Before the owner (hopefully me) is back, I must try on all these clothes ASAP. I push the worry of being discovered away. If I’m quick about it, no one will ever know about my terrible self-control. People try on clothes all the time, right?
As I attempt to zip the dress, I notice that it’s very small and usually when I shop, most clothes are way too big. Whoever designed this dress has all the proportions wrong! There’s no room for my rib cage, shoulders, or lower back. But I just know, in the center of my gut, that this dress has been waiting for me its whole life, so I literally suck in my stomach. I will myself to squeeze into this dress, which has not been designed for a human being. I wonder if I’m actually wearing the costume that belongs to an extra-thin greyhound. But isn’t the train too long for one of the grinning canines in the photographs?
Clenching my teeth, I use all my determined willpower to make the zipper go up three-quarters of the way, and for a magical mystical moment, it does.
In the closet mirror, I stare at myself in shock. The dress is absolutely stunning and Best Actress Oscar–worthy. I feel exactly like the girl in the pageant dog photos. My eyes have become larger, my legs have gotten longer, and I suddenly have developed an hourglass figure.
I’m 60 percent more attractive in this dress.
If I could wear this gown to an event, I’d be known as the long-lost Chinese American princess in the nameless couture dress. It’s perfect for my future role as a serious and devoted heiress!
I pose in the mirror, and just as I begin to admire myself from various angles, I imagine Samira and Peter seeing me in this dress, once I’m crowned princess of a small to medium-size country. “Resist me now!” I imagine yelling at Peter. The poor boy wouldn’t be able to run away.
Grinning like a crazed corgi with a bone, I swivel to examine myself from the side. But panicked shouting in Chinese suddenly bursts through my eardrums. At first, I think it’s my mom yelling and I can’t breathe. I spin around, embarrassed that someone has seen me posing and waving and making irresistible royal-canine faces at the mirror.
I don’t know what to say.
The only Chinese I know is my name.
More nonstop yelling from a girl who looks like she could be my age.
I don’t understand why she’s shouting.
Plus, I don’t understand what she’s saying at all. Sometimes I can understand a few words like “hello,” “school,” “dinner,” or “bathroom” when my parents speak, but the girl is speaking way too quickly. Like the cell-phone clerk with Mr. Chen. They’re speaking Chinese way faster than my parents. Chinese fast-forwarded X 2000.
“This isn’t what it looks like,” I say awkwardly, waving my hands at her. The girl stares at me for a long time before yelling in Chinese again.
“I’m sorry, but I don’t speak Chinese,” I say, but the girl looks even more unimpressed. Finally, she purses her glossy ketchup-colored lips and looks like how I look when I pluck a very spiky hair from my mustache.
She waits for me to respond, tapping her rose-gold Apple Watch impatiently.
“I don’t speak Chinese,” I say again.
Her surprise interrogation makes my cheeks flame. Like I’ve just ingested six vodka tonics in a span of thirty minutes and blurted out a very dirty secret.
Upon closer inspection, I realize it’s the same girl from the shiny photographs minus a very dressed-up dog. The girl facing me is definitely America’s Next Top Model material in real life. Her refrigerator-white skin looks practically photoshopped, and if I didn’t know any better, I’d assume she was a robot. Her bleached white-blond hair is long and rope-straight. She’s also wearing a nightdress that is both fluffy and magazine-editorial-looking and science-fiction all at once. It’s one of those amazing garments that reminds me of a very expensive but fabulous futuristic chicken.
Because I can’t help it and I have limited self-control, I reach out to pet the material. It’s like grabbing a handful of multicolored cotton balls. It’s absolutely fantastic, and I want to own it immediately.
“Your pajamas are amazing!” I say, hoping that she will somehow hear in my tone that I’m friendly and worth befriending.
But the girl yelps like she’s been electrocuted.
Then she picks up her phone and begins dialing frantically. Is she calling hotel security? The Beijing police?
I have to convince her that I’m not actually a thief.
Also, how do I tell her in pantomiming and English that I have a seriously real and emotional connection with this dress? How do I explain that the dress was practically begging me to try it on?
“I am so sorry,” I say, hoping that she will stop shouting and accept my apology.
The girl stares at me, flabbergasted. Then she continues shouting and I begin nervous-talking. She doesn’t seem to speak English, so it doesn’t matter what I say. I just want her to hear my calming tones. Aren’t you supposed to make loud, reassuring noises and dramatic hand gestures when you encounter wild animals and scarily angry people?
I start waving frantically while making what I think are soothing noises. “Oooh! Ahhhhhhhhh,” I say, feeling ridiculous.
Why did I even try on that dress? Couldn’t I have found the exact same one somewhere online and gone to the store to try it on?
My gesturing and noise-making works, because she suddenly stops yelling in Chinese and begins speaking in heavily accented English.
“Who are you? Why are you in my room?” she asks.
“I’m supposed to be here,” I say quickly. “I didn’t know this was your room.”
She points to the photographs on the wall.
“Are you involved in some sort of beauty contest?” I ask.
“This is the Creative Dog Grooming Contest,” she snaps, looking offended that I don’t know who she is.
“Huh?”
“I’m the second-best creative dog groomer in China!” she says.
“What?” I say, astonished.
The girl looks quite paralyzed by my response.
“Don’t you recognize me? I’m a top-ranking national champion of the dog and human show!”
She does not look impressed when I stare at her blankly.
“Turning dogs into other animals is a competition,” she insists, frowning at my lack of understanding.
“What do you mean?” I ask.
“I groom dogs into pandas or gorillas for pageants,” she says.
“That’s amazing!” I say, and I mean it. But I don’t exactly know what she is talking about. Are dog-grooming pageants a recognized sport in China? I smile encouragingly at her to continue, but she stares at me without blinking. She’s still in shock, so her eyes bulge a bit like a bug and I am honestly not sure where to look.
But after a few moments, Mr. Chen arrives. I’m so relieved. I want to hug him again, but I doubt that he will let me.
For a moment, he speaks with the girl and they argue frantically. He pulls out his iPad with the beautiful assortment of photos and points at me.
“Yes!” I say enthusiastically. “I’m Iris Weijun Wang! That’s me!”
Then it hits me. This Girl in the Cotton-Ball Pajamas must be my cousin Ruby. My dad said that we’re practically the same age. It did not occur to me because we look nothing alike. For one, she’s taller than my dad. And her face is stiletto-thin and angular and cheekboney like she’s on a cover of a magazine. But once she realizes that I’m her long-lost American cousin, she’ll know that this has been a gigantic misunderstanding and we’ll automatically be BFFs.