Jordan/Yuan-Wei: Mothers & Matrimonies

Hey all, been a minute.  Just dropping in to congratulate Jonah/Krystle on her engagement and state for the record that while I would feel like a complete asshole to ask her to choose a date that's either the weekend before or the one after my brother Max's wedding next summer so that I could just take a couple weeks of vacation and minimize the brutal jet lag next June, I am absolutely not above just casually mentioning this circumstance in a slice-of-life blog entry about how I've evidently reached the point in my life where everybody I know is getting married and it's kind of a pain in the ass.

I am, of course, pretty happy for everybody in my life who is tying the knot, especially them, although I'm not likely to join them any time soon; I had a long string of bad dates before meeting the guy I'm seeing now.  The funny thing is that my mother is starting to get antsy, quoting some statistics about women over 30 getting married or having children, and I tell her that wither you consider me a man over thirty or a woman under, but you can't mix them up willy-nilly like that.  She says it's perfectly reasonable - I've lived that long and I certainly seem to identify as a woman - but she's had two kids and is about to attend her second wedding, anything from me is a bonus.

Meanwhile, both of the Chen-Ais got married this summer, and I was a bridesmaid at both.

For original Chen-Ai/current Bingbing, it's to some guy whose family owns a bunch of factories in Guangzhou, who doesn't seem particularly evil himself, but the rest of his family and friends...  Ugh.  This was my first trip into the Mainland, which I gather isn't necessarily that big a deal for a lot of Hong Kongers, but I've been kind of skittish about it.  I'm not politically outspoken, but folks know I've spent a lot of time in the United States and that I tend to take that perspective.  Plus, I'm a Chinese-American guy who has taken over the life of a Chinese woman and while we've all experienced how the Inn's magic keeps people from believing in it, maybe there's someone in the Chinese government who sees me or the "Lee Yuan-Wei" identity as an asset.  Or just a criminal.

It doesn't seem to have bothered Bingbing, though, who after draining her old bank accounts as much as she could without the lawyers starting to lean on her sought out a new potential rich husband, and this guy is probably a good target because he may technically be what they used to call a "princeling" - wealthy family, educated abroad, not involved with the business's day-to-day - he seems to be an earnest socialist and humble.  Enough that, after I'd wound up dragged along on a few outings with them, I asked if she has Inn-related plans for him, and she stook her tongue out saying "yuk, no interest in having one of those things on my body, and his is big that I don't know what I'd do with it."  I gave her a look and she said she liked being Bingbing and wasn't looking to change.  Much more fun, she says, to be the pretty wife who is good at social things than actually running the business

I think she remembered my skepticism, though, because I fucking swear she had the dressmaker make my bridesmaid dress tighter, shorter, and doing more to push my tits up into a plunging neckline than when we tried them on, so I spent the whole wedding and reception looking like I was some tacky Kong Girl trolling for a rich Mainland husband of my own from among the much-less likable folks on hand.  Just gross even when they weren't grabbing my ass.

(It's been a while, but, no, I haven't become a shrinking violet or anything; I just enjoy guys pawing me a whole lot more after we've established we like and trust each other than before, and part of that is them not being asshats because I'm not one to hide what yoga and dance do for me!)

I admit, I did agree to a date with the least-objectionable one, but I'm glad the night ended on a silly-seeming pop-cultural argument as opposed to actually getting near a second date.  And that wasn't all bad; the guy I'm seeing now had actually been in the restaurant and mentioned it when a dating app matched us up, saying that I was right and he was impressed at my willingness to call something a red flag.  So not a total disaster.

I'm happy for the newest model Chen-Ai, though.  As much as she's made some solid progress in that identity, Cantonese is a tough language to learn at her age.  Six months ago, she met a nice man her apparent age that works at one of the large UK-based banks, they hit it off, and when he was reassigned back home, he proposed.  And while immigrating to a new country by marrying someone from there is not nearly as straightforward as people assume - I've reap up on this "just in case" - Hong Kong to the UK is apparently one of the easier cases; the new quasi-stepfather says that making it easier for Hong Kongers who held UK passports before the handover easier to immigrate was one of the few good/competent things Boris Johnson did.

This was a much smaller ceremony, as a lot of Chen-Ai's friends have sort of fallen away as she disappeared and returned as someone else who had a hard time communicating with her.  It's good, I guess; she's going to be starting a new life on the other side of the world and being able to make a clean break is probably pretty handy, but she gave me this big hug like I was her actual daughter and thanked me for how much I'd helped her to be able to get by so that she could meet someone like him.

I'm not sure what to do with that, really.  I know that I was often a real asshole before going to the Inn and especially while I was Deirdre, and I don't really recall a point when I decided to stop being an asshole.  Anne likes to point to me deciding Benny could keep my old life as that moment, and, maybe, but sometimes I feel like I was more intimidated than generous there, or what it means that I had to be made attractive or female for me to treat others well.  I like myself more than I did, and it's not just knowing that there are folks out there who want to fuck me.  If the thing I've got going now doesn't work out, I know I'll be okay.

But Chen-Ai didn't have anyone from her old life when she got married as Bingbing; her real daughter and the real Bingbing are men in Montreal and I gather she didn't really have any regrets about their not being there.  I don't know if the original Yuan-wei will come when and if I get married, but she came to graduation and we get along okay.  We'll find a way to explain why my folks are there.

Is there a point to this?  Probably not.  It's just been crazy hot and busy and I've had my weekends eaten by weddings lately and I needed to blow off some steam.

-Jordo

Jordan/Yuan-Wei: Finally Being Called "Home"

I'll get to the title I just entered, but first - do you ever think of how weird "Western Names" for Chinese people are?  Like, if I asked you what your favorite Chan Yuan-Lung movie was, you'd think you'd never heard of the guy, and that's kind of fucking crazy - you would think that after decades of having success on both sides of the Pacific, folks would at least absorb the name by which Jackie Chan is known in Hong Kong as a fun piece of trivia, or maybe try to use it more if they're good progressive folks, but nah - they (heck, I admit it, we) just keep using the name he chose because white people couldn't handle a Chinese name and he wanted to do business with them.  Even though people use the names of Japanese and Korean actors all the time, this weird and sort of racist tradition continues.

Although, heck, I'm named "Jordan" because my parents wanted to make things easy on me and Max at school and later on, and I went to using that after graduating college as Yuan-Wei because I'd rather go by that than "Missy".  Sometimes, growing up, I kind of wished I had a Chinese name; today I'm kind of grateful because it gives me a way to more easily reclaim a bit of who I am than other folks who have been to the Inn get.  Being Jordan Lee lets me more easily separate myself from Lee Yuan-Wei, even if it also means I'm also not Jordan Chang.

But it's apparently time to accept being Lee Yuan-Wei more.  The person who has been Wang Chen-Ai for the past couple of years is kind of stuck in Hong Kong despite not really knowing any Cantonese or Mandarin - just disappearing in the United States for a few months gets a flag put on your passport, apparently.  It's not as bad as it sounds - you can get by there just speaking English, and whatever magic the Inn has which keeps people from believing it exists must make her claim that some sort of stroke erased her first language but not her second sound less ridiculous.  She's hired "Bingbing" - the original Chen-Ai - as an "assistant" despite my warnings, but I can't exactly argue with someone on the other side of the world and a different culture from what is home that she shouldn't lean on the person who knows it best.

The family's lawyers feel a little differently, though, and have contacted me, saying that I really shouldn't leave my mother in this situation.  Romain and René - the original Yuan-Wei and Bingbing - either don't have super-strong opinions or just sort of freeze trying to figure out what their interest should be at this point and I don't blame them.  Meanwhile, my employer is finally getting around to opening a department in Hong Kong; they'd planned to do it a couple years ago, but then there was a fucking pandemic.  Now, though, they really want a piece of the visual effects market in China, and to a lesser extent Korea, Japan, and India, and here I am, with a pretty good record, speaking the language, and technically only living in Southern California because they sponsor my visa.  As it turns out, the timing of this works out pretty good for "Lee Yuan-Wei" - because they couldn't open two years ago, I've got more experience, so if I transfer to the new location, I'll get a promotion to lead animator, probably a couple years ahead of when I would if I stayed in L.A.  It's a good opportunity, but I'd like it more if it felt like "spend a couple years overseas, come home with a promotion" rather than maybe the end of my life as an American.

I don't think my employer would fire me for not going, but I have joked about it being a shame I'm not in a relationship so that I could believably become a citizen through marriage.

As you can see, there's a huge part of me that hates all this and resents that it's going to push me into upending my whole life again, and I kind of want to do what i did when I woke up as Deirdre and just put my foot down and say fuck it, I'm going to keep living my life no matter what.  But I was talking to my folks, and they kind of pointed out that the Inn has been good to me.  Not that I should be grateful for the way it messed up my life, but I've got friends, I'm physically younger, healthier, and more attractive, if in a different way.  This life comes with resources and I've been able to redirect it into something that probably suits me better than both my original path and the one it was on.  I've got friends in Annette, Jonah, Ernesto, and a few others like I haven't had before.  If that means helping to look after some 75-year-old white woman who finds herself trapped in a Chinese life she doesn't understand, I guess it's not a bad price.

I'd just like to feel like I've got a little more control over it before something else sends it in a different direction!

-Jordo

Jordan/Yuan-wei: Not Seeing a Master Plan Yet

Jacky kind of left his post-Inn visit to chance, but that is not how Chen-ai operates.  I may not know what her whole deal is about, but she had never sprung anything on me that hasn't taken some planning, even if I never see it coming.

Take last night.  My co-workers and I are rolling out of the building at around 9:30pm - something can't miss its Christmas release date, and, no, it's not Star Wars - and doing the usual when we've been hit with that much unpaid overtime:  Grabbing a snack at the taco truck a couple blocks away, because we've worked straight through dinner and who is going to want to fucking cook by the time we make our way home through traffic?  Add some beers from a nearby convenience store, and it makes for a fine end-of-week bitch session.

It's my turn to buy the beer, and I'm walking back to the truck when a bright green convertible slams on the brakes and turns into the lot.  The driver gets out, a blonde wearing a sparkly pink dress that shows pretty much all of her legs and has a plunging neckline that makes it clear she's got the sort of slender build to go braless, plus matching stiletto heels and dark sunglasses.  She makes a beeline in my direction.  "Missy?"

My colleagues raise their eyebrows, and I'm pretty confused too.  "Do I--?"

She takes off the glasses, and it's suddenly more obvious that the blonde hair is a dye job.  "It's me!  Bingbing!  Oh my god, the look on your face!"  She quickly pulls a phone out of a handbag, shoves herself against me, and takes a tongue-out selfie with one hand while extending the two fingers with the other.  "Can you believe this?  Missy and I grew up together in Hong Kong, and then I'm out here doing a scavenger hunt of all things, and I find her!  What are the odds?"

All my friends are smirking like seeing me uncomfortable is hilarious.  Rafik is the first to respond.  "If you want to catch up--"

"No way."

"Yes!  We're supposed to do this with partners, but since I'm between boyfriends...  Oh, you're still hung up on that!   But that was ages ago, and we were totally different people!"

I sighed.  "Fine.  Whatever you say."

Chen-ai/Bingbing squealed, and everyone made a point of calling me "Missy" as I got in the car, barely shutting the door before she hit the gas and tore out onto the highway, leaving me grabbing hold of the door while trying to buckle my seat belt, and soon work was out of sight (along my own car, I suddenly realized).  I looked over at Chen-ai, expecting her to drop the act, but she just switched to Cantonese.

"I should have done this years ago!  Is this what it felt like for you, seeing Yuan-wei's face in the mirror after choosing not to go back to being that fatty again?  So light and sexy and full of energy and free?"

"No!  What the fuck is wrong with you?"

She didn't say anything for a few minutes, and then seemed a little more serious and like the Chen-ai I remembered as we pulled into a gas station.  "You know, it's going to go a lot better between us if you just let some things go.   I promise."  She reached into what passed for a back seat and pulled out a garment bag, then nodded toward the restrooms.  "C'mon, go get changed."

I thought of refusing, but we were kind of out in the middle of nowhere and pissing her off was maybe not a great idea.  I snatched the bag and went to the back of the station, hoping this wasn't how I got left behind.

It was a really nice dress, as sparkly as hers but not quite so low-cut, even if there was no wearing a bra with it.  The cut (and underwire) pushed my tits up and in, anyway.  The matching handbag was just big enough for phone, wallet, lipstick, keys, and pepper spray; the matching shoes were also stilettos, and I felt a little wobbly from not having really gone out in a while (and folks were just going to have to deal with my unpainted toenails).

Chen-ai hadn't abandoned me, so I tried to play it cool.  "Pink and blue dresses?  Trying to say something?"

"Nah, it's just funny.  We've got a private joke."  She let me get secure in my seat before driving off this time.

We were in the city a half-hour later, able to walk past a round-the-block line at a club.  She asked what I was drinking, I said a 7-Up, and she said "Bicardi & 7, got it."  Before I could say no, it was in my hands.

We attracted attention, and though we weren't attached at the hip for the next three hours, I would always find her near me after a while.  I'm not going to lie, there were moments when I was a bit carried away by the great DJ, the cool light show, and the very hip crowd.  Some folks bought me really expensive drinks, and I do have the phone number of an actor who went from flattered that I recognized his face to curious when I said it was from putting it on a stuntman's body.

But Chen-ai seemed to being having an even better time, grinding on the biggest stars in the place, screaming that she loved that song, flirting and getting numbers from people half her age like it wasn't fucking weird at all.  Every once in a while, she'd make sure to introduce me to one, taking about how he might be a really good contact to have, or saying he'd been looking my way.

I guess she didn't quite know how much Bingbing could hold, because after a while she put her arm around my shoulders and said she needed me to drive her to the hotel.  I disentangled myself from the finance creep who was hitting on me, got her to the sidewalk, and took the key when the valet returned.

The car was annoyingly fun to drive, and the hotel was five-star.  I tried to drop her at the elevator, but she grabbed my hand, half-drunkenly saying we had to talk.  Her room was a suite, of course, and she had apparently already used the place's app to order room service, remembering how I liked my steak.

Hungry from not having my tacos hours ago, I attacked it right away, looking up to see her smiling.

"So what's this all about?  Making sure I can see how well you planned everything and prepared to fit in so that I don't try and push back?"

She gave a little "ugh!" gap, like the accusation was me being paranoid.  "Fitting in's not that hard, Jordo.  Like, all those eighties and nineties movies and TV shows you millennials watch, that's us.  Not that much has changed other than the phones!  And as for what it's about, like I said, it's easier for everyone if we get along.  Everyone thinks we're best friends anyway."

"Right, you want to be my friend."

"Why is that so hard to believe?  I told you that I'm impressed by how you handled all this, I stepped in when I saw Carlotta and Giorgia were trying to mess with your life, I've shared what I know about the Inn.  I know it's not great that I never really learned to play the part of a good mother because I resented Yuan-wei and that I like you better than her, but now I don't have to!"

"If you like me so much, why did you make me dump Jacky?"

"Did that turn out to be a bad thing?  Look, it's not your fault that you never developed the instinct for when guys are trouble the way other girls do, but were you going to listen to the woman you imagine is some sort of supervillain if I said he set off alarms?  Obviously not.  I figured maybe a little time as a woman would have made him appreciate you more, but from how receptive you seemed to be to other guys tonight, I'm guessing it didn't turn out that way."

I didn't concede the point, but I didn't say anything.

"Besides, you're going to want me by your side when they start asking about your mother."

That was what I was waiting for.  She said it in the same casual, fun-loving way as everything else, but a chill went up my spine and I carefully set my fork down.  "Chen-ai, what did you do?"

"Nothing, really, but my old identity is in limbo, so when nobody sees her for a few weeks, there will be some questions, especially if anybody finds out she's not at that place I checked myself into."  She gave me a look like I was the one making trouble.  "What?  It's not exactly easy to disappear for long enough to overstay a visa.  But I trust you to cover for me!"

"You expect me to cover for you?"

"I wouldn't have given you power of attorney otherwise, although I admit, I did figure you'd be coming to your friend Bingbing for advice."  She shrugged.

"What the fuck else?"

"What do you mean?"

"What sort of other fucking mess have you stuck me with?"

"There's no other mess, and the business runs itself."  I crossed my arms and stared bullets.  "Okay, fine, I put ten million dollars into a numbered amount.  Hong Kong dollars, not U.S., I'm not greedy or anything.  It's just kind of like start-up money."

"You did what?!!?"

"Hey, I earned that money, and I deserve to take some with me!  It shouldn't affect you at all - I didn't touch your trust fund, and barring any sort of emergency, nobody will have any reason to freak out and call the police about how your frugal, sensible mother hasn't been seen in weeks if you just stay in California and let our employees do their thing."

I pushed away from the table.  "There's the fucking threat."

She stood up and chased after me.  "It's not a threat, Jordan, it's precautions, just in case something went wrong or I got homesick.  I didn't even see the need to tell you before you started interrogating me because I could see you're so happy here and such a good person.  Trust me, we're going to be great friends by this time next year.  Maid of honor at my wedding."

I snorted, and she ignored it.  A big, genuine-seeming yawn escaped her.  "Wow, I haven't had a night like that in twenty years!  I've got to crash.  The hotel laid out a toiletries in the other bathroom and some really great pajamas in the other bedroom, so we can talk more in the morning if you want."  She hadn't taken her heels off, and giggled as she had to find her balance on the way to the bathroom.

I said hell no to that, calling to charge a cab to the room as soon as she had closed the door.  I'd been watching my drinks, but I still felt pretty drowsy when I got home, and feel asleep right away.

This morning, there were text messages from "Bingbing", saying she understood this was going to take some time, and since she had to go back to Hong Kong anyway, she'd give me my space.  Then the selfie she took at the start of the night.

The whole night almost doesn't even feel real, even with that stupidly nice dress hanging by the hamper.  There's got to be some sort of angle.  There's no fucking way that Chen-ai really thinks we're going to be besties after all she's done, unless she's crazier than I thought.

-Jordo

Jordan/Yuan-wei: Half a World Away

Been a while since I checked in, but I guess that happens to everyone - at a certain point, you are Jordan Lee Yuan-wei, recent college graduate with a job in the visual effects industry, and the fact that you used to be Jordan Chang, male and five years older, is less important on a daily basis.  Especially with my parents doing their best to act like I was born this way.  It was weird to get earrings for Christmas from my mom, but I'm not complaining.  Even though becoming a girl hasn't made me really into jewelry, that's her accepting a lot.

Of course, I don't may have one mother now, and Yang Chen-ai has been anxious in recent weeks.

I know that not many Americans have been following the news out of Hong Kong (this country has its own issues to fill all your worrying about the world going to hell needs), but it's something I get asked about a fair amount because I'm from there as far as anybody who doesn't know about the Inn is concerned.  What's going on scares the shit out of me, to be honest, because there's not a lot of scenarios that don't have Lee Yuan-wei going back there for more than a visit at some point, and I'm scared that it's never going to be close to the place I know again.

On the one hand I don't know if Chen-ai really cares about that.  Maybe she does; even evil people can love their home, though I think she's mercenary enough to put up with anything so long as the business continued to bring money in.  On the other, well, she had had her husband killed with the intention of setting me or whoever else wound living Yuan-wei's life up for the fall, so who knows what else she's afraid of happening to her should China take more direct control over Hong Kong and start looking into things that had previously been ignored.  It's enough to spook her, enough to get in contact with Bingbing and hint that if she would like to go back to her real life, that could be arranged, if Chen-ai were to become her.

I'm almost angry that she said no, for a bunch of really fucking stupid reasons.

I suppose all of you that read this blog because you, not having been to the Inn, see it as a weird or kinky fantasy saw this coming, because it's the most dramatic way to fuck with me, but it turns out that the person who has been living the life of Chen Bingbing for the past couple years is, you guessed it, my ex-boyfriend Jacky.  The one I broke up with because Chen-ai promised to ruin our lives if I didn't.  Who then, apparently thinking that I wasn't upset enough by the whole state of affairs, proceeded to fuck and then get involved with my brother without telling either of us what was going on.

The whole finding out deal was weird - I guess Jacky found out that Chen-ai was sleeping with whoever was living his life (he was working as her personal assistant), figured that meant he was never going back, so came clean to Max.  They didn't immediately break up, but he told me, and...  Well, the whole thing felt gross, and for a while my brother and I weren't talking, but eventually he met another girl and decided he didn't want to be in a relationship that wasn't just about the two people involved.  Jacky/Bingbing graduated from college this May and went back home to HK, and we'd kind of figured that was it.  I wanted that to be it.

I asked him what he wanted, and while he said that he had come to accept the idea of being Bingbing for the foreseeable future, it wasn't like he'd put down roots, and I can testify that the call of "how things should be" is damn strong, even when everybody thinks they're probably better off.  So who am I to tell him that there's probably some major league catch?

It's got me stupidly distracted, though, to the point where people are noticing at work.  I can tell them that I'm worries about folks back "home", but the truth is, they really don't give a shit; they just can't have our team missing deadline on animating a swarm of monsters.  so there's been a lot of overtime and I probably haven't been doing my best work.

And I don't get it.  I've always had it in the back of my mind that Chen-ai might decide to leave her old life behind and become a generation younger, I always thought it would be to become Yuan-wei.  It's just so much fucking simpler!  Has she stayed liking me enough to not want to mess with my life, or does she see some other way to mess with me?

Who the fuck knows?  This shit doesn't matter as much as the rest of what's going on in Hong Kong, and I wish it wasn't my first concern about the whole thing.

-Jordo

Jordan/Yuan-wei: Yes, It's Me, In the Sari

I dunno if Annette is going to make a post about the wedding on this blog, but I figure I'll leave all the really touristy, holy-shit-I'm-really-doing-this stuff to her, because as anybody who has seen her Facebook page over the last couple weeks can attest, she is really into doing that right now.  And who can blame her, really?  She's been an Indian-American dude, but only really did stuff that emphasized the "Indian" part of that a few times, plus it's all so foreign to everyone she knows in her "real" life that they more or less demand every second be documented, and she has happily complied.

We planned it so that our flights arrived in Mumbai at about the same time, and then Kareena was there to pick us up.  There was a lot of hugging before Kareena told us that we weren't just attending, but would be part of the bridal party.  "Mummydaddy didn't want that at first, since it's usually just family and closest friends, but I didn't think it was right that either of you should be off in the back, since me and Jor -- that is, Benny -- wouldn't be together without you two, I insisted."  She looked panicked for a second.  "It's that too much?  Maybe you wanted to be anonymous--"

Annette, at least, was down for it.  "Hell, no, just be warned - I am going to be the worst gawking American with her phone out all the time!  How 'bout you, Jordo?"

I have to admit, I had kind of figured it would be like René at my graduation, there but kind of just out of curiosity, but I also know I wasn't going to watch my own wedding without Annette there for moral support, so what the hell else could I do but say yes?  Which meant a quick drive into the city, where Kareena had some pretty specific ideas for what we needed in terms of outfits.

Also, that our plans to fight jet lag and be really fresh for the second days ceremonies were kind of dashed, because now we had to be at the ganesh pooja, and while it was a nice ceremony, it was kind of uncomfortable.  Benny was there, so they weren't conducting it entirely in Hindi, but I think that they would have otherwise just to spite us.  Kareena had been necessity vague about how we fit into her going from a not-quite-arranged marriage to what they see as rushing into things with Ravi's old roommate, so they think maybe one of us slept with him or was rejected and faked evidence of him being gay or something like that.  Since some of have probably been putting some way to get Kareena and Ravi back together for the last couple years, we're not exactly welcome guests to them.

The atmosphere was a little different the next morning as we all got our hands and feet painted at the mehndi ceremony; that was almost all Kareena's girlfriends and they just saw it as romantic, wanting details of how everything went down.  We kept to the story about how "Jordan" used to be a big gamer and "Yuan-wei" was one of the folks he regularly played with, that I met Annette at some college-night thing, we took a trip to New York, and one or the other of us noticed some sort of chemistry between him and Kareena, especially once he started getting into shape.  It's a cover story that sounds like one when Annette and I hear it, but I guess it sounds reasonable to everyone else.

It takes a while and I feel genuinely weird looking at my skin afterward.  The henna patterns look like tattoos and I don't know that I really like that.  I never got one back in my original life, didn't even consider my body my own as Deirdre, and just never saw how injecting ink into my skin was going to make me better-looking since becoming Yuan-wei, especially since I could still  remember Mom & Dad saying that there could come a time when I didn't want one,  and figured that went double for chicks.  I put on makeup and jewelry and sometimes do prosthetics for movies and Halloween and shit, but seeing my body as an artistic medium was weird, even if I'm probably more used to it as malleable than most.

The sangeet was that night, and I nearly had a heart attack when I saw Mom, Dad, Max, and Bingbing arrive and sit down away from me, with Benny.  When I didn't see them, I could kind of put the fact that the Inn cut me off from my family out of mind, but this hit me a lot fucking harder than expected, them traveling to the other side of the world for Benny.  It also removed me that I hadn't just come here out of obligation, and that Benny hadn't agreed to the big Indian wedding to make Kareena happy.  We were trying to get them into a state of mind where we could tell them the truth.

Annette grabbed my hand and was an awesome friend through this, but I didn't get much sleep after, and the next morning, as we all helped Kareena get ready, I really wondered about some stuff for the first time.  She looked so damn beautiful and happy, and I thought about how is always just fucking dismissed her back when she was sort of Ravi's girlfriend, I guess because of the whole arrangement that seemed to drop her in his lap, but I couldn't help going down the what-if path, like, if I'd been in shape, would she have been attracted to me the same way she was to Benny?  Then maybe I never go to the Inn, or I wind up taking Max or something, and, nope, just gross.  And maybe Annette has nobody who can help her out and gets in a real mess as Yuan-wei, or Benny steals Kareena from me...

It'll drive you nuts if you go down that rabbit hole, so I dug out and just got through the wedding.  I haven't really been to a lot, but, man, these Indian ones are colorful and festive compared to Western ones with churches and bland suits - there was horses drums, and fire!  It lasted a while, but it was good for gawking, and then there was the reception with food, music, and so much dancing.

I was a bit creeps out when the first Chinese guy asked me to dance, but he was like a second cousin, and even if we were still blood relations, well, that's not that close, and he was respectful enough when I removed his hand from my ass.  That I hadn't seen any of them for fifteen years made a lot of difference, as did the fact that, by and large, they were kind of a nice break between Kareena's male relatives and friends and neighbors and all.  Don't get me wrong, the Indian dudes are all cool and fun, and I've got no fucking problem with guys seeing me as hot in part because I'm different, but the confidence and directness was a bit much, especially the ones who pushed the conversation to marriage awful quick and then boasted about the size of their parents' house.

Still, I had a lot more fun than I'd ever had at one of these as a guy, to the point that I was still going strong when Annette tapped me on the shoulder and pointed to my parents, who were winding down and making their way to tell Benny and Kareena they were done for the night.  I made my way back to my seat to collect the shoes I had taken off earlier (we were well into the barefoot dancing stage of things) and Annette went to find Max.  We all meet up in the hallway and told them that we had something important to tell them, although Annette and Bingbing stayed behind in the hall when we got to Mom's and Dad's guest room.

Dad asked what this was about, and Benny looked at me.  "Should you start, or should I...?"

"Oh God, they're in some sort of weird poly thing."

I think we all looked a little shocked to hear my mom say that, but Kareena recovered first.  "No!  But, honey, I think you have to start."

Benny nodded, and turned to my parents.  "Okay.  Well, them, here goes.  I'm, uh, I'm not your son.  She is."

I looked at him.  "Oh, that's fucking eloquent.  Real sense of the moment you've got there."

My Dad looked at Benny, then me, then back to Benny.  "I'm afraid I don't get the joke, son, or why you'd do this tonight of all nights."

"It's not a joke, Da-- Mister Chang.  There's this cursed beach house in Maine, and it turns people into the last person to stay there.  I stayed there after Jordan, like, four years ago, and we were going to all change back, but that's how I met Kareena, so we didn't."

"Think back, Dad - didn't we think it was weird that Jordan suddenly started to become easy to get along with and care about his health when he came back from that trip to Maine with Ravi?"

I gave him a look.  "You know, you could have mentioned suddenly no longer speaking Chinese and changing jobs...

"Stop it!"  Mom looked at us.  "This isn't funny, and Kareena, I would not think you would be a part of the boys doing this."

"I wouldn't if it was a joke, Mama Chang, but we kind of have to.  Jordan, the new Jordan, he tried to tell me five times - he hates keeping anything from me - but the curse protects itself even beyond it being hard to believe.  I always thought it was just a metaphor for him trying to change his life until the night he proposed, and I realized he wouldn't risk that moment unless he really meant it.  That's the only time the truth can get into your mind, when your life is already changing.  We were just hoping this was going to be a big change for you, and not just us."

"That's--"  She looked at me.  "Tell me something only my Jordan would know."

"Honey--!"

Mom gave Dad a look, then turned back to me.  "Come on, make me believe this."

So I did, and if I made sure to do it in Cantonese so that Benny and Kareena didn't understand, I'm sure as fuck not putting it on the Internet for anyone to read.

They didn't quite seem to believe us, but Dad was getting angry anyway.  "This doesn't make sense!  You say you could turn back but didn't, and how do you know if this is supposed to be protected?" He looked hard at Max, who stammered that was a while other story.

"It's part of mine.  There are some bad people out there that use the Inn, and Max got caught up."

"So you say.  But even if this is true, why tell us?  Why make us feel like fools?"

"Don't you want to know, Mom?  I mean, okay, things are going to be weird, but the weird things have explanations now!"

"Do they?  Even if this is all true, you said you could have changed back, but you didn't, even after someone else hit the gym for you!  Why didn't you?"

"Benny and Kareena--"

"Bullshit!"  Dad moved his gaze between me and Benny.  "I love my son, but that's not like you.  You could be so selfish!"

That fucking hurt.  "Do you have any idea what it's like to see someone take your life and improve it?  To just watch someone make your body and then make friends and get a great girl and even find a job he doesn't hate and just absolutely know that you're going to fuck it up?  It's goddamn terrifying, and I thought I was going to get into a very different situation instead of this!"

This time Mom was the one looking between us, not sure exactly what she should believe our who she should address.  "I...  I hope you don't think we loved you more just because--"

She started to well up, and I grabbed her hands.  "No!  And even if you did, that would have just meant that you were proud of me.  You couldn't have known!"

Our faces were close, enough for her to see my makeup, or my cleavage if she looked down a little.  "You do understand that is hard to look at you and see my son."

"It's been four years, Mom.  More than enough time to figure out bras and heels and lipstick."

"But I saw you on the dance floor, and you seemed so... enthusiastic.  Does that mean that before, you were--"

"Trans?  I don't think so - I'm hardly the first guy to visit the Inn and eventually be okay with the change to female, like it makes the new you the real you somehow.  But I dunno.  I'm into my appearance more, but I don't know if that means this is more 'right' or I've learned some sort of lesson or I just still like looking at hot chicks and that includes the mirror in the morning.  But the important stuff hadn't changed.  I still love Halloween and Hong Kong movies and the Mets.  I'm good with computers and still like to draw, and now I get to use them together."

I think that's when Mom really started to believe, although Dad needed a little more convincing.  We went through a lot of the last four years, although we didn't fill them in on all the details - I don't know enough about Bingbing's deal to spill and Max won't, and we left out the part about Max getting fucked by Annette. 

I guess it's good that they wanted to know a lot about Jacky and Ernesto - if they still thought I was just some random girl, they wouldn't really care about my (ex) (not really) boyfriends.  Or maybe they would.  On the other hand, they didn't say I should be paying off the student loans that Benny inherited, which I kind of expected.

So, I don't know if I'll be invited to Thanksgiving, or if Benny will be, or what.  But, man, is it a fucking load off.

-Jordo

Annette & Jordan/Yuan-wei: Graduation

Annette:

This probably comes off as a little weird, but since both Jordan and I graduated from college a couple weeks ago, we figured it would make sense to do this as one post together, rather than bore you guys twice.  We were going to do it right after my graduation, but we got really busy - I'm moving in with her for the summer, and that takes some effort, we've both been looking for work, she's got immigration things to figure out...

Jordan:

We really need to get an Inn person into ICE so that we can say "I was born here" and they'll believe you and find a way to make everything work.  Sure, I'm not the sort of person those fuckers target, but who knows whether Americans will freak out about Chinese people by the time they can send me back to Hong Kong for overstaying my student visa in a couple of months.

Worrying about that sort of stuff was part of why I thought about skipping graduation altogether.  I'd done it before and it seemed kind of strange to invite those who remembered back for another one, and it also meant that Chen-ai was going to be there.  We avoid having to pretend to be family these days, but some things can't be skipped without people hitting you with way more pity or suspicion than you want to deal with.

Despite switching up my studies after my first year as Yuan-wei, graduating late or the like was never going to happen.  I didn't get the marks I'd hoped for on "I, Fembot" even though there weren't a whole lot of complaints about technique.  Someone thought it was tacky for me to use those themes and dinged me for that. 

Annette:

If only they knew!

Jordan:

Whatever; all the folks I've shown it to who have been turned from men into women and had to deal with new urges like it, and it gives me something to show prospective employers on Vimeo.  Freaked Harmon out to see the finished product, though.

And Ernesto seemed to think it was pretty decent.  He jokes about the best part being the brain he made and seeing "Alicia" vamp it up after being so prissy off-camera, and kind of doesn't entirely get that he does a lot of the "guys expect too much of women" stuff we're spoofing, but he thinks it's funny anyway and is impressed that I did some coding for some of the effects work.  He wanted me to show it to his family on Saturday night, but his grandmother seemed like she wouldn't be amused by the sex stuff.  On the other hand, not showing them stuff we'd worked on together made them positive that I was his girlfriend.

Annette:

You should be his girlfriend.

Jordan:

Even if I was interested, Chen-ai would destroy him and you know it.  You notice I haven't heard from Jacky at all since dumping him?  You'd think he'd be at least try to win me back rather than just giving up.

Annette:

Apparently not having a penis for four years doesn't get "no means no" to sink into a guy's head.

Jordan:

You're a fuckin' riot.

Anyway, Sunday was the big day.  I got a bunch of texts in the morning, half congratulations and half asking what was going on later.  I didn't get to meet anybody who had come to town for it before heading to the building, dressed a little nicer than I initially planned to.  It was hot and humid enough for cutoffs and a crop-top, but Romain was going to be there, so I did wear a nice dress under my robe.  It would have been nice to send Chen-ai home with pictures of me looking trashy, but Romain deserved better.

Annette:

Is it weird that I've got a crush on Romain and René as a couple?  Like, I want to figure out how they could fit me in?

Jordan:

YES.

Anyway, graduation was, like, pretty much the same as the first time, only longer, and I was doing it in heels this time.  Not a huge deal - I've made stilettos my bitch by now - but not ideal.  Ernesto's folks waved, Chen-ai nodded, and that was that.  I was kind of glad Romain had decided to forego sitting in the audience (even with a couple of seats between him and Chen-ai, it would have been fucking torture for him), even though he'd wanted to be here.

Chen-ai had a list of places where she wanted pictures with "her graduate", so we ran around town for the rest of the afternoon.  I think the only time we really spoke during it was when she decided she wanted a snack at Flour and set out what sort of budget I should adhere to in various cities.  We had the conversation in Mandarin, at her insistence, leading her to say Beijing was out about halfway through.

Annette:

What's the furthest from her you could reasonably go?  New York?  London?

Jordan:

You joke, but...

Annette:

So, did she just fly in for the ceremony and then leave?

Jordan:

If she did, she's got a demonic ability to avoid jet lag.  But, no, I think she arranged some business things, and I figure she wanted to talk with Bingbing at some point.

Annette:

Must have been later in the week, because I was fifth-wheeling it with her & Max & Romain & René until you got to The Changeling, and she didn't even get a text.

Speaking of, how awesome was the cake Ashlyn and Jonah got for us? 

Jordan:

FUCKING INSANE. 

Like, I know Ashlyn likes to doodle and draw, but five or six pictures of us as we were from before we went to the Inn until we're in caps and gowns printed on a lenticular card and put on the top of the cake...

And it was a damn good cake!

Annette:

Plus, the look on Max's face when you mentioned carbs...

Jordan:

The hotness does take more than good genes and yoga to maintain, sadly.  But I guess that's another thing I've learned and gotten better at these past four years, right?  Learning how to handle my body so that, no matter how it's shaped, it looks and feels right and shit.

Annette:

To tell the truth, I'm still not sure what I want to be like that.  Sandra left me kind of skinny and living with a bunch of judgmental sorority sisters after I'd just come off three years of eating like a guy.  Like, that was kind of tough on me, and it really messed me up a lot this year, trying to catch up with low blood sugar all the time because I felt like I'd forgotten how to be a woman and tried to follow their lead.

Jordan:

And yet, you brought your GPA up over your senior year.

Annette:

Not by that much, but I've got to admit, it felt good.  My    was never actually disappointed with how Sandra or I was doing, but when you come back to your original life, you want to do better, make them understand that what they've been seeing wasn't the real you.  And I think that's why all our friends from the Inn who threw us that graduation party did it as a combined thing, because they knew that I'd want the end of the week to be just for me and my mom, even if Max is the only other one I know who's really been able to come full circle like that.

Anyway, I didn't have a hot/humid commencement like you did, and guest tickets were really at a premium, but it was kind of amazing.  I felt really lucky to be graduating from such a top school, kind of pinching myself as we got closer to it.  It's stupid, I know - everyone else in the class has kind of taken going here for granted after four years, and I've experienced literal actual magic three times, with half my friends being part of a secret club that even the most elite legacies here don't know about.

But I did it!  I did it despite strange supernatural forces sending me onto other paths.  I did it despite having to spend my first year doing it from afar, living vicariously through a girlfriend, and then having to catch up.  I don't know if a tag-team post is the right place to say it (feel free to delete this paragraph when I hand you the laptop, Jordo), but there were a lot of times where even though Jordan was the person who understood what things were like for me the most, I really resented her.  Every visit to the Inn made her younger and more attractive and was like a second chance, while mine seemed to take me further from where I wanted to be, making me older and with my options seemingly narrower, and really just a stroke of luck getting me back to my real life and worried I wouldn't fit in it any more.

But I did it.  Even if I don't know what I'm going to do now.

Jordan:

Me neither.  It's kind of fucking terrifying - I don't know what country I'll be living in by the end of summer, and the whole thing with Romain the past few weeks has been goddamn weird.  He wants to be here for me finishing what he started, but he and René don't want to take back their old lives.  But that's an improvement; at least he's willing to talk with me at all now.  I think he's kind of curious what I'll make out of his old life.

Annette:

I think I'm going to wrap it up because I've got a Skype interview early tomorrow, but I want to make sure you say the thing before we hit Publish.

Jordan:

Ugh, does it have to be a fucking announcement?  (She's nodding)  Okay, fine.

I changed my name.  Back, sort of.  When I watched the finished cut of "I, Fembot", it didn't feel right, but it didn't really hit me until later that it didn't feel like mine with "A Missy Lee Film" on it.  I fucking hate being called "Missy" - not even "Melissa", just plain "Missy" - and no offense to Romain, but I can't see putting it on my résumé or in credits for movies and the like.  I can deal with "Lee Yuan-wei", but a lot of folks here want a Western name, and since Jordan can be a girl's name, I decided to reclaim it.  I'll be "Jordan Lee" from now on.  First use of that is on my diploma.

Annette:

And, honest, I think that's a way cooler graduation/commencement thing than just moving a tassel on your hat.

Jordan:

Says the person who's not filling out a bunch of forms.

Annette:

And with that, I'm going to bed.  Wish us luck as we try to figure out what tomorrow is going to bring, but in a perfectly normal way!

Max: Mystery Girl

I'm not sure what switch flipped in Bingbing III at Jordo's Halloween party, aside from her having a few drinks, but I like it even if it is kind of weird, even by Trading Post Inn standards.

I mean, I should be feeling some sort of horror right now or something - like, even if the Bingbing I knew want who I thought, should I really be cool with her doppelganger being around?  The further I get away from spending those weeks as Elaine, the more they seem kind of unreal, but if I get into that mindset, then it's like somebody scooped my girlfriend's brain out of her head and replaced itwith someone else's, and I'm okay with that because she's still cute.  I don't actually have need to have spent time as a woman to know that's kind of messed up.  Sure, Carlotta Wong was a monster who was just using me and doesn't deserve any sort of loyalty, but what does liking this new Bingbing day about me?

Maybe nothing.  She is, after all, very different.  She doesn't wear make-up, favors t-shirts, jeans, and sneakers, likes video games, and trends to be a lot more in sync with me when we're scrolling through Netflix or Amazon looking for movies to watch.  A lot of times during the first month or so, I kind of wonder why I didn't see a lot of the same things looking at "Deirdre" when that was Jordan's identity.  Bingbing was maybe not quite so angry and defiant as Jordan was, but there's still a lot of "I'm just not going to do this", right down to not putting a bra on until the day she got caught in a thunderstorm and wound up calling me from a stall in a ladies' room so I could bring her some dry clothes.  Her first period was a pretty big freak-out, too.

Still, it built some trust.  One thing I forgot to mention in some of the other times I wrote here is that while Jordan and I tend to think she's someone Chen-ai is using to keep an eye on us, she seems to think it's the other way around - that Yang Chen-ai turned her into a girl, and we're supposed to report back on her.  There's a weird sort of logic to that, I suppose, if it's not something she's saying to throw us off the path.

That could also be what suddenly dragging me into Jordan's spare room and kissing me was about, but it's a pretty crazy play for a former guy.  She kind of avoided me for about a week afterward, as much as she could when we're sharing a bed, but then the weekend came, some friends had Knocks tickets, and we kind of got invited as a couple.  Bingbing thought it would be fun, so I said yes.  We're riding the escalator up to out seats in the garden when she makes a little motion to switch places because she's a foot shorter than I am.  I say sure, but she's the one who has to kind of squeeze past my buddy and his girlfriend, who are using the opportunity to lock lips.

"New couple?" Bingbing asks in Cantonese.

"Yep.  Still really into that."  I try and smile in a way that says "not really mocking", and then she smiles back before leaving forward and kissing me on the lips.  "What's that for?"

"Well, aren't we a new couple too?"

"Are we?  I thought you were just kind of drink at Yuan-wei's party and regretting it."  I tend to use Jordan's new Chinese name with Bingbing; it flows better in Cantonese and is what she uses.

"I was, kind of, a little, but...  I know it's not fair to tell you so little about the real me, but I'm kind of unexpectedly single right now, and you're kind of the only person I can be not-lonely with, and might understand why I'm not really looking for something long-term."

"So you'll settle for me?"

"No!  Or yes?  I'm not settling, really, since you're a really good guy; you're good to me we even though it might be a lot easier to just put up with me, or even not do that.  I appreciate that."

"And this?"  I leaned in and kissed her.

We were at the top of the escalator a couple seconds later, so she puked back, but picked the conversation back up in the seats.  "I won't lie, kissing you is kind of weird, and you touching my, uh, chest even weirder, and I'm not ready for more yet, but I guess maybe two months or so is when it starts to kick in that your body responds to different things and since you've gotten used to, like, peeing differently and putting different underwear on, maybe doing other things in a new way might not be so bad, at least once.  That's how it was for you, right?"

I turned kind of red - if there's anyone I should be able to tall to about that night with Annette, it's Bingbing, but I kind of can't.

"Well, I've also got used to a bunch of girls at school saying hello by kissing cheeks, so there's that."

Right around then, the others want to know if we're talking about them in Chinese so they can't understand, so we switch to English.  The game's about to start anyway.

That's kind of what is been like the last month - we're mostly just friends, maybe feeling less weird about holding hands to keep attached while walking around the city, but when we're with other couples we'll kind of join in the public displays of affection so it's not uncomfortable for anyone.  There was a brief moment of cuddling while watching a movie a couple weeks ago, but she suddenly say up straight when she realized, which cooled off any forward motion on that.

Or did it?  Bingbing's always very careful to change clothes in the bathroom, bringing a random pairing off t-shirt and jeans in there every morning and pajamas every night, but this morning she does it in the bedroom, walking out to where I'm eating breakfast.  "You know more about how girls dress here than I do - is this all right for class?"

I look up, and for a second it's like seeing the old Bingbing ready for a night out, and it throws me.  "I,uh, only did it for a couple months, and Jordan was pretty good about leaving me be most of the time--"  She gave me a look that combined annoyance and playing to remind me that she wasn't really asking about me, so I tried to shake it off.  "Okay, uh, the skirt's all right, but unless you can button the top up a little more--"

She took it off right there, walking back to the bedroom in her bra.  "I thought so, but I figured maybe in New York."  She opened a drawer and pulled a turtleneck out, holding it up to her chest.  "Think this works?"

"Uh, sure, but if you don't mind me asking, what's with suddenly going for that stuff?"

"I've got a group presentation in class today, and Marilyn was all 'and wear a skirt and heels!' when reminding me too be on time."  From the way she imitated her classmate in English, Marilyn sounded kind of like a bitch.

Bingbing noticed that my gaze had drifted down to her chest and made a little "ah!" nose before quickly pulling the shirt over her head.  She quickly ram to the closet and grabbed a pair of shoes.  "Give it to me straight - what am I in for with these?"

"Uh, that seems kind of... advanced."  I pulled another pair out that wasn't quite so high and was a lot more solid.  "This should be good for just speaking in class."

"Thank God."  She threw the other pair back in the cost, not looking where landed.  "Of course, I'm going to freeze my ass off between now and then.  It's negative five, or, um..."  She tried to do a Celsius-to-Fahrenheit conversion for me, but went with "it's really cold."

"I haven't tried them myself, but Yuan-wei says pantyhose keeps your legs surprisingly warm."

She looked skeptical, but pulled a pair from the dresser.  She stuck a foot in and only for it halfway to a knee, and I could see her searching her memory for how a girlfriend or sister put them on.  She finally managed it, slipped on the shoes and stood without wobbling much, and looked in the mirror.  "Well, she's going to give me shit about my hair, but oh well."  She looked around for her coat, found it, threw it on, and then stood on tiptoe to give me a kiss.  "Thank you so much for helping me not get murdered by my classmate.  You're the best."

She left, and I started getting ready for my day (still looking for work).  She just called an hour ago to ask if I wanted to see Star Wars or the new Yuen Woo-ping movie tonight, her treat, and to meet her at the theater, so I guess the presentation went well.

I called Jordan, but it went right to voice mail, so I guess I should throw it open to everyone - am I nuts, or did some kind of line get crossed today?

-Max

Annette: Stupid, stupid, stupid!

How did I revert all the way to teenage girl after three years of supposedly being more mature, better at knowing what I wanted, and even ready to commit to being married?  It's like my brain looked at the experiences of my life as Ravi and Benjamin and said, "oh, that's got nothing to do with Annette!"

Maybe I should have just listened to my sorority sisters who were saying it wasn't cool to bail on a fraternity party for something  that was "like, gonna be all Chinese guys anyway, and you know what they say about them" (they aren't all racist, but it just takes one to make you want to book the whole house for a couple weeks at the Inn to get them some perspective, especially if the racist one is also one of the ones looking to marry well, and you might want to land yourself a parachute student, chickie).  But, no disrespect to them, I've been out paying with them three times in the last couple weeks, and while it was the same sort of baseline fun that comes with beer, dancing, and the guys finding as much reason to dress sexy as the girls, it was kind of a drag, because while some girls would be saying things like "they're just guys" when someone was being a creep, I kind of know better.

But, anyway, I squeeze myself into my Sexy Nurse costume, throw a peacoat on, and avoid the Red Line by taking the 47 to Missy's neighborhood.  She's really done a pretty good job with the place for basically working by herself between a dozen other things, and she's bought way better beer than the fraternity probably did.  I'm a little amused watching her and Ernesto together, because while I don't think that they'd end up together even if such a thought wouldn't cause Chen-ai to completely blow a gasket, but they give each other shit like people who are together.  Minus Chen-ai, maybe we'd be joking about when they finally get together, or maybe not; maybe the one time they had sex was enough to let them figure out they're not really compatible that way.

Anyway, the apartment filed up quickly enough, and I kind of get pressed into helper duty with Ernesto.  Still, I spotted Max as soon as he arrived, and ran up to say hi to him in his doctor costume, only to be stopped a little short to see that Bingbing was with him, also dressed in a nurse outfit, but opting for solid white stockings and flats rather than the fishnets and heels I'd gone for.  No cleavage, either.  Kind of to be expected, since we're all pretty sure she used to be a guy, but even though the were folks all around the apartment less covered than me, I sure felt kind of tacky in that moment.  Then she does a "hi, Annette, right?" and it irritates me, because even though I know I technically haven't met this Bingbing, it feels a bit put-on.  That's when Missy comes over, looks a little surprised at our matching costumes, but laughs, saying is not like we've got the Wonder Women outnumbered.  I drop back toward a keg, get myself another cup of Sam Adams, and let a short theater major be really obvious about talking to my boobs for a bit.

Soon enough, Missy finds me, and comments on our costumes matching, saying that's a fun coincidence.  I say it's no coincidence, that Max had told me he was going to come as a doctor, so I ran out and got this slutty thing, thinking that maybe I could tempt him into trying it out this way once, and if he liked it, then maybe we could go from there.

She got real quiet all of a sudden.  "What do you mean 'this way'?"  She knew, though, and started heading toward the corner where Max and Bingbing were standing, away from the rest of the guests.  "You and Annette?"  She had her fist up like she was going to do something stupid, so a grabbed her from behind.

Max looked at me.  "You didn't tell hi--her?"

"You said you were going to, that you were her brother and she deserved to hear it from you, and if I'd been born a guy I'd understand."

"I... may have said that.  Uh, sorry Jordo, I should have told you."

"That you fucked my best friend?  I'm letting you stay at my place, trying to help you adjust, and you fuck my best friend behind my back?"

"It wasn't like that!"

"No?  What was it like?"

"It was like I fucked him."  I felt Missy go kind of limp in my arms as I hissed this into her ear, not really wanting to broadcast the next part.  "Aside from how I was the guy at the time, not that that matters, there's no way sleeping with a dude was going to be his idea.  I was the one that wanted one last hurrah, and convinced Max it wouldn't be as weird for him later if it was someone who had started out as a girl and would be one again by the time he got his dick back."

She got enough feeling back in her legs to turn around and step away from me.  "And it just had to be him, huh?  Well, sure, I guess that makes sense."  She straightened her costume, suddenly noticed something needing a refill, and went to the other side of the room.

Me, I avoided looking at the guy I'd been planning to seduce, thinking that someone else who knew what the whole Inn thing did to your head, and instead started banging on my temple with a balled up fist.  "Stupid, stupid, stupid!"

"No, it's on me.  You don't sleep with the girl your brother's for a crush on, no matter how drink and curious you are, even if she's only gonna be a guy for a little while longer and he's committed to being a girl for the long haul.  You just don't do it."

Wait, what?  "You're being silly; Missy never had a crush on me!"

"Are you kidding?  I've read all your entries on the blog, and I was there for some of 'em.  She kissed you at that ballgame!"

"That's--"

"And you know how stubborn Jordan is.  No way 'Deirdre' puts on her first bra or dress if he's not trying to impress you."

"I was, like, gay!"

"Like that matters for a crush!  And then - oh, wow, you know what?  I bet he was okay with giving up his life and potentially becoming Benny because he knew you were attracted to the original as yourself!  That makes so much more sense than Jordan just giving his life up because of Benny and Kareena!"

"Dude, that's your brother you're talking shit about!  Be nice!  Besides, our bodies and orientations were in line after that, and one kiss she immediately walked back aside, she never made a move!"

He started counting things off on his fingers.  "Maybe she wasn't really confident enough as a girl yet, maybe she figured you wouldn't want to jump into something so fast after having your life stolen, maybe she figured it was up to you to make the first move.  Then, when all that's out of the way, you're dating Marybeth and she's seeing Jacky."

"There.  She was going out with Jacky.  No crush."

"C'mon, Annette, she totally would have left Jacky for Benjamin."

"Bullshit."  I down my nearly-full Solo cup, turn around, and clack away on my fuck-me heels.  I think I'm going into the bathroom, but wind up in Missy's bedroom instead, and flop down on her bed.  I can just reach the door with my toes and kick it closed.

Pretty soon, Missy's in there.  "Hey, can I apologize?"

"For what?  Acting like you've got any right to tell me and Max who to sleep with or not asking me out when we were single and not both women?"

"Someone's got a high opinion of herself."

"Hey, that would be having a high opinion of who I used to be.  But Max makes sense.  Why didn't you ever, you know...?"

"I dunno.  Probably afraid of fucking it up.  I mean, badass bitch I may be, but how do I get through life as a chick without you?  It doesn't happen."  She turned around and flopped down on her back next to me.  "Besides, I liked Marybeth, you seemed happy, and if it's anyone else but Max and you..."

I was about to say something but someone opened the door and was about to say they were low on vodka, only to pull back and try to look up our skirts, leading us to both plant a hand between our legs and yell "in a minute, asshole!" in unison.  He quickly backed away and shit the door, and we looked at each other and laughed.

I sat up, a little dizzy - I hadn't really drank like that since being a girl and half Benny's weight, and it always hits me worse when I move after sitting still, no matter what I look like.  "Whoa.  Well, that's that.  No Chang boys for me."

"Hey, if you want to go after Max, don't let me stand in your way.  You're seeing your sights low, but it's not like he can do better.  Just be aware, he probably fed you all that because he knows he's not half the man you were."  She reached a hand out and I pulled her up.  "Whoa, I think all that missing vodka is in my brain.  Okay if I give you some cash and you make the liquor run?"

"No problem."  We went back into the kitchen, did a quick inventory, and then she gave me a couple hundred from her purse.  Ernesto came along to help me carry it, and the night air cleared my head a bit.  Ernesto and I talked about his and Missy's projects, and he had a lot of nice things to say about my contributions.  He's really a sweet guy, but I think I'm going to need a bit time before I can really consider guys where I'd have to hide the whole Inn thing.  Maybe when I've been just Annette long enough for my time Ravi and Benjamin to be a weird thing I did when I was younger than such a big part of who I am.

I didn't immediately see Missy when I got in, so I started to go into her bedroom to return the change, but only had the door open a crack when I saw it wasn't Missy in there, but Max, with Bingbing on top of him, sucking out his tonsils while his hands caressed her butt under her dress.

I closed the door and bumped into Missy coming out of the bathroom.  "Hey, here's your money, and I'm just going to go home before the T stops running, okay?"

"Uh, sure.  We still on for the spooky scavenger hunt?"  Some guy Missy knew from some Asian students thing had roped her into some MIT thing for Halloween night, and then me so there'd be two guys and two girls.

"Wouldn't miss it.  Beats the heck out of whatever sorority stuff I'd be doing otherwise."

And with that, I left, taking a huge breath or five outside the door.  We're gonna have some stuff to tali about tomorrow!

-Annette

Max: Keeping Up Appearances

A lot of the process of reinserting myself into my life and rebuilding it has been a lot easier than it feels like it should.  Sure, on the one level it should be easier than being turned into someone else - I've spent twenty-two years building to this, I know my friends and family, and there's magic going on that keeps people from actually believing something happened, so I bet that any memories of being "out of character" get smoothed away.  On top of that, I've got a clean slate - after graduating college in May, I had no job lined up, and Carlotta Wong didn't bother finding one when she was living my life (I know this in part because Mom and Dad have asked me how things are going on that front, kind of concerned about how little effort seemed to be made over the summer).  The only other person in my apartment right now is Bingbing III, and she gets it.

Indeed, she gets it well.

We spent a few hours solid scanning social media to see how close Carlotta and Giorgia had been over the summer, both not to be surprised by what people mentioned when talking with us and morbid curiosity - you never want to know what someone else has done with your body (even if it's really there's and just looked like yours or if the shape you've got now is a surprise or, will, whatever this is), but this situation, with them not biologically sisters anymore and not thinking they would be again, is weird.  We wouldn't be trained if they did anything, but we'd probably be uncomfortable.  No signs of creepiness aside from there just being one bed in the apartment, at least - no kisses on Facebook or Weibo or anything, nobody saying we're now like we were before the summer or pulling back on the PDAs lately.  But who keeps track of that stuff unless you're really pushing the line, one way or another.  Apparently the Wongs weren't.

As for us, it's been kind of strange.  Bingbing has kind of been looking for a new place, but she's also been busy with school and whatever else she does - Jordan and I half-joke about her spying on us for Chen-ai, but she does go off on her own a lot, though not really for long enough to go to Boston and watch Jordo do anything.  We do wonder about other sorts of spies - we gained another roommate at the start of October, because Giorgia wouldn't have been able to pay for this apartment herself with "Max" in limbo, and apparently she wasn't counting on Carlotta covering it as Yuan-wei.  The new girl doesn't seem like any sort of secret friend of the Wong sisters - she just seems like any other white college senior - but who knows?  Probably not worth worrying about unless she starts making threats.

It made me sleeping on the couch weird, though, so I bought a sleeping bag and moved back into the bedroom, although after a few days Bingbing said it would be okay to share the bed, at least with a pillow wall and sleeping head-to-foot.  Decidedly not sexy, but we're not as cramped as Benny and Annette likely were.

I think she assented to it because we kind of hang out a lot anyway.  We like a lot of the same stuff, it's easier for her to be around the people Giorgia-Bingbing knew with me around to back her up, and while her English had certainly been improving steadily, it's probably easier to have a native speaker around for certain situations, and although she's gone through a lot of the first-time-as-a-woman stuff by now, it's pretty nice to have another person who's been through the change around for support.

That said, it was still kind of surprising when, after we both got invitations to Jordan's Halloween party and I told her that Halloween was kind of a big deal in our family, she asked if we should do some sort of matching costume.  I pointed out that this would be not just like hanging out with people who think they know both of us or going to a movie together, but like a date, with drinking and dancing and working together to get ready.  I wouldn't expect anything from her, but there would probably be a lot of guys hitting on her if we weren't kind of glued together. 

She said she knew, but it would feel a bit safer if she were with me, although she acknowledged that it was a lot to ask for me to keep pretending, that I'd probably like to start looking for a real girlfriend, but, I kind of don't know.  I think it's going to be kind of hard to trust someone new for a while, and even if I don't know that much about Bingbing III, she does sometimes make me feel a little less like I've been betrayed when I look at her.

-Max

Jordan/"Missy" Yuan-Wei: Baring It All

I told myself I wasn't going to be doing the acting part of this film/television major I'm working on now anymore, but Ernesto came to me begging, saying the script he had for his senior project had something that was perfect for me, and while I think there are probably plenty of Asian-American actresses he could find, it's fun to be asked, and I'm almost certainly going to need some of his help in making my own short film.  I may have changed my major because I felt more drawn to this than the original Yuan-wei did, and I certainly like acting less, but I've got so much less experience than guys like Ernesto who have been picking up cameras and making homemade movies since they were ten that I'm way behind in practical terms even if I do sometimes breeze through class like someone who's five years older and had some real-world experience with things the rest don't.

It's a good distraction, though - as much as I'm not really thinking of fucking Ernesto again, it's weirdly enjoyable to be working on something with a guy I have slept with right now.  The boyfriend-shaped hole in my life that I probably won't be allowed to fill until Chen-ai finds some advantageous fuerdai to marry me off to isn't completely filled with Ernesto, but the fact that I know he likes me and probably would be my boyfriend if I made the right move is something to lean on, as is just keeping busy on my own short film project and other stuff.

Some of that "other stuff" involved a quick weekend trip to Montreal so that the new Bingbing and I could talk to René and Romain in person.  I met her in the airport and still have a hard time getting a handle on her.  I'm pretty sure she was a guy before, just from the effort to dress plain and avoid makeup and stuff, but the secrecy is weird.  Most of us are so glad to have people with whom we can be ourselves that we're giving out life stories before someone else finishes mentioning the Trading Post, but she knows Chen-ai put her in this position, and probably figures we won't trust her completely anyway.  Still, I invited her along because she and René deserve the chance to meet, and if she is any sort of representative of Chen-ai, then the guys deserve a chance to ask her a lot of questions.

There isn't really a good spot to do this sort of thing - not their apartment, not our hotel room, not a restaurant, not a park.  We choose one of the last in the list, where we could be away from other people if things got a little heated, but I did wonder as we met there if the hotel had conference rooms we could rent.  I mean, I guess you could call this a meeting, as it's kind of a formal discussion even if it's not business.  But I didn't think to ask that while making the reservation.

So we met.  René have me a hug, while Romain offered a handshake.  René also leaned in to stare closely at the new Bingbing, appraising what he would look like if he hadn't been to the Inn three years ago.  We sat on the grass, and I related everything Chen-ai had told me.  René and Romain both looked shocked when they found out that Chen-ai had sent them to the Inn deliberately, and René took Romain's hand when I told them about how Chen-ai had been someone else when he was born, then started crying when I said it looked like his father had been killed.

Then he took a deep breath and let it out shaking.  "I guess that's good to know."

René kissed him on the cheek.  "I'm so sorry."

"No, it is good.  I mean, it's a hell of a thing to hear that the woman you thought was your mother resents you and your actual mother just abandoned you, and the person who stole your life may have murdered the parent who did love you, but it's kind of freeing to know that all you'd really have to go back to is money, and Mom is probably after that, too.  I mean, this life isn't perfect, and I'm not sure I'm really happy to tell Jordan here 'good luck with that', but...  I do like Romain's folks, this is a pretty nice city, and...  It's not like I've forgotten being a Chinese girl, but this is like my whole adult life."

I tried not to look too happy about him saying that, because it would be really inappropriate, but it was kind of a relief not to be worrying about pressure from that side, even if it was a shitty way for it to happen.

Bingbing looked at René.  "And what about you?  I'm not planning on making the rest of my life."

René shrugged.  "Nous sommes unis.  We're together."

"Oh. Okay."

We took early flights home on Sunday, with Bingbing apologizing that she would have liked to get to know them better, but she had homework and she was still having a bit of a challenge working in English since it wasn't her first language like it was for the Wongs and me.  René said he got that - he had to get used to English and French when the Inn dumped him in Quebec - but that it would get easier.  And that next time we'd have to meet in a fun way, maybe finally making that trip back home to Hong Kong.

I finally opened Ernesto's screenplay on the flight home - I'd kind of saved it during the trip so I could give everyone the attention they were due - and immediately noticed that my character was in the opening scene, in bed with the hero, and the stage directions had her putting a bra on with her back to the camera but not actually finishing getting dressed until after their conversation.

It wasn't the makings of a bad movie, but I kind of snickered reading it, not calling Ernesto that night.  He was in my first class Monday, after all, so I just sat down next to him and leaned in.  "You know," I said just loud enough that he'd be afraid of other people hearing it,  "most people who want to see me naked just send me gross messages on Facebook."

He went red.  "It's not like that, I just thought, you know, that it would really let you show that you're smart and funny as well as pretty."

"That's sweet, but, come on, you know I'm a shitty actor.  You just want to get me in a bed and see what happens now that I'm single again."

"Wait, you broke up with Jacky?  What happened?"

"Thing with my mother.  Be really glad you've never met her."

"Oh.  I'm sorry, if faking that sort of intimacy is going to be hard or awkward--"

Suddenly it hit me.  "Oh my God!  You don't want me for this because you're attracted to me, but because you're not!  You can just have me take off my clothes and it's like my tits are just props and you won't be thinking about fucking me at all!  Holy shit, I didn't think chicks could get put in the friend zone!"

"Sssssshhhhhh!!!"  Other people had started to come in and pretend not to take an ingest in our conversation.  "No, it's not...  Look, it's not that I don't like you like that - trust me, there's a good chance I'm going to spend the rest of the month obsessing over whether you just happened to mention you were single on purpose to send me a signal - but I got really nervous just writing that scene, and this movie is going to be a huge part of my grade, and the student films are the first thing anybody looks at when we go in for interviews, so, like, I don't want to blow it and I know I can work with you!"

"That's... really sweet."  I honestly couldn't think of anyone saying that to me before Chen-ai, and having Ernesto say it made me feel a hell of a lot better.  "Fine."  I gave him a peck on the cheek.  "I'll get naked for you.  But you're helping me make a brain for my film!"

He tried to shrink into his chair at that,  so he didn't ask me when he'd get to see my script.

Which was good, cuz it fucking sucked.

Naturally, I didn't realize it sucked until I showed it to Annette over pizza at my place, and she asked if she was allowed to be honest.  I said sure, and she immediately printed it out, got out a pen, and started crossing shit out, circling the occasional thing, and making a shit-ton of notes.  "So, I get that you want to do a guy-turned-into-a-girl thing while it's still relatively fresh in your mind and all, but, dude, come on, look at this thing.  It's all gay-panic bits and transphobic stereotypes, and, c'mon, folks like us really should be able to do something smarter than that, and even if we didn't have our unique point of view, the people who will be grading this probably won't be into something that's just broad gross-out comedy.  But there's an idea here..."

So we've spent the lady couple of weeks rewriting, kind if changing the script from "this guy has his brain implanted into the body of a female sexbot and isn't that gross?" to "not only is his brain in a sexbot body, but its operating system pops up a bunch of augmented reality stuff that basically hit him with all the messages a woman absorbs about how to dress and behave to please men at once".  We've had to cut a lot of stuff I liked out of it, even some of the stuff that Annette didn't think was trash, but it's probably a better script because of it.

Now I've just got to find a cast, locations, a crew, and equipment; shoot the thing; edit it; and then do a bunch of special effects because, like Ernesto says, this is the first thing people will look at on our résumés and I'm not sure whether I'm going to actually want to manage a shoot after this but will probably always like rendering VFX, so I should have s bunch of that in there even if mousy of my classmates are trying to be realistic.

No problem, right?

-Jordan/Yuan-wei

Max: Nothing's quite normal now

After last week, I'm grateful to be back to normal again - male, Chinese-American, just out of college.  It happened relatively quick, in terms of not having to wait around as Elaine for days after having Yang Chen-ai switch up the plan so that I can become myself again ahead of schedule - it happened late Friday night or early Saturday morning, depending on how you count those hours - and I think that was probably by design, with the Wong sisters figuring on a full house on Labor Day weekend as unsuspecting guests try to get the most out of the last holiday before fall.

I did like Chen-ai suggested (which, to be fair, is along the lines of what Jordan's model says) and stuck a chair in exactly the spot Carlotta had been when she changed.  Nothing happened Thursday night other than me giving up at around 4am and having a stiff back when I woke up at noon.  Annette had already caught the train south when I woke up and met Jordan for brunch, saying she had friends and roommates to meet for the first time before class started.  If she was freaked out enough by the whole general situation and wanted as far from Old Orchard as possible, I can't say I blame her.

Friday was pretty boring.  Jordan and I are both city people, and we felt like we'd pretty much exhausted what there was to do in Old Orchard by then.  We played some cards, wasted time on the Internet, and quietly mocked the folks next to us who thought that Lisa's Pizza was top-tier pie (we are New Yorkers under the skin, after all).  Then night came, he went back to his rented apartment, and I went back to the Inn.

Regular visitors talk about a tingle that comes earlier in the evening on nights that the change takes place, and Jordan, who makes computer models to try to predict the changes, has a theory about the change actually sending some sort of wave back in time because it's pushing and pulling information and extra mass out of some alternate dimension and this causing ripples on the t-axis, but I don't know about any of that.  I just know there was some sort of electricity when I walked into the building, although it might be easy to miss if you weren't looking for it.

As 2am approached, I found myself wondering what to wear.  I don't think I've heard any stories about people harmed by wearing chokers or thongs and becoming bigger, but the thought gets in your head, even though being naked starts to feel super inappropriate - like, soon those won't be your curves anymore, so you shouldn't be so causal with them, even if it took you weeks to get to that point.  I wound up in a t-shirt and a new pair of boxers - I wonder how much fresh underwear gets bought in the nearest department store after the Inn does is thing - so when I did change back, I mostly saw my skin tone change rather than really noticing inflation and deflation.  I noticed it when walking to the bathroom to check in the mirror, in that certain parts being non-retractable is proud positive that Apple doesn't design the human body.

It was me.  Carlotta hadn't given me a stupid haircut or let me get fat or left me with a tattoo or anything, although I guess she might have if she'd had the winter and next spring.  I let out a breath I didn't realize I'd been holding; maybe I'd find this experience educational someday, but no sleight to Elaine, I was glad to be myself again.

A noise from the adjoining room made me stop moving for a moment.  It was right next to the wall, and when I closed my eyes and tried to imagine Jordan's floor plan, I wondered if the person on the other side of the wall had become Bingbing or if they had become whoever was in the room, and someone else drew that straw.  That was room 8, so they should have become Brittany and Ethan.

I did take out my phone and send Jordan and Annette selfies.  It felt pretty good that they both responded in a couple of minutes, with Jordan sarcastically saying good, I can go to bed now and Annette sending a couple emojis (I think the wink indicates that the hearts-for-eyes-and-wide-open-mouth was partly in jest) and a request to look her up the next time I'm in Boston.

I officially still had a girlfriend, though, and I figured that whoever wound up with that rule was going to need help like I did, as would everyone else, so I took my bag and the one I recognized as Bingbing's and headed out to the lobby.  Starting around 5am, there were a bunch of freaked-out people, and I did my best to explain what was going on.  Jordan wasn't letting her phone wake her at first, so I was on my own, and it wasn't so bad after a while.  Some folks were angry that I hadn't done anything to warn them, but being myself again made me a bit more intimidating than I was as Elaine, so it didn't get violent.

By about 11am, I'd counted twelve of us, but no Bingbing.  Only room 4 seemed to be unaccounted for, so I walked over and knocked on the door.  "Are you okay in there?  I know what's happened to you is scary, but I've been through it.  Things can get back to normal and I can help."

The door opened as far as the chain would let it, and "Bingbing" looked out.  Her hair was messy, and she had a look I'd never seen on that face when it was Carlotta inside, though it occurred to me that maybe I should have seen her look worried at some point if we'd actually been as close as I thought we were.  Seeing that I was Asian too, she asked what had happened in Cantonese.

I was a little surprised by that, and I guess it showed, and I told her the Inn was cursed, that the guests turned into the last people to stay there, but while the origins were hard to dig up, the effects were fairly predictable, so if you got the timing and positioning right, you could be yourself again, although it generally took about a year because this place filed up pretty well for someplace under a hex.  I took the passport out of the bag and handed it to her, and she closed the door, likely running to the mirror to check that she'd become Bingbing rather than just a new girl - after all, if she was Chinese to start, that wouldn't seem so random.

She came back and opened the door all the way.  "So I'm this Chen Bingbing now.  Why?  I thought I was just getting a job in America, and they told me to do a training thing here while they sorted out my visa.  Did they know?"

I said we'd have to do some research, but I suspected of we traced whoever owned her new employer back a ways, we'd find Yang Chen-ai, and her new job was keeping an eye on me and Jordan.  I told her that story, trying to minimize some of the scarier parts, but she was curling up into a ball by the end anyway.

By then I'd looked around the room and saw that the clothes on the floor were guys', and rolled the suitcase over.  "I'm guessing what's in here will be more comfortable than what you've got.  It looks like you were, uh, taller before."

She admitted that was the case and took the suitcase into the bathroom.  Not sure whether to stay or go, I stood by the door and looked at my phone until she came out wearing a t-shirt, jeans, and sneakers.  She hadn't put a bra on, but it seemed like it would be really inappropriate to offer help with that.  "So," I said, "you want to meet Jordan?  Yuan-wei is supposed to be your best friend, although I guess it might seem silly to keep it up."

"Might as well, especially if you're right about what I'm supposed to do."

So I texted Jordan, found out that Cary had his truck nearby, and decided to meet up there.  On the way, I asked who she really was.

"I...  I don't know if I should say.  You seem nice, and I'm sure your brother will too, but how can I really know?"

I was kind of disappointed, but said it was fair enough.  Jordan was a little less thrilled about not knowing who her supposed best friend was, but figured there was no way too force this information out of her, especially since she already seemed freaked out by how comfortable this girl I kept calling my brother was - elated, even, to still be Yuan-wei.

Jordan yelled "guess who!" when we came to order, introducing me and Bingbing.  To my surprise, Elaine was in the back of the truck as well, reading something on a tablet that I suspect would raise eyebrows if it had been a physical book in the hands of an eleven-year-old, and she jumped out the back to look at me from all angles.  "Don't take this the wrong way, but you gave up being me for this?"

"Like you won't be thinking 'he's hot and knows my body, I should call him' in a couple of weeks."

"Dude, I'm in fifth grade.  That'd get you in so much trouble even if I had the right hormones to care."

Jordan raised an eyebrow.  "You're not changing back?"

"Well, it's not like your wicked stepmother gave me a heads-up on her plan so I could just run away from home before this guy got temporary custody and Mackenzie disappearing again would have the cops sniffing around him.  Instead, I get to re-experience middle school!"

"Ouch.  Although, I guess it will be easy this time."

"The schoolwork, but having ten- and eleven-year-olds try to befriend you as the new girl is weird.  And I think one of the boys already has a crush on me."

We came up with the idea of co-writing a letter to Elaine #4, and sat down at a picnic table to do so.  I'm not sure what Jordan and Bingbing #3 talked about, but by the time we were done they were talking about getting moving, because school was about to start, whether in Boston or New York. 

It seemed weirdly abrupt, but at least we didn't have to really say goodbye until we got to Boston, and we stood kind of awkwardly in North Station until she said that, look, just because she'd been a girl for the years didn't make her a hugger, but...  And then she grabbed me, and I hugged her back, and he said he was glad we could talk without hiding anything now.

"Yeah, I'm just glad to know.  We've got to find a way to make Mom and Dad believe, though."

"I know!  I keep trying to figure out how that's going to work, besides hijacking some other major life event.  Cause that's be fucking weird and selfish, right?"

"Maybe I can tell them I've proposed to her, and then we can be like 'okay, now that you're in the right frame of mind, what I really want to tell you is...'"

It was weird that we were able to laugh at that, although Bingbing said not to even pretend, and why not just do it ourselves without involving her.  We were like, dude, gross, but I have to admit, we gave it some thought.

Jordan offered to buy us plane tickets home, saying if Chen-ai had a problem with that, then they might as well get the argument over spending her allowance out of the way early.  I almost said no, but I figured Bingbing's first exposure to New York didn't have to come via the Chinatown bus.

When we did land, she wasn't exactly thrilled to find out that Carlotta/Bingbing had moved in with me/Giorgia over the summer, or that there was just one bed in the apartment.  Truth be told, I also kind of wanted to throw the mattress out the window when I thought about that - sure, she moved in before the trip to the Inn, but she must have known what she was going to do by then, right?  Gross.

I took the couch that night and we did our own things for the first few days - she's been doing school registration stuff, buying books, all that, while I've been trying to set up job interviews - Carlotta taking the summer after graduation off hadn't really helped my prospects.

The text from Benny-Jordan didn't come until a couple nights ago, and I was kind of nervous when he asked if I wanted to hang out, shoot some hoops, and talk.  I kind of had to.

Meeting up with him at the gym, it seemed almost as absurd to think I'd been fooled into thinking he was the real Jordan as it was to have "Yuan-wei" tell me she was.  He just didn't move like my brother always had, he enjoyed ruining and sweating, and he was friendly toward people the old Jordan would have snapped at.  And the first thing he did was apologize.

"So, like, your brother said I should have tried to get you to dump Bingbing as soon as she found out she wasn't the original, and I said she deserved a chance."

"I wouldn't have listened.  She was too much exactly what I wanted in a girl, and Jordan, well, he could be kind of a jealous dick about girls."

"Ah."

We talked a little more, but that was the main thing he wanted to say.  He didn't really apologize for taking over Jordan's life; he said that as much as he knew it didn't really feel like what he was supposed to do, Jordan did say to take it and how do you just give Kareena up?  And while he had gotten his Cantonese up to "embarrassing" in the last two years, he couldn't imagine landing in the position Jordan and Annette had found.

So that's where things are now.  In a lot of ways, things are kind of back to normal - I'm in my apartment, looking for work, and I've been hanging out with Bingbing more in the last few days, showing her where to get authentic Chinese food in Manhattan, where you can see Chinese movies, that sort of thing.  We met a friend of mine for dinner last night, and it was almost like a date.

But it wasn't, and it seems like there are a lot of things right now that seem the same as they were at the beginning of summer, but which I know aren't true.  My girlfriend's not my girlfriend, my brother's not my brother, there's a hot chick out there who is, a scary lady in Hong Kong who can redirect or lives in crazy ways, and two women whom I've been told I don't have to worry about, but how can I not?  How do I just answer my parents calling about Sunday dinner and act like all that's not out there?

I suppose the every-day stuff will overwhelm it, especially when I'm working and have a real daily routine.  But there's way more at the edges of my life that I didn't know about before.

-Max