Shanghai Girls (Shanghai Girls #1)(104)

I know by now to beware this opening.

“You always said that Auntie May was the most beautiful of the beautiful girls in Shanghai.”

“Yes,” I say, glancing at my sister, who looks up from her magazine. “All the artists loved her.”

“Well, if that’s so, why is your face always the main focus on those magazines Dad buys, you know, the ones that come from China?”

“Oh, that’s not true,” I say, but I know it is. In the four years since Father Louie bought that issue of China Reconstructs, Z.G. has designed another six covers in which May’s and my faces are absolutely recognizable. In the old days, artists like Z.G. used beautiful girls to advertise the luxurious life. Now artists use posters, calendars, and advertisements to communicate the Communist Party’s vision to the illiterate masses, as well as to the outside world. Scenes in boudoirs, salons, and baths have been replaced by patriotic themes: May and me with our arms outstretched as though reaching for the bright future, the two of us with kerchiefs in our hair, pushing wheelbarrows filled with rocks to help build a dam, or standing in a shallow paddy, tending rice shoots. On every cover, my face, with its rosy cheeks, and my body, with its long lines, is the central figure, while my sister takes the secondary position behind me, holding a basket into which I put vegetables, steadying my bicycle, or bending her head from the burden she carries while I gaze skyward. Always there’s some hint of Shanghai in the painting: the roll of the Whangpoo outside a factory window, the Yu Yuan Garden in the Old Chinese City for uniformed soldiers to practice their rifle drills, the glorious Bund made drab and utilitarian for marching workers. The subtle hues, romantic poses, and soft edges that Z.G. once loved have been replaced by everything outlined in black and filled with flat color—especially red, red, red.

Joy hops up and walks the length of the porch. She examines the magazine covers that May has on the wall next to her bed.

“He must have really loved you,” my daughter says.

“Oh, I hardly think that’s possible,” May says, covering for me.

“You should look at these more closely,” Joy says. “Don’t you see what the artist has done? Thin, pale, and fashionable girls, like you must have been, Auntie May, have been replaced by robust, healthy, strong working women, like Mom. Didn’t you tell me that your father always used to complain that Mom had a face like a peasant—ruddy and red? Her face is perfect for the Commies.”

Daughters can sometimes be cruel. They sometimes say things they don’t mean, but that doesn’t mean her words don’t sting. I turn away and stare out to the vegetable patch, hoping to hide my feelings.

“That’s why I think he loves you, Auntie May. Surely you see it.”

I take a breath, one part of my brain listening to my daughter, the other part reinterpreting what she said before. When she said, “He must have really loved you,” she didn’t mean me. She meant May.

“Because look,” I hear my daughter say. “Here’s Mom, all peasant-perfect for the country, but look how he painted your face, Auntie May. It’s beautiful, like you’re a fairy goddess or something.”

May doesn’t say anything, but I sense her examining the pictures.

“You know, if he saw you now,” my daughter continues, “he probably wouldn’t recognize you.”

Like that, my daughter manages to wound both her mother and her aunt, poking at our softest, most vulnerable, parts. I press my fingernails into my palms to bring my emotions under control. I lift the corners of my mouth, exposing my teeth, and then spin around and put my hands on my daughter’s shoulders.

“I came out here to say good night. You should climb in bed. And, May,” I say lightly, “can you help me with the books from the café? I can’t seem to make the numbers work.”

My sister and I have had a lifetime together of false smiles and escaping things we don’t like. We leave the porch, acting as if Joy hasn’t hurt us, but as soon as we get to the kitchen, we hold each other for strength and comfort. How can Joy’s words be so painful after all these years? Because inside we still carry the dreams of what could have been, of what should have been, of what we wish we could still be. This doesn’t mean we aren’t content. We are content, but the romantic longings of our girlhood have never entirely left us. It’s like Yen-yen said all those years ago: “I look in the mirror and I’m surprised by what I see.” I look in the mirror and still expect to see my Shanghai-girl self—not the wife and mother I’ve become. And May? To my eyes, she hasn’t changed at all. She’s still beautiful—Chinese-beautiful, ageless.

“Joy’s just a girl,” I tell my sister. “We said and did stupid things when we were that age too.”

“Everything always returns to the beginning,” May responds, and I wonder if she’s thinking about the original meaning of the aphorism—that no matter what we do in life, we will always return to the beginning, that we will have children who’ll disobey, hurt, and disappoint us just as we once disobeyed, hurt, and disappointed our own parents—or is she thinking about Shanghai and how in a sense we’ve been trapped in our final days there ever since we left, forever destined to relive the loss of our parents, our home, Z.G., and carry the consequences of my rape and May’s pregnancy?

“Joy says these mean things so you and I will come together,” I say, repeating something Violet said to me the other day. “She knows how lonely we’ll be without her.”