Boy Wonder rolls his eyes. “Jenna’s my girlfriend,” he tells me.
Oh.
So he has a girlfriend.
I guess in my imagination, Boy Wonder always went it alone. Like me.
The other kids have gathered around the van’s back door. As Li-Han inserts his key into the lock, Boy Wonder fishes his phone from his pocket and thrusts it under my nose.
“Jenna Chu,” he says.
His girlfriend smiles from his screen: a professional photo I couldn’t have afforded if I worked a year at the Patio Grill. She’s even more beautiful than he is—her heavy black hair frames a slender face, delicate nose, and rosy lips. At her throat, dangling from a fine gold chain, is a class ring set with a sapphire. People sometimes called me a porcelain doll growing up, which I half liked, half hated. But Jenna actually fits the description, down to the French manicure on her folded hands. I’m surprised Boy Wonder hasn’t broken her by accident.
His arm brushes mine. He’s standing too close—I step back and catch an odd expression on his face. Surprise. I tug on my ponytail, realizing too late that it’s lopsided.
“She’s really pretty,” I say.
“She’s much more than pretty. She’s super smart, too.” Boy Wonder’s voice sharpens, and my face heats with embarrassment. I hadn’t meant to imply she wasn’t. Now he probably thinks I’m shallow. “She’s going to Williams next year.” Is it me, or is he sharing an unusual lot about her?
“Boring, you mean?” Sophie yawns. “‘Ricky, what am I going to do with myself all summer while you’re gone?’” she says in an obvious imitation. Li-Han swings open the van’s rear doors.
“Shut up, Soph. She’s got plenty to do.” With impatient jerks, Boy Wonder hauls our bags onto the sidewalk until he snatches up a black suitcase and lopes up the stairs.
“Rick, you forgot your backpack,” Sophie calls.
“Damn.” He swings back for it, then catches my eye. “Watch your step, okay?” He grimaces. “I might not be around to catch you next time.”
What the heck?
With that condescending remark, he loops his bag onto his shoulder and dashes back up the stairs as if his entire GPA depends on him calling Jenna before he takes another breath. At the sliding doors, he nearly mows over a petite counselor.
“Rick, watch out,” Sophie chides, but he’s gone.
And good riddance. Muscles can’t fix whatever his problem is.
“Zhè shì Pan Mei-Hwa,” Li-Han introduces the girl counselor as she joins us, straightening her yellow Chien Tan shirt over a red skirt striped with yellow, green, and black.
“Huānyíng lái dào Chien Tan!” Mei-Hwa Pan waves both hands in greeting. She speaks Mandarin like a native speaker, though her rounded features aren’t quite Chinese. Her long black hair is bound in a heavy braid, tied with a green ribbon. Her face is open and friendly, and when she smiles at me, I almost ask her to please tell me what I’ve gotten myself into.
Then a girl from the back of our van shoves her bag into Mei-Hwa’s arms. Mei-Hwa blinks, but follows on her heels up the stairs in the same direction Boy Wonder took.
I grab my own rolling bag. A long-necked black bird alights on the bushes lining the concrete steps. Ivy-shrouded walls close us off from the rest of Taipei, but not the sun beating mercilessly down on my head.
I have no idea how a Loveboat fits into all this.
But if I’m going to be stuck inside these walls with Boy Wonder all summer, might as well shoot me now.
6
There’s no chance to ask Sophie about the “Loveboat” in private.
Potted plants divide the spacious, sunlit lobby into lounge areas furnished with chairs sculpted from twists of cherry-brown tree roots. Sophie and I join the back of a line to a registration desk. On the wall, six clocks made of polished cuts of driftwood display times in San Francisco, New York, Taipei, Beijing, London, and Tokyo.
All around us, more kids drop suitcases, saying to one another, “Don’t I know you from RSI?” A guy in a Berkeley T-shirt fist-bumps another guy half a head shorter: “Yo, saw you at Cal-Michigan! Sorry, man, next time.” Three girls in near-identical pastel dresses fall into each other’s arms, squealing, “How’ve you beeeeeeen? Did you see Spencer’s here, too?” Even Sophie reunites briefly with girls from something called a Center for Talented Youth summer camp.
“How do so many people here know each other?” I ask Sophie.
“It’s that six degrees of separation thing. Only for us, it’s like, two degrees, know what I mean?”
I don’t. I don’t know a soul here, but in this moment, the loneliness I feel is overridden by the larger strangeness of blending in. In the mall back home, heads sometimes turned when I walked by with my family, but now, my Asian Americanness is invisible, erased like a shaken Etch A Sketch. It’s an unexpected relief.
As we inch forward, Li-Han walks toward us from the opposite direction, balancing a tray of plastic cups. Sophie grabs two, along with fat straws. “Classic,” she says. “I hate all the syrups people put in nowadays.” Dark brown marbles revolve lazily in the bottom third of a coffee-and-cream liquid. A plastic film seals its top.
“What is this?” I ask, mystified.
“Bubble tea!” Sophie jabs her straw through the film and sucks up the marbles. “You seriously never had it? Milk tea with tapioca pearls.”
“I’ve heard of it.” I’m wary—I’ve never drunk anything swirling with solids. But I imitate her, puncturing my top more forcibly than I intend, making Sophie laugh. I suck in a mouthful of cold, sweet tea, punctuated by the chewy spheres. “Oh. It’s good.”
Sophie laughs again. “Ever. You’re a Twinkie.”
I frown. Like the Hostess dessert—white inside, yellow outside? Grace Chin from my youth group would come out swinging if anyone used that term on her, but I’m not mad. Just defeated . . . again. Even among a horde of Chinese Americans, I’m not Chinese American enough. A sudden burst of missing Pearl weakens my knees.
Then a shuffle of guys descend on us: tall, short, lean, heavy, hairy—even a mustache and scary goatee. They ask our names and I find they all share two things in common: they’re top college–bound (UCLA, Penn, Stanford, MIT) and they’re sweating as much as I am. The humid air practically licks me. The male attention, the eager-eye smiles and handshakes—it’s all a little overwhelming.
Two girls stop to introduce themselves. “Hi, I’m Debra Lee.” A girl with blue, pixie-cut hair carried up in combs offers a firm handshake.
“I’m Laura Chen,” says her friend in a Yankees cap.
“We’re Presidential Scholars,” says Debra. “We met in Washington.”
“We met the President of the United States.”
“That’s how we got invited on this trip.”
“Oh, Deb, we better run.” Laura checks her watch and flashes an apologetic smile. “We’re meeting the commissioner with the other Scholars—see ya.”
They speed off before either Sophie or I can get a word in.
“Oh, pardon me. A VIP awaits.” Sophie rolls her eyes. “Wow, that was annoying.”
“No kidding.” I toss my half-finished bubble tea in the trash, all my appetite gone. It’s obvious now. My parents have sent me here to be sanctified. As iron sharpens iron, so one well-honed nerd sharpens another—except these aren’t ordinary nerds like me, they’re prodigies on the order of Boy Wonder.
“Wong Ai-Mei.” A woman in her forties, heavy-set in a green qipao, greets me from behind the registration desk. Her salt-and-pepper perm curls down like a helmet on her head.
“It’s Ever.”
“Ai-Mei,” she thunders at me with general-like authority. Clearly, it’s not up to me what I’ll be called this summer. “Huānyíng. Wǒ shì Gāo Lǎoshī.” Welcome. I’m Teacher Gao. Gao—“tall.” It suits her. The rest of what she says is lost on me.
As she digs into a box behind her, Sophie murmurs, “Everyone calls her the Dragon. Sucks we’re stuck wit
h her as program head this summer.” The name fits her haughty jawline and nose.
We are roomed by arrivals. The Dragon hands Sophie and me keys to room 39, along with a tote bag stitched with a red, white, and blue flag of Taiwan, a white sun instead of stars on its blue square. It contains a yearbook and folded map of Taipei.
The Dragon switches to English in my parents’ Hokkien dialect accent to set forth the program’s expectations: Mandarin, Chinese culture, study hard.
“What electives would you like?” she asks. “Each runs for two weeks, then we have field trips.”
“I’m doing a double cooking class,” Sophie says. “I already sent mine.”
“Elective?” I say. “I haven’t picked any.” Sophie gets a binder of recipes while I flip through the materials: paper cutting, zither, Chinese yo-yo, kite making, mah-jong, Chinese chess, fan dancing, ribbon dancing, sword fighting, lion dancing, dragon drums, dragon boat racing, stick-fighting, Mulan-style, wow—
“Oh! Ai-Mei, your parents already sent in your electives.”
My head snaps up. “They did?”
The Dragon hands me a sheet bearing my Chinese name at the top:
Mandarin: Level I
Elective 1: Introduction to Chinese Medicine
Elective 2: Calligraphy
“Hey, we’re in Mandarin together,” Sophie says, but I barely hear her.
They picked my electives.
Just like they picked them through high school: French instead of Latin, a dead language, Advanced Topics in Biology instead of Dance.
“Can I switch one to ribbon dancing?”
“Ah, I am sorry. Class is full.”
“What about fan dancing?”
“Full as well.”
“Stick fighting?”
The Dragon shakes her head. “Your parents asked for these. You can call them.”
I imagine the dead-end conversation with Mom: Chinese Medicine is for med school. Calligraphy is practical. Good for writing prescriptions the rest of your life. Seven thousand miles away, their invisible hands are still tight around my life.
I answer through gritted teeth. “Fine.”
“Please reserve an hour for homework each night, always travel with a buddy, bed check at nine thirty p.m. No boys and girls in a room with the door closed.”
“Of course not.” If Sophie held her hand up, Scouts honor, she couldn’t appear more sincere. “We wouldn’t think of it.”
I can’t help but smile. Until the Dragon introduces the demerits system.
The wall to her right contains a grid of the Chinese names of all Chien Tan students, more than I can count. We get demerits for coming late to class, failing to turn in assignments, using cell phones during school hours, failing to be in by bed check, getting caught up after lights out. Too many demerits means a call home. Twenty strikes and we lose the two-week Tour Down South—a chartered bus tour of the island at program’s end.
“What?” Sophie protests. Apparently, that trip’s worth something.
I frown. Nerd camp with Wong-family level regulations. Everything about the Dragon—including her Hokkien accent and short, permed hair—reminds me of Mom. Studies come first. Why do you need to go out with Megan when you see her every day? My summer’s shaping up even worse than expected.
As the Dragon turns away to file our papers, I lean in to Sophie. “You said no supervision.”
“There are rules. You just have to not get caught. They’ve sent one or two people home in their whole history.”
“One more thing.” The Dragon’s back. “Every year, the kids put on a talent show on the last night.”
Of course they do.
“Maybe you’d like to participate?”
Right . . . how about a solo flag corp dance? I shake my head.
“Oh, I have no talents.” Sophie cheerfully pushes back the sign-up sheet. I can’t help laughing. Sophie is a bit overwhelming, but also seems pretty down to earth, and funny . . . not her fault she’s related to Boy Wonder. With her around, maybe this summer will be more bearable.
We gather our bags and head for the elevators. Sophie waves to a few guys we’d met earlier. “Benji Chiu is a doll, isn’t he?” she whispers. “And David’s Haa-vard-bound—so cute, don’t you think?”
“Mm-hm.” I’m noncommittal. Benji brought his stuffed bear, Dim Sum—a little too cute for me. David—I’m definitely not a goatee girl.
“Ooh, check this out.” Sophie rips a purple flyer off a bulletin board pegged with glossy pages offering massages, tutoring, summer concerts. She plunges into the empty elevator. “We need a plan!” Sophie bats my arm with the flier. “The clubs! I’ve got a list of the best restaurants. Oh, and our glamour shots!”
“Glamour shots?” My stomach dips as the elevator rises. “Like what movie stars get?” For the girl stapling Summer Reading List posters to the guidance office bulletin board just last week? “I can’t afford—”
“They’re crazy affordable—trust me. I’ll book our appointment. Also, Rick and I are visiting our aunt at the end of the month—you’re invited, of course.”
“Oh, um. Wow.” How generous—she seems to have taken a liking to me and I find myself not wanting to let her down. “Are you sure?”
“Roommates are family. Especially ones who aren’t speeding off to meet the commissioner.”
We laugh. “I’d love to come. But aren’t we in classes all day? One hour of homework a night? Where are we finding time to do anything else?”
The elevator halts on the third floor, and I drag my luggage into a lounge of blue-silk couches arranged around a black-lacquered table. Sophie’s eyes glint with mischief. “Two hours a morning, plus two hours of culture class in the afternoon. Who cares about homework and the rest of the time is ours.” She lowers her voice. “What’ll they do if we skip? Send us home? No way. They want us to have a good impression of Taiwan.”
“But demerits—”
The elevator chimes behind us. To my surprise, the Dragon steps out, a crowbar in hand, face as grim as if she’s breathing fire. She’s followed by Mei-Hwa Pan, the petite counselor Boy Wonder mowed over earlier.
“Uh-oh,” Sophie breathes. “Something’s up.”
The two march past us to the third white door on the left, which the Dragon pries open with her crowbar. Her sonorous voice berates and scorches. We pass the doorway as a half-naked girl bursts out, giggling, clutching her pink dress to her bra. Behind her, a guy in a black shirt scrambles off the rumpled bed. Lights glint off his wavy, crow-black hair, tousled and falling in his face. He grabs his shorts—but not before I catch a glimpse of his . . . equipment.
Oh my God oh my God oh my God.
Back home, I’m not even allowed to watch kissing scenes—whenever one comes on during family movie nights, Dad always flips the channel. Now I’m too stunned to close my eyes. Seconds later, the guy’s in his shorts, shuffling past the Dragon into the hallway. His arm brushes mine. Insolent eyes—dark, liquid, opaque—slide to make contact. His lips curve in a wolfish smile and I read a spark of interest, an invitation. A dare.
The girl giggles again. She’s pulled on her baby-doll dress. “Let’s go, Xavier!”
A hot name to match the rest of him. I feel a small shock as our connection breaks. The Dragon chases them down the hallway and Sophie clutches my arm in a Megan-like way. Her body shakes with silent laughter as we weave toward our room.
If Dad were here, he’d have swatted Xavier down the hallway with his rolled-up World Journal and placed me under house arrest for my own protection.
Maybe nerd camp isn’t so nerdy after all.
“So that—” I finally say.
Sophie’s cheeks are red from holding back her laughter. “That’s Loveboat.”
I’m starting to get the picture.
Our door is stuck, swollen into its frame with humidity. I turn the key and shove, then Sophie turns the key and shoves; then she says, “Here, you keep the key turned and we’ll s
hove together.” With our collective weights, the door flies open with a whoosh of air.
“We make a good team.” She laughs and swoons onto her pinstripe mattress. “Oh my God, Ever! That Xavier was the hottest guy I’ve ever seen.”
“He’s taken already,” I point out. Not that the pink girl had stopped him issuing that once-over.
“Taken?” Sophie snorts and sits up, flipping her sleek hair behind her shoulder. “One out of four relationships break up because of Loveboat.”
“Wow, really?”
“Yeah, my cousin was dating someone then she met a guy at registration and they’ve been together since . . .”
Sophie prattles on as I set my purse on my dresser and cross toward our double-paned window to check out the view. Our room is clean but simple: two beds, two desks, two dressers, a hot water thermos. Three stories below, the lush green lawn separates us from a row of brick buildings. A concrete wall, twisted over with green foliage, encircles the compound. Beyond it, to the left, the blue-green Keelung River divides us from the far bank—a sprawl of rectangular high-rises of Taipei, and beyond those, a gray-blue mountain dominates the horizon.
The view could have been really nice—except for the baby-blue pipe that stretches across the entire river, supported by two concrete columns. A red maintenance catwalk tops it. For sewage? What an eyesore.
“What music do you listen to?” Sophie winds her earphones around a slim iPod shuffle.
“Oh, um—I love musicals,” I admit, a little embarrassed. Most of my classmates were into rock, hip-hop, metal/goth stuff.
“What’s your favorite?”
“Oh, lots. Anything Disney. Les Misérables, Phantom of the Opera. My best friend and I’ve watched The Greatest Showman about a half dozen times.”
“I adore Greatest Showman. When Phillip ran into the burning building after Anne, I about died.” She lays a hand on her heart, so dramatic I have to smile.
“I loved her trapeze dance. When she’s telling him they’re impossible.”
“The same songwriters did La La Land,” Sophie says.
“Really?” Cool that she knew that—she knows so many things I don’t.
Loveboat, Taipei Page 4