Mei-Mei’s rolling backpack wobbled behind her as she walked along the emptier-than-usual sidewalk. The uncomfortable moist warmth of her own breath in her HEPA particle-filtering face mask tried to lull her to sleep, but the stinging in her eyes kept her alert. Wearing the thick cotton of the mask so often itched her sensitive skin, but she enjoyed how it at least made her face look smaller. Also, the risk of contracting emphysema and having her family struggle between whether to treat her with herbal or western medicine was a thought she’d much rather avoid thinking about.

Baoding’s air quality index was at a not-so-easy-breezy 199 according to the app she had gotten on her new phone (at least, she believed it said 199 - the device overheated and she dropped it faster than you could say zàijiàn). The faintest ashy gray tinge stitched itself into the air as factories generously released their stormy clouds into the atmosphere. On days like this where the heavens seemed to lower themselves to earth, Mei-Mei would usually not risk the well being of her qi to go out and about - whether it was to go to school or even to buy manhwa. However, there was only a few months left until she had to take her gaokao, and her parents liked to remind her of it by saying that this was, “fēng yún biàn huàn” - or irregular weather.

After a few minutes of walking, her watery eyes followed a hazy white blur in the distance. It was her bus, creaking slowly to a stop as its fluorescent lights melded with heather air - a dulled green, orange, and yellow.

She imagined that those lights would be the last modicum of color she’d see until cram school was over. Her mind whirred a cacophony as it conjured images of slate walls and bodies overtaxed by monotony. Mei-Mei mentally prepared herself for the jaded fingernails, dulled and placated skin, and inconsolable vehemence of pencils gouging into decoy gaokao exams.   

Whooshing her mind clear and mercurially rushing to get one of the last seats on the bus, she quickly passed her bus ticket to the driver and sat down at one of the only available seats next to a haggard looking Japanese man.

She remembered her plans to chop half her name and move to Japan in her youth. She’d much rather be “Mei” to mean “beautiful and reliable” than “Mei-Mei” and to be a “little sister.” Her aunt Liu Yang was moving there to find work (and admittedly, adventure) while Mei-Mei was only entering junior secondary school. But unfortunately, her parents didn’t entertain her reverie for a half second. They refused to have their own daughter’s name associated with one of China’s infamous unmarried, “leftover” women. Impulsively, she countered that perhaps spending at least a smidge of time in fresh air might do her some good, but they pretended not to hear. Mei-Mei’s face turned as red as the hongbao her relatives gave her annually during the Spring Festival. In actuality, Mei-Mei’s failure to uphold the strong Confucian values her parents had instilled in her led to her hongbao for that year being lighter than usual, a strict reminder that Mei-Mei should be more filially pious in light of being born a daughter - the only child her parents could have without being heavily fined and ostracized by the government and society. After this, any time she wanted to refute her parent’s decrees, “No zuo no die” reverberated in her head like a gong - she knew that speaking unnecessarily would only bring her trouble.

For the rest of her years, Mei-Mei remained silent as a mouse. Her teachers praised her excellent behavior and reassured her parents that many tall, wealthy men would likely have interest in her. She was a long-haired Han Chinese and had a height of 167 cm, even tall perhaps by some western standards. The only thing in Mei-Mei’s way was her face. Sure, she had a small face and a tall nose, but her full set of lips and tan skin were her adversaries. She remembered spending a summer indoors, praying to the Buddha for skin as light as milk, only to feel made a fool of when it remained the hue of oversteeped milk tea. Her curves were nothing to be envious of nor pitied. Once she saw a beautiful European girl buying dumplings from a street vendor in Beijing while visiting with her maternal grandparents. Mei-Mei could barely withhold her simultaneous fascination and jealousy of the girl’s straw-colored hair, butterfly pea colored eyes, and milky skin. Her lips were small and pink like she had just eaten a popsicle. When her grandmother asked her if she had noticed the walking porcelain doll, Mei-Mei ambiguously replied that she had seen nothing of note.

Such memories felt as though they had occurred dynasties ago. The older she got, the more every passing xiaoshí mattered when it came to her gaokao score. Her parents were tireless workers - her mother was a factory worker who made headphones, and her father was a dagōng. Their desire for her to improve the Huang family name and succeed farther than they had in turn motivated them to wring out every ounce of energy in devotion to Mei-Mei’s studies. After all, studying for the gaokao was a lengthy process, and sending your child to a cram school costed a small fortune. However, if it got Mei-Mei into a university, her family would think it was all worth it: she would truly believe that the color yellow - which her last name was supposed to represent - was lucky. Being less developed than modern cities, Baoding’s good feng shui may allow its students to seek graduate studies with lower gaokao scores, but with fewer seats allotted to them per university, competition was fierce.

After sitting in the bus for more than half a day, Mei-Mei’s legs felt numb. The driver trudged to a stop, announcing that they had arrived in Xi’an. Xi’an was in Shaanxi, only one province over from Hubei where her home city of Baoding was, but Mei-Mei still already felt her homesickness to her toes. As she got off the bus she noticed four other students her age dismounting their wobbly legs onto the fixed concrete, also each carrying some sort of luggage - both the physical and emotional kind.

The bus drove off, cutting a short-lived path through the fog. She could’ve sworn that through the window, the Japanese man she was sitting next to the whole time was looking out the window at her with pitiful eyes. Mei-Mei’s nostrils flared secretly under her air mask. He was the foreigner trying to feed himself from the fruits of her country.

A small distance away, a gangly, strict looking man introduced himself as Mr. Lee. His short black hair looked as though it was shorn with a razor, and his square glasses did nothing to reflect the droopy bags under his eyes. He waved them to follow him, and the five of them resigned themselves to follow this mysterious man to what they hoped would be a better life.