Lady Hotaru

I was on a tour in London when this had all begun. It was July 6th of 2030, and it had been pouring since 8 o’clock in the morning. The thunderstorm woke me up at 8 but I went back to sleep after the thunder came in at such a frequency that it established a soothing rhythm. When I finally got out of bed at noon I rushed to the Rivoli Ballroom to get ready for the performance in the evening. It was still as dark outside as if it were midnight. 

I stared into the darkness, and asked David, “Is this type of weather normal to you? ”

“Aye, more and more normal in recent years. Last year, we had a storm season throughout July, August and September. Streets were flooded everywhere. Thought London was turning into Venice.” David put on a kilt over his pants and took off his pants from inside the kilt. 

“Strange,” I looked outside while putting powder on my cheek and nose. I have always insisted on doing my own makeup, even after I went big, I still do my own makeup for any medium and small events. 

“Strange indeed,” David chortled. As if he just thought of something interesting, David walked towards me with an intrigued look on his face. 

“May I ask you something? ” David asked. 

“Of course,” I answered while trying to pick out a color of lipstick for my lips. 

“Where are you guys from? ”

“New York,” I looked at David as if he was silly. This was not the first year I performed in London nor the first time with David. He knows that my entire team is from New York. 

“No, what I meant was just you...and ah, originally, ” David said with a sense of hesitance. The room was silent for half a second. In 2027, 48 countries banned initiating questions for a person’s nationality in public. The UK was one of them, but not the U.S. By ‘a person’ they really mean a Far East looking person. The reason behind these policies is so that Chinese national or ethnic people do not have to live in terror like they did before the Berkeley Terro in the U.S or Paddington or Gould street in Australia…. Ever since the Global Covid 19 Pandemic in 2020, the Chinese-U.S Nuclear War Scare in 2022 and Mainlander Guerrilla Warfare in Philadelphia in 2025, the global anti-Asians sentiment, have been extreme. People have been robbed, raped and killed. “You know I am serious about fight racial discrimination!” David claimed. He said that but they all hate mainlanders. It is in fact both politically right to be against racial discrimination and hating a Chinese mainlander. 

After a short pause, I said, “I was a Singaporean before I became an American citizen.”

David bursts into a nervous laugh and becomes relaxed after the laugh. “I thought you were. That’s what I would have guessed. Your accent sounds like you are from Singapore.”

No, it doesn’t. I have an almost perfect American accent even though you can still tell English is not my native language after talking to me for 10 mins or so. But I do not have a Singaporean accent!

“Are you asking to see if I’m a Mainlander Chinese? ” I asked sharply.

“No...absolutely not. I am not like one of those people. You see...” David mumbled while approached me from the other side of the room, then the six-foot strong built man got down on one knee next to my vanity. 

He reached out to hold my hand. “You are the most beautiful woman and performer I have ever seen and I have been a fan of yours since 2023. I’ve had deep respect and love for you ever since. I do feel strongly about protecting my country from the Chinese communists’ propaganda and nuclear attacks. But I am not a racist against asians. I’m not like those thugs. You have to believe me. I would never do anything to harm or disrespect you! ”

I smiled awkwardly after David stared at me sincerely for about 5 seconds. “It’s okay David. I believe your heart is in the right place.”

“I cannot imagine what you have gone through these years getting mixed up with the Communist Chinese Mainlanders, those rogue, brutal animals...” David looked at me with real sympathy in his eyes.

“It’s not right to kill Mainlander civilians or assault Mainlander immigrants on the streets either, you know?” 

“Certainly.” David quickly responded and he put on a very superficial smile. “I’m very sorry if I upset you and about my inappropriate comments.”

I turned to my mirror glumly and did not say another word on the subject. 

I had a strange and tingling feeling when I took off my smart watch and saw two messages unread on the watch before getting on stage. I put my watch in my performance jewelry box and took off my robe. Out there on the stage, the cheering and the clapping sounds from the audience drags me back to my reality, or is this actually my fantasy? People think performers put on makeup, costumes, a character to be someone else, but I feel more real in my makeup and costumes than any other time. 7 years have gone by since I became famous and I still worry that this has all been just a sweet dream for me, that I will wake up one day and realize that I have never been me. The stage feels like a sanctuary. I took a deep breath and felt that serenity took over my body and swept away all the stress and anxiety I had from the talk with David backstage. 

This is my fourth year touring Europe, at the age of 34. I have always believed that the thirties are the best years in one’s life. You are just done with that crisis in your twenties when you think you should start to put your life in order but you are so young and know so little about the world, you are caught by the earlier childhood trauma that you freeze and think you have no value to offer to the world. Then one day at the end of your twenties and when you are heading towards your thirties, you are lifted by fate to take a drastic turn, you manage to snap out of all that negativity and start a family and a career. The family and career are so young too, just like you, they haven't got enough time to go sour yet in your thirties. It's truly the best time in one’s life. 

I closed my eyes calmly, felt alive and entered a meditative state. The world quiets down. After a short while, the host’s voice breaks the short silence before the show.

“Let’s welcome our Lady Hotaru! ”

It was around 2 a.m when I got back to my hotel room. David walked with me and Jenny, my assistant/manager, to my room and kissed me on the cheek to say goodbye. I pretended as if I were too drunk to behave in a proper manner. I waved my purse at David while waiting for Jenny to reach for my finger to unlock the door. Jenny pushed me in bed and hooked my face up with the make up remover machine. 

“Are you going to be good? Do you need me to get you some sober-up? ” It was obviously a rhetorical question for Jenny because as she speaks, she’s already pressing buttons on the espresso machine. 

“I am fine.” I murmured. I buried half of my face in the sheets and had a peek at the green stuff going into the cup. “Am I becoming an alcoholic, Jenny? ”

“Far from it. ” Jenny laughed. “But I have dealt with way too many drunk artists and performers to be a fair judge to that question. Well, you are far from an alcoholic by your profession’s standards. ” Jenny handed me the green gel that was prepared by the espresso machine. “Also that’s an outdated word, alcoholic. Don’t you know kids nowadays are boycotting that word? I am old fashioned on that question: nobody should be pumping poison without any limits. But many of our old morals don't apply anymore, do they? With these newly developed, fixes, drugs, sober-ups, whatever stupid names they have, kids can just drink as much as they want as long as they took some green pills or liquid! ”

“Unless they were too drunk to remember to get the green stuff! ” I sat up and had a sip or a bite of the gell-ish “beverage” Jenny offered me.

“You are quite right. Sober-ups don’t give people work ethics either, do they? ” Jenny kissed me on the forehead. “Kinsley darling, Now drink up and have a good night's rest. We are leaving early for Warsaw in the morning. Then we can go home! And you can see Jamie and the kids! I know it has been stressful for you. Just hang in there. We are almost done!”

“Good night Jenny,” I finished the drink. It really started to grow on me. The sweet, cool aloe taste has already made my stomach feel better.  

“Good night, Kinsley! ”

As the sober-up started to work, the heaviness of my body was leaving, being replaced by a comfortable relaxing feeling. I was almost falling asleep until I remembered the unread messages on my watch. I sat up and reached for my purse. It is rare that I receive messages from that watch. It was connected with my mac instead of my phone. And my mac was connected to this old cloud account with an email address I haven’t used since I was in college. I hardly ever receive any messages from my watch. I grew curious. Maybe it’s from an old boyfriend or a college friend.

My world started to spin when I saw the messages in Chinese on the watch. It’s from a number with a Russian area code.

Message 1: “Banny, your father is under house arrest. I’m afraid we will not make it to see you again in this life. I am sorry for how our last conversation has ended. We love you..”

Message 2: “We miss you, Banny. We miss you.”

My heart sank horribly as I read the messages. I was hopeful that this is a prank, except no one who would make such a prank knows enough information about me to do it and no one who does know enough information about me would prank me in such a cruel fashion. And even if they did, they would not call me Banny. 

There is only one person on this planet that calls me Banny...my mother, Jan, who lives in mainland China with my father, Chief Lee, the Chief engineer of No.3 National Factory of Heavy Industry. That’s right. I’m no singaporean. I am a mainlander. My parents refused to move to the U.S. in 2023 when China had first adopted its 21st century closed door policy. That was the last time I saw them. It has been 7 years.

During the China- U.S. nuclear missile competition, the western countries had put up a united front against China in trade and adopted policies to decouple from China. The Chinese government established control of 40 African countries and launched vast propaganda campaigns against the west.

China created the Afro-China Metro State (ACMS) to promote business and trade between China and African countries. ACMS initiated a series of beneficial policies for Africans including enabling African students to go to top Chinese universities with far more lenient standards than were used to screen Chinese students and provide African students with financial aid. There are other policies for African citizens such as being able to enlist in the Afro- China Metro Military and receive training and benefits in Mainland China. In Kenya and Tanzania, over 70 percent of the adult males are enlisted in the ACMS military. 

The forced merging of Africans in Chinese societies did not receive welcome from China’s societies. Instead these policies drove Chinese society to have widespread complaints against Africans and intensified the deep rooted racism against the Africans. The west think the Africans were used as body shields and dispensable soldiers to protect Chinese’s interest. China, however, claimed that it has solved the African problem that the white struggles to solve for centuries. China claimed that states that joined ACMS had doubled its GDP every three years and more children were put in school than ever in the history of these states. Then there is the offended common Chinese people. When they read about the prosperity in Africa in the news they think, is that my tax money being put into building other people’s countries? Sure it would be nice to live in a country where you have everyone join the military and get free money when we are busting our asses more and more everyday while getting less and less. 

Nonetheless, the mass surveillance control made sure nobody could do anything to challenge the execution of the nation’s policies. China, as its propaganda claims, remains the safest country in the world while ACMS runs as a close second in the rank therefore makes China the “true savior” for the Africa continent. However, anticipating the economy going soft which would result in undermining the Communist regimes’ legitimacy of ruling in China, in 2023, China closed its borders from all countries, including Russia, except for ACMS and North Korea. The Chinese commercial airplane companies were all merged and acquired by the government at zero cost. China used the new Five Ones policy which was an updated version of the Five Ones policy used during the 2020 Covid 19 Pandemic. 

There shall be ONE flight on ONE route every ONE month to ONE ACMS member state from ONE airline company. 

Basically except for one full plane after another full plane of African and Chinese soldiers traveling between China and the African countries, no one can get in and out of China legally anymore. 

The internet was also replaced by the local area network within China. Although getting connected with the outside world is not impossible technically for many mainlanders, the severe punishment deters people’s online activities. From 2023-2028, 80 million people were arrested or sentenced to re-education camps. Knowing my parents, being the patriots and uptight people they are, they wouldn’t ever do anything illegal trying to contact the outside world, not even to contact me. I didn’t think I would hear from them today, or any day, or maybe at all during my life.

I haven’t seen or heard from my mom or my dad for 7 years. I did not know if they were leading a good life or a crappy one. I didn't know if they were dead or alive. We have such distinctively different souls, except that they don’t believe in souls. As a kid, I wished to have different kinds of parents, the ones I saw on TV shows. The warm, flexible, loving ones. On the other hand, I can’t blame my parents for hating me because I want things that are so foreign to them. I am an alien in the family because I don’t worship anything they do, things they devote their lives to: the older family members, the state authorities, and a joyless life.

Joy was literally punishable by humiliation when I was growing up. My mom used to rip all of my fiction books while I cried hysterically when I was 7. We stared at each other in my room while the white pieces of papers flew everywhere over my bed, my desk and on the floor. She said she can’t understand how weak I am to absorb those emotions and feelings and the evilest of all, doubts, from the books I read. At the same time I can't understand her cruelty, numbness and inability to appreciate and relate to other human beings. She felt betrayed and I felt disappointed. I believe that the wedge between me and my parents was forever drawn on that day when she ripped all of my books.

I developed a ritual to bury my books periodically after reading them. It made perfect sense to me while others found it bizarre. They don't understand, where I grew up, books are just like people, they die sometimes. 

When Chinese first announced its policies to close the borders, when most of my mainlander friends in the U.S. managed to get their parents out so they can stay together. My parents rejected with deep contempt my proposal for them to move. My mother called me back after the second last unpleasant conversation which I thought was to be the last. She called me back and stayed silent for a while. “What do you want, Mama?” I asked softly. 

“Will you move back? You can still move back.” She asked me, sounding even a little vulnerable. 

“I’m sorry but I won’t. ” I answered. 

“That’s great!” She got her normal sarcastic voice back. I hung up the phone before she could say any other thing. I want to remember her with that little bit of rare vulnerability. It feels like love. 

There is a void in my heart where my parents lie, but I understand their decisions at the end of the day. I know why they made it. I know how different we are and how we are different. The knowledge that comes with the indication of the impossible reconciliation, hurts me in all eternity. But on the other hand, their reasons, morality, and values also hurt me. Everything hurts.

I don’t know what to do with their message which seems to carry so much information, yet delivers so little at the same time. What’s going on with them? Is my Dad being arrested? Is my mom sick? She has always had a sensitive nervous system. Do they want to see me?

....

Do they still love me?