by David Yoon
John Lim had a drink too many, liquid courage gone wrong, and wound up crying with his head in Ella Chang’s lap while she sat erect and stoic and unmoved.
Amore.
Ella heaved John’s head upright and slapped him into composure. They’re doing it right, Ella and John. They’re keeping their thing a secret from the parents, who would only get all up in their business and start planning the next Chang wedding.
We hung out with the super-Koreans. They were really cool and friendly. They’re no different from us Limbos, except that they’re 100 percent fluent in both languages and can electric-slide effortlessly between cultures while being perfectly confident in identifying as Korean first, American second, and are basically better at everything than I could ever be, so fuck them.
Joy and I snuck away a few more times during the night like smokers needing one more hit. Her hands did indeed feel cold against my bare arm, and my bare chest, and around my bare waist. I knew what was happening was wrong. In the great ledger of love, it no doubt counted as cheating.
There was one song during the night, a fist-pumper of a dance track that had me and Joy and everyone hopping up and down right until the words This could be the night / Wrong feels so right. Me and Joy landed on our heels and just stared at each other: a quiet island of guilt at the center of a raging ocean.
For the late-night part of the wedding all the Olds got up to sing noraebang for the exhausted audience. Mom-n-Dad crooned out an old duet ballad—something about a baby in a boat and a snowy tree—and just for a second I could see them as a couple and not my parents. During their long final note I worried that Dad’s injured lung would burst from the strain. But it didn’t. Everyone thundered with applause at his vocal heroism. Dad wasn’t just okay—he sounded great. I clapped hard, too, and Joy kissed my cheek.
I had this weird feeling. Like I was a boy who had everything. Dad was okay. I was in love—unequivocally, uncontrollably in love. Cleaved to Joy for all the world to see. The super-Koreans nodded at us with hipster approval.
But.
As the party began to dissolve, I found my jacket abandoned on a chair and checked my phone. I knew what I would find there.
How’s the party going?
Send pix if you can, dying to see you in action in that suit
Can’t wait to hear all about it tomorrow
I love you, good night zzz
Brit.
Brit alone in her room on a silent Saturday night, checking her fartphone for messages from me. Not bored, for Brit finds the world too fascinating to ever truly get bored. Not upset, for Brit knows how weddings can be.
But she has no idea how this particular wedding was.
The reception party ended. Mom-n-Dad and Joy’s mom-n-dad bowed and bowed in farewell. I gave Joy’s hand one last squeeze, as if to say, Goodbye, upside-down world. Time to bring it right side up again.
While I drove my tipsy parents home—Mom nodding off, Dad again with his to-go cup from hell—I gritted my teeth and accepted the hard fact that in order to remain a good human being, I would have to tell Brit at school. Monday.
Moon day.
At Calculus, Brit mouths I love you over her desk. I don’t have the black eye at this point. I smile a brittle smile, then pretend to get caught up in something Mr. Soft is saying. She doesn’t notice a thing. Neither does Q or any of the other Apeys. I feel like I’ve traded one huge secret for another one the same size, different shape.
Me and Brit—me-n-Brit, Frankenbrit, oh god—split up for classes with a quick hug, and then it’s back to AP Bio, AP English Lit, and CompSci Music. It all goes well. Everything goes well, as usual. Except for this bomb in my heart. I jump when the bell rings. I jump again when my phone buzzes.
Greenhouse, says Brit. Now!
And I walk the empty corridor with dread.
Outside, the light is orange and strange and tinged with a sour burning scent. I heard somewhere there’s a wildfire happening close by. I can’t possibly worry about wildfires right now.
When I round the corner, Brit ambushes me.
“Finally,” she says, and kisses me so long and hard I have to brace myself against the side of the greenhouse.
“Did you miss me?” she says.
She feels different. She feels like I’m about to leave her. And I feel different. Like a liar. I’ve been a liar for some time now, and the only way out of this razor-blade briar patch I’ve created is to plow straight through.
“Yeah, so, listen,” I say.
“Tell me all about this crazy Korean wedding,” she says with an eager wiggle.
The green nebula. The kiss. The fireworks. Joy’s cool fingertips.
“The wedding was . . . eventful,” I mumble.
“Did anyone fall down on the dance floor?”
“No.”
“Did anyone make any crazy last-minute speeches?”
“No.”
Brit looks perplexed. “No strange wedding crashers?”
“It was on a boat, so no.”
Brit holds my face as if checking for fever. “Are you okay?”
There’s no fever, because I find I’ve somehow turned to stone.
Just say it, Frank.
“So, listen, Brit,” I say. “I need to tell you something.”
Brit continues to hold me for a moment as her face tightens. A gray flake of ash falls onto her eyelash; she blinks it away. She recoils in confused horror, as if my face has suddenly vanished. Her arms release. She hugs herself amid the gathering ash storm.
She must see something on my face, because all at once she looks ill. “Oh god.”
“I’m sorry,” I say, then cut short. Every word I can think to say sounds terrible.
Brit takes a step back and holds her fists at the ready. She breathes hard. The air sharpens like a blackened edge. Some invisible voice whispers into Brit’s ear, and she looks at me like she has just learned the horrible solution to a long-ignored puzzle.
“It’s Joy, isn’t it,” she says.
Wise, aware Brit, with her beautiful power to see things others can’t—whether she wants to or not. My insides hang unmoored. I had been hoping to ease into this. No idea how, but still. Now there’s no way but straight through. “Brit,” I say. “Listen.”
“We were just at the ice-cream museum,” says Brit, recalling the evidence of past events. “She and Wu were together. We saw them. We were together.”
I force myself to talk. “I can’t explain it. I think I’ve liked her for longer than I realize.” I’m not explaining things to her. I’m explaining them to myself.
Brit begins to plead. “But that’s not fair. You love me. You love me.”
“I’m so sorry.” I’m about to vomit from nerves right now. I need to find words that make sense to Brit. “I have to be honest about what’s in my heart. For better or worse. I can’t help what’s happening to me. And I’m sorry it has to hurt you.”
Now Brit is tilting her head at me. “Is this because it’s easier to be with someone Korean? Is this why you, why you, why you’re dumping me right now?” Brit’s eyes go full and glossy with tears.
“It is not any Korean thing,” I say. “No.”
“And I got your mom to like me,” she says sadly. “I worked hard for that.”
The sky is getting more and more orange, to the point where it is almost brown. We probably should go inside.
“She didn’t know,” I say, and instantly regret it. It’s a slip. I’m wanting to explain to Brit that none of this is her fault, that I did in fact like her a lot, that she is an extraordinary person. But my tiny three-word slip threatens to turn into an avalanche.
“Wait—what?” says Brit.
“Nothing,” I say. Nothing? Come on, Frank.
“What do you mean, she didn’t know?”
<
br /> Brit changes. She grows red. She smells different, like someone I don’t know. She’s clenching her fists.
“Frank, what do you mean, she didn’t know?” She raises her voice. “Look at me, look at my eyes, and say it slowly and clearly.”
I can’t look at her. The words just dribble off my lips:
“I pretended to date Joy so I could go out with you in secret.”
Brit barks a horrified laugh. She rips the long skinny flowers from the earth and clutches them.
“You hid me from your parents?” says Brit. “Like something to be ashamed of?”
“Brit, you don’t know what it’s like, being stuck between—”
“You two are like con artists,” says Brit. The tears wash down her cheeks, and she examines me with a hard mixture of disgust and disappointment. Disaggustment. “I have no idea who you are. You two deserve each other.”
She clutches her fist again and rends the poor flowers in two and flings them at my face. She doesn’t punch me. This isn’t where I get my black eye, not yet. She just sprints away and leaves a trail of sobs behind her.
In the distance I can see a jagged red fire line just cresting the hills.
* * *
• • •
Due to poor air quality, students are advised to go home early and stay indoors, say the announcement speakers. The fire is 50 percent contained, and rain is expected tonight. We’ll be sending out an email.
The bell rings, and students disgorge into the hallway. Q finds me.
“Fire day!” he says, and holds up a high five. “Pax Eterna at my house, baby!”
I just look at him.
Q lowers his hand. “You okay?”
“No.”
“What happened?”
“I just hurt someone real bad.”
“What? Who?”
“Can I tell you in the car?”
Q checks my arms and head as if looking for damage. “Can you tell me now?”
“Q,” I say. “We live in Southern California. It is our custom to hold all important conversations inside automobiles.”
Q puts an arm around me and we walk slow, slower than we usually walk, like hospital patients doing a turn about the ward. Eventually we reach the school entrance.
From behind a column a tall, muscular prince with the eyes of a hawk sidesteps into our path.
Wu.
“This is for Joy,” says Wu Tang, and punches my head.
That makes no sense, I want to say, but the crack of the ground on the back of my head stops me. I go down with even timing, like the crisp pop-krak of an electro backbeat. A speck of ash falls into my eye from above. Saying This is for Joy might not make sense, but the punch does. The punch makes perfect sense.
I just have to laugh.
“What the fuck,” shouts Q. “Help!”
I turn to see Wu holding Q at bay. “You gotta let me do this, bro,” says Wu, before turning back to me.
“Fuckin’ steal my girl?” says Wu.
“No,” I say, shielding my face. “Yes. I don’t know.”
“Fuckin’ steal my girl?” says Wu.
“She stole me. We stole each other. I’m sorry, okay?”
“What the fuck is going on?” says Q.
“I thought we were buds, Frank Li,” says Wu. “Then Brit comes up to me.”
When I look up, I see that I’m the one who’s hurt Wu, not the other way around.
Shit.
“I’m sorry,” I say. “I’m really, truly sorry. I mean it.”
Wu dismisses some dark thought with a flick of his cowlick hair. He straightens. Then he offers me his hand. He offers it like he’s remembering protocol from some Rulebook for Gentlemen: When a man is down, offer him a hand up.
I take his hand and rise. My eye is already throbbing.
Wu takes a step back and examines me. “You disappoint me so bad, bro.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Nurse’s office is down that way,” says Wu to Q. “Take him there right now, get some ice on it.”
“Uh,” says Q.
“I can’t tell you how sorry I am,” I say.
“Just go,” cries Wu, and turns his back to leave.
Wu walks with his fist cocked and raised, and one by one slams seven locker doors shut on his way out.
chapter 23
you eating melon
Traffic is hell—most of the roads heading into the hills are closed because of the brush fire—but Q and I hardly notice. We roll up the windows of the grumbling Consta, close the vents, and enjoy the AC. Three fire trucks go screaming by, whee-whee-whee.
We hardly notice because I’m busy telling Q everything, as instructed. I tell him:
How the words I love you never quite traveled the air right toward Brit
How I often found myself thinking of Joy first thing in the morning
How such signs are now obvious in hindsight
How the stupid touristy Landworth ship will forever mark the most romantic night of my short life so far
How this black eye is really a passport stamp on my face, finally letting me out of the purgatory of Love Customs and into the welcoming area of Gate J Arrivals (the J stands for Joy)
“Your metaphors are giving me the pre-puke drools,” says Q. “Please don’t ever try to become a writer.”
“I think I’ve been through a lot.”
Q smiles at me. “Now that I know the whole story, you clearly deserve that eye. But Joy feels right. I’m happy for you.”
Q puts the car into Park to give me a side-hug. Someone honks at us from behind.
“Eat my butt cheek,” shouts Q to the rearview mirror.
We get to Q’s, crunch the white gravel path to his Byzantine double front doors, and are greeted with howls of worry and concern from his mom.
“It was a tetherball accident,” I say.
“You need to stop taking tetherball so seriously,” says Q’s mom.
“Tetherball is not a sport,” says Q’s dad, with a pair of glasses atop his head, another pair on his face, and another around his neck. “But that does not mean it’s harmless.”
We eat—this incredible osso buco—forget to clear our dishes, and run upstairs so Q can show me this Pax Eterna game everyone’s talking about.
“Poor Brit’s gotta be heartbroken,” says Q while the game loads. “But the heart wants what it wants.”
“I hate myself for hurting Brit,” I say. “But I had to be honest with myself.”
“I’m really, terribly, awfully happy for you, old bean,” says Q.
“It would’ve been worse to string Brit along, right?”
The game is ready. But Q can’t seem to shake a nagging thought. “You didn’t choose the tribe, did you?”
“That’s a valid question. But no way.” I switch hands to hold my ice bag. But now I find myself wondering:
Did I fall in love with Joy because we have more in common?
A favorite book of mine, the sci-fi comedy classic Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, says the secret to flying is simply to fall toward the ground without actually hitting it. The way you do this to forget the fact that you’re falling, even as you’re falling.
I love Joy because she is smart. Because she is ambitious, and a huge nerd endlessly fascinated by the built world around her. I love Joy because we go way back to when we were kids, and that counts for more than I realize. I love Joy because she is gorgeous.
But that’s the obvious stuff. At the core, I love Joy because she makes me laugh. A girl who can make you laugh is worth laughing with forever. And you know what? I love Joy because I make her laugh, too. When I’m with her, I become totally unself-conscious. I no longer think about who I am, or where I am, or when. I am si
mply present with Joy. I forget about the ground, and miss.
“I chose Joy,” I say. “Fuck the tribe.”
Q nods, impressed.
“Joy is my tribe,” I say.
Q nods.
“And so are you,” I say.
It’s like Q was waiting for me to say that, and he breaks into a big shy smile. We smile together for a long moment like this. Senior year is almost halfway over. Then it’s graduation. After that, college. In the meantime, I will see Joy as much as I can. But I will not neglect Q, either.
Twin sister Evon comes in, scans my face with a sexy cyborg gaze. “Tetherball, huh.”
I shrug.
“Do you have a phone charger I could borrow?” says Evon.
“Don’t you already have like seven of my chargers?” I say.
Evon snatches a Citrus-Spin™ orange charger from my bag and darts away into the magical deer forest where she dwells.
“Look how incredible this is,” Q says, turning my attention toward his huge screen. He scrolls through lists and lists of little maps, all marked with red Xs and the word FAILED.
“No one has won a game of Pax Eterna, not me and Paul Olmo, no one.”
I lean forward. “Huh?”
“So, in Pax Eterna each time you start a new game, you get this pristine tropical island with everything you could possibly need, all there and ready,” says Q. He moves his God-hand cursor to give me a rapid-fire tour. “Ore, water, fertile lands, blablabla.”
I squint at dozens of tiny black skull icons. “Are these dead bodies?”
Q strokes a pretend beard. “My god, it’s happening all over again.”
“How do you win?” I say.
“The way to win Pax Eterna is to build—and hold—a successful, stable society for a full month. There’s a twenty-thousand-dollar jackpot prize. No one’s done it yet.”
I examine data in a sidebar. “So they’ve made a game out of the biggest human challenge ever. World peace.”
“Here’s the thing,” says Q. “Anyone can join any Pax Eterna game in progress. So in me and Paul’s island here, there’s only two factions, but already they’ve started killing each other. And it’s only been a couple hours.”