Page 86 of The Manor of Dreams

Ada closed the door behind her. “I thought you were gone. Where were you?”

“Meeting with the lawyer.” Ma sighed. “Going over the proceedings. Dad didn’t have a will.”

Ada took stock of her mother’s appearance. She had lost weight over the last few months and her face had a gaunt weariness to it. “What does that mean?”

Ma shrugged. “Everything goes to us. It’s what he would have wanted.”

Ada nodded. She focused on the bookshelves with the titles she’d practically memorized. The collection of Yeats poems was missing. Her mother followed her gaze until they locked eyes.

“I reorganized the shelves a bit,” Ma said in Mandarin. “Actually, now that you’re here. Is there something you want to tell me?”

Ada stared at her.

“About what’s going on between you and Sophie, maybe?”

Sothatwas why Sophie had ended things with her. Ada tried to formulate a response. She could say the notes were from her English class. She could deny it. Or she could plainly say the truth. What then? “How did you find out? Who told you?”

“Does it matter? I’m your mother. Of course I know. You should have told me a long time ago.”

Her mother looked strangely calm. Was she furious underneath? Upset that Ada had kept this from her? Ada couldn’t tell, and it terrified her.

Ada picked her words carefully. “What did you say to Sophie last night?”

Ma flinched. “What?”

“I saw her go up to your room. And afterward she told me she couldn’t see me anymore.” She took a deep breath. “Did you tell her to say that?”

“I didn’t.” Her mother’s eyes narrowed. “Sophie ended things with you?”

Ma was pretending not to know. Ada was sure of that. “What did you tell her, then? We—” Her voice caught. “We care about each other.” And then, even quieter, she confessed, “I care about her. A lot.”

Ma watched her, and Ada fought the urge to hide.

“You should probably respect her decision, shouldn’t you?” Ma said. “I know what it’s like at your age. It’s easy to get swept up in your feelings. But you should be cautious about this. If Sophie came to her senses, then so should you.”

Came to her senses?“Ma,” Ada said slowly. “What do you mean?”

“You know what I mean.”

Ada stiffened. She’d kept her feelings a secret all this time because she’d wanted to protect what she and Sophie had. She didn’t want to have to explain it to anyone. She’d thrilled at realizing that the things she’d only observed in the past between other couples at school—the electricity, the tension that passed between them with a look in the middle of class, or the murmured words between lockers—she felt all those things and more for Sophie. Being with her was the easiest, mostnatural thing Ada had ever done. Of course she knew the words other people around her would use to describe it, words they spat and hurled at each other, and it made her skin crawl. But did her mother think those things, too?

She’d heard her parents whisper about it in disparaging tones, how Dad’s co-star had been fired from a movie because he was seen with a man at an awards show after-party. And now Ma was finally looking at her just like she’d feared. Like something was wrong with her.

“Bao bèi, I am trying to be prudent. I want what’s best for you. You know that, right? She’s the housekeeper’s daughter. I know you’ll get some sense. We can forget this before anyone has to know.” Ma said this as though she thought Ada would be relieved.

Housekeeper’s daughter?Ada thought of what Sophie had told her. That they’d all grown up the same, gone to the same schools and lived in the same house. But she realized now that in Ma’s eyes, they would never be equals. That even if Ma was okay with her and Sophie being together, she’d always think of the Dengs as less than.

“You don’t know me, then,” Ada said. “At all.”

Ma’s expression turned cold. “I am a tolerant mother,” she said. “I could have thrown her out for this. Or sent her away. But I didn’t.” Ma stood up from the desk to face the bookshelves again. The conversation was over.

Ada paused at the foot of the stairs and looked up at the closed doors. Who could have told Ma? Lucille? But Lucille always came to Ada first. She and Ma always fought. And she’d been preoccupied at the party.

Which left Rennie.

It dawned on Ada. Of course it was her little sister. Ada remembered the night when she kissed Sophie’s cheek in the garden and had glanced up to see Rennie’s light wink on for just a moment. Renniehadbeen watching them.

Ada knocked on her door.

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