Dear Girls by Ali Wong

Author:Ali Wong
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Random House Publishing Group
Published: 2019-10-14T16:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 8

Mr. Wong

Dear Girls,

Whenever possible, I try to coordinate matching outfits for me and your father. We have matching black puff vests, matching Nike sweatpants, matching Allbirds shoes, and matching Hokusai print T-shirts from Uniqlo. I used to not understand why older Asian couples dressed alike. Some people think it’s because they’re slowly becoming the same person—an elderly, wise, balding, cheap, tai-chi-loving, ginseng-obsessed tortoise. But I have Daddy wear the same clothes as me in order to claim him. A wedding ring is not enough and him wearing a T-shirt that says TEAM ALI is a little bit tacky. I don’t want any bitch to be misled into thinking that he’s snatchable. Some might think it’s a bit possessive, I prefer to view it as a reflection of my love, and how much I value him.

When I met your father in 2009, he was taking a year off from business school. After a string of losers, I was so excited to date someone from Harvard. Finally, somebody who owned a printer and a garlic press! The first time he invited me back to his apartment, I couldn’t wait. I assumed he lived in a spacious one-bedroom in the West Village, with some Moroccan poufs, an open-concept kitchen full of stainless steel appliances, and maybe even a Vitamix!

Well, as it turned out, Daddy lived in a closet. No, he wasn’t gay. He lived in an actual closet in the East Village. You had to go through Daddy’s roommate’s room to get to Daddy’s room, because Daddy’s room was the closet of his roommate’s room. Immediately when you walked in the closet, there was a ladder to get to Daddy’s bed, which was a platform that only had space for his mattress and laptop. Underneath the platform was where he stored all of his belongings and got dressed. It was like a treehouse of ancestral disappointment. Since there was nowhere to eat in Daddy’s closet, we ate breakfast on the roommate’s bed after the roommate had gone to work. His roommate did healing work with very powerful magnets so we couldn’t have our cellphones in that room or our text messages and personal info would go to outer space. I acted like I was totally cool with all this, but in my head, I was like, Motherfucker, I thought you went to SIDWELL with Chelsea Clinton!

But this adult man who grew up in a mansion with so much privilege never complained about these odd living conditions. He decorated it with Christmas lights and photos from his time in the Philippines, and made an altar by his bed. It showed me right away that he was a grounded person, someone who could make the most out of a shitty situation, and it really surprised me and made me wonder what else he had to reveal.

Every time we hung out, I thought, Who is this guy? During the day we’d go to yoga together and eat hummus for lunch. Then at night,

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