My eyes drink in the views as they rush by, my lips parted in awe. It’s a city made for movie screens, a city that’s stepped out of history, with one foot in the future. A city big enough to get lost in, or big enough to fit in. We speed past sparkling new subway stations, faded wonton restaurants, flower shops bursting with pink tulips and chrysanthemums, chairs stacked up beneath plastic awnings, stores illuminated by tiny LEDs spelling out advertisements in characters I can’t read. I try to commit it to memory, taking mental photos of everything I see: the twelve-story malls, the lush green of the parks breaking up the yards of steel and cement, the potted plants dangling from apartment windows, the groups of men playing mahjong in the alleyways, the woman walking her pet alpaca along the pedestrian crossing.

“Is this … your first time here?” Daisy asks. Her voice is quiet, almost hushed, like she’s scared of disturbing me.

I pull my gaze from the window, flushing when I realize that I must look like a typical wide-eyed tourist. “Yeah. Is it yours?”

She shakes her head. “My dad’s side of the family is from Shanghai. I come here basically every holiday.”

Her Chinese must be so much better than mine. The familiar insecurity prickles uncomfortably against my skin. Even though my mom insisted the program was perfect for people like me, I’m starting to fear that everyone on the bus is better at Chinese than I am, that I’m the only tourist here. Cyrus’s Chinese is perfect. Two of the girls filled out their customs declaration forms in Chinese. And Oliver was flirting in Chinese, which would require a particular command of the language. Luckily, my own flirting tricks are pretty universal, since they’re limited to squinting and smiling and twirling my hair in a semi-ironic way, and hoping the other party finds me attractive enough.

“So why did your parents sign you up for the program?” I ask Daisy.

“My parents didn’t,” she says, picking at a piece of lint on her dress. “Um, I did. People are always telling me to explore new things and be more social and push myself outside my comfort zone—and my comfort zone is the size of my bedroom, so …”

“Who’s people?”

“Teachers. Relatives. The school librarian. Whoever writes the advice columns in magazines. My neighbors. My dentist.”

I bite back a laugh. “It’s nice that your dentist is so invested in your social life.”

“My dentist recommends that I ‘put myself out there’ more often than he recommends that I floss properly.” She sighs and looks at my ear, which is the closest she’s come to making eye contact with me so far. “It’d be so much easier if I were you.”

“Me?” I repeat.