My Sylvie thrusts a piece of scrunched-up paper onto my stomach. “For you, Mummy! I painted you at daycare today.” The drawing features a collection of lines and circles. Long black hair, a joker’s pasty red smile, stick-like arms reaching out as if mad. The face is coloured in crayon-yellow. I have never thought of painting myself yellow. Perhaps I don’t have the artist’s eye in me, to have missed that crucial detail.

“I love it, sweetie,” I say, tucking it under a stack of her artworks on the dining table. Bam-bam — storming around the house in a Batman cape, Sylvie bangs every object with her plastic golf club. Bam-bam — the club hits the pile of drawings where my hidden yellow face quivers.

[…]

At the prep school interview, Sylvie is asked to draw on a piece of paper and I am led to a chair, in front of the Deputy Principal whose blonde bob with streaks of grey frames her sharp face. I sit on the edge of the chair, straighten my back, mirroring her perfect posture.

“So, have you been here long, Tian?”

I blink. I was expecting questions about my daughter. I’ve lived in Australia for seven years, is that long or short? What’s the definition for the length of time in this situation? Tick, tock, tick, tock, her face seems to be tightening with the ticking clock and I blurt out, “Not long.”

Was it a good answer? I can’t tell from her clamped lips.

The need to make small talk. To leave a good impression as a relaxed person, not your tense, stereotypical Asian who is bothered by the question and the drawing her five-year-old has done.

“How ya goin? It’s been hot, hey.” I emphasise the Aussie accent. The DP’s eyebrows arch, no words coming out. “The storm this morning didn’t help, hey. So humid,” I explain.

Apart from being useful as a dictionary, there is another benefit of a white Australian-born and raised husband: his presence creates a breezy atmosphere in any social event.

Dazzling with a holy halo, he walks into the DP’s office and the still air finally flows in the room. The spell of silence is broken. The DP’s voice returns; her face melts. She doesn’t start by asking my husband if he has been here long. My husband doesn’t mention the weather. They talk about how the school has changed — my husband studied at the same primary school thirty-something years ago and she says she’s the same. “We’re both alumni!” They laugh at the discovery. I am glad they have something in common.

In the sound of their chattering, I sink deeper into the chair, searching around to keep my mind occupied: the hanging banners of the schoolhouses — Cook, Tasman, Oxley — in red, green and blue. Photos of the Year 6 cohorts for the last seven years. A framed newsletter clipping of an article about the four school captains’ outstanding achievements. My Sylvie shuffles to a fish tank placed on the small table next to me and presses her nose onto the glass. Her face glows in the tank’s blue light. She is the golden-haired doll I had when I was a kid who looks nothing like me.

 “Where did you get these prints?” As we are leaving, I gesture at the pictures of Alice in Wonderland, to make myself visible.

 “Oh, they’re just from IKEA,” the DP says with a stiff smile. “I like Alice in Wonderland, to encourage children to explore the unknown world,” she adds and turns to my husband. “Do you read Sylvie stories? It’s good for her literacy development.”

“No, I don’t, but my wife does, every night.”

“In English?”

 “Of course, she even writes down Sylvie’s stories in English — ”

“I keep a collection of her stories called Tiny Sylvie’s Adventures in Mighty Aussie Land,” I lie. There are only three stories in the notebook.

“Wonderful,” the DP says brightly to my husband and then looks down at Sylvie’s drawing. “What a nice family portrait. A plus.” She hands Sylvie a sticker. In the drawing, my husband and daughter’s faces are left white on the white-coloured paper — so bland.

[…]

We drop Sylvie off to my in-laws. Driving home, I take off my sunglasses, scrutinising my face in the mirror. “Does my face look yellow to you?”

“What?” My husband peers at my face. “No, you’re pale.”

“But I’m not white.”

“Of course you’re not. You’re Asian.” He shakes his head, chuckling.

“But I’m not yellow. I’m only a shade darker than you.”

“You’re golden? Honey or olive? Who cares?”

I recap the interview to my husband. He says it’s no big deal, that I am being too sensitive and asks what I am going to cook for dinner.

“Do you think this school supports cultural diversity? I saw a lot of white kids in their school photos today,” I say.

 “What do you mean? You’re in Australia. The population is predominantly white?”

“This suburb … hmmm … seems to be quite white —”

“I don’t think a suburb has a colour,” my husband says.

“You know what I mean. Did you notice their four school captains are all blonde? And the names of their three houses …”

My husband cringes. “Weren’t they elected based on merit? Do we need a racial quota for a local primary school now?”

Neither of us speak for a while. He turns up the music.

“The Voice vote last weekend.” I stare at him. “You didn’t even vote Yes.”

“So? It’s a free country.”

[…]

I throw myself on the couch and message my friend. She replies instantly, saying she feels stupid for asking a similar question to the parents of her daughter’s classmate. They were Asians whose English was good so she thought they had moved here from other cities in Australia, but it turned out they’d only been in the country for five months. She texts:

Now I understand why they looked at each other embarrassed.

What did you ask?

Where’re you guys from?

My friend is a considerate and intelligent woman who is completing her PhD. Her elegant cheekbones make her look like the blonde movie star Cate Blanchett. My friend didn’t know. The DP might not have either. I might have been too sensitive.

 She texts: How do you feel?

Next message: Your feelings are valid, you know.

I send her a love heart emoji. It’s nice to have someone who cares about your feelings. I’ve been ignoring them since I moved here. How could these feelings — sadness, loneliness and anger — help me with my life in a new country? These emotions will pass and the reality will remain unchanged.

Another message:

So hungry! A baby shower today —my first outing without kids in a month. A month! I came home and husband hadn’t left any dinner. Said he thought I’d had dinner. Didn’t even apologise! Shanghainese husbands are supposed to be more attentive to their wives. Not this guy! I haven’t eaten for almost a whole day now! I’m on a hunger strike!

Watching the typing dots flare on Messenger, I wait for more of my friend’s fiery words but the dots stop. Maybe she’s getting a bite to eat. Hunger is urgent — it causes physical pain, as opposed to my problem. People can live without emotions, not without food. I think about children holding out their hands for food rations in Gaza. Elderly people dying in their bomb-blasted homes in Ukraine. My starving friend waiting to be fed by her husband, who used to be an Associate Professor in Political Science in Shanghai and now works as a driving instructor, was made to quit alcohol because my friend couldn’t drink during pregnancy and tonight, he must surrender to her, to redeem the “crime” he had committed. I should be grateful. Last month, I wrote a gratitude letter to myself, as requested by my counsellor. My hot-blooded words sprawling on the page like a declaration:

Be grateful for: being alive (chronic bronchitis and mental health issues are nothing); having a roof over my head (though it requires repair); a job that pays (limited work options as a migrant with “working in progress” English but I should be happy with what I’ve got and hope for the best); somewhat supportive husband (when I come home late from work, he presents his signature dish — pizza with homemade toppings sprinkled on a store-bought base).

Perhaps I should believe in it the way my daughter believes in Santa and the Tooth Fairy.

“What’s for dinner?” As I leave the house, my husband calls out the window but I give no response. The late afternoon air, still hot and muggy, reminds me of the summer I brought him to my hometown for the first time. How amused he was when he noticed an old man strolling around him at a bus stop, smiling in poorly disguised curiosity. At a family dinner, sitting at the head of the table, he grinned at me from behind the mountain of food on his plate and overflowing glasses of rice wine served by my eager-to-please relatives. No one assumed he was good at maths, was a bad driver, grew up with a tiger mum. By the end of the holiday, he didn’t want to leave. I knew he felt special among the crowd of yellow faces for being a white foreigner.

[…]

No one else is running by the river. I hold my nose charging through a cloud of flies swarming over a shadowed pool of green water. Tottering along the edge of walkway, a pregnant woman engages in a rapid exchange on her phone, laughing. I don’t remember being that energetic when I became heavy with Sylvie; I barely talked most of the time and missed home. An off-leash Labrador cuts in front of me and I almost trip. As the paved path disappears into the trees, I can only hear the thumps of my shoes hitting the ground. My breath is heavy. I focus on my goal, to stop only at the water bubbler near the end of the track when I see, out of the bush, two boys racing towards me. One of them is lugging a tree branch. “Nǐ hǎo!” the other boy calls out, hands together, offering me a small bow as if praying to a statue at a temple. I lick my lips and consider saying something but I run to the water bubbler as planned and drink some water. I pace around for a moment before sprinting back.  

“G’day kids.” I catch up with them, steadying my breath. “Why did you say ‘Nǐ hǎo’ to me?”

“Ms Chen told me to practise the greetings. Do you know her?” the boy says. His crystal-blue eyes filled with honesty. “I’m from that school.” He gestures at the school in the distance — the school I’d been to earlier.

I am tempted to ask if he knows my friend, Mrs Smith, who is Australian and white but instead, I wipe the sweat from my eyes and say, “So, you’re practising greetings, hey? You’re in grade five?”

“No, Year four. Wǒ jiào Ollie. Zhè shì … hmm … wǒ de péng yǒu, Josh.” In battered Chinese, Ollie proudly introduces his friend Josh who studies me through red-framed glasses.

“I know Chinese food. I like sushi,” Josh says.

Ollie points at Josh. “He doesn’t speak Chinese. He goes to a different school. They have Japanese.”

“Konnichiwa, watashi wa Josh.” Josh suddenly strikes a soldier pose, lets his stick fall and bows to me, fast like a knife splitting the air in half, in a ninety-degree bend.

We wait. I scratch a mozzie bite on my leg. There is no sign of Josh standing upright, so I give Ollie a look.

“I think he’s waiting for your reply. It’s the polite thing to do,” says Ollie. Josh nods, still bent over.

I role-play the greeting scene.

“Look, it’s good to practise your Chinese, but don’t practise it with someone you don’t know.” Perhaps I should stop there. “What if the person is Malaysian or Korean or Japanese? It can be … like … racism, you know.” Somehow, I whisper the word racism as if it’s taboo.

“Ah … I didn’t know.” Ollie seems startled.

I say to Josh, “And sushi is not Chinese food. It’s Japanese.”

“Okay. Ching Chong, Ching Chong. I’ll remember it. Thanks.” Josh smiles and waves at me.

“Oh, what does Ching Chong mean? I’ve heard some kids saying that at school,” Ollie says.

It must be my gloomy face and my glare that signal Ollie. Shuffling away, he gives Josh a let’s- get-out- of-here wave and they flee, chasing each other. I watch them darting into the sunset. I sigh. They are just kids.

I run towards home. “Why bother? Can’t you let it go?” my husband would say. Don’t even dodge the bullets. Ignore the bullets. Pretend the bullets aren’t real. Maybe it’s easier. Being a sensitive person is exhausting. No matter how hard I’ve tried to blend in — to gain higher qualifications, to be better at my job, to marry a white man, to only speak English at home — and yet, when I almost forget the colour of my skin, still being reminded of it, as though there’s always wind sneaking into the wooden Queenslander through invisible gaps. Why does it have to be this hard?

[…]

The sky is endless burnt orange. Water splashing from kids jumping into the pool and their shrieks spilling over the fence. Somewhere, party tunes pumping, vibrating with the breeze. The air swells with home cooking. Smoky BBQ. Roast with salty crackling. Spaghetti infused with tomato sauce. I picture the fried rice I’m going to cook for dinner: fluffy fat eggs in the hissing oil before I toss in the rice; the steam rising with the fragrant smell. As I’m craving this, flying eggs explode next to my white runners and I jump. A young man’s shrilling voice trails behind a car racing past, “Beep! Beep! Sayonara!” A raised finger sticks out of the car window and more eggs fly out, smash on the kerbside.

I mutter, “Ah — for fuck’s sake.”

“Fuck off!” I shout to the car in the distance, adrenaline rushing through my head. I look at the runny eggs the colour of my face. What a waste of money. “Better use them for fried rice, you bloody idiots,” I say to myself.