Summary

Joan reflects on her appearance. She takes comfort in being “just under” five feet tall (7). A man at the hospital where she works tells her she looks mousey. Joan privately muses that her looks must be gone since she spent her twenties in school.

Joan’s mother calls her while her father has a fatal stroke. Joan orders her mother to put the phone to her father’s ears, since hearing is the last sense to go. She says the word “Chuàng” into the phone and raises her fist into the air (8). When Joan’s colleagues ask her the meaning of this, she evades them, not wanting anyone to know she speaks Chinese. One of the meanings of the word is “to begin” (8).

Joan asks her colleagues Reese and Madeleine to cover for her. She is going to China for the weekend...