30 Evie
30 Evie
San Francisco, California
two months later
Evie has never cleaned so much in her entire life. And not just swipe-at-a-couple-windows-and-call-it-a-day kind of cleaning.
She’s been engaged in a sweaty, all-day marathon that leaves her feeling like one of those crusted-over pieces of cheese at
the bottom of a decades-old oven. Spent and disposable. But when you inherit a century-old Victorian bursting with decades
of collected artwork and knickknacks from all over the world, there’s bound to be a few pounds of dust. A spider or twenty-five.
Thankfully, Auntie H ? o’s old friends haven’t stopped dropping by with loaves of zucchini bread or bottles of zin. The most conscientious among
them usually offer an extra hand for dusting and scrubbing. Of course, most of them prove less than helpful, easily distracted
by trying on Auntie H ? o’s clothes or reminiscing over said bottle of zin. Like Priya, who took a nap in the middle of the floor that Evie was in
the midst of vacuuming. Or the screenwriter who curled into Auntie H ? o’s claw-foot tub, sobbing because he’d received a rejection from a studio while he was supposed to be Windexing the mirrors.
Evie spends more time socializing than she does cleaning, but she doesn’t mind one bit. It lifts her spirits to see the house
teeming with life again, though there is a markedly somber tone, everyone remembering the force of life that departed too
soon.
In between sobs, the screenwriter sniffled, “I love this house. It was my home, just as much as any other. Whenever I talk to anyone who knew Miss H ? o, they talk about the inspiration she gave them. She was the mother we never had; she was magic .”
Evie agreed. In fact, something small and wonderful lit behind her mind when she heard his words, like a candle sputtering
to life—an idea that only Auntie H ? o could have come up with. But driven by exhaustion and an overflow of emotion, Evie shuttled that idea away for the moment.
There would be time. Years and years in this beautiful, boisterous place.
When she arrived back in the States, she went straight to Auntie H ? o’s lawyer and got the keys to the San Francisco house. Her jet lag hadn’t even faded before she collapsed into her old bedroom
with the rosebud wallpaper and porcelain whale lamp. Her house. Her life.
There was no more talk of selling. With her newfound fame (well, as much fame as a poet might reasonably expect), she also
has enough income to keep the house for a few years and leave teaching until she figures out what’s next. Granted, it’s much
too big for one person. And the money won’t last forever. But those are problems for another day.
Atlas took the news of her departure remarkably well. He asked if she might be open to a “long-distance, unlatched affair
between kindreds,” which she took to be a petition for an open relationship. She responded with a resounding no, not because
of the open relationship part, but because of the Atlas part. Still, he’d had the generosity to arrange for movers to pack
her few belongings in Midland and ship them to her in California.
Lillian had been equal parts dismayed and—once she realized that West Coast winery vacations were now on the horizon—overjoyed.
Last Evie heard, Lancaster Small had taken over her old position. She sent him congratulations, which he did not respond to.
Her old world moves steadily along without her, but there is a rightness to this.
She’s exactly where she belongs.
After cleaning, Evie takes a long, hot shower, then dries her hair and puts on her favorite outfit. A Wednesday Addams–style dress that cinches at the waist, along with a pair of ankle boots and one of Auntie H ? o’s long gold necklaces. She’s attending another reading today, but this time, she’s the headliner. There’s a sign for her
and everything.
After things took off with her last book, she decided that she would live bravely, if she couldn’t love bravely. She says yes to any opportunity within reason, like speaking on podcasts, delivering
speeches at conferences, and—most important for her career—signing a six-figure, two-book contract with her publisher for
both another poetry collection and a memoir, something she has no experience with but is determined to learn by taking one
of the many writing workshops in the Bay Area. Her classmates always gape a little when they recognize her name, but soon
realize she is just as clueless as the rest of them.
The night of the reading, the small bookstore is crowded with people. At least half are already seated for her, she notes
with a flutter of pride. At first, she felt guilty that she’d benefited so much from what she considered essentially a fluke.
But soon, with coaching from Lillian and Fen, who’s still gallivanting around the world with Mei between filming, Evie learned
to take it in stride. To ride the wave for as long as she can. After all, that’s the only thing you can do in an industry
that changes like the tides.
Onstage at the bookstore, she reads her most popular poem, the one the former First Lady quoted, along with a few others,
including the crowd favorite, a limerick about one of Auntie H ? o’s raucous parties. Looking out onto the crowd, she sees listeners leaning forward, nodding, smiling.
A few are her neighbors, Auntie H ? o’s old friends and now hers, beaming with such pride that Evie fights back a few tears. They’re all clutching copies of her book. The validation feels fantastic, of course, but it’s more than that. She feels at last as if she’s come into the life
she’s always hoped for.
And yet.
There’s a dull and insistent throbbing in her heart. A sense of having left something important behind. It had begun on the
shores of H ? i An, and months later, that feeling never, ever dissipates.
At the Q&A after the reading, a man in a fedora who reminds her of ?? c asks, “What are you working on next?”
Evie takes a sip from her miniature water bottle. “I’m writing another poetry collection inspired by my recent travels in
Vi ? t Nam. I went on a matchmaking tour that my late aunt set up. Maybe you know of her.”
The crowd chuckles.
Someone else asks, “What was the best thing you did in Vi ? t Nam?”
She doesn’t know what prompts her to say it, but she does, summoning all her honesty and vulnerability. “Falling in love.
It was also the most surprising thing. But what I’ve learned is that the best moments are the ones that happen when you’re
fully in the moment. The best connections are the ones that happen in good faith, when two people allow each other to become
radically vulnerable with each other. Love, friendship. Art. It’s only possible when you allow yourself to leap.”
There’s a sigh around the room, an anticipation for a story with a happy ending, which most of us secretly want, even if we’re
not willing to admit it aloud.
Then a woman stands up at the back of the room. Evie squints through the glare of the lights, then recognizes the brush of
blond hair. That dignified and rigid frame, a five-foot-seven steel rod. She gasps.
Grace Lang gives her a smile, one that’s warm yet laced with regret. “Whatever happened with that love story, Evie?”
The way her mother says her name, heavy with affection, makes the audience wheel toward her. They take in Grace’s cocked head,
as well as Evie’s visible shock. Their eyes ping-pong from mother to daughter.
Evie studies her mother. Her hair has grown a bit longer. Her clothes, more colorful. But it’s Grace. In San Francisco. The
woman who once vowed never to leave their tiny hometown got on a plane for her .
Pride swells in Evie, for both herself and her mother.
Evie takes a breath. “I wish I knew. There are no guarantees—even on a love tour.”
The room sighs again, this time with a little sadness. People who read poetry know something about heartbreak.
Grace nods and slides back into her chair. Later, after the reading and the signings, the grateful handshakes, and that rush of exhausted triumph, Evie finds her mother standing near a display of Auntie H?o’s Cabinet of Curiosities .
“Want to see my house, Mom?” she asks.
And, as if they haven’t spent years apart, communicating mostly through fragmented emails, Grace holds her hand out to her
daughter. They walk out of the bookstore together.
On the narrow back patio, over glasses of pinot, they discuss Grace’s lightly unpleasant plane ride (“A man took his shoes off next to me. I could see his toenails! They needed clipping, Evie!”) and Evie’s memoir. Grace is curious about everything,
willing to fill in the gaps where she can. Evie is impressed by how much she remembers, but she shouldn’t be. No one has marked
Danh Lang’s life with more love and attention than her mother.
“I wish Auntie H ? o had left journals or photos—something,” Evie sighs. “She never spoke much of her childhood.”
“Ah, you’ve reminded me.”
Grace reaches into her bag and hands something to Evie. A photograph.
When Evie flips it over, she sees Auntie H ? o as a girl, her arm slung around the shoulders of another teen, a boy wearing a polo shirt and pants rolled up to the shins.
Both are barefoot, standing on a boulder in front of a mountain. There’s a picnic at their feet. The sun in the photo, plus
the years of age, blows out all the shadows, so what remains are the wide smiles and dark heads, leaning toward each other.
It’s hard to make out their faces beyond that.
“Is that Dad?” Evie whispers.
Grace shakes her head. “This is Auntie H ? o’s best friend and first love. They went to secondary school together. Their families were neighbors. In the eighties, though,
your father’s family had the chance to emigrate to the States. The man begged Auntie H ? o to stay with him, but she wanted to see the world. She wanted to go to college and make her way—which she did.
“She always meant to send back for him. For years, she would dream about having him by her side. But I think she was scared
of what he would say. Whether he could forgive her. By the time she wrote, he’d already married another woman. Had a couple
of children. It broke Auntie H ? o’s heart. She refused to return to their hometown because it would mean having to face her heartbreak. All the regrets. She
never spoke about him again. I think she always blamed herself for waiting too long to admit her feelings.”
Love bravely.
So Auntie H ? o had a great love too, one so immense that it drowned out any longing for another person. She wasn’t the example. She was
the cautionary tale.
“How do you know all this?” Evie asks. It’s hard to believe Auntie H ? o would have confided in Grace.
“Your father told me. He was concerned for his sister. Worried about her unprocessed pain, I suppose. If you muffle an emotion
for too long—even a difficult one, like grief—it makes you hard. But now I know that if you let any emotion take over, like
I did with my fear, it transforms you into a smaller version of yourself.”
“I know, Mom. I understand.”
Evie watches her mother wipe a tear away. She fidgets with her wedding ring, which she still wears, two decades later.
Grace says, “I found this photo in his papers after he died, though I never showed you.”
“Why not?”
Grace presses her lips together. “It wasn’t my secret to tell.”
“I see.”
Grace sighs. “But to be honest, I think I was jealous of your relationship with Auntie H ? o. And maybe even a little bit jealous of how close you and your dad were. I know H ? o was more adventurous and fun-loving. And she saw a side of you that I couldn’t embrace at the time, I guess, in all my grief
over your father.”
“I was grieving too.”
“Sweetie, I know. Evie, I’m so sorry. Seeing your name everywhere made me realize how little I understood you. How few attempts
I made to connect. What you said in the bookstore about leaps? I was never ready for the leap. But I am now. I read everything
you wrote. It was like seeing a curtain drawn back on your heart.”
“I would have loved to share so much with you, Mom. And to get to know you. We were both so lonely.”
“I wish I could do it all over again.”
The night is descending, and Evie can only see shadows on her mother’s face, flickering in the glow of the tea lights. Grace
looks tired, but softer. Evie thinks that if she were to glance in the mirror, she might resemble her mother, even though
everyone always said she took after her father’s side of the family.
Evie reaches over and squeezes her mother’s hand. “It’s okay, Mom. We can get to know each other now.”
Grace is surprised. “You think? It’s not too late?”
“Sure,” Evie answers with a crooked smile. “As long as we’re alive, there’s still enough time for everything.”
“Even mothers who have years to make up for?”
“Especially those. Daughters too.”
“And you’ll tell me about the matchmaking tour?”
“I’ll tell you everything.”
They light a citronella candle and pour another glass of wine. Fireflies hum in the night. Somewhere nearby, a party starts
up on someone’s deck, music streaming into their ears. The city is waking up, like a child after a long sleep, raising her
hands to stretch.
Looking at her mother, Evie reflects that maybe when Auntie H ? o talked about loving bravely, she wasn’t just talking about romantic love. These days, Evie’s found a way to love many people, in many ways. Lillian and Fen, Talia and the rest of the tour guests, even Atlas with his irrepressible curiosity and flamboyant zest for life. Her life is fuller than it’s ever been. It’s not the happily ever after Auntie H ? o likely imagined for her, but it isn’t a miserable life. Far from it.
Still, Evie can’t ignore the gnawing pain inside her, her desire to talk about Adam. How he appears in nearly every dream
with his smile, his touch. How her longing for him is so acute that sometimes, even standing amid a crowd, she looks over
her shoulder, as if he’ll appear.
Among all the regrets of her life, she hates that she left him without saying goodbye. Perhaps she was scared he’d convince
her to stay. Or perhaps she wasn’t nearly as brave as she thought. Her decision to return to the States fills her with pride
and shame in equal measure. She doesn’t regret embracing her future—but she regrets that she never fully closed the door on
the fleeting, breathtaking love story they could have had.
The night has just begun, and Evie, sitting across from Grace, finds another opening in her heart. She lets her mother in.