The woman who cut and painted my toenails

is from Vietnam. Green card, she says. Many  
people, my uncle the doctor, died in boats after April 30, 1975, she says. She tells me about  
her fiancé. Thirteen years and when I couldn’t get back for my visit  
after September 11, 2001, the new laws, she says, he kicked me out. His mother, she  
says. She went back for a visit in 2007 and he was a doctor, offered 
her an apartment, but she likes 
her own money and she wouldn’t do that 
to his wife, she says. When my friend  
the performance artist, a vamp, shows up to meet me, the woman who cuts and paints  
my toenails tells us about the last guy who asked her out. Got her number from their shared  
bank teller. Drove her around and then brought her back to his house. When she refused  
his advances—Did he even make you dinner? the performance artist asks—he told her she was a  
high-quality woman. I remember dating, all the pop-up ads for instructional guides on  
Becoming a High-Quality Woman. Save your money, she says. The bell on the door  
is a white crystal pocket 

and a college student walks in. Fill? The performance artist and I make plans for sushi  
while my toenails dry. When I am ready to pay, the woman who cut and painted my toenails stops  
as she’s walking to the register and hugs me from behind. So tall! she says, tenderly, petting  
my forearm hair. It is May 18, 2016, and our good president has now been at war longer  
than any other in American history.