“You know what, Mom? Nothing’s burning. I don’t feel incomplete. What I do feel is frustration about having this conversation with you again, and especially now.”
“You are the fifth daughter,” Mom says, as if I’ve somehow forgotten. “The family has waited years for you to claim your gift. I havebeen very patient, but you need to stop wasting time and come home. You need to fix your moli. I was ashamed today to have so many people ask why you still lived in Toronto, with not even a store of your own.”
That hurts, but I know the real reason why she was ashamed. It’s because her bags aren’t designer and the funeral catering wasn’t done by a Hua family personal chef. Family lore says the massive wealth—like, “rooms filled with gold” levels of wealth—brought in by our genius Ming ancestor Xiaoting was increased by subsequent fifth daughters until the Huas were as rich as emperors. The whole shebang was lost after the Second World War when my grandmother’s uncle poured it into supporting the nationalists over the winning communists, who took what was left of the money along with the house.
The family managed to sell the store and used the proceeds to set themselves up in Vancouver. The Huas—now reduced to me and my mother, since Dad insisted Eric have his last name—became denizens of the average middle class instead of the obscenely rich. This weighs on my mother. I may have accepted my life, but she dreams of a time dripping with jade and gold, where the Huas properly belonged.
“I know it’s the money. You want the money, and you’re tired of waiting.” She’s going to have to wait forever, though, since my moli simply isn’t there.
“Having money keeps our family safe, but that’s not the reason I want you to keep trying.”
I make a disbelieving noise. “No? That’s not what Eric said.”
She doesn’t blink. “Eric exaggerated.”
“You don’t know what he told me,” I point out. “He said you’ll need to shut down the store in six months.”
“I will never shut down Yixiang.” Her mouth tightens. “The Jins are helping me find a new location, that’s all. The rent has gone up again. That’s not your concern.”
Not since you walked awayremains unsaid, but the words linger inthe air as if she’d shouted.
“Sure,” I mutter.
“You have a power that’s meant to be used.” She pauses with meaning. “Then passed to your daughter.”
This call for grandchildren isn’t new, so I ignore it. “I don’t. That was what we learned when I went away.”
“Being too scared to try again doesn’t mean you lack your moli. It needs to be cultivated. You are a Hua, and the gift is there but you’re ignoring it. I don’t know if it’s pride or fear holding you back, but it’s time you grew up.”
I wonder at what point a jury would consider matricide justifiable. “I’m not scared.”
“No? Perhaps it’s plain laziness, then. You could have stayed and worked at Yixiang with me and your grandmother. We could have helped you. You have the best nose the family has seen in generations. Instead, you ran away at the first challenge.”
A challenge—that’s putting it lightly. It’s also one no other Hua had to face. “I wanted to make my own way.”
“You belong here, with us.” She taps the register Waipo sent me. “With me. You have a responsibility and should come back.”
“No.” The word is out almost before she closes her mouth. Perhaps if I thought she wanted me for myself, my answer would be different, but she only wants what she can get from me in her pursuit of past Hua glory.
“Luling…”
“I said no.”
Mom shakes her head. “You have too much of your father in you,” she says. “A Hua would fight, but you abandoned your heritage and your gift at the first obstacle. Such a waste.”
There’s a long silence as I decide to take the slightly higher road by not answering. Mom breathes in and looks at the two registers on the desk. “Remember your history, Luling,” she says softly. “All I askis that you try to be the woman you’re meant to be. Not this shadow.”
“I did try.”
She shakes her head. “Not hard enough. Double-check the door when you go.” She heads back out into the night. That’s it. She always has the last word.
If I were a different person, I might rip the registers into shreds of unapologetic and defensive defiance. Then an extra dose of daughterly guilt hits me, as it usually does after an interaction with my mother. Why am I doing this to her when Waipo is so newly gone? Why can’t I control myself? Yet every comment from her is a sliver that I have to pluck out immediately before it can burrow deep.
I abandon the desk and go to the rear of the lab, where a heavy metal door, painted white, leads to the small walk-in vault my mother had installed at what must have been exorbitant expense. I haven’t been back here since I left, and unaddressed and unnameable feelings pummel me like hail. My grandmother believed in my power, and so does my mother, both clinging to the idea that I have to possess my moli because—as with NASA Mission Control—failure is not an option. I might have accepted that I’ll be the one to break a thousand-plus years of family tradition, but they can’t.
Too bad they have to. Or at least my mother does, since Waipo is hopefully beyond caring. Moli perfumes only change emotions, not the future or the past. My mother can’t make a perfume to fix me, although she clearly wishes she could.
Filled with words I wish I had the nerve to say, I stab in the key code and shove open the door to the small vault. The lights flicker on and the air, cool and quiet, settles around me like a blanket. The vault has the same environmental controls as a museum, necessary when protecting ancient perfumes. From the entrance, I can scan my entire family history. Every eldest Hua daughter kept samples of her moli fragrances along with information on the notes or ingredients, vitally important since most of them have long faded. The earlier ones, tothe far left, are powders and incense, meant to perfume clothing with a subtle scent. Later ones in the middle include oils and waxes, and then on the far right are the essences and alcohol-diluted formulae I was mostly trained in.
