Twenty-One
Unbelievably, I still have to go to school the next day.
I brush my hair and shrug on my blazer and pack my lunch as if everything is normal. But I pay more attention now. I finish
the entire bowl of congee my mom makes for me and ask for seconds, with more pork floss and century-egg slices on top. (“Has
my cooking improved?” she marvels, to which I answer, “Of course!”) I wave at my dad on the way out.
The sky is a pure, perfect blue, and I pay attention to that too, the feeling of the sun on my face, even though my bag is
weighed down by homework and mock papers.
My first class is art. I don’t realize how much I’ve missed it until I’m sitting at my usual table, my paints and paintings
spread out in front of me. All of my self-portraits have been restored to what they were before, my face showing, every brushstroke
in place.
“Morning.”
I spin around at the familiar voice. It’s Leela, her ponytail swinging over her shoulder as she drops into the other seat,
and I can’t stop myself. I reach out and pull her into a crushing hug.
“Oh my god,” she says, laughing, but she hugs me back. “What’s with the sudden display of affection?”
“I just had a bad dream,” I say, squeezing her arm. “I’m still a little spooked.”
She snorts. “Is it as bad as that dream you had where Old Keller transformed into a spider and started scuttling around on
your desk so you couldn’t finish your English essay?”
“You still remember that?”
“Um, yeah , you traumatized the hell out of me with that story.” She shudders, then pulls back to study me. “Why are you smiling so
wide?”
“Am I?”
“Very wide,” she says. Then she glances over at the self-portraits and claps her hands together. “ That’s what I was looking for. Of course.”
“What?”
“It’s so weird,” she murmurs, “but the other day, I suddenly thought of this series of paintings I loved. I had like, the
vaguest impression of them; I couldn’t even tell you what they were about, only the feeling I would get when I looked at them,
like this—this tightness in my chest, right where my heart is. It drove me mad that I couldn’t remember who the artist was
and what they were called. I even tried to Google it. But this is it. It’s your paintings I was searching for. Have they been here the whole time?”
“Yeah,” I say. “The whole time.”
“I really love them,” she says. “Like, genuinely.”
“That’s good, because I was thinking of adding another self-portrait to the series.”
But this self-portrait is different.
I start on the sketch, shaping my nose, my eyes, the contours of my cheekbones. I’m not looking directly ahead or up at something I can’t have, but at someone over my shoulder, and I’m smiling. The colors are softer, plum-purple and pale lavender and carnation pink for the collar of my dress, buttermilk yellow for the sunlight streaming in behind me, old rose for the shadows under my collarbones. I mix and blend the paints and run my brush across the canvas and it’s like the world disappears. I don’t even realize the period is over until Leela nudges me, giggling.
“Looks like someone’s come to see you.”
“Who?” I ask.
The answer is waiting by the door, hair falling perfectly over his eyes, his eyes falling straight on me. He’s holding his
books in one arm, the other propped against the frame. He looks so beautiful that I can’t believe he’s waiting for me.
I make my way toward him, and I’m surprised to find him grinning. “Hi,” I say, uncertain.
“Hello,” he says, then leans in. My heartbeat skyrockets, but he stops inches away from my ear and whispers, “You have paint
on your face.”
I shove him back, and he’s laughing. “I thought you were going to start being nicer to me,” I grumble, mortified.
“What do you mean? That was nice of me,” he says. “Or else you would’ve headed off to English with red smudged on your cheek.”
I wipe my face roughly. “Still there?”
“Yes. I think you made it worse.”
People are moving around us, streaming in and out of the classroom. A few girls pause to sneak not-so-discreet glances at
him.
Aaron doesn’t seem to notice them. “Let me,” he whispers. “Don’t move.”
I couldn’t move if I wanted to. I’m too nervous, frozen to the ground as he brings his thumb to my cheek and swipes it very
gently over my skin. I hope he can’t feel me trembling.
“There,” he tells me. “All better now.”
We’re gathering at Jessica’s house again on Saturday.
We bring braised beef this time, and a bag of fresh mangoes. When the door opens, I smile up at my aunt and greet her without
thinking, “Hi, Mom.” Then immediately wince at my mistake. Some habits really are too easy to form.
My mom pokes my forehead. “Xia jiao shenme ne? Your mom’s behind you.”
“Sorry,” I apologize to them both. “I, uh, was just kidding—”
“Jenna is so funny,” my aunt says cooperatively. “Young people and their sense of humor these days.”
“Yes, yes, just hilarious,” my mom mutters, poking me again.
“We have mangoes for you,” my dad offers.
“Aiya, you’re too polite,” Auntie says, as she always does. “I tell you every time, you really don’t have to bring anything....”
“How could we come empty-handed?” my mom protests.
This process repeats itself a few times before we finally make it into the house.
“Jessica’s out in the yard, by the way,” Auntie tells me. “She should be happy to see you.”
I’m not sure the latter is true, but I do find her sitting on the back porch, ankles crossed, hair blowing back in the breeze, the kind of graceful I could never fully emulate, even with her body. At the sound of my footsteps, she turns her head a fraction toward me, her eyes wary. It still feels strange, to have her here, this blood-and-flesh person, this separate entity from me. It feels like I’m looking at myself, or looking at another version of myself.
“You’re here,” she says.
I hesitate, then move to join her, encouraged when she does not protest. “How has... everything been?”
“Good.” She tucks her hair behind her ears. “Strange. I don’t know. I’m not sure if it’s just my imagination, but people are
treating me... differently. Lachlan and his friends don’t seem to like me much.”
I grimace. “That’s, uh, my bad.”
“No, it’s fine. I never liked them much either,” she says with a little smile, and I feel myself relax. “And I don’t really
mind how other people are acting now. Like I’m—a real person, you know what I mean? I didn’t feel fully real before. I didn’t
think I would ever have a chance to.”
Another breeze floats past us. I lift my head up, letting it fan my face.
“You know what used to bother me most about you?” I ask.
“What?” she says.
“You were proof,” I tell her, and only when the words are out do I realize how true they are, how long I’ve been carrying
them. “You were proof that it was my fault.”
She frowns. “I don’t get it.”
“If people didn’t like me,” I explain, “or if I didn’t get a particular offer or acceptance letter or award, if I was excluded or ignored or underestimated, if I didn’t get the life I wanted... I could only blame myself for not being good enough, because you were there. You came from the same city, the same family, and you managed to achieve everything I couldn’t. It was simple,
really: you were successful, and I wasn’t, so either I was doing something wrong, or there was something wrong with me.” It’s
still a little embarrassing to admit, to draw out the clear differences in our lives and point at everything she did better,
but the pain I’m braced for doesn’t come. Steadily, I continue, “You were, like, the better version of me that I could never
be. You were what everyone else thought I should be. You were the standard.”
Jessica blows out a long breath and stretches her legs over the grass, processing this. “God. Jenna, that’s...”
“But I didn’t realize how lonely being used as the standard was,” I say. “How hard it was for you. How utterly exhausting that gets. I was so caught up in feeling jealous and insecure that I didn’t even think about it. I just assumed... I assumed
all the wrong things. I’m sorry.”
She’s silent for a moment. Then she makes a soft, half-choked sound. “I’m sorry too. I knew people compared us sometimes,
and I knew it must have bothered you, but I—I didn’t know how to talk to you. I was scared that I’d only make things worse.”
Her voice grows smaller. “That you wouldn’t want to be around me anymore.”
I blink. “You were worried about that?”
“Of course,” she says. “You’re my cousin.”
“We have other cousins,” I point out. “We have at least a dozen, I’m pretty sure. Another one was born just last year. And
they’re all very nice—except maybe Liuwen. He still won’t admit to stealing my money from the spring festival.”
Her eyes widen. “Hey, he stole my red pocket money too.”
“Oh my god. So he has this whole criminal business going on.”
“Evidently,” she says, with such indignation that we both pause, and dissolve into laughter. “You see,” she adds. “I might have other
cousins, but you’re my favorite cousin. Just don’t tell the others at the next big reunion.”
“Don’t tell them that you’re my favorite cousin too,” I say, and I find that I really do mean it. “And not just because you’re
super smart or most likely to buy a mansion and invite me to visit your home theater or whatever. But because you make the
most incredible lemon cookies, and you always give the best fashion advice, and I can trust you to come with me to take back
our red pocket money.”
“I’m very honored.”
“You should be.”
When our laughter subsides again, she offers me a tentative sort of smile. “So... no hard feelings?”
“That depends on you. Have you forgiven me for taking control over your body and ruining your perfect streak across every
subject?”
“I can’t believe it. I can’t believe this is real life, that we’re even having this conversation. But yeah. Yes.” She hesitates, tracing a line in the gap between the planks. “You know, I spoke with Cathy yesterday about her essay thesis, and... I’m going to confess.”
“What?” My head jerks up. “Are you sure?”
“I’ve already made up my mind,” Jessica says. Sighs. “Even if nobody had found out, it’s been gnawing at me ever since I did
it. I—I don’t know what I was thinking, honestly.”
“You were under a lot of pressure.”
“Yeah, but it was still wrong,” she says quietly. “I just don’t want to start at Harvard in the fall carrying this awful secret
with me. I don’t want to pretend. I’m too exhausted to go on the way I have these past years. I’ve burned through all I have
to offer, and I’ve run out of fuel. And if they revoke my acceptance because of it...” She swallows. “Then I’ll learn to
live with that, somehow. I thought I needed to be the kind of person who’d sacrifice anything for success . I thought sacrifice was a good thing, that it proved you were determined, dedicated. But there are some things I have to keep for myself. Like, my integrity.
Like my dignity. My sanity.”
“That’s... really brave,” I tell her.
Surprise dances across her face. “I don’t think anyone’s called me that before.”
“You are,” I say firmly. “And no matter how it goes, I’ll be here.”
She smiles. “I know.”
I smile too, and set my eyes on her garden. The lavender has started to bloom, the magnificent purple petals rising above a sea of silvery-green leaves, all of it as beautiful as a painting. “I’m going to miss this yard. And this porch,” I muse aloud. “I miss my own bedroom a lot more, though.”
“If you ever miss it, you’re always welcome here,” Jessica says. “We’re family.”
And I’ve never felt so grateful for it, so happy that we’re related, that when we all moved here from Tianjin we took a piece
of home with us. That thousands of miles away, we can still have gatherings, and homemade food, and fussing parents and petty
arguments and inside jokes.
“Jenna!” My mother calls from inside the house, and my grin widens. “Jessica! Wash your hands—it’s time to eat.”
“Okay, coming,” I yell back.
“Hurry up, the noodles are sticking.”
I push onto my feet and hold out a hand to Jessica. She takes it, straightening her plaid skirt in one quick, elegant motion,
and as we walk back into the house together, the living room warm and hazy with steam, our mothers adding last-minute pinches
of cut coriander and chives to the dishes, our fathers setting the floral-patterned bowls down around the table one by one,
it’s like we’re kids again, back when we’d play outside before dinner and fold tiny stars out of paper. Make a wish, Jessica would always tell me, and I always did.
But right now, there’s nothing else I’d wish for except this.