Repeat After Me Read Online Free PDF Page A

then slid into the elevator out of sight. The doors closed, and he was gone, swallowed and digested by my building. I hung the dragons in my hallway. Now, as I write this, they’re in my Beijing bedroom, where Da Ge has never been and will never be. Where I’m more of an American than I ever was in New York, but less of a VIP guest than a Chinese horse-ass patter.
    The day after Da Ge brought me the dragon scroll, Xiao Wang arrived at school early and stood next to my desk.
    “Do you have a question for me?” I asked her.
    “I’m sorry,” she said, “Do you like to come to my grandmother’s house for dinner with me one night?”
    “I would love that,” I told her, honestly. “When?”
    “Maybe tonight,” she said.
    “Really? Tonight? Of course. Perfect.”
    “We can go together after class.”
    “At three-thirty? Isn’t that early?”
    “Maybe my grandmother like to eat quite early.”
    After class, Xiao Wang took my arm and held it the entire way to her grandmother’s, as if I had never left Embassy alone. Or taken the subway. She hosted me from the moment she invited me until I left her grandmother’s apartment five hours later, in a string of polite gestures I found both bizarre and endearing. On the train that afternoon, Xiao Wang gave me a nervous look.
    “Maybe I should tell you about my grandmother.”
    “I would like that,” I said.
    “My grandmother is very old lady. How do you say, ancient?”
    “You can say ‘ancient,’ but probably not in front of her,” I suggested.
    “She come from China many years ago. She is seventy-eight now, but she still don’t, you know, used to America.”
    “I can understand that.”
    “So sometime she say the rude thing about American. I hope it’s okay for you.”
    “It’s definitely okay for me.”
    “Also, maybe the food she make is too hot.”
    “It should be fine. I’m sure it will be delicious.”
    “Maybe she believe American are rich and lazy. Sometimes fat, too.”
    “She’s not wrong.”
    “Well, you’re not so fat.”
    “Thank you.”
    Chinatown was all Chinese signs, garlic, electronics, suitcases, pajamas, “I Love New York” souvenirs, and people rushing up and down, horizontal on sidewalks, vertical in building elevators and stairwells. Xiao Wang led me through the crowds to her Grandmother’s apartment, a sixth-floor walk-up next to a flophouse called the Eternity Hotel. The building was cramped and dingy; hot noise from the hotel spilled into the windows. Each of the six flights we climbed had twelve stairs. At the top, Xiao Wang unlocked a door marked 6-C. Xiao Wang’s grandmother padded over to greet us. She was wearing a cotton jacket and cloth shoes. Her features were soft with age but suggested a former birdlike clarity. She smiled and said something in Chinese.
    “Welcome you warmly to our house,” said Xiao Wang.
    “Thank you.” I looked around. Pipes hung low across the ceiling, which had intricate maps of water damage and looked like it might sag and fall through its own cracks. There was a gray-and-blue-flecked fold-out couch, a wicker rocking chair, a twelve-inch television, and several folding chairs around a plastic table. To the right was a kitchen that couldn’t have held more than one person at a time. A metal hood fanned out over the stove. To the left was a bedroom with a dresser and double bed visible through the open door. The bed appeared to have been made to military standards. I imagined bouncing coins on its quilt.
    Xiao Wang’s grandmother gestured toward the couch and said something else. I nodded as she spoke, unsure of whether to look at her or Xiao Wang, when Xiao Wang began translating.
    “Please sit,” Xiao Wang said, so I perched myself awkwardly on a folding chair. “My Nai Nai say we are grateful for the teaching English. She say I often talk about the class and that I like it. She do not say that when I come home, Ioften give her the lesson of that day, so she can feel like to be