by Diana Ma
“I’ll like anything you give me.”
“Paper fan?” I tease. “Postcard with ancient poetry in calligraphy? Key chain that says ‘I’ve been to the Great Wall’?”
“Anything,” Ken says firmly.
“You have a seriously low bar for presents.” I’m so relieved to be back in the rhythm of chatting and joking normally with him.
“But a high bar for a girlfriend,” he says in a low, sexy voice.
Girlfriend. Warm fuzzies fill my whole body. See? You were being totally paranoid about what Ken’s doing on a Friday night without you. So what if he’s not great at staying in touch? What matters is how well we click when we do connect. “I suppose, then, that for my boyfriend, I can step up my gift-giving game. We’re talking a miniature of the Great Wall here. Or maybe a pair of those little doorway guardian foo dogs.” Foo dogs are “shi shi” in Chinese, which actually means stone lions. I have no idea why they’re known as “foo dogs” in English.
“Now I’m going to be disappointed if I don’t get a foo dog!” I can tell Ken’s grinning even if I can’t see it.
“I’ll try not to disappoint you.”
“You’d better not.” He laughs. “Don’t break my heart, Gemma.”
Guilt floods the happiness away like icy water poured over my head. “I won’t.” My words and tone are too solemn for our banter, but Ken doesn’t seem to notice.
Once we hang up, I fling my phone aside and roll over onto my back on the bed and stare up at the smooth white ceiling. What’s the big deal? So I met a guy I can’t stop thinking about. It’s not like anything is going to happen . . . and even if something did, it wouldn’t mean anything. Ken is a long-term relationship. Eric is a temporary infatuation.
Still, I could tell Glory and Camille about Eric. It would be nice to get some advice. I pick up my phone again and start a group thread to my roommates.
Hey! Had my first day off and went sightseeing. Finally.
Camille is the first to respond. Ooh! What did you see? Pics plz!
I send them a selfie at a food stall. My finger hovers over the unsmiling picture of me at Tiananmen Square, but I end up not sending it. That’s way too hard to explain.
Glory chimes in. Nice! Glad you got out! How’s the film going?
Awesome! I add heart emojis for emphasis. There isn’t an emoji for “I love being an actress on a real movie set, but it’s way harder than I thought, and I’m afraid of letting down my mentor and totally blowing it, plus the director doesn’t like me.” So I add a wow emoji instead.
Camille texts back. Meet any interesting people yet?
Perfect time to mention Eric. But what do I say? Met a cute guy. Enemy of my newly discovered family. We met when he thought I was my cousin. She warned me to stay away from her family and then paid for my hotel upgrade. So . . . yeah, some interesting people.
Miss Ken. I add a sad emoji to my text and send it off.
We all text a bit more about what Camille and Glory are up to, and then I sign off. It’s getting late, and I’ve had an exhausting day. Time for bed.
Then my phone buzzes. It’s my mom. For just a second, I consider letting it go to voicemail, but then she’ll just call again. And again. I answer the phone. “Hi, Mom.” My mouth clenches around a million questions threatening to spill out of me. Why were you kicked out of your family? Why would you need to go all the way to the United States to get away from your family? Why won’t you even talk about your family? Why did you forbid me to come to China? What the hell did you do?
“Gemma, this is your ma.”
“I know.” Here we go—the familiar phone-answering ritual. My heart is beating so loudly that I’m afraid she can hear it.
“Why haven’t I heard from you? No time to call your mom?”
“Sorry. I’ve been so busy with work.” I like to stick as close to the truth as possible. Like I said, I’m a terrible liar. Though I seem to be getting plenty of practice lately. How did I become the kind of girl who lies to her parents and her boyfriend? This isn’t me.
“You’re acting at night? When I call you at night, you don’t answer.”
Crap. Nighttime for her in Illinois is daytime for me in Beijing. “I’ve been . . . out.” Again, not technically lying.
“Oh?” Sly speculation slips into her voice. “Out with anyone special?”
How the hell does she do that?! Mother’s intuition is a scary-real thing. “Um, maybe?”
“Zhong Guo Ren?” She’s trying to sound casual, but I can hear the underlying hope as she asks me if this “special” person is Chinese.
I’ve never dated anyone Chinese before, so she’ll be over the moon about a Chinese boyfriend. “Mom, don’t make a big deal out of this—but yes.”
There are muffled squeals on the other end of the line, and she’s probably doing a happy dance right now. So much for not making a big deal out of it. “What’s his name?” she demands when she’s done squealing.
“Eric.” Immediately horrified, I yell out, “No! That’s not right! Ken. His name is Ken.”
I tell myself that it means nothing that my overtired brain landed on the wrong name initially.
“What happened?” I hear my dad ask. “Is Gemma going to college?”
“No.” Mom sounds like she’s come back to earth a bit. “She’s dating a Zhong Guo Ren. Someone named Ken. Or Eric.”
“Ken,” I say firmly.
“Hao,” Dad says. Good. That’s what he says to everything. Except for me not going to college. He probably wouldn’t approve of me going against their express wishes to stay away from Beijing either.
“Is there an Eric?” Mom asks shrewdly.
“Oh, he’s just a guy I met today.” I hope my mom doesn’t ask how I met Eric because I can’t come up with a lie off the top of my head.
“As soon as I met your ba,” she says mistily, “I knew he was the one.”
My face heats up. It’s embarrassing, but also endearing, that my parents are still head over heels in love with each other after decades of marriage. Dad murmurs something in Chinese to Mom so softly that I can’t make it out. No doubt he’s saying something revoltingly adorable.
OK, I have to try. “So, where did you and Dad meet again? Was it Hong Kong?” I take a deep breath. “Or Beijing?”
A vast silence greets me. The only thing I hear is my own shallow breathing. Just when I think I’m going to drown in the rivulets of sweat pouring from my forehead, Mom speaks at last. “I told you that we both went to college in Hong Kong,” she says coldly.
“Yes, I know, but—”
“And why do you ask now?” Her voice is sharp and suspicious.
Shit. “No reason,” I mumble. How can I be so bad at this? You’d think I’ve never done improv before. Pull it together, dammit! I’ve got to change the subject fast—otherwise, that scary Mom-intuition will kick in, and she’ll somehow find out I’m in Beijing. But what will deflect her from her suspicions? “It’s just . . .” Then a brainstorm hits. “You know how it is when you get to know another Chinese person? We end up talking about our families and where they’re from.” Luckily, this is true. Ken and I did have this conversation. And nothing will distract Mom like the topic of my new Chinese boyfriend.
“Oh.” Mom pauses, and I hold my breath. “You and this Ken were talking about your families?”
“That’s right.” I let my breath out slowly so she doesn’t hear the relief in my voice. “So, you knew Dad was the one, huh?”
Mom doesn’t let herself get distracted. “Is this Eric Zhong Guo Ren too?”
“Yes,” I admit. I don’t add that Eric is Chinese, as in a citizen of China.
“Ah.” The tone of maternal satisfaction in that one syllable makes me smile despite the earlier close call. It must be making my mom delirious with happiness that I have not only one but two Chinese romantic interests. It’s a win-win for her. Then she says, “Even if this Eric is not Chinese, it doesn’t matter. I can tell that h
e’s the one for you.”
What? This is mind-blowing on many levels. First, Mom is super practical and not at all romantic (except when it comes to my dad). This is the woman who’s always told me that I should never let a boy get in the way of my education and that I should have a career so I’ll never have to rely on a husband to support me (not that I disagree with her). Second, Mom hasn’t ever said that she wants me to date someone Chinese. But it’s kind of obvious. Paul, my boyfriend in high school, was white, and she never thought much of him. Then again, maybe she didn’t like Paul because he was a bit of an ass, and not because he was white.
“How can you tell that I like Eric? Because I don’t. Not in that way.” Another lie. That damnable little voice is back.
“I know these things. Ken may be a nice boy, but you obviously forget him too easily. This Eric—you can’t forget him. You want the one you can’t forget. I know because you are just like me.”
There are worse things than being just like my mom. After all, she’s a smart, successful art director at a nationally famous museum, and she married a great guy. Still, I can’t let her think she’s right about Eric. “I haven’t forgotten Ken. It was just a little slip of the tongue. Ken’s wonderful—you’ll see when you meet him.”
“When will that be?” she asks, switching gears so fast it makes my head spin. “This is a good time for us to visit. Your dad’s still on summer break from teaching at his college, and I have some vacation time I could use.”
“Winter,” I say resolutely. “You’ll meet Ken when you visit during the winter holidays.” Filming should be wrapped up by then, and I’ll be back in LA with my parents none the wiser about where I’ve been.
“And will we meet Eric too?”
“He won’t be in LA over the winter holidays.” Well, that much is true. Eric will be in China, and I’ll be thousands of miles away. I should keep that in mind. Ken is in LA. Eric isn’t. “Besides,” I say with a certainty I wish I felt, “there is absolutely nothing going on between Eric and me.”
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
It’s been two weeks, and I’ve talked to Ken only once more after our first phone call. The second conversation was brief because he was off to a rehearsal and I was needed on set. The few emails and texts that I have gotten from him have been a little . . . lacking. Not cold exactly. Just not warm. But mine haven’t been much better. Maybe we’re both just busy. Or maybe we both have something to hide. The thought fills me with worry about what Ken might be hiding and guilt over what I am hiding.
In those two weeks, I also haven’t heard from Eric. Given the whole “our families are enemies” situation, Eric’s probably waiting for me to make the first move. But I don’t. Part of the reason is the weirdness of it all, but the other part is the sixteen-hour days on the set of Butterfly. By the time the weekend rolls around, I’m totally wiped out. The other actors go out together on the weekends, and although I get along well with them, they don’t invite me to join them. I have a feeling they think of me as their kid sister.
I did consider texting Eric last weekend, but decided against it. Instead, in a stroke of genius (if I do say so myself), I booked a tour to see the Great Wall. A tour for Americans. No one expects to see Alyssa Chua sightseeing with a group of American tourists. It was just as awe-inspiring and grand as I had imagined. But a little lonely to be seeing the Great Wall with a bunch of strangers.
The whole time I was there, I had a little daydream running through my head of Alyssa and me—racing each other up and down the steps of the Great Wall, strolling arm in arm, and catching up on the lives we led without each other. But I haven’t heard anything from Alyssa since her pink note warning me about Eric.
I shove aside this silly fantasy of becoming friends with Alyssa. For tomorrow, I’ve booked a tour at the Summer Palace, like Eric suggested. I’ll see it on my own, and I won’t waste a single minute thinking of what it would be like with my cousin at my side.
But first . . . one more day on the set. We’ve mostly been shooting on location in the suburbs of the city, but today, we’re back in the studio. My pulse races. I have to admit that I’m excited about today’s shoot. Today is the first day I get to play Sonia in her Song male drag.
Beijing is hot in late August, and the air conditioner in my dressing room trailer is broken, so there are fans everywhere, blowing my hair into my face and melting my makeup. Liz is in despair, but at least I don’t need as much makeup as usual today.
While Liz does my makeup, my mind turns to the original M. Butterfly play. I’ve been reading David Henry Hwang’s script for inspiration. The play spans decades, but the most fascinating time period in it for me is the Chinese Cultural Revolution that started in 1966. It was a time when art was outlawed—except for revolutionary art approved by the Communist Party—because that art was seen as the trappings of the elite, ruling class and possessing any of it was considered proof of being a counterrevolutionary. Even owning classical art or Beijing opera recordings was a crime punishable by public humiliation, imprisonment, and . . . worse. But there wasn’t much worse than actually being an artist.
There’s a scene in the play that haunts me. Two dancers enter upstage to the sound of relentless percussion. They’re dressed as revolutionary Red Guards who go from house to house—looting and burning cultural artifacts—in a mockery of a communist revolutionary performance. Then the dancers drag in Song Liling from the wings to be sentenced to hard labor in a commune. He is no longer Butterfly—the beautiful, elegant opera singer. But he is no less graceful in a Mao suit as he kneels before his comrade-turned-accuser. Then, with brutal suddenness, Song Liling is beaten and forced to confess his “crime” of being an actor and performing “perverted acts” with another man. It’s a chilling scene that I can’t imagine replicating in a rom-com. Fortunately, however, I don’t have to.
The current Butterfly isn’t set during the Cultural Revolution, so my only concern is doing justice to my character. The original Song Liling/Butterfly is strong in a time of terror, and although Butterfly is a modern-day story set in today’s China—Sonia/Song should be just as strong. That’s how I’ll play my character.
Liz finishes my makeup and then stuffs my flyaway hair into a short wig. I sneak a peek at my reflection in the mirror. Huh. With this movie’s budget, I’d think they could do better than straight, bowl-cut bangs. It’s a cute haircut on a five-year-old, but it just looks silly on an adult. Maybe Liz is going to style it now. She always does wonders with my hair.
But Liz gives the wig a final pat and asks, “Ready for costuming?”
“Oh, OK.” Should I say something about the wig? No. I shouldn’t second-guess my hair-and-makeup person. Maybe the bowl cut is all the rage now, and I’m just an unsophisticated American who doesn’t know any better. I stare in the mirror and silently tell my reflection, You will rock this bowl cut.
Liz wheels out the rack with a single garment bag hanging on it and leaves to give me privacy. I unzip the bag and perk up immediately at the sight of the neatly pressed black suit and white dress shirt. Oh, this is going to be fun! I put on the shirt first and button it up. Then I tuck the long tails into the pants and finally button the jacket over the pants. Anticipation bubbles up in me . . . and fizzles out again at the first glimpse of my reflection in the full-length mirror.
The jacket hangs loosely around my shoulders, and the hem of the pants is too long, as are the arms of the jacket. The shirt is made of some kind of stiff material that won’t lie flat against my collar bone. The shirttails are so long and the pants so oversized that the material is bunching around my waist in weird little bulges. Dismay fills my throat. This can’t be right. A tailor was brought in to take my measurements, so how is it possible that this suit fits so poorly? With the bowl haircut and misfitted suit, I look utterly ridiculous.
I sigh. Jake’s probably going to fire whatever poor sod is responsible for this costume.
I’m reluctant to leave my trailer and face
Jake’s formidable wrath, even when it’s not directed at me. But the heat in my trailer is heaving at me like a living thing, and today’s shoot is taking place in an indoor set with a working air conditioner.
I walk the short distance to the studio, and as soon as I get inside, my makeup starts to solidify, and my scalp itches a little less under the wig. I exhale in relief as I approach the set, a sterile office with black leather chairs and lots of chrome. We’re shooting the scene where Ryan hires Song as a lawyer for his company, not knowing it’s really Sonia, his ex-girlfriend.
Jake, Eilene, and Aidan are already there.
The relief I feel at the cool interior fades as I wait for Jake to explode. Instead, he looks me over and says, “OK, you look the part of Song. Now you’ve got to act the part.” My eyes widen when he doesn’t say anything about my costume. But my surprise doesn’t end there. Jake proceeds to tell me what “acting the part” of Song means. “Gemma, when you walk in, I want you to trip over your pant legs. Be awkward. Make it clear you’re uncomfortable in menswear.”
Wait a minute. . . . “But I’m not—” I protest.
Eilene straightens in her director’s chair. “Not what?”
“I’m not uncomfortable in menswear.” I gulp in a lungful of air because Jake’s glaring at me, but I make myself go on. “Or at least I wouldn’t be uncomfortable if this suit fit right.”
Jake speaks very slowly and carefully, like he’s talking to a small child. “This is a rom-com we’re shooting. That means we need some laughs. Some physical humor. So you’re playing someone who has trouble acting like a guy. Because you’re really a girl. It’s supposed to be funny. Got it?”
Oh, I get it all right. Ken’s words pop into my head. All the Asian men in that film will be sexless and nerdy. The bowl haircut, the ill-fitting suit, Jake’s directions—it all makes sense now. Whether Jake realizes it or not, he wants me to play Song as a comedic stereotype of an effeminate Asian man. Because, of course, it’s hilarious to think that an Asian man could possibly be a real man. And how can he drive home that point? By having a woman play an Asian man in drag. A sick feeling worms into my stomach. No way can I be part of that. Before I know it, words are pouring out of my mouth. “What if I do this differently? What if I play my character in a way that’s not so . . . um . . .” stereotypical, offensive, racist. I edit out all that on the fly. “. . . awkward?”