Finally

Eryn Mei Peritz, United States

The first time you came to China you expected it to be full of rundown streets with chicken and children running loose; your aunts and uncles expected so too. After you received the notice from the orphanage that they had a healthy June baby waiting for you, they were just so happy for you but warned: You must raise her without any notion that she is anything but American. No trips back or Cantonese learning, no culturally immersive classes or clubs, but most importantly – make sure no AIDS or hepatitis B. If she’s not healthy give the baby back. You didn’t nod but just said okay. 

Right before you left from LaGuardia, they waved tearful goodbyes and hugged you, promising that it would all work out. You boarded the airplane with your certificates of authentication, the social worker’s note of recommendation, and the picture the orphanage had sent to you. That was the last item you checked before boarding. 

Back home your aunts had tried setting you up on dates, none successful. The men were all too much; flashy watches and suits with collars that were so stiff you felt them jab your neck as they leaned in, expecting a goodnight kiss. You preferred women, but the only women you knew who went out with other women were the ones your aunts talked about in hushed whispers after they had too much to drink; the alcohol lowered their inhibitions though they didn’t mind telling you those things sober. 

When the plane landed, you had to wait for the mothers putting their children into strollers and sighing of relief after the sixteen hour flight. You sighed too because motherhood was something you had so desperately wanted. You craved the long nights no longer spent alone, and the feeling of a breathing body that belonged to you, and only you. After waiting months for the letters from your coworkers and boss (all praising your “outstandingly, upbeat character”) and waiting for confirmation from both the American and Chinese officials that you in fact, would become a mother early October, you found that you were not exhausted. You felt more alive, more awake than you had in years. You brushed aside your family’s race-related comments just as you had done to their homophobic ones. In time you hoped, they would come to love both you and your new Chinese baby. You hoped because that was all you could do. 

Eryn Mei Peritz (丰春苹), 17, is co-editor-in-chief of her school’s literary magazine, Context, and was selected to attend the Alice Hoffman Young Writers Retreat in the summer of 2020. She has a fierce passion for novelty earrings and pom-pom tailed poodles (hers of course, included). She can most likely be found curled up with a cup of green tea and a good book. Her poem, “Won, Too,” and another prose piece, “Science isn’t optional,” were also published in this issue of Aster Lit.