Free Dreams of Joy: A Novel by Lisa See Page A

I GO TO WAH HONG. WILL SEND MAIL DETAILS WHEN I GET TO SHANGHAI .
    THE NEXT DAY , I put on the peasant clothes my sister bought for me twenty years ago to wear out of China. I go to the railway station, buy a one-way ticket on the Kowloon–Canton Railway, and board the train. It starts to move, and in minutes we’ve left the city and are crossing the New Territories, which are still part of the colony.
    I wonder how Joy got across. What if she went to China and China didn’t want her? They would have known immediately she wasn’t from Shanghai. We always thought her Chinese was good compared with that of the other kids in Chinatown, but her accent … And I don’t know who or what to believe—the man at the family association or everything I’ve heard about Red China in Los Angeles. Is Joy dead already? What if people decided she was a spy? What if she was killed the moment she set foot in China? This is my greatest fear, the thing that turns my heart black with despair. What point will be served if I follow her? Just another death—my own. Other questions torture me too: If I find Joy, what physical and emotional shape will she be in? Will she even want to see me? Will we be able to repair our relationship, which, after all, was based on a lie? Will she come home with me, assuming we can find a way out of the country?
    The twenty miles to the border—a bridge above the Sham Chun River—comes sooner than I expected. The flag of the People’s Republic of China flaps in the breeze. Guards come through the train. They check the identity cards of those who are returning home from doing business or visiting relatives in Hong Kong. It’s a large number, which confirms what the man at the family association told me. This is, it occurs to me, much like the border between California and Mexico, where many people cross back and forth each day to do business.
    When I tell the guard I’m an Overseas Chinese who’s returning home, I’m taken off the train, along with a few others. Memories of entering America flood my mind: my sister and I being separated from the other passengers and being sent to the Angel Island Immigration Station, where we were interrogated for months. Is that what’s going to happen now?
    I’m escorted into a room. The door is shut and locked behind me. I wait until an inspector enters. He’s a lot shorter than I am, but he’s wiry and tough.
    “Are you stateless?” he asks.
    Hmmm … Good question. I don’t have a passport. All I have is my Certificate of Identity issued by the United States. I show it to the inspector, who doesn’t know what to make of it.
    “Are you an American citizen?” he asks.
    If this really is like Angel Island, then I have to follow what May and I did back then—muddle the story to thwart the bureaucracy.
    “They wouldn’t let me become a citizen,” I answer. “I wasn’t good enough for them. They treat the Chinese very badly.”
    “What is the purpose of your return to the People’s Republic of China?”
    “To help build the nation,” I answer dutifully.
    “Are you a scientist, a doctor, or an engineer? Can you help us build an atomic bomb, cure a disease, or design a dam? Do you have airplanes, a factory, or property to donate to the government?” When I shake my head, he asks, “Well, then, what are we supposed to do with you? How do you think you will help us?”
    I hold up my hands. “I will help with these.”
    “Are you ready to give up the filthy, stinky American ideals you’ve cherished in your heart?”
    “Yes, absolutely!” I answer.
    “Are you a returning student? We have a special reception station in Canton for returning students, who are expected to make a clean breast of their reasons for coming back to China, their ideas about fame and profit, and any anti-Communist thoughts they might harbor.”
    “Forgive me, but do I look like a student?”
    “You look like someone who is hiding something. You don’t fool me by wearing