When she pulled the box from the attic and saw the looping strokes of her daughter’s handwriting, her hands shook; by the second letter, the tears fell so freely she could no longer see the page, only feel the weight of every word pressing into her chest like a wound reopening.

January 27, 1990 6 years old
Lunar New Year (春节)

Dear 妈妈 (mama),

The 抱住 (firecrackers) outside go pi pa pi pa so loud my chest shakes. Little red paper falls down like bird feathers. I keep the closet door open just a crack so I can watch.

The table is so full, the bowls almost touch – 鱼 (fish) with shiny eyes, 烤鸭 (roasted duck) with skin that shines, oranges stacked high like little suns. Everyone laughs when 哥哥 (brother) talks.

哥哥 gets a fat 红包 (red envelope) from uncle. I see the corner open a little, thick bills sleeping inside, all red and new. 哥哥 grins so big his cheeks fold up like dumplings. Another aunt presses her 红包 into his pocket. He can’t even hide it.

You come to me when nobody looks. Your hands are cold. You give me a 红包 with no name on it. You smile quick, like we are playing a secret game, and whisper, 快，放口袋里 (quick, put it in your pocket). When you leave, I peel back the sticker and open it. There is only air.

I don’t ask why I can’t sit at the table. I don’t ask why I didn’t get any money. I think maybe if I don’t ask, you won’t be angry with me for being here.

我想你会高兴我出生了 (I want you to be happy I was born).

With hope,

Your daughter

April 5, 1994 10 years old
Tomb-Sweeping Day (清明节)

Dear 姥姥 (grandma),

We arrive when the sky is thick black and the moon is hiding behind clouds. 爸爸 (baba) says it’s better this way, less trouble. I don’t know what trouble he means, but I keep quiet. Even still, I’m scared of the way the dirt path swallows our footsteps.

I never met you. 妈妈 (mama)  says you had hands that smelled like 茉花 (jasmine) and a laugh that made the neighbors come over just to listen. I wish you were still here. Maybe if you were, we could drink tea together, and I could tell you the things I don’t say to anyone else.

When we reach the tomb, 哥哥 (brother) gets the incense. 爸爸 guides his hand, showing him how to bow three times. The smoke curls up like ribbons, soft and silver. 妈妈 lays the chrysanthemums. I carry nothing.

“不要碰 (don’t touch),” 爸爸 says when I lean too close. I hide my hands in my sleeves. The air is cold, but my face feels hot.

I look for my name on the carved stone. There’s 哥哥, 爸爸, 妈妈. Not mine.

You’ve been gone for so many years, but tonight everyone remembers you, lights incense for you, speaks your name out loud. I am here, standing just a few steps away, and still, I am not remembered.

Being a ghost might be better. At least then someone might leave me flowers.

With longing,

Your granddaughter

August 10, 1999 15 years old
Qixi Festival (七夕节)

To my future love,

Tonight the sky is supposed to be full of magpies, wings outstretched to make a bridge for 牛郎 and 织女 (the cowherd and the weaver girl) so they can meet just for this one night. Mama says it’s just a story for children, but I think maybe it’s also for people who still believe someone might be waiting for them.

I am not allowed to go out. Brother leaves after dinner with his hair combed, his shirt tucked in, and a smile he only wears for the world outside. Baba slips him some money, whispering about “treating her well” like I’m not in the room. I scrub the pots until my fingers wrinkle, steam curling around my face.

I wonder if you will ever see me. Not in the way the neighbors do, a shadow that passes, a girl whose name no one says too loudly, but really see me. The way the cowherd saw the weaver girl, even when she was hidden behind the clouds.

Maybe love is for girls who exist. Girls with names on the family register, girls who can walk down the street in the open air, girls who will be remembered when they are gone.

If we ever meet, I hope you know I have been here all along, waiting on my side of the river, with empty hands and a heart full of stories.

With love,

Your girl

July 7, 2002 18 years old
Gao Kao (高考)

To Baba,

I studied from brother’s old books, the ones with his notes in the margins, equations written in a rush, whole poems underlined twice. When he wasn’t looking, I pressed my pencil into the same paper, as if I could leave my name in his place.

When it came time to register for the exam, mama whispered with the neighbor’s cousin, and for one summer I became another family’s child. Different last name, different village. I sat in that crowded exam hall with my borrowed identity, absorbed within rows of students bent over desks while fans clicked overhead. The paper smelled faintly of ink and dust, and when I wrote my essay, my hand did not shake.

When the results came, I discovered I had scored higher than brother. I saw your eyes flicker for half a second, surprise, maybe even pride, before you smoothed your face back into something blank.

I asked if I could apply. You didn’t yell. You didn’t even frown. You only said, 没有户口，不能上大学 (“Without a household registration, you can’t go to university”), as if it were answering a question about the weather. As if the sun simply decided not to rise for me.

That night, I took brother’s books to the field behind our house and buried them where the soil turns dark and rich after rain. I thought maybe next year I’d dig them up, but I know I won’t.

You have already given our family’s name away. I have nothing left to write mine on.

With desperation,

Your daughter

October 3, 2009 25 years old
Mid-Autumn Festival (中秋节)

To Mei Lin,

Tonight, brother returns, the air sweet with osmanthus and roasted duck. He brings his wife: you. Your hair is glossy, lips painted the color of fresh lychees. When you saw me clearing the dishes, you handed me your empty teacup without looking, murmuring, 谢谢阿姨 (thank you, auntie), the way you would thank a servant.

No one corrected you.

I carried the tray back to the kitchen. On the table sat the mooncake, its golden skin glistening under the light. The knife divided it into perfect wedges, each with a salted yolk at the center. I took the broken piece, the one where the filling leaks from its side, and ate it standing up.

Through the doorway, I see Mama touching you, her new daughter’s arm, her eyes warm in a way I have never known.

That night, I did not go back to my room. I walked past the threshold of our house, past the lane that smells of steamed buns, past the rice fields silvered by moonlight. I disappeared before anyone noticed. This time, it was my choice.

It is worse this way, because when you choose to leave, there is no one left to blame.

I wish you luck in my old family. And if one day, you and my brother have children, I hope the second will not be hidden like me.

I hope the law will not steal their name, nor love.

With quiet grace,

Your sister in law

August 28, 2015 31 years old
Ghost Festival (中元节)

To all the second-born children,

They say tonight the gates of the underworld open, and the dead wander among the living. Paper money burns in gutters, curling into ash. Candles float on the river like small, beating hearts.

I light my candle. Its flame wavers, as if it knows. The wax drips fast, hot over my fingers, blistering skin I can no longer feel anyway.

I think of the first red envelope my mother gave me, the one slipped to me in secret, unmarked, empty. Of the family tomb where I could not lay flowers. Of the pots I scrubbed on Qixi, wondering what it might feel like to be seen. Of my textbooks buried in the garden, pages turning to soil. Of the broken mooncake I ate standing alone in the kitchen while another daughter was welcomed in my place.

Tonight I will not be hidden.

I place the candle at my feet. The flame catches the hem of my skirt first, a small kiss, then a hunger. The smoke curls upward, the way my university letters once did, the way all my wishes have.

The heat climbs fast, licking my skin, filling my lungs until every breath tastes of metal. I do not scream. I do not run. I have disappeared all my life; this is only the final step.

When the wind rises, the fire leaps higher. I close my eyes and imagine myself among the other spirits, finally walking in the open, my name spoken without fear.

When the flame goes out, there will be nothing left to hide.

I will walk behind you always, finally alive in the afterlife.

With forever,

Your ghost girl

Postscript:

 

Facing extreme overpopulation, China’s government in 1979 ushered in the One-Child Policy. Families who broke the law risked heavy fines or forced sterilizations. In those years, thousands of children were hidden in attics, erased from records, or quietly abandoned, loved in secret, or not loved at all, and never allowed to exist in public. The policy would not be eased until 2015, too late for so many ghost sons and daughters.