An-Ya and Her Diary (14 page)

Wanna reads Ellie these stories, but it seems like Ellie doesn’t understand that the stories are similar to her own story. It is like she doesn’t know anything about her life before adoption and doesn’t understand what adoption even means. Does Ellie understand that she is Chinese?

Maybe I don’t remember the Chinese language, but I remember what it feels like to speak it off my tongue. Maybe that doesn’t make sense, but I don’t know how else to explain it.

I remember when everyone around me was Chinese, and I remember I never thought things would be different. In China I was Chinese and there would never be another way that I would need to learn to live. My only dream was for Them to come back and get me. When They did, I would have still been Chinese living in a Chinese world in China.

Now I am still Chinese, but I don’t remember the Chinese language, and I am living in America. I am surrounded by people who don’t understand anything about China except what they have read in a book or what small things my parents learned during their travels to adopt Ellie and me.

During my adoption in China, there were Chinese government people who were in charge of my adoption paperwork. They asked me—

An-Ya, do you want to be adopted and do you agree to this adoption?

Daddy and Wanna and Ellie were in the room, and I knew they couldn’t understand what I was being asked. I remember looking around the room and wondering what would happen if I said—

No. I do not want to be adopted. Send me back to the orphanage.

But I didn’t. I must have said yes. I didn’t know then how the word
yes
could completely change everything that I knew about life. After that everything that I knew changed completely.

I was afraid. It was like I left my body, but my voice must have said yes. It is possible that my voice didn’t say anything and my body nodded my head. I don’t remember. Whatever I said or did must have meant yes. Because after my response, a government woman knelt down and took one of my feet and rubbed it in red ink. Then she lifted me onto a big table. My red painted foot was pressed onto my adoption papers. It was that red footprint stamp that began the end of my life in China.

Everyone in the room smiled and clapped.

I remember looking at my foot and thinking that the red ink on my foot would never go away. My foot looked like it was covered in blood. Wanna was given a wet towel and she scrubbed my foot and tried to wash it all away. She smiled up at me as she held my foot and tried to remove the red ink stain.

148

Dear Penny,

Wanna and Ellie are home and I am in bed and I am trying to fall asleep. I was thinking about something. I want to write it down before I forget.

Ellie was a baby when her little foot was painted in red ink. She didn’t speak any language yet, so they must have never asked her if she was ok with her whole world becoming different. Her little foot was covered in ink and stamped red onto her adoption papers without her ever being asked if it was ok.

I feel like if I scraped the skin off of my foot deep enough that the red ink stain would still be there underneath. It is like the red ink stained my foot, but the red color is now covered over with new pink skin layers. I guess the red stain is underneath the skin of Ellie’s foot too. She just doesn’t know it is there yet. Maybe someday she will need me to tell her about it.

Abby’s foot must be stained red underneath her skin layers too. I won’t be there to let her know what it means.

All of us who were adopted must have the red stain underneath one of our feet. Even the Mean Boy must have it. The day that I was adopted, Wanna tried so hard to wash the red off, but I don’t think the stain ever goes away completely. It is hidden, but it is still there underneath the layers.

149

Dear Penny,

This morning I was eating my oatmeal in the kitchen with Ellie. Wanna was wearing a new purple apron and cleaning the counters. All of a sudden, Wanna turned to me and said—

An-Ya, I didn’t know you were a singer.

Wanna was looking at me like she was hoping that I would start singing right there and then. I knew these questions were coming my way someday, but I wasn’t ready for them yet.

I said—

I used to sing sometimes.

Wanna said—

With Ping-Hao? Or did you sing other times too?

I said—

I didn’t call her Ping-Hao. I called her my nanny.

She said—

Right. Maybe you called her the Chinese word for nanny, which I believe is…
Ayi
. It means something like an aunt in English.

I said—

That sounds right.

Wanna said—

So you only sung with your Ayi?

I said—

No, not always. Sometimes I was made to sing for other people.

Wanna was quiet for a minute, and I hoped she was done asking me questions. But she wasn’t done. She said—

Were you happy singing for other people or just with Ping-Hao…your Ayi?

I said—

Ping-Hao. My Ayi.

Ellie said—

An-Ya is singer? That is so good, An-Ya!

Ellie was eating oatmeal, and the ends of her black hair were dripping into her breakfast.

I said to Ellie—

I am not a singer anymore. I sang Chinese songs and I don’t remember them anymore. Can you please keep your hair out of your oatmeal bowl?

Ellie smiled at me and said—

I will help you, An-Ya. I teach you new songs!

I finished my oatmeal without looking at anyone. Then I took Angel Bones outside.

150

Dear Penny,

Nothing about today went the way that I dreamed that it would go. I took my letter for Levi outside with me and sat with Angel Bones under the willow tree. I waited.

I thought about showing Sitka the letter before I gave it to Levi. I even thought about showing it to Wanna. But after thinking about it a lot, I wanted Levi to be the only one to read it.

I played with Angel Bones. I threw her leaves and she chased them around as they blew in the wind. After a while I gave up hope that Levi would come. I was relieved because I decided the letter idea was not good. I was going to throw the letter out as soon as I went inside.

Then he was there. All of a sudden, Levi was on his bike in front of me. The letter was on the ground, and I was hoping he wouldn’t notice. Why did I make the stupid decision to write LEVI in bright blue on the envelope?

Angel Bones was standing, with her tongue hanging out, right next to the letter in the grass. It was terrible. I couldn’t speak or move.

Levi said—

Hey. You ok?

I tried to smile but only one side of my mouth would lift up.

And then he saw it. He looked at me and looked at the ground and looked at me again. Finally, he said—

So there is an envelope on the ground with my name on it. Am I supposed to pick it up or something?

I looked at Levi and watched him push his hair away from his eyes. He got off his bike and said—

Soooo I am going to pick up the envelope since it has my name on it. Ok?

I couldn’t move or speak. I watched him pet Angel Bones and then he took the letter out of the grass and said—

Nowwww I am going to open the envelope that has my name on it. Ok?

After the envelope was opened, because I didn’t jump and grab it out of his hands and run, he pulled the letter out and sat down to read.

I couldn’t believe this was all happening. He was really here. He was really going to read the letter.

I sat down too because my legs were shaking, and I worried if I didn’t sit down, I would fall down instead.

Angel Bones ran circles around us as Levi began reading my letter. I felt like I wasn’t breathing well. It was like half of my lungs weren’t able to fill up with air.

Levi stared at the first page. He turned all the pages over and then looked at the first page again. Then he looked at me and said—

This is a really long letter.

I looked at the ground and waited for him to get up and leave, but he didn’t. He kept doing the same thing. He would look at the first page and then quickly turn the other pages over.

I couldn’t understand what Levi was doing. I wished that he would either read the letter or get up and walk away. I tried to keep my eyes on the ground.

Levi whispered—

An-Ya? I can’t read this.

I looked up into his eyes, not understanding what he meant.

There was hurt in his eyes and I wondered what I had done to give him pain.

I whispered back—

I don’t understand?

He said—

It is my fault. I have this thing called dislexa. I can’t make this letter make sense to me.

He shook the pages of my letter in front of me. I was lost and not understanding anything that was happening.

Again I whispered—

I don’t understand?

He said—

It is my brain, An-Ya. It is hard for me to read and understand sentences and what they mean. My brain doesn’t work right.

At first I worried that he was making a joke out of me. But his face told me that he wasn’t joking at all. His face said that he really couldn’t read what I wrote and understand it. His eyes were sad and frustrated.

Dislexa
was a new word to me. It was a word that I now know causes Levi pain.

I need to go eat dinner now. I will finish writing to you later.

151

Dear Penny,

Since Levi couldn’t read the letter, I thought that I should tear it up and start over with speaking.

Instead, Levi asked me to read the letter to him. He said that it would be faster that way. He said that for him to try to read it would take a long time.

I took a minute to think about it. I could read the letter or I could make up another letter and pretend like I was reading the real letter. It was a hard choice. The only problem was that I didn’t know what to make up and pretend like I was reading at the same time.

I decided to read the real letter. I started reading it and Levi told me that I was too quiet and he couldn’t hear me. So I spoke with a louder voice and read the whole thing without looking at him until I was finished.

When I was finished, Levi was sitting still and looking at me. Angel Bones was sitting next to Levi and staring at me too. I said—

What are you looking at?

Levi kept staring and said—

That was the weirdest letter I have ever heard in my whole life. Can you read it again?

He meant it. He wanted me to read it again. I didn’t know what to think, but I started the letter all over again.

Levi asked me to read the letter four times. After the fourth time, he told me to hand the pages over to him. I did.

He looked at me and said—

I wish I could keep this.

I said—

You can’t.

He looked at the pages one more time, and then he tore them into one thousand pieces. He threw them into the wind.

Angel Bones chased the paper flying all around us.

Levi wrapped his arms around me, and his hair pushed against my neck. When it was over, I could feel my shoulder was wet. He whispered into my neck—

I don’t understand everything, but I do understand some things.

What did I do with my arms? I don’t remember. Was he crying? It all happened so fast. And then he was back on his bike and gone.

I sat under the willow tree and tried to remember everything that happened with Levi. I didn’t want to forget any of it.

152

Dear Penny,

After dinner, I asked Wanna how to spell
dyslexia
and if she knew anything about it. She said she only knew a little bit but asked me to come and sit with her at the computer and we could learn about it together. Wanna never asked me why I wanted to know.

I shared a chair with Wanna. We sat pressed against each other as she typed questions into the computer. Wanna was cleaning the wood in the house earlier, and she smelled like lemons.

I learned a lot about dyslexia. I learned that Levi was not alone. There are many people who are dealing with letters that don’t look right and sentences that don’t seem to be in the right order.

I asked Wanna if there was a name for why Abby looked the way that she did. What was the name for someone with white hair, white skin, and grey eyes that don’t work very well?

Wanna told me that Abby had albinism. We looked on the computer at pictures of children and adults who had the albinism.

It was hard to look at all of those faces of people who had the same thing as Abby. It made me remember how afraid I was, in China, when Abby would get sick or if I couldn’t find her in the orphanage. I didn’t know if what she had, the thing that made her hair white and her eyes grey, was going to make her die.

Now I know that her body will be ok and the albinism won’t kill her. But I still feel scared because I will never see her again to know for sure that she is ok on the inside.

She isn’t my Abby anymore. She isn’t my Ye-Bi in China. She is now a stranger to me. I am probably a stranger to her too.

I thought about telling Wanna what I have told you. The parts about being scared. But instead I said—

Thanks.

Wanna leaned her head down and placed it against mine. She said—

You are very welcome.

153

Dear Penny,

Wanna lets me borrow her music player to listen to before I go to sleep.

Wanna’s player shows me the song it is playing. It tells me who wrote the song and the name of the song.

I have one song that I like to play the most.

When I listen to the song, I can see my dancers in my head. They dance with everything that they hold inside of them.

The dancers move slowly, but their feelings are fast. They wear long dresses that float around them when they turn.

The name of the song is ‘Fly Away’ and the singer’s voice is soft and low when he sings—