American Panda: Chapters 7–11

Next thing I knew, she was grabbing the arm of Dr. Chang’s office chair and yanking it toward her in a flourish.

Nicolette looked at her for a moment, piecing it together, then sat with gusto.

“How can you be a doctor if you’re like this?”
Dr. Chang and I exchanged a glance. Then she said, more to me than Nicolette, “You compartmentalize. It’s doable. You’ll learn, Mei.”

I laughed. Instead of revulsion, which my mother had led me to believe was the only possible response to my loud, openmouthed “man-laugh,” Darren grinned at me—genuinely, I think, since it reached his eyes.

If I told him I was also going to be Course Seven, he would expect us to gush about biology together, in which it would inevitably be revealed that I actually hated it.

Seeing his fervor, I blurted out, “I love your passion.”

Maybe incite some fights over whether the Logs or the Chorallaries are better—or maybe just commit all-out blasphemy by saying a capella sucks.

Maybe incite some fights over whether the Logs or the Chorallaries are better—or maybe just commit all-out blasphemy by saying a capella sucks.

Maybe incite some fights over whether the Logs or the Chorallaries are better—or maybe just commit all-out blasphemy by saying a capella sucks.

I coughed out her sickly sweet perfume and rubbed my tongue against my palate to get rid of the acrid taste.

In the ensuing silence, during which I could hear my own heartbeat, Năinai’s eyes glazed over as they always did before a flare-up of her dementia.

I could never compare with “most excellent,” zuì yōuxiù Xing, who was the coveted eldest son of the eldest son.

My brain flooded with memories. Xing reenacting Sailor Moon episodes with me. Xing buying Horny for me because my parents had been too frugal.

Even after all that had transpired, she had taken the high road.

I ran over on the heels of my father, hoping to be able to do something, even if it was merely being a buffer.

“Xing, your mother and I are so disappointed in you. If you marry her, that will be it. No chance of reconciliation. Forget our address, our faces, our names. You’re dead to us.”

Năinai was more lucid than I’d seen in a long time.

As a child I’d had a hard time imagining this austere stranger loving Kit Kats—better known to my family as Yéye táng, or grandfather candy.

Năinai paid her respects first, as always, and completed her version of worship while seated, refusing to give her late husband more. I suspected Năinai kowtowed only to stay in the ancestors’ good graces.

My parents had just finagled a copy of Xing’s senior-year transcript, which had taken many phone calls, too many threats, and probably some misdemeanors since Xing had made sure the transcript was never to be sent home.

Without opening my eyes, I knew the unwelcome visitor was Năinai—the only person with the gall elderly status to regularly intrude on her sleeping hosts in the hopes of waking someone to keep her company.

The only way my father knew how to express himself to Yéye was through an archaic tradition done after death.

The few times he had talked about Yéye, he’d spoken with such reverence.

Năinai obviously didn’t know he continued to smoke for years, a pack a day, in the basement. The only way Yéye helped him quit was by dying of emphysema.

“Eugene will never take you if you’re dirty, sullied by another person,” she continued, oblivious to my nausea.

"...I’m scared you’re too headstrong, and it will be a problem when you get married.”
Only if I marry a Chinese person with traditional, unrelenting parents...like you and Băbá.

“Mămá, if you don’t want me to go through what you went through, wouldn’t it be better if I married someone not Chinese? Or at least someone with parents less overbearing than Mrs. Huang?”

I froze, hoping to stave off what usually came next.

She seemed to be the queen of campus. Another Queen Helen. The difference between us couldn’t be more pronounced, like molten lava cake and red bean dessert soup. And it only became starker as we made our way, arm in arm, into the Dirt Cowboy Café, which I originally read (with a zap of panic) as Dirty Cowboy Café.

I was initially frazzled by the plethora of options written on the wall, but then I remembered how far I had come to get here today.

Ms. I-Hold-Nothing-Back used to rail on my parents, calling them dictators, tiger parents, qíguài.

She felt Chinese but didn’t feel constrained by it like I did.

But we were so different I couldn’t isolate her views of the culture from the effervescent bubble that made up the rest of her.

I grew so accustomed to her voice that it blended with the background din and I didn’t notice when her mouth clamped shut.

I couldn’t help imagining Darren flailing his gangly limbs around.

“Because your mother disapproves of me?”
Of course he had noticed at the restaurant—Mămá Lu wasn’t exactly known for her subtlety.

“Look, what I feel—the sense of duty—it’s debilitating, makes me feel so ashamed that I don’t even care what I want.”

In Taiwan during my parents’ childhood, filial piety was as much a part of life as breathing—ingrained from birth, expected from everyone.

In Taiwan during my parents’ childhood, filial piety was as much a part of life as breathing—ingrained from birth, expected from everyone.

Then a protective timbre surfaced in his voice. “I don’t want you to get in trouble with them. If they find out, they might cut you off. No tuition, no roof over your head...”