Free Tiger Girl by May-lee Chai

shut, but they can only cry in birds’ voices. The father looks up and sees his children circling above his head, shrieking, but he does not recognize them. They have turned completely into birds
.
    Ma drifted away from me into her dreamless sleep. I held on to her hand all night, thinking about the bird girls, flying freelyabove the jungle, the sunlight strong against their feathers, the wind carrying them higher and higher, the beasts below them small as insects. Could they see the villages where we toiled? Could they see the soldiers with their guns walking two by two so no one can escape? Could they see all the way to the ocean? I imagined the bright blue water stretching to the long curved edge of the world, like the map that hangs on the plywood wall of the makeshift classroom in the refugee camp. The one the teacher points to when she shows us where the lucky families go when they are sponsored to leave. I was thrilled by the idea that I, too, might turn into a bird. Such lucky girls, I thought.
    I never thought to wonder: Did they ever miss their human parents? Did they miss their mother even though she’d sent them away? Did she ever tell them stories? Did they ever wonder why she changed?
    Nor did I think much about their father, who could not recognize their cries. How long did they cry out to him? How long before they gave up and flew away?
    This was how my nights passed in the refugee camp.

CHAPTER 8
The Plan
    That night as I lay on the sofa, I tried to think of what I could offer Uncle. Right now I was taking up space, eating his food, earning no money. No wonder I felt like a burden.
    Before I gave up and went back home, back to college, I had to try harder. I couldn’t give up after a couple of days. I was sure there was a way to win Uncle over. To show him that I was a good daughter, one he’d be willing to acknowledge, one he’d be proud to call his own. I wasn’t just someone who reminded him of all that was unhappy about the past, of the wars and all that had been lost.
    I needed to show him I could be useful.
    Uncle loved the donut shop. He spent all his time there. He’d even given it a special fancy name. If I could make it into a success, I figured, he’d be happy to have me around.
    I got up from the couch and pulled the Yellow Pages out from under the phone. I took out my notebook and pencil from my backpack and began to list our competition, trying to see if we had any advantage in terms of location, bus routes, price, service, anything. I knew we could beat anyone on flavor, but how to let people know?
    I brainstormed a list of promotions: manning tables in front of grocery stores or bus stops like kids selling Girl Scout cookies. Give-aways at beauty parlors, nail shops, tanning salons, video stores, and florists, all these little businesses inthe endless strip malls. Maybe I should pack up a variety box and donate them to the cops? Thank them for their service to the community, write up a card, and drop a box by? I didn’t trust cops myself—when had they ever helped my family?—but they might be useful to have around, keep the gangs away. And, rumor had it, they like donuts.
    By the time the light seeping through the crack in the curtains was the bluish color of skim milk, I had a list of promotions two pages long. I was dozing off when I heard the newspaper thwack against the apartment door.
    I checked my watch. It was twenty after five and Uncle still hadn’t come home.
    Rubbing my face with one hand, I staggered to the door to get the paper, a thin local called the
Santa Bonita Times
. There was a picture of a girl in pigtails holding a bunny under the headline: “Local Girl’s Prize Rabbit Returned.” Some kid’s pet went missing for five weeks and then showed up again mysteriously on her family’s doorstep accompanied by an album of photographs showing the bunny in front of famous places: the Hollywood sign, Universal