by Ann Mah
“Everyone…seems to know Claire,” I manage weakly. Privately, I wonder why, if they’re such good friends, Claire has never even uttered her name.
“So, tell me…” She leans in close and her perfume almost chokes me. “How are things going between Claire and Wang Wei?”
“Um…fine?”
“I told Claire, who cares if he’s one of the richest men in China? If that two-timing bastard won’t commit to you, dump him! He’s not worth it! And then Sam saw him at Q Bar with Sophie Wang—you know, the Hong Kong movie star?” She pauses and gives me an expectant look. I nod. “I told Claire she should go after him with a butcher knife. But he just claimed they were discussing business. Huh!”
I keep a pleasant smile on my face, but inside my heart is sinking. I had hoped Wang Wei was some kindhearted but misguided guy who was simply sowing a few wild oats. But the reality sounds much worse than I feared.
“She sometimes seems a little blue…” I say, thinking back to that morning in the kitchen, when Claire seemed ready to burst into sobs.
“I knew it!” Tina scoots her chair even closer, and I immediately wish I’d kept my mouth shut. “Do you think they’re going to break up?”
“Well, you know Claire,” I hedge, wanting to bite my tongue off. “She’s very proud.”
“That’s so true.” Tina nods. “She keeps everything inside. I’m always telling her to loosen up, open up, maybe see a shrink. But she always has to be in control.”
“That’s probably what makes her such a successful litigator,” I say snappily, feeling suddenly protective. Only I’m allowed to criticize my sister.
“Oh, she’s smart about a lot of things. Just not men.” Tina digs through her bag and pulls out a pack of Marlboro Lights. “Do you mind if I smoke?” She taps out a cigarette and lights it before I can respond, blowing a stream of smoke past my shoulder. “How about you? Single?”
“Me? Oh, yeah. Well, you know how it is…I just moved here…” Nosy old cow, I think.
“A pretty girl like you? Well, I’m sure it won’t take you long to find a man.” She takes a long drag and regards me with a steady gaze.
How did this meeting turn into a summit on my love life? I attempt to refocus. “About the article—”
“Ah yes. Enough gossip.” Tina straightens in her seat and taps cigarette ash onto the floor. “Frankly, we still don’t know if we can offer you access,” she says. “Shooting starts in a couple of weeks and we’ll need to see the interview questions beforehand. We’ll need to approve the article before it runs. And,” she continues in a crisp tone, “we’ve moved the set to Shanxi province, so you’ll have to make your own arrangements to get out there.”
“Shanxi?”
“We have accommodations for the cast and crew, of course, but we’re filming during the Pingyao International Photography Festival so most hotels are already full. You better make reservations now.”
As I’m scribbling everything down, my cell phone rings and Jeff’s name flashes across the screen. My heart floods with joy, followed immediately by panic. He had to call now?
“Don’t you want to answer that?” Tina peers at the phone as it beeps and hums.
What to do, what to do? I’m dying to talk to Jeff. But if I answer she might cancel everything. Geraldine and Ed would kill me.
Reluctantly, I press End on the phone, sending Jeff into cellular oblivion.
“Nobody important,” I assure Tina with a smile.
Do you think she knew it was him?” Geraldine’s screech raises a squeal of feedback on my cell phone. “I’m telling you, she has eyes like a hawk.”
“I promise you, she didn’t have a clue. She was too busy digging for information on Claire’s love life. Anyway,” I switch topics, “how are you feeling? Did you go to the doctor?”
“I saw my herbalist yesterday.” Cough, cough. “He has me on these little bottles of Chinese medicine. They’re dark and sweet.”
“Hm. Don’t you think you should see a real—er, I mean, a Western doctor?”
“Why? It’s a total waste of time and money. Anyway, I’m getting moxibustion this afternoon and that should clear everything up.”
“Is that where they stick needles in your spine?
“No,” she says patiently. “It’s when they suck the toxins out of you with hot glass cups. I’ll have hickeys all over my back. And hopefully I’ll be cured by Sunday.” For weeks, Geraldine has been planning a mid-autumn festival party, to be held at her home, a restored courtyard house that Gab says is like an untouched corner of old Beijing. It’s hidden in a tangle of narrow hutongs in the Back Lakes district, and, unlike many old-style homes, which were divided during the Cultural Revolution, is complete with four buildings and a spacious central courtyard. “I told you I invited Jeff, right?” she adds.
“Yeah.” I shift the phone against my ear.
“I got an e-mail from him this morning. He asked about you.”
“Really?” A smile creeps across my face.
“He likes it when women play hard to get.”
“I’m not sure that’s what I’m doing.”
“He said you’re intriguing.”
Hmmmm. Intriguing. Not that I care what he thinks, of course.
On Sunday, a brisk wind scrubs away the pollution, leaving behind a deep, pure blue sky. I linger in the kitchen over a cup of Earl Grey tea, allow the sun to warm my back and absorb myself in the crossword puzzle. As I fill in the clue for 17-across “Parisian river” (S-E-I-N-E), my thoughts wander to Charlie. I haven’t heard from him since our aborted date, and I have no idea if he’s still traveling or simply avoiding me. I’ve looked for him at the lobby newsstand, but found only a tall stack of International Herald Tribunes.
Claire wanders into the kitchen, dressed in a baby blue trailer-chic velour sweatsuit that reveals a strip of taut stomach. “Hi, sweetie,” she croons, opening the fridge and peering inside. “Shoot! We’re out of milk.”
“I’m going to Jenny Lou’s in a minute. I can pick some up.”
“I’ll come with you,” she says. “Just hang on two secs while I get ready, okay?”
An hour later we are strapped into the backseat of Claire’s silver Audi while her driver, Mr. Wang, weaves his way in and out of traffic. Claire pulls out a compact and smooths on another glistening coat of lip gloss. “Want some?” she asks, her eyes fixed on the tiny mirror.
“No, thanks.” Before leaving, I’d brushed on some mascara and changed out of my hooded sweatshirt into a pale pink cashmere sweater and dark jeans. It seemed silly to dress up for the grocery store, but one look at Claire’s sexy suburbanite outfit—Juicy sweats, kitten-heeled sandals, tousled mane of hair, and full foundation-wearing makeup—and I know I’ve made the right decision.
Claire closes her compact with a snap and pushes her dark hair behind her ears so her diamond solitaires glitter in the morning light. I know those earrings. They were a gift from our parents, Claire’s reward for getting into Yale Law School: a pair of diamonds so large and perfect and sparkly that I called them the Elizabeth Taylors. I still remember the day she got them. They appeared on her dinner plate, nestled into a red leather box that had been tied with a white satin bow.
Claire stared at the box and we stared at her. “Aren’t you going to open it?” our mother finally asked.
Her face solemn, Claire slowly picked up the box and loosened the ribbon. Prying open the hinged cover, she gently touched one of the diamonds with her fingertip.
“Do you like them?” Mom plucked one of the earrings out of the box and held it up so it caught the light. “Aren’t they beautiful?”
We watched the sparks of light bounce off the wall. “Thank you,” Claire finally said. She fastened first one diamond and then the other into her ears.
“They look nice on you, honey,” said Dad.
“Remember, I promised to get them for you if you got into law school? We’re so proud of you.” Our mother beamed.
&
nbsp; “Thank you,” Claire repeated, and helped herself to a spoonful of bitter melon in black bean sauce.
“Aren’t you proud of your sister?” Mom nudged me. “Maybe you’ll follow in her footsteps. Claire could tutor you on the LSAT.”
I busied myself with balancing my chopsticks on the edge of my plate. I was sixteen and I hadn’t even taken the SAT yet, let alone the LSAT.
“Have you thought about what you want to do after you finish college?” my mother pressed me.
I took a bite of pork, chewed, and swallowed. “I don’t know…Maybe work in magazine publishing?” I wasn’t even sure what that meant, but I knew I liked to read.
“Magazine publishing!” My mother widened her eyes. “You’ll never make a living doing that!” she said. “Tell her, Claire.”
“You’ll never make a living doing that,” my sister repeated, except her voice seemed flat.
Now, I touch the skin of my narrow earlobes, which are empty and bare. Unlike Claire, the model nerd teen, I ditched SAT class and didn’t get into the Ivy League. Instead of jewelry, I received my mother’s enduring disappointment, which extended to my choice of college, career, and companions. Now, in the car, I gaze at my sister’s diamonds. If diligence could sparkle, it is in the shimmer of those earrings.
At Jenny Lou’s, Claire and I each grab a basket and split ways to wander through the narrow aisles. Jenny Lou’s, J-Lou’s, J-Ho’s, call it what you will, the shop is the Beijing expat community’s lifeboat of sanity. Geraldine brought me to the store my first week at Beijing NOW, and I gasped with relief at the sight of boneless, skinless chicken breasts, the boxes of cereal and Twinings tea bags. Here, one hundred kuai notes fly freely out of our hands, spent on the things we miss the most: the tastes and textures of home. Now, I wind my way through the pasta aisle, lingering at the cheese counter to eye the hunks of Gorgonzola and wedges of Brie. I examine the rows of old and new world wine, the jars of Nutella, the produce aisle with its avocados and fresh basil.
Rumor has it that Jenny, an enterprising young woman from Anhui, once eked out a living selling fragrant bunches of dill, basil, and mint at the local wet market. Ten years later she presides over an empire, with five stores that bear her name.
I finish gathering the rest of my list, and find Claire at the cashier. She must have spent her time investigating the beverage aisle. Her basket contains:
SWEETENED GREEN TEA, 12 BOTTLES
SKIM MILK, 1 CARTON (SMALL)
SPECIAL K “LOW-CARB LIFESTYLE” CEREAL, 1 BOX
I see her glancing at my basket, her brow furrowed as if she’s having trouble adding up the calories. In my basket is:
HUNK OF PARMAGIANO-REGGIANO, CAVEMAN-SIZED
PASTA, 2 PACKETS
FULL-FAT RICOTTA CHEESE, 2 TUBS
FROZEN SPINACH, 1 BAG
EGGS, 1 DOZEN
SALTED BUTTER, 1 KILO
EXTRA VIRGIN OLIVE OIL, LARGE BOTTLE
“My, what a lot of dairy!” she exclaims, her eyes traveling down to my waistline. “Are you sure you want to…” She pauses. I can feel her weighing her words in her bossy big sister way, and resentment flares within me, hot and familiar. Why does she have to be so smug? Why do I always feel like she’s making the right choices while I’m killing myself with saturated fat?
“You’re so critical, Claire,” I snap. “Why are you always so critical?”
She shrugs and we move to separate cashiers to pay, before gathering up our groceries and riding home in silence.
It’s 2:00 P.M. I’m standing over the kitchen sink, squeezing liquid out of defrosted spinach. Geraldine asked me to bring dumplings to her moon festival party, and of course I said yes. There’s only one problem: I don’t know how to make Chinese dumplings and I don’t have an Asian cookbook. Solution? Spinach and cheese ravioli. After all, everyone knows Marco Polo stole ravioli from China.
When people find out that I like to cook, they always ask if I make Chinese food, and they’re always surprised when I say no. “Why not?” they say, raising their eyebrows, as if Chinese recipes are something passed along in the DNA, along with black hair and single-lidded eyes. It’s a question I’ve been dodging with a smile and a shrug, ever since I was eight years old and we lived next door to Melanie Stansfield.
She and I weren’t best friends or anything—she always wanted to dress up Barbies and parade them around in the dream house caravan, while I wanted to redesign their ball gowns into mini-skirts with the help of pinking shears—but we lived so close, of course we played together. I ate at Melanie’s house all the time; her mother served things like pot roast and mashed potatoes, or meat loaf. Melanie would nibble at her meal, but I always cleaned my plate, delighting in its ordinariness—it was just like the food I saw on TV. One night, in the spirit of reciprocation, my mother invited Melanie to stay for dinner. I still remember that feeling of panic, thinking: Oh please God, just let her go home.
But Melanie didn’t go home. She stayed and sat at our round kitchen table, spun the lazy Susan too fast, and watched us manipulate chopsticks while she pushed her food around with a fork and knife. Her eyes grew wide when she saw the thick-stalked, stir-fried jielan—“It’s like Chinese broccoli,” my mother said—and I thought she would scream when the steamed fish appeared, with its gaping mouth and unblinking eye. She tried a spoonful of mapo tofu, her eyes streaming as the chili caught her tender tongue, and hid a black bean sparerib in her napkin. I watched her pick at her food and felt embarrassed by the meal, which, to Melanie, was not exotic, but simply weird.
A few days later, at Melanie’s house for an after-school snack of graham crackers and milk, her mother turned to me. “What exactly do you eat for dinner at your house, Isabelle?” She eyed me appraisingly, as if noticing for the first time that I was Chinese.
“Oh, just Chinese food.” I tried to avoid specifics.
“Was that tofu that Melanie ate the other night?”
“Um, yeah. I think so.”
“Huh.” She moved away to empty the dishwasher and the topic was dropped.
After that meal, though, Melanie became distant and cool, in the cruel manner that little girls know best. She started hanging out with another neighbor, Anna Carpenter, and sometimes I would see them staring at me across the playground, whispering and giggling. At home I still ate Chinese food—I had no choice—and I enjoyed it. But each bowl of rice, each pink shrimp, with their spiny antennae and crunchy shell, each cool, creamy slab of tofu, had become a symbol of my Chineseness—the thing that made me weirdly, unquestionably, different from my peers.
By the time I had a kitchen of my own, ethnic food had become chic. As college students at NYU, my friends and I rode the 7 train to Jackson Heights and feasted on masala dosas, we saved our pennies for jars of duck confit and scoured Chinatown for delicate sprigs of lemongrass. I sampled everything—from French to Filipino—each bite a discovery. Of course, I ate Chinese food, but constant exposure as a child made it ordinary. I never craved it. And I never cooked it.
Now, I open the stained pages of my favorite cookbook, Donatella’s Italian Kitchen, which I brought from New York. I’ve experimented with almost all the recipes—except for fresh pasta, which I’ve always been eager to attempt.
I open the book. Fresh pasta sounds hard, but it’s really not that difficult, I read. Great! Once you develop a feel for the correct consistency of the dough, you will be able to make such delicious pasta that even Marco Polo would be impressed. Marco Polo again! It must be a sign.
Okay, the recipe…Three cups flour. I start hunting for a measuring cup. Hm. Not with the baking sheets, nor with the mugs. I search through all the cupboards, unearthing a stash of contact lens fluid, teeth whitening strips, and a mass of tangled yarn and sticks that’s either an abandoned knitting project or an avant-garde sculpture, I’m not sure. But no measuring cup.
Well, I’ll just have to eyeball it. It’s all about proportions anyway, right?
Grabbing a mug, I p
ile flour onto the counter, wincing as a large flurry dusts the floor white. Claire would have a heart attack over the mess, but luckily she’s not home, having sped off for a coffee with her friend Samantha immediately after we got home from the store.
I dig down into my mound of flour, scattering another shower over the tops of my sock-clad feet. Beat together the eggs, olive oil, and salt and slowly pour them over the flour. So far, so good. I start mixing everything together, trying to control the flour, which seems to have a mind of its own. Beat until the dough becomes too stiff to mix with a fork. Fork? What fork? Was I supposed to be using a fork? And why is there flour everywhere?
It’s coating the counters in powdery white. It’s cascading down to the floor, filling the air in thick clouds that are eerily reminiscent of Beijing smog. If I didn’t know better, I’d bet our kitchen had been the center of a cocaine bust.
Meanwhile, I gaze with dismay at the ball of dough that I’ve managed to pull together. Which is the size of a tomato. A grape tomato.
What am I going to do? I promised Geraldine I’d bring dumplings. The creamy, cheesy ricotta-and-spinach filling (delicious, added a dash of nutmeg) mocks me in its bowl, all mixed up with nothing to stuff. Suddenly, I have a brain wave. I grab my wallet and run downstairs to our building’s little grocery store, praying that Claire doesn’t return before I’ve had a chance to clean up the mess.
Freaking Jiminy Cricket. I’m back from the store only to find Claire standing in the middle of the kitchen, a look of sheer bewilderment wrinkling her face.
“Isabelle. What. Is. Going. On.” She grips the counter for support.
“I’m so sorry, so sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry,” I babble. “I was trying to make ravioli and the flour just got everywhere, multiplied like rabbits…” I scan her face. Is she mad?
“What are you going to do?” she whispers.
“I’m going to clean it up. I promise. I’m so sorry, Claire. Honestly, it was an accident—”