Afterparties, a much-anticipated book of short stories by Anthony Veasna So, is coming out this month. So passed away last December at the age of 28. The day after his death was announced, my auntie sent me a message, registering her shock. It had felt like the death of a cousin of ours who had managed to thrive, against all the odds, all that fucking intergenerational trauma, faced by young Khmer Americans.

In the last week or so several essays about So have been published. I hadn't realised he had died of a drug overdose under mysterious circumstances. An article in The Cut notes that So concealed things about himself from his parents, and I thought immediately about how in my twenties I couldn't tell my parents anything about my life, because so much of it was anathema to my mother. Friends. Parties. Dating (like, kissing without getting married first?!). Creative writing. Risque books. Traveling on my own. Anything that involved freedom and desire. So I never told them about the Vietnamese guy I dated in college or the time I went to Europe during summer break, among other things.

But I dunno. Maybe there's no connection between how So and I concealed aspects of our lives from our families, performing the good Cambodian child for them. Just coincidence. Like, maybe it's a family thing for me. Brother moved to the northernmost part of California without any way to contact him. Dad had heart surgery while Mom was vacationing in Australia, not telling anyone and alarming everyone (but me, because nobody told me). He had other secrets, which he took to the grave. I too have a few secrets to bury unspoken with my bones. Meanwhile Mom told us everything; some things we didn't need to know.

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