by Gish Jen
— Did you know? he asks her.
— My father said my mother ran away and then died, she says in this low voice, sort of between regular and a whisper. — Of, how do you say. Brain tumor. Long long time ago.
She’s pretty pale too, they’re like a perfect match.
— She swam to Hong Kong, says Dad. With a basketball under each arm. And from there this relative helped her. The same one who sent this book.
— Basketball?
— Two, says Dad. Two basketballs. One under each arm.
Nobody says anything for a while, and so I say: — Wow.
— And so what happened to the number-two husband? says Lanlan. Did she leave him too?
You can hear everything in the house that hums then. Like the fridge, and the radiators, and the timer that turns the living room light on.
— No, he died in an accident, says Dad. I always just assumed he was my father.
He cracks his knuckles.
— Adopted! he says.
— Who’s adopted? I say.
— Me, he says. How do you like them apples.
He looks strange, like one corner of his face got caught on a fish hook.
— How lucky! I say.
The sweat beads are getting bigger.
— Second choice doesn’t mean second-best, I say. It’s just how things happened.
— A joke, he says. Haha. A joke. Why didn’t my mother tell me? How could she not have told me?
LAN / He kept saying that. But doesn’t everyone have things they want to forget? It’s only natural.
WENDY / — And why did your father never tell you? he asks Lanlan. — Why did he tell you she was dead?
— Maybe he did not want to talk about such unhappy things, says Lanlan. We had so much unhappiness already. Maybe he thought I was not strong enough to know. And anyway, what use was it?
LAN / I said that because my family was from Suzhou, we were still Suzhouren. Even if my mother was from Sichuan, we were still from Suzhou. A very nice place.
We looked for my name at the end of the book, just to see it. And sure enough, there it was. Lin Lan.
Then I began to feel strange too.
WENDY / Lizzy comes in so we have to explain the whole thing all over again, it’s like we have to convince her, she just can’t believe it. Meanwhile Lanlan stares and stares at the book like she sort of gets the characters but not what they mean exactly.
LIZZY / Dad was like the opposite. Shocked, but then inspecting the book. Asking for translation. Pointing things out.
— Is that where my name would be? he asked Lanlan. Right next to yours?
— Of course, we do not even know that everything in the book is true, said Lanlan.
— You are in denial, I said.
— Denial? she said. What means ‘denial’?
She put her hand on her potbelly. Her nails shone.
LAN / — Younger brother, I said. Then I said it in Chinese. Di di.
He put his head in his hands.
— At least you are not my real brother, I said. At least we are not like brother and sister, grew up together. It is just our names put together in the book.
CARNEGIE / And yet how much more natural, in the end, to be married to Blondie.
A joke!
WENDY / — I think it’s great you were adopted, I say again.
But no one says anything back, Lizzy is looking at the two of them and thinking who knows what.
— Don’t think anything, Lanlan says to Lizzy. Nothing to think about.
And she starts flipping through the book, reading all the characters like it’s the easiest thing now.
— Look how many sons were give away to other families to carry on their line, she says. Look! In this generation, only one family had sons, all the rest had to adopt a son from somewhere else. Maybe your mother didn’t tell you because so many families are adopt sons all the time. Who is going to carry on the family name if she does not adopt you, right? Really, she has no choice. Nothing to discuss.
— Maybe your mother didn’t tell you because she thought it would make you feel bad, I say.
LAN / — Chinese people try not to make people feel bad, I said. We try to talk about something nice.
CARNEGIE / — That was Mama Wong all right. Never one to say something that might make someone feel bad, I said.
WENDY / The sweat beads are like running down in little streams now. He’s this weird color I’ve never seen him turn before, and his face has that hooked look again and he sounds like he can’t talk.
LAN / My mother! I asked if I could see a picture of her, but no one answered, that’s how strange Carnegie looked. That’s how pale.
LIZZY / — Are you okay, Dad? I asked. Dad! Are you okay?
WENDY / Mom used to say that once when I was little I sat on the stairs with her and asked if she would die, and when she said that she would, I cried and cried and said I didn’t like dying and that if she died I would come and shake her and make her wake up. And when she said that might not work, but that there might be a heaven, she wasn’t sure, some people thought so, I said I would go and find her there, but how could I find her? And she said it would be easy because she would stand in the very most obvious place, all I had to do was think what the most obvious place would be. And I said, in the garden, and she said okay, it was a deal, she would meet me in the garden.
But now I look at Dad and think where am I going to meet him? We never said where we were going to meet, and so I shake him and shake him and say, Dad! You have to wake up! You have to wake up! You have to wake up! Dad! Dad! And his eyes do open but they look so weird especially compared to his eyebrows which look the same. And when he says, My medicine, it’s as if he is making his voice funny for fun, except that he’s not joking when he says, Call 911. Although he does also tell us to tell the ambulance not to stop at Dunkin’ Donuts.
— Tell them this time of day there are no more Munchkins anyway, he says.
And: — Don’t shake me please, can’t you see I’m already shaken?
And: — You’ll always be my peanut. Don’t forget. Don’t forget.
CARNEGIE / They say you can’t remember open-heart surgery, how could I possibly remember a thing? Maybe the ambulance ride, so much bumpier than you’d expect, and everything rattles, and it’s amazing how slow cars are to get out of the way, apparently, because what you feel is not how fast the ambulance is going but how often the driver hits the brakes, again and again and again, thank god the EMT is there to protect you, where did they get this driver? And how many unconscious patients must be jolted back awake by the noise of the siren! You know you’re still alive because it’s giving you a headache, and besides, you feel the urge to drive yourself. At least tell them the best way to go. This time of day I wouldn’t take Route 2, I say. Everything happening so fast and so slow, the snapshots already out of order: the face of the EMT, so much more interested than you’d expect, given how many emergencies he saw a day, I’d guess four or five, or was that wildly off? And Lizzy’s round face when they slid me like a pizza into a pizza oven. Lan’s thinner face and great posture. And Wendy’s face, the thinnest, how hard it was to believe she had been such a fat baby. How teeny she seemed, disappearing behind my huge feet, my enormous feet, teenier even than Bailey would’ve seemed, if Bailey were there, because Bailey would’ve been held up by someone, whereas there was Wendy on her own feet. Teeny. Though that wasn’t why soccer wasn’t her sport, it just wasn’t. Where was Blondie? I thought. Blondie. Bailey. All I could hear was Wendy’s child-sized voice, dwarfed by my sheet-draped feet. Asking, Should I tell Mom?
— Tell Mom, yes! I shout, as best I can with the oxygen mask already over my mouth. The rubble of an earthquake mounded on my chest. — Tell Mom to take care of you! I try to tell the EMT, in case she can’t hear me. — Tell her to tell her mom. Take care of her. Tell her.
— Relax, he says. Relax. Is this your first heart attack? Don’t try to talk. Just nod
or shake your head.
I nod.
— Good, he says.
— I want to go back, I tell him. My son. I need to call my wife.
But he just says: — Try to enjoy the ride; I’m giving you a little something.
Maybe I really did remember all that, but could I have remembered the emergency room, people pounding on my chest and yelling yelling and more people running in and yes the decision yes to open my chest and yes massage my heart yes? Of course I was under, and yet I have an impression of it all the same, no doubt from movies and M*A*S*H: the klieg lights, the veins found, the sensors stuck on, and not to forget the dozens of extras, all crowding around, squeezing your hand, delivering their big line. Okay, we’re moving you onto the table now. Just a pinch. This will be cold. You’re going to be okay. How’s the weather out there? You got to love the new tunnel. A warm blanket; the cold cold O.R. The lights, the radio, the surgeon’s eyes behind his glasses, and everyone splattered by the end like a butcher.
Of course I didn’t see it, and yet I knew it later, vividly, the surprise was what my body knew—things it had never known before, my bruised and broken body, my pried-apart limbs; how punctured and be-tubed. Fluids in, fluids out, intake, outtake, meds and nurses, meds and doctors, visitors and dreams, all I could think was, I suppose I really am no longer young, to which Mama Wong said, Young! Of course not young, how could you be young! But you never grow up either! That’s how I know I brought you up Chinese and still you grow up American.
Mom! I said. You’re better.
Of course I’m better, what did you think? I was going to stay like an idiot forever?
Mom, I said. I had my heart attack. I got attacked by my heart.
Your heart was always problem, she said. From the beginning I say so—no drive, number one. Number two, have to rescue everyone. Even I am dead, look how you try to rescue me. For what? What kind of joke is that?
Mom, I said. Do you know this poem?
We the living, we’re passing travelers:
it’s in death alone that we return home.
Of course I know it, you think I have no culture? she said. You will never know how much I know.
I was going to be okay, but they were sending me back to the O.R., why were they were sending me back to the O.R.? Suddenly there was Lizzy saying they had to leave Bailey, Bailey wasn’t allowed to come, good luck though, we all love you, and then there was Lan’s voice, I thought, saying what? Was she whispering? And Wendy saying, We hope you live, then Blondie telling her not to say that, she shouldn’t say that, and Wendy crying and saying I couldn’t hear her anyway and what did that mean, ‘unconscious’? Did that mean I was being kept alive? And was that Blondie’s voice then telling her it was okay, even if I could hear I wouldn’t mind? I hoped it was Blondie’s, but then it was Lan’s, and then they were all gone, and I couldn’t say good-bye, I just wanted to remember what I could remember while I could. Why did everything hurt? Bailey’s first full sentence—Dad go away. Followed by Mommy mine! Mommy mine! How Lizzy’s arm hung stiff beside her after her tetanus shot, how she wouldn’t let anyone even see it, and yet how she played still with her dolls and blocks and shopping cart. Played and played, with one arm. How old was she then? And Wendy, demanding Read book! I want Lizzy read book! Insisting, when we couldn’t see the moon, Lizzy find! Lizzy find moon! Telling us, I don’t like dying. Asking, What will happen when everyone on the earth is dead? And, When I have babies, will you be my grandpa? And there was Lan at her computer; and there, Blondie dividing perennials in the garden. Now who can I give this to?
And there I stood at the kitchen sink, licking the peach juice off my hands before washing them, of course I had to wash them, but first I had to get all the juice. It was a beautiful afternoon.
We were lucky! Now you think so. All that time you act like you want to be something else; now you wish you were FOB. That is because you know the end of the story. At the beginning of the story, you do not know what is happen, you don’t feel so happy, believe me.
On the other hand, sometimes we get up early in the morning, just me and my small son, and I feel this is a big life. Sometimes I think how many people are bored, and how we are not bored. We are going somewhere; we are going, going. I made up my mind about it already, and I know. We are going up. You can be rich in money, and of course, this is good. But you can be rich in story, and this is good too. Sometimes I think people just want to be rich in money because money make their life a story.
Ma, I say. I got the book, and it turns out I’m not even your son.
Only an American boy would read something and think, Oh, that must be true. As if true is that simple!
So what is the truth? I say. Tell me before I go back to my family.
Your so-called family, she says, with a laugh.
My family, I insist.
She laughs again.
Lan is your daughter.
My long-lost daughter.
And I?
She laughs. Who you are if you are not my son?
I love Blondie, you know, I say. That’s another joke. I married the love wife.
Then how can she be the love wife? Tell me.
And what about Lan? I might have married her, you know. If Blondie divorced me.
Another wrong wife!
Ma. Weren’t you the one who sent her to me, from your grave? A second wife? A love wife?
Laughter.
It seemed natural enough, I say.
Natural! she exclaims. On the other hand, marry Blondie not so natural either.
What is, then?
Nothing is natural, she laughs. Nothing.
This is a joke, I say.
She laughs and laughs. No one is so easy to surprise as an American, she says. Let me ask you, now, honest way. How can you be my son?
How can I not be? I say, after a moment. After all, you wrecked my life.
Ah! Now you are like real Chinese! See some big joke.
Stay, I say. Mom. Don’t go. Stay.
But she does not answer.
Come back, I say. How can I wreck my life by myself?
You doing fine by yourself, she says. Anyway, I am not your mother, talk to you. Of course not.
What do you mean?
Look how you love me, she says. How can I be your mother, you love me like that?
But I do, I say. I do.
Then I am not Mama Wong, she says. Do you see?
I see and I don’t see, I say. I see and I don’t.
Good! See and don’t see, say and don’t say, know and don’t know. That is the natural way.
What do you mean?
Listen, she says. I was not your mother. You were not my son.
But that’s not true.
Okay then. I was your mother. You were my son.
That’s not—
Exactly!
I thought you said, A child should say this is my mother, period. This is my father, period.
Otherwise family look like not real, I said.
I thought you said—
Since when do you listen to me anyway?
Since—
What you listen is your own fault! I am dead! Don’t blame on me!
But—
I am dead! I am dead! I am dead! Do you hear me? Dead!
But—
Shut up, she says. Go! No but.
But—
Two wives are always trouble, I can tell you that.
But—
Go, she says. The way you hang around, looks like I am the love wife. Go!
But—
What’s the matter with Lily Lee? That’s what I want to know.
Ma—
Go! Go!
WENDY / The waiting room is full of people waiting and waiting. Nobody says live or die, everybody talks about making it. Did he make it? Did he make it? And we talk that way too. We hope he makes it. We hope he makes it.
We talk about the other people.
We talk about the c
afeteria.
We talk about the shop downstairs.
But mostly we don’t say much. Mostly we hope, and wait for when we’ll know what we’ll know. And I guess that will be it. This world can disappear like any other, that’s what Great-grandma Dotie used to say, but anyway, right now, here we are. Bailey and Lizzy and Lanlan and Mom and me. We’re eating chips, we’re watching TV, we’re taking Bailey to the bathroom. We’re doing somersaults, and shooting fire, and playing birthday party.
— I am three! Bailey tells us. Not two! Three!
Nobody stares at us, I guess it’s obvious we’re together.
Waiting.
One corner of the waiting room is ours because that’s where we put our stuff, by the window. We take up five seats, but Bailey just uses his to jump off of. Mom sits across from Lanlan and her tummy. They both have snacks for Bailey, and Bailey takes snacks from them both. They both play with Bailey, and Bailey plays with them both. But it’s like they’re on opposite sides of the earth instead of in the same little corner, if one of them walks in front of the other, the other looks down. Mom’s eyes barely even look blue anymore.
It’s hard to believe you could ever call either one of them a love anything.
But these are our seats, there are no other seats, the waiting room is crowded. On the other hand, if we leave, no one takes them, I notice. Because they’re our family’s.
Mostly we don’t leave anyway. Mostly we sit, minute after minute, watching the same clock, here in the corner of the waiting room that is where our family sits. Soon we will know, soon we will know, soon we will know something.
In the meantime, the family book is mine, I think. Does anyone even remember that? Mama Wong left it to me. Though of course I’m going to share it.
When the sun gets too bright, we pull the shade.
And just that second the surgeon appears, a silhouette in the doorway.
— Well, we went into extra innings, he says. But we made it.
We made it! How we cheer and cheer then, wildly, all of us—cheer and cheer, our whole family, together. Hooray! We made it! We went into extra innings, but we made it!