'I don't know when I'm going back to Seoul. I can keep on studying. I can tell my parents I still need to study more. Even if I pass the Chinese test and get a certificate, I can still keep on studying, get a job here -'
'That's stupid. You can't do that.'
'If you just tell me you can stay here -'
'You know my parents want me back home. You're Korean! You'd have a good idea what Chinese parents are like. They're not that different.'
'Hey, I know you better. It wouldn't be just family pressure. You'd at least try to fight for it if you really cared. '
'Okay. Okay. You know what? It's like this. I don't even know if it's going to be worth the effort.'
'What do you mean?'
'I mean...I mean, I can't just drop everything and stay here forever. I had a life somewhere else too.'
'But you're always saying how Vancouver is too slow and how nothing happens, that there's not enough there for you and Beijing is -'
'I know, I know, but I was already in the middle of something there. If I decide to stay here, I'll have to start new for real, and...and this was...I was only supposed to be here for a year. Everything has been great, everything good and bad, but I've just never thought that...that...do you see?'
'Look, I'm just...I don't know.'
'You know you're not going to stay in Beijing forever either, and...and I just don't see the point.'
'So what do we do? We just visit each other?'
'I don't know, all right? I don't know.'
'All right, there's still two months anyway.'
'All right.'
'Are you done with your plate?'
'Yeah. Thanks. Hey...come here. I'm sorry. You know we'd have to go home sooner or later.'


*

Beijing was a little detour to keep off the hunger till we reached home. That is why we write stories of it so we won't forget. That is why my friend's story cannot have a happy ending.
If I had found a home in Beijing, where I am disguised by my skin, where I am a nameless unit in a sea of faces, where I am finally part of the majority until I speak and the accent reveals everything, I would have forgotten all my wonder.