Across Nevada, they pushed against the limits of my fitted cotton dress. Boarding the plane for California, I abandoned the wasteland of my decision. I couldn’t read; I couldn’t think. I could barely remember signing the papers. I just looked hard out the windows of the plane and watched the ground get farther and farther away. But as we lifted off, there was nothing as heavy as my chest, weighted with milk. I wore the green checkered dress that had been tailored for my sister in China. She lent it to me in Nanchang when I had taken a detour from my European travels to visit her, along with the silver sapphire ring we exchanged once a year. I’d worn it in Italy, and then she wore it in China. It turned our skin green and itchy, but its promise was to guarantee we would see each other again, no matter where we had to travel to do it. By the time I reached the hotel, I was swelling out of the straps. I pulled the dress halfway over my head and my sister tugged vigorously to get the tight waist over my chest, all the while exposing my postpartum belly and saggy underwear, stuffed with padding.
