pink

Katie's life was full of pink. She lived in a flat on the upper east side with her father, except her father was rarely there, so really she lived in the flat with herself. Her father was a very somber, very busy man. So busy, in fact, that instead of tucking Katie in to bed each night, he would call and leave her messages, to be listened to each night before going to bed. His wife had died giving birth to Katie, and, suddenly finding himself a single father, the very immediate need of providing food and shelter for the baby took priority over all else.

As the years went by, he moved further and further up in the business world, which meant he was able to provide better food and shelter, but also less and less time for Katie. So Katie grew up with nannies and pink, for the less time her father was able to spend with her, the more he tried to make up for it by buying her anything and everything he could imagine she might need. And since he knew very little about her other than that she was a girl, and that girls liked pink, everything Katie owned was pink. Pink toothbrushes, pink lunchboxes. Pink stuffed bunnies and puppies and duckies and bears. Pink bookbags and bicycles, pink pencilcases and trapperkeepers. And of course, pink clothes. Skirts, shirts, shorts, jeans, sweaters and blouses, all were pink.

And Katie came to hate the color pink, but she was a good girl, and she knew her father was working very hard to make sure that she got the best nannies and the best schools and the best piano and violin teachers (because, let's face it, all Chinese parents make their kids take piano and violin lessons) and the best chefs and, well, the best everything. So she gritted her teeth and went on living in pink.

Each day, she'd get dropped off at school by her driver in a pink limousine, wearing her pink clothes and carrying her pink bookbag. The kids at school teased her and called her funny names. In elementary school, the boys made fun of her for being so pink and so girly. In middle school, everyone made fun of her for being different. And then in high school, everyone pretended to be friends with her because they knew her father was rich, but they poked fun at her behind her back, partly because she was different, and partly because they were jealous, but mostly because that's just what high school kids do.

And so Katie was very lonely for a very long time. Until one day she met Jake. He was funny, and popular, and athletic, and confident, everything Katie wished she had the courage to be. He took her to movies and parties and popular kid hangouts and best of all, shopping. For the first time in her life, Katie felt free. Free to wear whatever colors she wanted, which was any color other than pink. Free to skip classes and violin lessons and get A-'s and stay out way past her bedtime. Free to try things like wine coolers and kissing and shop-lifting. Katie was so intoxicated by her newfound freedom that she didn't notice herself changing, and changing, and changing.

And then one afternoon Katie came home to find her father waiting in the living room. Katie had asked him for money to buy herself a dress to go to the prom with Jake, and he'd decided to surprise her with something special. On the couch lay a luminescent pink silk brocade qi pao, intricately embroidered with lotus blossoms. As she came in, he picked it up and held it out to her, awkwardly waiting for her to take it. It was breathtakingly beautiful, but all Katie saw was pink.

"God, dad, enough with the pink! I am so sick and tired of pink! I'm pretty sure if you were to buy me a coffin, it would be pink! I've been patient, I've been so patient, but I have had it!" As she reached out and dashed the dress from his hands, her bracelet caught on the folds of the dress, ripping the delicate fabric.

To her horror, her father's proud face crumpled as he knelt and gathered the ruins of the dress. He held it to him as he began to weep softly, and she suddenly realized she had seen it before. Fumbling through the book of poems he kept on the nightstand, she pulled out a worn picture tucked between the pages. The young man in the picture had a look of such joy in his eyes that she almost couldn't recognize him. It was her father, standing with his arms around a laughing, slender beauty in the pink brocade qi pao.

A pink sheet of paper fluttered out from between the pages of the book, and Katie caught it before it fell the floor. It had been refolded so many times the paper was starting to fray in the creases, and the characters written in a delicate hand were blurred in places. my beloved husband. it's a girl! we're having a baby girl! i am so excited i am having trouble sitting still. i want to shout it from the rooftop for the world to hear. i know the doctors will say it's too risky, that we should adopt, but isn't this a sign? isn't it a clear sign from the heavens, telling us this is meant to be? i can't wait for you to come home from the states so we can start planning and, of course, shopping! i know you abhor pink, but i have been waiting my whole life to have a little girl so i can dress her in little pink outfits and buy her all sorts of pink plush toys and little pink tea-sets. we're having a baby girl! i can't wait to meet her. i can't wait to meet her. i can't wait to meet her!!!