Lisa Ko: The Leavers

He hadn’t invited anyone to his shows, though the last time he played, two weeks ago, Roland had happened to be walking past the bar and had noticed Daniel’s name on the blackboard outside, alarming him by shouting “Daniel Fucking Wilkinson!” after the last song. “Why’re you being so secretive?” Roland had said afterwards. “We hung out two days ago and you didn’t say anything about playing.” It wasn’t about being secretive; it was about self-protection. “Just say the word and I’ll let Thad know and you can put this out. But don’t wait too long. No one else is doing stuff like this.”

Christmas lights were strung up along the bar’s walls, points of blues and yellows and reds. Daniel heard the guys from the next band talking to one another, caught a glimpse of the bartender playing with her phone.

The first two songs came out wobbly, his voice still froggy, the pacing rushed, but by the third song, the one about Deming and his doppelgänger, the initial terror had mostly burned off and his playing was steadier, his voice stronger, and he started to feel the words he was singing. Between songs, he paused for enough time to elicit a trace of dry applause from the next band, which made up in enthusiasm what it lacked in volume.

What was the compulsion to expose himself so fully, to keep doing something that scared the shit out of him? It hadn’t been scary when he’d been playing other people’s music, or performing with other people. This was different. Roland had called his songs fresh, crazy honest, the real deal, and after each gig Daniel thought, May I never do have to do that again . But a few days later he’d be sending out links to his webpage, trying to book the next one.

He made it to the final verse when he looked up at the near-empty room, the fear barging in. Do the audience a favor, he thought. Cut the set short. He stumbled, forgetting the next line. The song hung in freefall. He wanted to flee, to safety and also to humiliation, but knew these were good songs, that he was worthy of being heard, and he hated, more than anything, not being listened to. He remembered the line and the song righted itself, regained its balance.

When he finished his set, no one congratulated him. It was the end of another winter, more than a year after Psychic Hearts’ first show at the loft party, and Roland and Nate were recording a full album. Toward the end of February, several days after Angel had deposited his sixth money transfer, she had e-mailed him, one line, which made him laugh:

The white sheep comes home to roost.

~ A

He was rarely home these days, working at Tres Locos and teaching private guitar lessons to middle schoolers on the Upper West Side. He met up with Roland a few times a week, and on Wednesday and Friday afternoons taught an after-school music class at a community center in Chinatown, where most of his students’ families came from Fujian Province, and more than a few had also been sent to live with their grandparents until they were old enough to go to school. The Upper West Side kids got frustrated when Daniel tried to teach them how to hold the guitar, and their parents wanted them to be the next Jack White (in their spare time, grades came first), and he looked forward to the days he taught in Chinatown, how the kids there called him Yi Go and got excited when they nailed the rhythm of a song. They hadn’t yet learned how to be afraid of not looking cool.

It was less than ten blocks from the bar to the subway but felt farther, carrying his guitar and gear in the sleet, boots skidding along the sidewalk. Across from the subway station was a pizzeria, and he was hungry, but he would wait until he got back to Manhattan. There was food in the refrigerator, and he was becoming a good cook, trading meals with his roommate, perfecting a soup that was a decent rendition of the one at Leon’s spot back in Fuzhou.

ONE MONTH AFTER HIS birthday, eating dinner by himself while his mother and Yong were at work, Daniel had come across a picture in an article he was reading online, Lower Broadway on a spring afternoon, delivery vans and cabs, halal food carts and fire escapes. That night, for the first time since he had come to China, he listened to the songs he had written over the summer. The music shot through his headphones in silver waves; it was the familiarity of feeling perfectly like himself. He wanted to tweak a few lines, so he typed up some notes, wishing he had his guitar.

After he decided to leave, he told his mother that it wasn’t about Peter and Kay, that he wasn’t choosing them over her. She had cried. The visa form had already been submitted. “But we’ll see each other again,” he said. Leon came with them to the airport, and when Daniel turned at the ticket counter he saw them from a distance, his mother in her suit and heels, Leon in his sneakers and windbreaker, talking and laughing like old friends. He wasn’t sure if he was making the right decision, didn’t know how long he’d stay. Maybe he would come back to Fuzhou after New Year’s. Either way, it was incredible to decide something. He had never allowed himself to fully trust his choices before.

Three stops and more than twenty-four hours of travel later, he arrived at the Syracuse airport the morning of Christmas Day. English clanged out around him in fraught copper lines, and nobody looked Chinese. Outside, waiting for Peter and Kay, it was freezing, and he didn’t have a jacket.

They parked and got out of the car. “You must be tired,” Kay said, hugging him tightly. “All that flying!” Peter hugged him, too, thumping him on the back.

On the drive to Ridgeborough, fighting jet lag, he’d entertained them with light observations about the differences between Fuzhou and New York, talking about traffic and smog, the menu at Pizza Hut, his Speak English Now students. How it didn’t snow there, it was that far south. He felt bad, offering Eddie and Tammy and Boss Cheng up for amusement, but it seemed easier than having the spotlight on Mama or himself.

Back in the house, he skipped out on church and took a nap, and when he woke up he took his guitar out of the closet. After months of not being played, the strings were still in tune. Moving between chords, his fingers and wrists loosening, he elicited color shifts he’d forgotten about: brown and aqua, ranges of mauve and pink, the squeakiest of greens. Shit, it felt great. Though he could have sworn there used to be these tiny cracks in the fingerboard that he had wanted to fix but never got around to. Or had he fixed them before he left and forgotten?

Peter knocked on the doorframe. “Reunited at last,” he said.

Daniel looked up. “Yeah, it’s been a while. Still works, though.”

“Do you notice anything different?” Peter pointed to the fingerboard. “I took it to the Music Department at Carlough and one of the professors recommended someone he knew, a guitar repairman. I thought it could use a little TLC.”

He helped Kay chop vegetables and peel potatoes for dinner. “I haven’t had potatoes in ages,” he said, as she poured canned pumpkin mix into a pie shell. She was wearing a lavender sweater he hadn’t seen before; Peter had a matching one in green. “We had rice, though. Lots and lots of rice.” Hearing himself in English still felt strange.

How easy it would be to say it: I learned so much when I was there — let me tell you about her. She had wanted me. But every time he started to say something, he stopped.

Kay passed him the pie shell and told him to put it in the oven. He set it down on the rack and closed the door. When he stood up, she was watching him, and he was afraid she would start talking about him going back to Carlough, or GA meetings.

“Was it hard?” she asked. “Being in China?”