal, with a pair of fold-up scissors. Nothing seemed to be missing. Still Carnegie strode off, indignant, damaged bag on a luggage cart, to demand the airline do something. We trailed him like ducklings, gathering obediently outside the claims office until, triumphant, he reappeared, with the announcement that he had arranged for the bag to be replaced with a new one.
At this, Lan smiled her first full, true smile—a completely sweet, open, girlish smile, so guileless and lovely that Carnegie Wong, my husband of fourteen years, blushed.
WENDY / In the car she insists on sitting in the third seat, in the way back, so that Mom and Dad can sit together and we three kids can sit together too, in the middle seat, not that we want to. She doesn’t talk at all in the beginning, but when we talk to her she turns around, and after a while she talks too.
— Do you have favorite color? she asks.
— Guess, says Lizzy.
And Lanlan—she makes us call her Lanlan—says: — Black.
Or at least sort of. She doesn’t say ‘black’ exactly, really she says ‘brack,’ but we understand her because we like her.
— You knew because I’m wearing black! says Lizzy.
Lanlan nods. — Black very nice, she says. Do you like draw picture?
— Yes! says Lizzy. But how did you know that?
— Black very—how do you say?—artist, says Lanlan.
— You’re wearing black! I say. You’re wearing Lizzy’s favorite color.
— Wow, she says. Or do you say Wow-wee.
— Wow, says Lizzy.
— I see, she says, though this frown like nests in her face.
— How about Gee whiz? Or Gee, what. Gee willikers.
— Gee willikers? says Lizzy.
— Better stick with wow, I say.
— Wow, she says.
— Are you artistic? Lizzy asks.
— Me? Oh, no no, she says. Then she says: — I can see American fashion is not like Chinese fashion.
— We have bellbottoms, I tell her, and flower power!
— Not everybody wears that stuff, says Lizzy. Like I personally don’t pay attention to fashion at all.
— In China, we have fashion too, says Lanlan. But I am like you. Do not pay too much attention.
— Not even a little? I say.
— Well, okay, she says, smiling. — A little. Last few weeks. Now I am—how to say—fashion victim.
— I pay a little attention too, says Lizzy.
— A little? I say. A lot! That’s all she knows, is fashion! A lot of people dress like Lizzy. Like her friend Xanadu. Ask her about Xanadu, Xanadu is practically her twin!
— That is totally untrue, says Lizzy.
— Wow, says Lanlan calmly. And how about you, Wendy? Are you fashion victim?
She talks and talks to us, patting Bailey on the head every now and then even though he’s asleep.
— My turn! My turn! Lizzy and I begin to shout at the same time, but when Lanlan puts her finger in the air, even Lizzy shuts up like magic.
— My English not so good, Lanlan keeps saying. I only know a few phrases.
— Like what? says Lizzy.
— ‘Call 911,’ says Lan. ‘In case of emergency call 911.’
— Your English is fantastic! we tell her. Did you study in college?
She smiles a little, then says: — Not exactly college. But like college. Usually we say university.
Instead of ‘usually’ she says ‘u-ally.’
— Like university? we say.
— In China, many people, maybe they not so rich, or have difficulty pass exam, try study by self, she says. See teacher every once a while.
— Wow, we say.
— Can get degree this way. Of course, take some time.
— Did you get a degree? we ask. Did you?
She doesn’t answer but just smiles and sits there kind of ladylike with her back straight up and her knees pressed together, so that her lap is
like a table.
— We are rich Americans, says Lizzy. Aren’t we?
Lanlan looks out the window at the big mist, as if there’s something to see. There’s nothing to see but still you can see her eyes jerking back and forth, because of its going by so fast.
BLONDIE / Of course, she was amazed by our house. We ourselves were amazed by our house—a lovely old farmhouse, walking distance to town, with a porch, and a large rolling lawn, and a converted barn housing cars and, these days, a black-and-white pygmy goat—Gabriela’s, actually, as you will hear. Even in the fog you could see how the house commanded its little knoll. The land settled in green swales around it, like a skirt. I had my eccentric sunflowers in back—you couldn’t see them right away. But there, by the driveway, stood our small orchard of seven wide apple trees, planted in a circle so that their arms all but touched. Of course, individually those trees were awkward, as apple trees can be. They had that arthritic look. As a group, though, they appeared, charmingly, to be playing ring-around-the-rosy. And in the spring they formed a ceiling of blossoms. If from the front yard you made your way up the little incline—there were five or six stone steps—you ascended into a low sky of bloom—a heaven. Who could get enough of that magic? And in the fall! You could see the branches bending with fruit now—most of it edible, though we did not use pesticides. Soon the girls would be out apple picking, the old branches bending so low they all but dropped their fruit into the baskets. Both Lizzy and Wendy climbed on those branches when they were little, and pretended to be high in the air; both walked the branches like a circular balance beam when they were older. And both made it to the tops of the trees, one day, and yelled for Carnegie and me to come see.
CARNEGIE / The middle branches were squirrel diving boards; our Olympians sprang from them onto the driveway, that around the bikes and trikes, Rollerblades and roller skates, they might race. Overhead, the mockingbirds blithely popularized (okay, plagiarized) the more original songs of others.
Clouds drifted. The wind wafted.
