Chapter 2

Jane

There was so much on Jane's metaphorical plate as she balanced her work with integrating her niece – whom she was legally responsible for right now – into both American life and her upcoming schooling. That included taking the quiet girl for a tour of Winchester Academy before classes began.

Cecelia was already enrolled, so that wasn't a problem. But today was the day she met the administrators, became familiar with the grounds, and acquainted herself with her new schedule. Jane was assured that Winchester Academy catered toward the local old-money crowd as well as gifted scholarship kids who were bound for the Ivy League. While some graduated and went on to Oxford or Cambridge like Jane had, most had their sights on Harvard, Yale, and Princeton. Most were legacy students who didn't have a choice. Cecelia, though? Jane didn't say it out loud, but this was where her niece's life truly began – on her terms.

Which was why Jane agreed to this to begin with, as long as Caitlyn and Rebecca were on board. If anyone in that family knows how important it is to get away from Hong Kong, it's me. Cecelia had forged part of her own identity by refusing to follow the usual path to England. She may have been raised in the Queen's English like many Hong Kongers, but she had taught herself the American accent through Hollywood movies and talking to people online. Lilian encouraged her daughter to "follow her heart," but the Lams were a different story. They needed Frank and his mother's permission for Cecelia to go to America, and that only came when Jane's mother Willow sniffed through every corner of Winchester Academy before declaring it good enough for her granddaughter. Assuming she must go to America, anyway.

(And she must.)

"One second, love." Jane stopped her niece as soon as they stepped out of the car. "Quick inspection so we make a good first impression."

Cecelia rolled her eyes as they remained standing in the parking lot, the August humidity no competition for Hong Kong. So was it any wonder that Jane's niece stood before her in a blazer and tights under her plaid skirt?

No, Winchester Academy did not have a uniform, but it did have a strict dress code. All students were expected to be covered up to a certain degree, to have nothing written on their clothing (unless it advertised the school or a club therein,) and to not deviate from a standard of colors based on the time of year. For the fall semester, students were relegated to dark shades of green, red, and blue, complemented with black and gray. In the spring, white and softer tones were allowed, making Caitlyn quip about rules regarding Labor Day and whites. I don't get it.

But it was Jane's job to ensure her niece's hair was tidy, her legs and chest were covered, and she wore an outfit that would be allowed on her first day of school. God, why do we have to look so… Asian? That was her honest thought as she saw a middle-aged woman walk out with her teenaged son, who immediately stared at Cecelia as if she were God's gift to him. Did Cecelia know about fetishization on this side of the pond? God! Did Jane have to have that talk with her niece?

"What's wrong?" Cecelia asked.

Jane shook the foulest thought from her head. "Nothing, love. You look great." She erected her spine before her niece. "How does your old Aunt Jane look? Great?"

Cecelia cracked a smile. "You kinda look like a guy."

"Brilliant! These wankers won't know what hit them!"

That crack expanded into a full shit-eating grin as Cecelia fell into step beside her aunt. "I've never heard you say ‘wankers' before."

"Oh, don't you worry, you'll hear me say it enough that it loses all of its edge. Maybe don't say that around here, though."

They met up with the Vice Principal in her office, a portly woman with ruddy cheeks and frizzy hair like Rebecca's. Only instead of ginger spice enunciating that figure, Vice Principal Williams dyed hers a shade of brown that did not complement her naturally pinkish skin tone. Jane thought this interesting since she was under the impression that anyone who made it this far up the food chain at a place like Winchester must know how to style herself a certain way.

She assumed a lot of things about these administrators. That was her first mistake!

"I want to go over a few things with you before we embark on our tour," Vice Principal Williams said as Jane and Cecelia made themselves comfortable at her desk. "Ms. Wong, it's my understanding that you are Cecelia's aunt… and her legal guardian while she is here?"

"Yes," Jane said, careful to keep her tone light and as devoid of sarcasm as possible. What a trial. Already, scalding, biting words about her sister touched her tongue. Yet she won the battle of wits with herself. "It's customary in my family for the youths to study abroad by the time they're in the upper levels. I went to a boarding school in England. Our Cece here has… other continental ambitions."

"Ah, well, thank you for choosing America, Cecelia."

The girl in question struggled to keep a straight face. "Not a problem."

"Now, as for how we have you set up in your system… there's what you will go by in school and have on your ID card, and then there's how we have to report your progress to the government and your related departments back in… where is it you are from? Hong Kong?"

Oh, this is getting good. Jane couldn't wait to see where this conversation went. "We were both born and raised in Hong Kong, yes," she said. "Poor Cece here can't remember the colonial days, though. That's how we can date her dear ol' Aunt Jane. I'm practically withering in my age." She was in her forties, but Ms. Williams didn't need to know that.

"Right. I'm asking because I know it's customary for many Chinese people to have both a Chinese name and an English name."

"Chinese?" Cecelia hissed to her aunt.

"Go along with it," Jane spat back in Cantonese. "Almost every American you meet here will make a damn fool of themselves over it. Either by bending over backward to pretend you're anything but a Hong Konger or ensuring to your face that you're ChineseChineseChinese."

Ms. Williams glanced between them, her fake smile growing. "Everything all right?"

"Perfect," Jane said, switching back to immaculate English. "I am sorry, what were you asking?"

"I was asking if Miss Lam has another name that she goes by back in Hong Kong."

"My name's Cecelia…"

Here I go, to the rescue once again. Jane better get used to it. "To my knowledge, her legal name in Hong Kong is also Cecelia Lam. It is the only name on her passport." She cleared her throat. "I think you'll find that having two names has fallen a bit out of style among our class." Jane wouldn't speak for others. She only knew that her own "Chinese" name was a result of her parents growing up in a different world. The only people who call me Lin Hua are my mom when we're speaking Cantonese and Caitlyn… Hell, Caitlyn called her Lin, not the full clip!

To literally everyone else, even in Hong Kong, she was Jane. Plain, silly Jane.

"My name's Cecelia," the girl in question reiterated. "Some people call me Cece."

"And you speak perfect English. How about that?"

Cecelia sent her aunt a countenance harboring a distress signal. "Welcome to America," Jane lackadaisically said in Cantonese.

Luckily for them, this was the hardest part of the orientation. Once they were out of Ms. Williams's office, taking a tour of the grounds and meeting some of the teachers, they were treated more like a normal family transferring at the start of a student's sophomore year. It was understood that Cecelia was a "normal" student, not on exchange, and planned on being in New England for at least a year or two, if not graduating from Winchester Academy before applying to an Ivy League university. She didn't know which one yet, but Harvard was the commonly understood name in both the Wong and Lam households.

They were assured that Winchester Academy sent an above-average number of students to Harvard. And Yale. And Dartmouth…

When they were overburdened with information and literature full of happy, smiling rich kids in dark-colored clothes, Jane and Cecelia returned to the car and decompressed with the air conditioner blasting in their faces and NPR playing on the radio. Jane promptly turned it off.

"Where are we going?" Cecelia asked when they were back on the road.

"You'll see."

If there was one thing Jane knew the kids in Hong Kong liked those days, it was overpriced drinks to go with their oversized shirts. As it so happened, she knew the perfect café downtown that catered to the same crowd. I may be wealthy, but come on, these prices… Forty dollars for two people to get fancy drinks and some sandwiches. Never mind a dessert! Yet Cecelia didn't say no to an iced latte with soy milk, a BLT on artisanal bread, and the kind of colorful fruit tart that looked more tailor-made for Instagram than someone's plate.

Jane was content with a hot coffee and the hummus plate. She wasn't a big snacker. Nor was she a growing teenage girl.

"This is nice," Cecelia humbly said. "Thanks."

"Ah, I know it's nothing like the places your mom and your friends take you to back in the World City. But some places here aren't so bad."

Cecelia sipped her drink before cutting into her large sandwich. Already, Jane eyeballed the to-go container that her small niece would surely need. Lilian and our mom will kill me if I let Cece pack on the American pounds. Jane could hear it now.

"I don't go to many places like this back home."

"Really? Things have changed since I was your age." Jane didn't only mean traveling abroad to study. Whenever she was in Hong Kong, she was out of her home of White Fir as much as possible, hanging out with other teens at malls, clubs, and at the marina where she knew more than one classmate with a yacht they could party on all day. Jane had to meet her first few girlfriends somehow…

"Ah Ma was strict," Cecelia said, referring to her father's mother. "Way stricter than Ngoi Poh." That was Willow, Jane's mother. "I couldn't go anywhere without an escort unless it was with friends she signed off on. I had to be friends with Jenny Cheung and Delilah Lim because they were the granddaughters and nieces of Ah Ma's best friends. We hated each other! Jenny always called me fat, and Delilah used to lie about popular boys liking me so she could laugh when I went to talk to them."

"So, what did you do back to them? Don't tell me you just took that."

Cecelia giggled. "I once put a cockroach in Jenny's bag."

"No bloody way! You touched one to do that?"

Nodding, Jane's niece grinned to tell the tall tale. "You should have heard her scream! I think she peed herself a little!"

"Hmph. Serves her right. What good is it calling a girl your age fat? You're like… fifteen. You don't even know what fat is yet."

Cecelia set aside her drink and took a bite of her BLT. "Now that Ah Ma is dead," she said with food in her mouth, "I've got some more freedom." She swallowed. "Dad's always working and Mom is… yeah. She's busy."

"Your mom is like a flitting filly who doesn't know what she wants until it's right in front of her face. I say that with love, so don't think I'm insulting her." Jane would save that for later when she had a better relationship with her niece.

"I was in front of her face for years."

Jane immediately detected the dejection in Cecelia's voice and decided to change the subject. "So, what do you think of your school? Your schedule looked interesting. I didn't know you could take a whole course on marine biology. Of course, when I went to boarding school, it was focused on the humanities. Looks like this Winchester Academy wants a more liberal arts type education."

Cecelia shrugged. "I thought it was weird they tried to put me in Mandarin class. I already know Mandarin."

"Yes, that was strange, but at least there was still room in the French class during the same period. Your mom will be thrilled to know you are taking French."

"Why do I have to take another language? I already know four."

"Four? What's the fourth?"

"Hokkien."

"Really?"

"Lots of Hokkien speakers in my classes. You pick it up."

"If you want into an Ivy League, knowing a fifth language will help. These days I am only fluent in three, and even my Mandarin can fizzle out if I do not practice enough. Aiya…" Jane switched to Mandarin while containing her laughter. "Maybe I should practice on you."

"You sound so gruff when you speak Mandarin."

"Do I? Probably because all of my Chinese girlfriends spoke it as their baby tongue when I was dating. Women like it when I speak a certain way."

It wasn't until she put down her coffee that she realized what she had said in front of her young niece. While Cecelia stared at her, Jane had an epiphany. Because while Cecelia knew that Jane was married to a woman – and in a relationship with another one – it probably wasn't freely talked about in the Lam household. Or Wong abode of White Fir, for that matter."

"Don't look at me like that. Hey, if there is anything you want to ask, now is the time. I am serious. I have an American wife and an equally American partner. I do not want you saying something embarrassing to them and making them uncomfortable. They have done a lot to let you come live with us so you can have this opportunity." God, I sound like my mom! Scolding a teen girl because it was easier than being more open like a good book. "Rebecca gave up her room so you can have some privacy to get a full night's sleep and be… a teenager, I guess." Jane remembered what that entailed, but she'd rather not dwell on it. Hormones. So many hormones. "So, if you have inappropriate questions, you ask me, your silly Aa Ji."

She shook her head. "Nope. Mom filled me in on everything."

"Oh, did she? What did she say?"

"She said that you're married to Caitlyn, which I already knew, and that Rebecca is also someone very special to you two."

"That's one way to put it."

"Although I thought that you had divorced Aunt Caitlyn, but it doesn't matter."

"We did divorce. We recently remarried due to a visa issue I was having. See? This is a good example of a question you can ask your stupid aunt."

"How is that an inappropriate question?"

"Well… you shouldn't catch my partners off guard. Also, Caitlyn speaks Cantonese and a good bit of Mandarin, so don't think you can get away talking shit around her."

"I'll keep that in mind."

"If you are calling anyone a daft cow, say it in English, with pride. It's good practice."

Since Jane likewise said that in English, more than a few people glanced in their direction. Like I said… with pride. Daft cows were pastured all over the world.

"I will."

"Good. So… how's the sandwich?"

Shortly after, they finished their lunch in silence, Jane scrolling through her texts while Cecelia studied her new Winchester Academy literature. Cecelia still needed new supplies, but she was kicking that responsibility over to Caitlyn and Rebecca, who knew about going to school in America more than anyone else in the family. I need to get back to work. That was a stark reminder as she scrolled through her texts and realized she had yet to get back to a few people. She was normally way more on top of things.

Before I had a kid!