The Wangs vs. the World(54)
But Saina, of course, hadn’t seen it that way. “You named yourself after Barbra Streisand??” she’d asked, incredulous. “But can you sing? Or are you just a total fan or something? I mean, Barbra Streisand? That is so weird.” Barbra had watched the words come out of her stepdaughter’s perfectly glossed young lips, which rested underneath an aquiline nose that gave her a faintly Native American air, as if Saina were descended from some noble, nearly extinct tribe rather than two crooked branches of a billion-person Chinese tree. It would have been unthinkable to tell that hateful little beauty that she had chosen the name because she admired the singer’s apparent disregard of her own odd looks, so in the end, Barbra had merely shrugged, and said, “Good English practice.” Except at the time it had probably sounded more like “Good-u Eng-u-reesh pu-lac-u-tis-u.” And now it seemed like the sum of her sixteen years in America was her hard-won ability to say that sentence flawlessly. Nothing more. And sometimes not even that.
For a minute, Barbra was deaf to Andrew and Grace’s backseat mockery as her own anger pulsed and swelled, threatening to blow out the windows of the ancient car.
One must do something with one’s life, so she had done this, and now, even though it was all falling apart, it could not be undone. Charles. She couldn’t take another minute of Charles. Barbra sat like this, in a private stew of rage and regret, frozen in place by blasts of air-conditioning and her own lying face until they pulled up to a W hotel.
“What are we doing here?” asked Grace. “Aren’t we supposed to be poor?”
Charles laughed, uncomfortable. “I figure out that I still have some hotel point left that not part of credit card, so we come here for special occasion.” He said all of this towards Barbra, voice hopeful, but didn’t have the courage to look into her eyes or touch her shoulder.
“Guys! Can we get a move on? Um, does anyone want to come with me?” said Andrew.
“I’m coming!”
“Oh, Grace. I’m sorry, I just checked, it’s twenty-one and over. You can’t come.”
“That’s so unfair! What if you were headlining? You wouldn’t be able to bring your kids?”
“I don’t know,” said Andrew, who never knew anything. “I guess not. But I really have to go, like right now.”
Barbra finally turned to Charles. “Wo qu. Ni ying gai pei Grace zai lu guan.”
Not what he was expecting, she thought triumphantly. He tried to look mischievous as he said, “Ke shi wo shi xiang wo men ke yi . . .”
Barbra shook her head, an emphatic no. As if she would even consider having sex with him at this moment. It would have been pathetic, sprawled on the coverlet of this midrange hotel, clothes tossed atop the children’s luggage, groping at each other’s flaccid bodies as some sort of nod to her birthday. Absolutely not.
“I will go with Andrew,” she said again, this time for the children’s benefit. “You stay, keep Grace company.”
“I don’t need a babysitter,” said Grace, as Barbra had known she would.
“I’m not babysitter; I am Daddy!” said Charles, as Barbra had known he would.
And Andrew, of course, had no choice but to acquiesce and they drove off, leaving Charles and Grace in the lobby on either side of a giant white chair.
The comedy club smelled like all bars did—cold and sticky. Andrew was likely embarrassed to have her here with him, a silent mother figure hovering as he worshipped the black-and-white headshots that lined the hallway. Barbra recognized some of them, the lumpy ha-ha faces staring out of ugly oak frames.
“Steven Wright,” whispered Andrew, touching the scarred glass as if it were a reliquary. He was wishing himself onto the wall, it was clear. Barbra had never seen her stepson look at anything like that before. The Wang children were so used to getting things that it rarely occurred to them to want anything. But was this what Andrew really wanted? A life of lonely motel rooms, performing for white people who probably wouldn’t think that he was funny?
Andrew walked on ahead of her and found them a tiny round table, its black top cracked from years of damp drinks and once-upon-a-time cigarette burns, then dutifully fetched a gin and tonic cluttered with chunks of lemon. His own beer sat sweating and untouched as they suffered through a vaguely amusing comic who talked about mistaking himself for a bear on a hunting trip, a rather boring one who spent his entire seven minutes affecting an unconvincing lisp, and a succession of indistinguishable men in ill-fitting plaid shirts who all seemed to have been blessed with crazy girlfriends. And then it was time.
“Alright, dickheads,” shouted the chubby emcee, his mouth hidden behind a bushy beard that was inexplicably dyed blue. “We’ve got a virgin here tonight! Let’s help pop his open-mic cherry with a warm Austin welcome. Come on up, Andrew Wang! Hey dude, here’s a comedy tip. Don’t suck. Unless you’re gay.”
Without looking at her, Andrew squeaked his seat back and ran towards the stage, managing not to trip as he bounded up the stairs. Once the emcee was done making a lewd gesture with the microphone, Andrew grabbed it and turned towards the audience.
“What’s up, Austin! Yeah, it’s true. It’s my first time here. So, uh, yeah, why do girls always want guys to take them out to a romantic dinner? Dude. Dinner is the least romantic thing ever. There’s nothing romantic about eating. When you buy someone dinner, you’re just, uh, buying things for their . . . you know, for their, uh, for their ass. Right?”