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1905 Redefining America%u201cI can%u2019t wear these!%u201d Phuong said, laughing as she held up the nearly nonexistent panties. %u201cThey%u2019re scandalous!%u201d%u201cOf course you can wear them,%u201d Vivien said, still kneeling by her suitcase. %u201cGo on, try them on. I can%u2019t imagine you in those granny things you have.%u201dFor a moment, Phuong hesitated. But Vivien was her sister and a doctor, and there was no need to be shy. She quickly stripped off her rayon pajamas and her cotton underwear, and just as quickly slipped on the brassiere and panties. Vivien nodded approvingly and said, %u201cNow you look sexy. Some boy%u2019s going to be very lucky to see you in those.%u201d%u201cMy mother and father would never let me wear these.%u201d Phuong inspected herself from head to toe with the hand mirror her mother kept hanging from a nail in the wall. %u201cOnly naughty girls would wear this.%u201d%u201cIt%u2019s time for you to be bad,%u201d Vivien said, yawning. %u201cMy God, you%u2019re twenty-three! You don%u2019t even want to know what I was doing when I was twenty-three.%u201dThe touch of lace against her skin, and the glimpses of her nearly nude body draped so provocatively, made Phuong inordinately happy. She hummed as they tidied up, Vivien putting away the suitcase and Phuong donning her pajamas and drawing the curtain separating her side of the room from her parents%u2019. Then she slipped into bed after Vivien, and lying there, her arm linked with Vivien%u2019s arm, she could feel her sister%u2019s gift endowing their relationship with even more intimacy and trust.%u201cWhat%u2019s the first thing you%u2019ll do in Chicago? Call your mother?%u201d%u201cTake a long drive by myself. I miss my car.%u201d%u201cI don%u2019t even know anyone who owns a car.%u201dVivien stared at the ceiling fan stirring the hot air of a typically humid night. The open window allowed in the merest of breezes.%u201cCan I tell you a secret?%u201d Vivien said.6065%u201cYou already told me.%u201d%u201cWhat?%u201d%u201cA secret.%u201d When Phuong turned her head, she could see into Vivien%u2019s ear, the canal small and dark. %u201cAt Cu Chi.%u201d%u201cI guess I did.%u201d Vivien scratched a bite on her neck. %u201cI thought I would come here and I would love my father.%u201d%u201cYou don%u2019t love him?%u201d Phuong propped her head on her hand. %u201cOr you didn%u2019t love him?%u201d%u201cIt%u2019s easy for you to love him.%u201d Vivien sighed. %u201cIt%u2019s easy for him to love me. That%u2019s the way it should be. He remembers me. I don%u2019t remember him. Can you love someone you don%u2019t remember? Can you love someone you don%u2019t know?%u201d%u201cI%u2019m not sure.%u201d A burst of cackling and laughter came from the alley outside, the neighborhood%u2019s old ladies sitting on their thresholds, gossiping before bedtime. %u201cBut I know he%u2019s not easy to love.%u201d%u201cA woman can%u2019t fall in love with a man for whom she feels sorry. Can she?%u201d%u201cI%u2019ve never fallen in love with anyone, so I don%u2019t know.%u201d The screech of the metal gate that was the living room%u2019s front door announced their father%u2019s return. %u201cBut you%u2019re saying it wrong. You%u2019re not falling in love, you just want to love him.%u201d%u201cYou know what my mother told me when I said I was going to Viet Nam?%u201d Vivien paused. %u201c %u2018Your father%u2019s only going to break your heart too.%u2019 %u201dThen Vivien rolled over on her side to face the wall, where a green gecko clung patiently to the plaster. The stairs creaked as Mr. and Mrs. Ly ascended, the discordant notes together constituting a coda to Phuong%u2019s day so familiar that only Vivien%u2019s arrival had made her aware of it. Her sister%u2019s restless presence in Phuong%u2019s bed and the caress of the lace on her skin rendered the usual unusual, sharpening Phuong%u2019s perceptions as if before this they had amounted 7075Copyright %u00a9 Bedford, Freeman & Worth Publishers. Distributed by Bedford, Freeman & Worth Publishers. For review purposes only. Not for redistribution.