by Cassey Yun
It was the first day of school, and her teacher hesitated when she reached her name. “Lin… Xiao…yu?” she asked, elongating each syllable like a rubber band about to snap. A few kids snickered. Xiaoyu raised her hand. “You can just call me Lily.” The teacher smiled in relief and wrote LILY in neat, sure letters on the board. It was simpler that way. It had always been that way.
Back home, though, her grandmother never called her Lily. “Xiaoyu,” she would murmur, the name smooth and soft, like a river stone. “Come help me.” In the kitchen, steam fogged the windows, smelling of ginger, soy, and a deeper scent that Xiaoyu could never quite pinpoint in English. “What did they call you today?” her grandmother asked one day, not even looking up from her cutting board. Xiaoyu hesitated. “Lily.” Her grandmother nodded, filing the information away somewhere private. “And what do you call yourself?” Xiaoyu didn’t answer.
At school, Lily fit in. She laughed at the right jokes, finished her lunch quickly (no more dumplings after someone commented they “smelled funny”), and practiced the Americanized pronunciation of her own name until she barely recognized the flattened tones. “Your English is so good!” people would exclaim. “Thanks,” she’d reply, though English was the only language she spoke without thinking. She even found herself correcting her parents, sometimes. “It’s ‘restaurant,’ not ‘restauraunt’,” she’d say too fast, leaving the word hanging sharp and unnecessary in the air. Her mother would simply nod.
Then came the assignment: “Tell the story of your name.” Lily stared at the paper. Her name was Lily. Easy. Simple. Done. But the assignment felt heavier than that. Back home, she found her grandmother in the living room, peeling an orange in one long, careful spiral. “Why did you name me Xiaoyu?” she asked. Her grandmother smiled faintly. “Because it means ‘little rain.'” “Why rain?” “Because you were born during a storm,” she said. “The kind that sounds like the sky is opening.” Xiaoyu imagined it: rain hammering down, windows rattling, a roaring, lively welcome. No one at school would ever know that. “Do you like it?” her grandmother asked. Xiaoyu shrugged. “It’s… difficult for some people.” Her grandmother looked at her then, really looked. “Is it difficult for you?” Xiaoyu didn’t answer.
The next day, students began presenting. Names with meanings of strength, courage, and light filled the classroom. When it was her turn, Xiaoyu walked to the front, her hands feeling strangely large. She wrote on the board: XIAOYU. The class fell silent, a hush of unfamiliarity settling over them. “It’s pronounced… kinda like ‘shy-ow-yoo’,” she said slowly. A few students repeated it under their breath, testing the sound. “It means ‘little rain,'” she continued. “I was born during a storm.” She paused. In that moment, she almost switched back. Almost added – But you can call me Lily. Instead, she didn’t. “That’s my name,” she finished.
After class, a girl from her homeroom stopped her. “That’s actually really pretty,” she said. “Xiao… yu?” “Yeah,” Xiaoyu said. It wasn’t perfect, not yet, but it was getting there.
That night, when her grandmother called her to the table-
“Xiaoyu.”
She answered right away. “Coming.”
After dinner, Xiaoyu lingered at the table, tracing circles in a small puddle of spilled tea. Her grandmother watched her for a moment, then reached over and placed a warm hand on hers.
“You don’t have to choose one world,” she said softly. “You can walk with both.”
Xiaoyu nodded, though she wasn’t sure yet how to do that.
The next morning, she hesitated at the classroom door. Her teacher was already inside, flipping through papers. When she looked up, she smiled.
“Good morning, Lily.”
Xiaoyu swallowed.
“Actually…” Her voice wavered, but she didn’t let it fall. “Could you call me Xiaoyu?”
The teacher blinked, surprised but not unkindly. “Of course,” she said, trying the name again, more carefully this time. “Shy-ow-yoo?”
“Close,” Xiaoyu said, and repeated it, slower, letting the tones rise and fall the way they were meant to.
Her teacher tried again. Better.
A few students looked over, curious. No one laughed.
At lunch, she opened her thermos. Steam rose, ginger, soy, something deeper. She didn’t hide it this time. Someone at her table leaned in.
“That smells good,” they said.
“It is,” Xiaoyu replied, and for the first time, she didn’t feel the need to apologize for it.
Walking home later, she felt the sky darken. A soft drizzle began light, steady, familiar. She tilted her face up, letting the drops gather on her eyelashes.
Little rain.
Her name didn’t feel too big or too complicated. It felt like something she could grow into.
When she reached the house, her grandmother was waiting by the door.
“Xiaoyu,” she called.
And this time, the name didn’t feel like two versions of herself pulling apart.
It felt like one whole thing.
She stepped inside.
“I’m home.”
Art by Breilmann, Heino, “A Girl“
About the Author
Cassey writes poetry and personal essays about growing up between cultures. She is still trying to figure out what finding your voice actually means.