That summer, Annette sent me postcards. She always addressed them to “Miss Kimberly Chang” and she signed off with “Yours Truly, Miss Annette Avery.” I’d given her my real address because I didn’t want these letters to have to go through Aunt Paula and I figured that even if Annette looked it up on a map, she was too innocent to know what sort of neighborhood I lived in anyway. From camp, she wrote:

I am so bored here! There is no one fun and all of the

activities are dumb. The only thing I like is swimming.

When it gets hot, the water is cool in the lake. They

make us sing stupid songs and play stupid games. I

wish I was back in NY with you!

I’d never seen a lake and I’d never been swimming. Like many people in Hong Kong in those days, Ma and I hadn’t had the money to do such things. Often, when I was working, I pictured being at that cool lake with Annette. Summer in the factory was one long rush of heat amid the deafening roar of the fans. It was impossible to hear one another over the noise and so the summer became a wordless time for us. The windows remained hermetically sealed, probably to deter any inspectors who might look in, and the huge industrial fans were the only relief we had.

Each fan was tall and black like a sarcophagus, swathed in dust. Thick strands of filth hung off each part of the wire hood, swaying in the wind until they broke off to splatter against my face or worse, the piece of clothing I was working on. The air they blew was a sweltering wind, merely redistributing heat from the steamers and scorching motors of the machines to our own wet bodies and back again, yet we were glad of them because there was nothing else. During our breaks, we were too hot to play, and Matt and I stood with arms outstretched in front of the fans, our hair streaming out behind us, pretending we could fly.

The factory dust became worse than usual because we were bathed in sweat and the fabric fibers clung to us. My bare shoulders and neck were streaked where I’d wiped the dust off with my fingers.

Despite the expense, Ma bought me a few stamps so I could write back to Annette, because Ma thought it was educational for me to write in English. I wrote this:

Sorry it is boring there! New York City is

relaxing. I enjoy it to rest and read books.

Songs and games are greatly stupid. I hope

you come back soon. Maybe my mother and

me will go trip soon.

From Florida, Annette wrote:

Your so lucky you get to relax in NY! Well, my

grandmother’s house is pretty neat. Yesterday, we had a

barbeque and I got to eat my hot dog while I was

sitting in the pool! Where are you going? I hope you

have a great time! Don’t forget about your best friend

when your gone!!!

She also sent me a postcard with a picture of a castle and the words “The Magic Kingdom” printed on it.

I answered:

I had a hot dog one time and I liked it very greatly.

Only I not like the yellow sauce. Ma and me maybe not

go trip now because it is too nice in New York City.

When I go trip in future, I will buy you a present. What

you like? Thank you for a beautiful postcard. I like it

very much. Your grandmother belong to your mother’s

side or your father’s side? I hope she has good health.

Every night, when I got home from the factory, I reread Annette’s letters. I longed for a story of my own to tell, about a trip to New Jersey perhaps or Atlantic City, where some of the sewing ladies went. If I were rich, I would buy Annette and Ma many presents, from places all over America.

In our apartment, the roaches and mice had returned with a vengeance and we couldn’t leave anything unsealed even for a moment, not even the toothpaste, or we would return to find a roach licking it, with its long waving antennae. We took off all the garbage bags from the windows in the kitchen. The sunlight streamed in from the back for the first time. I looked for the woman and baby in the apartment next door but their room was empty. Even the bed was gone. As soon as the weather became warm enough, Ma took out her violin almost every Sunday evening. I would clean up after dinner while she played, sometimes only for a few minutes, because we usually had so much work from the factory to finish at home.

I said to her once, “Ma, you don’t have to play for me every week. You have so many other things to do.”

“I play for myself too,” she’d answered. “Without my violin, I’d forget who I was.”

Finally, the heat got so bad that Ma bought us a small fan and we set it in front of our mattresses. After work, we both caught our breath in front of that fan, sitting on the mattresses on the floor, our backs resting against the wall. Slowly, two yellowish human-shaped stains developed against the cracked paint: a small one for me and a larger one for Ma. Those stains are probably still there in that apartment, and I’ve dreamed about them, about our skin cells, our droplets of oil and sweat, sunk into that porous wall, bits of us that will never escape.

One Sunday afternoon near the end of the summer, Annette appeared at my apartment. Ma and I were buttoning up some jackets we had brought home from the factory. I jumped at a loud noise. It was so unfamiliar, it took me a moment before I recognized it as the doorbell.

“Who can that be?” Ma said.

I ran to the front window as Ma said behind me, “Kimberly, stop! They’ll see you!”

I was already peering down and saw Annette’s round face framed by her halo of hair, turned up toward us. My knees buckled. I ducked down and hid myself below the window. I hoped she hadn’t seen me. I’d caught a glimpse of their car on the street with a short man inside, probably Mr. Avery.

The doorbell rang again, then again. Ma and I stared at each other, not daring to whisper, as if the factory inspectors were at our door. Finally, the ringing stopped and I heard the car drive away.

“I think they’re gone,” I said.

“Don’t look yet,” Ma said.

We waited another ten minutes before I dared to check that Annette and her father had left.

A few days later, I got another letter from Annette:

You are going to be very disappointed! Because I actually

came to your house, just to say hi! But you weren’t there.

I thought I saw a face in the window but no such luck.

Hey, what’s your phone number? How come I still don’t

have it? See you very soon… at our new school!!!!

In preparation for Harrison, Ma bought me some new clothes. I had to get a dark blue blazer to conform to the dress code, but it was hard to find one we could afford. Finally, in a discount store, we bought a navy blue one for $4.99. It was made of scratchy polyester and the sleeves were so long they covered my hands. The shoulders were padded and protruded into the air past my own, but at least it vaguely resembled the ones I thought the other kids had been wearing. We got a white shirt and a dark blue skirt at Woolworth’s.

When I had the entire outfit on, I looked in the mirror and I saw a small Chinese girl with short hair, her torso and arms engulfed by a boxy blazer. A cheap shirt peeked out from under the blazer and below that, a stiff skirt jutted out above skinny calves. The skirt had large rhinestones around the waistband because we hadn’t been able to find a plain one. I wore my brown Chinese slippers, the only shoes I had that could go with a skirt. The entire outfit was uncomfortable. I felt lost in the contours of someone I didn’t recognize.

I was as ready as I ever would be to start Harrison Prep.

Now that I was a student, I could take a private bus to Harrison that stopped close to my old elementary school. I stood there in my ill-fitting clothes, and when the bus pulled up, I didn’t recognize it for what it was. It was sleek and gray, with a white board showing the number 8 in the front window. Inside, the seats were arranged around the perimeter instead of in rows. The bus was half full, with about seven other kids of different ages already on board, all of them white, all in blazers. I slid into the closest seat, next to an older boy who was so tall he stretched his legs out into the middle of the bus.