Girl Giant and the Monkey King

by Van Hoang

  Lowering to all fours, the Monkey King growled back. Thom laughed, and that seemed to egg him on, because he grinned and barked at the dog. The dog sniffed at him, confused. They circled each other.

  The Monkey King barked loudly, and the dog jumped, backed up, then moved forward, as if unsure whether to attack or run away. The Monkey King giggled and rose in the air before launching toward the dog.

  “Wukong, no!” Thom grabbed the back of the Monkey King’s robes before he could attack. She dragged him away.

  The Monkey King barked a few more times at the stray, but he couldn’t keep it up for long, because he was laughing so hard.

  When he calmed down, he turned around and grabbed Thom’s hands.

  “You are strong,” he said over and over, swinging her around and around. “You. Are. Strong.”

  Thom closed her eyes, dizzy and excited and … proud. “Yeah,” she said. “I am.”

  18

  KATHY STAYED HOME SICK FROM school the next day and couldn’t play in the game against Comer Middle School. Dressed in their soccer uniforms—blue-and-gold striped jerseys and white shorts with matching knee-high socks—Thom and the other girls waited on the field as Martha counted the players, again and again, as if hoping that the next count would yield someone new.

  Bethany dribbled the ball, rolled it onto her foot, tossed it into the air, and began bouncing it with her knees. Show-off. But she had a right to be. She didn’t miss and kept going until Thom lost count.

  Coach Pendergrass called Thom over. Coach’s hair was a fluffy mess, curling like uncooked ramen noodles around her face. She scribbled furiously on her clipboard, crossed out what she’d written, and muttered to herself.

  Kathy usually played middle or right forward, two of the most important positions on the team, and it was unthinkable that Thom could replace her. Which meant shuffling a lot of players.

  To her surprise, Thom was placed in the left center. A weak spot, but at least she wasn’t useless in defense. The girls glanced back at her with uncertainty and a bit of fear, but whether actual fear of her or just fear of losing the game with her on the field, she couldn’t tell.

  She thought of Cassie Houghton, who, according to Coach, had finally come home from the hospital but would have to wear a brace for a month while her ribs healed. She let out a sigh of relief that Kathy wasn’t there, watching her with suspicion.

  The game started. The ball hardly ever came to Thom’s side, but she still got to run up and down the field with the rest of the team and pretend she was important. She couldn’t help grinning, relishing the fact that she was playing! She’d missed this, missed the way her feet pounded on the grass, her pulse racing, her teammates by her side, all eyes on the ball. She glanced at the bleachers, where some of the other girls’ moms sat, sharing bags of chips and plastic bins full of cupcakes and cookies. She missed having Ma there, but once again, Ma had to work.

  “No!” someone shouted, and Thom looked up just in time to see the ball head toward her. “Kick the ball—that way!” Coach waved frantically at the opposing goal. Bethany and Sarah, who usually scored, were too far upfield. Thom was the only one on the team anywhere near the ball, and the other team was closing in fast.

  Thom looked at their faces. She could do it. Send it flying. Gentle, though, so no one got hurt.

  Her foot shot out—but it was too late. A red jersey pushed past and stole the ball, a blur as she ran down the field and scored. The other team erupted in cheers. Thom’s team moved back into position, shoulders slumped. Pinpricks of heat traveled on her skin from all the dirty looks. Sarah shook her head, and Thom knew the rest of the week’s practices were going to be dangerous.

  As the referee set up the next play, someone giggled to her left. But there was no one there. She was the player farthest left, and the bleachers were on the other side. She shook her head and focused on the ball.

  Spurred on by anger, Bethany rushed forward and claimed the ball, dribbling it down the field.

  As Thom followed, she heard another giggle to her left. This time, she was sure she hadn’t imagined it.

  “Wukong?” she whispered under her breath.

  “Oh, are we really on a first-name basis now?” the Monkey King’s voice spoke out of nowhere.

  “You’re here.” This made her feel better, like she had an ally, and relief wrapped around her. She wasn’t alone. She didn’t have to do this alone.

  “What is the purpose of this game? Running around like horses, kicking a random object.”

  “We need to put the ball in that goal.” Thom ran with her team, but whenever the ball came close, another player got there first.

  “Well then, put the ball in the goal.” He giggled. “You can do it. Why did you stop earlier? You’re better than everyone here. You can run faster than them. You don’t get tired. You can kick farther than any of them, too.”

  “I can’t. If I kick too hard, everyone will find out about my strength.”

  “Then why play at all?”

  “Because…” She searched for the right answer. In West City, it had been something to do with Thuy and her friends. Here, she had joined out of habit, a way to get to know the other students, maybe even make friends. And the truth was, Thom loved soccer. She loved being part of something, part of a team with a single objective. Sure, it was tough, but when they scored or won, it was the best feeling. “Because I love it,” she said.

  He was quiet for so long, she thought he’d left. But then she noticed that the ball was doing strange things, making its way toward her, slowly but surely, despite her own team’s efforts to stop it. If someone kicked it away, it came to a sudden stop, gravitating toward her like she was at the bottom of a downward slope.

  “Go, Thom. Now’s your chance.” The Monkey King’s voice was pushing her forward. No. He was pushing her forward, his hands at her back. She wanted to stop, but it would have looked too funny to everyone watching, so she let him move her. “Kick it! Go!”

  She couldn’t. Everyone was watching.

  Something knocked against the back of Thom’s leg, and her foot connected with the ball, sending it down the field.

  The Monkey King’s giggle bounced off her eardrums as he ran with her, his shrieks drowning out any other sound. Each time she came close to the ball, he moved her leg so that she kicked it with just the right amount of strength.

  Even though the Monkey King was the one controlling her strength, forcing her to use exactly the right amount, Thom felt the rush of understanding, the excitement that came with mastering a new skill. She had always either used too much power, usually breaking something in the process, or she’d held back altogether. Now she realized that she didn’t have to—that if she was disciplined enough, she could actually play and live and do the things she wanted.

  Thom had left her teammates and the red jerseys behind, and it was just her, the goalie, an invisible demon-god, and the thrill that she had never come this far before.

  The Monkey King giggled and said, “It’s all yours.” And Thom thought he was gone, but he wasn’t gone, he didn’t leave her. Still, this time, she was the one who controlled the kick. Her foot connected with the ball, and it flew into the air, rose above the goalie’s outstretched arms, and hit the net.

  The buzzer sounded. The referee blew his whistle.

  Thom had won the game.

  * * *

  Even though she’d scored the winning goal, the girls didn’t treat her any better. Whispers echoed in the locker room, and she heard snippets of the conversation.

  “Did you see the way the ball flew?”

  “Yeah, like there was a ghost or something.”

  “Do you think she did it?”

  “Maybe, but how?”

  “Who knows. She’s such a freak.”

  Thom hid her face in her locker, breathing in the smell of old sneakers and the chemical singe of chlorine. The elation she’d felt from the game was quickly diluted with shame and guilt and
confusion. If she avoided the ball, she was a coward, but if she won the game, she was a freak. What was she doing wrong? She wished Ma wasn’t working late again. She wouldn’t be by to pick Thom up for another hour.

  After everyone left, Thom found herself back on the soccer field. A dewy mist had settled over the grass, and she felt the chill seep in through her sweats and hoodie.

  “Monkey King?” she whispered, hoping he was still there. Silence. The field was empty. The boys’ soccer team had gone home; the track-and-field runners were long gone. She would practice alone then. The Monkey King had shown her that she could still play soccer even though she was superstrong. With more practice, she could play better, score more, become an excellent teammate. She grabbed a ball from the storage bin and placed it in front of the goal.

  Out of habit, she glanced left and right before pulling her leg back and delivering a kick. The first shot was too strong. The ball crashed into a goalpost, which skidded back by a foot.

  The second shot was way too weak. The third was better. After a few rounds, she realized she had to keep it at about a tenth of her actual kick strength, and then she decided she needed to divide that in half again.

  “Not bad,” a voice said out of nowhere.

  She jumped. The Monkey King giggled. “You really need to stop the invisible thing.”

  “What if someone sees me?”

  “Can’t you change into a man or something? Isn’t that one of your powers?”

  “I can transform into other animals, yes, but humans are so ugly. Why would I want to hide this face?” His furry head popped up in front of her. He batted his eyelashes and then disappeared. “Let me see what you can do.”

  Thom took a deep breath. “Okay.” She kicked the ball but got nervous, now that she knew she was being watched, and miscalculated. The ball rolled forward a few feet.

  “Weak. You underestimate yourself.”

  She tried again.

  “Better, but stop holding back,” he said.

  “I have to hold back. I’m too strong.”

  “For this world, yes. For the mortals. But not with me.”

  She wished she could see his face. There it was again—that tease, a glimpse, a mention of this other world, one she might belong to more than the one she was in. She wanted to ask more about it—no, to see it. “Are there others like me?”

  “Like you?”

  He hesitated, and hope rose. Maybe she wasn’t alone.

  “No. Not like you,” he said. “You’re different. Better than anyone I’ve ever met. You and I—we make a great team. You’re strong, almost as strong as me, and with my cunning and magic, we can do anything!”

  Thom beamed. That wasn’t the answer she’d hoped for, but it still felt good. No one complimented her like this—not her teachers, not even Ma—and he knew about her strength and praised her for it when most people would have been afraid.

  She tried the ball again, and with the Monkey King whispering advice, made the goal ten times in a row. She jumped up and down, her fists in the air, a grin on her face.

  Then a tingly feeling chilled the back of her scalp—like she was being watched. She stilled, turned.

  Kha stood on the small row of bleachers at the side of the field.

  “You should go,” she said softly to the Monkey King.

  He sniffed in Kha’s direction. “That boy is not what he says he is.”

  The back of her neck tingled more. Mochi hadn’t liked Kha, either, had barked and growled at Kha for no reason when her dog was usually friendly with strangers. Then again, Mochi hadn’t let Thom pet him for months, so she doubted her dog was a good judge of character.

  “Don’t trust him,” the Monkey King whispered. “He’s deceiving you.”

  He stopped speaking, but she had no idea if he was really gone.

  Kha took Thom’s gaze as an invitation, jumped down from the bleachers, and approached her. He looked incredibly grown-up, in ankle-length chinos and a plaid button-up shirt, his hair stylishly rumpled, his bangs swept casually over his brow. He held up a palm, and she slapped at it but missed and had to try again. Smooth. Her hand came away hot—she felt hot, standing this close to Kha. She stepped back, and the evening air cooled the flush on her skin.

  “Hey, what’s up?” Her voice was too squeaky, her words too fast. Had he noticed the Monkey King? Could he see him when he was invisible? “What are you doing here?”

  “I came to ask about your dress,” Kha said. He smiled, and his cheekbones reflected the light in that pearl-like shimmer she’d seen before, but when he tilted his head, it disappeared. Weird.

  “My what?” she asked.

  “Your dress. You know, for Culture Day.”

  Thom groaned. She had forgotten all about that. She’d only agreed to dressing up and matching with Kha to get her mom off her back.

  “Are you wearing white pants or black pants?” he asked, whipping out his phone and pulling up pictures to show her. “White would look better with your áo dài, but black is better with mine.”

  “Black then.”

  “Really?”

  Thom shrugged. No matter what pants she wore, Culture Day would be disastrous. But maybe she could get out of it somehow. She still had time to think of something.

  “Sweet!” Kha tucked his phone away. “Hey, great job earlier at the game!”

  “You watched my game?”

  “Yeah.” An awkward pause. “It was the Monkey King, wasn’t it? That’s how you scored.”

  Thom opened and closed her mouth. Lie. Make something up. Kha didn’t understand the Monkey King—how could he?

  She laughed. “Come on,” she said. Her laugh had sounded fake, even to herself. “You don’t think I could have scored on my own? I’m good. You saw all this, didn’t you?” She waved at the soccer ball, abandoned in the goal.

  “I knew it was him. Thom—”

  And thank heavens her phone buzzed.

  “My mom’s here,” Thom said, glancing at the screen.

  Kha tucked his hands in his pockets, looking hopeful and expectant.

  Don’t trust him, the Monkey King had whispered. But he looked so innocent and puppylike, and she didn’t want to be rude. Plus, he’d watched her game, and he was being nice to her. He had always been nice to her. She hesitated. “Do you want a ride home?”

  She hoped he would say no, but his megawatt grin lit up his face, those sharp incisors gleaming. “That’d be great!”

  “Where are your grandparents?” she asked as they walked to the front of the school. If the Monkey King was following them, he was completely silent.

  “Probably hanging out with their friends.”

  Thom laughed—old people had friends?—but realized Kha was serious. “Really? What do they do?”

  “Play mahjong, mostly. Or Thirteen.”

  “I love Thirteen!” It was a popular strategy card game where players had thirteen cards and followed a set of rules to get rid of them. She had something in common with Kha. Well, with his grandparents.

  “We should play it!” Kha walked with a bounce, like he was always about to make a flying leap. “You should come over. It’s better with four people.”

  “When Ma and I play,” Thom said, “we pass out the whole deck, so it’s more like Twenty-Six. But it makes it easier to guess what the other person has.”

  “I used to do that with my dad.” It was the first time Kha had volunteered information about his parents.

  “Did he let you win?”

  “That’s not really his style.” Kha looked down at his shoes. “He likes to win. He thinks something’s only worth doing if it means beating someone else.”

  “Even his own son?”

  “If he let me win all the time, how would I learn to beat him?”

  “Beating someone isn’t the whole point of the game. Not always, as long as you’re having fun.”

  “My dad never has fun.” Kha still hadn’t looked up, and now he shrugged his shoul
ders like he was trying to shrink into himself. Thom almost reached out to pat him.

  “Maybe you can play against my mom. She always lets me win. Until I really started winning. Then she got more…”

  They’d reached the car. Ma leaned over to smile and wave at Kha.

  “Ruthless?”

  Thom opened the door and gave Kha a strange look. “Fair.”

  19

  TO THOM’S HORROR, MA INVITED Kha over to dinner, which he accepted after a short stop next door to get permission from his grandparents. And then to Thom’s surprise, dinner wasn’t as terrible as she’d thought it would be.

  “Thom won the soccer game today,” Kha announced, and Ma clapped. “How come you didn’t watch the game?” he said.

  “That mean coach kick me out, said I’m not allowed anymore. Sometimes, I still sneak in, but then I have to be verrrry quiet or they kick me out again. I wanted to be there today, but I had to teach a course at the library, so I couldn’t come.” She leaned over to plant a kiss on the top of Thom’s head. “Good job, cưng!” Thom was pleased—Ma rarely hugged, much less kissed—but she was also embarrassed at the way Kha smiled at them. “See,” Ma said. “I told you soccer would get better.”

  “Ma,” Thom whispered, ducking so her hair hid her face.

  “Wait, Coach Pendergrass banned you from the games? Forever? That’s kind of harsh,” Kha said.

  “I scold one girl.” Ma held up her index finger. “One time.”

  “She screamed at her,” Thom said. “For like ten whole minutes.”

  Ma shook her head, but Thom leaned closer to Kha. “People were too shocked to stop her until the girl started bawling.”

  No wonder Bethany, Sarah, and the team didn’t like her. Maybe they were just terrified of Ma.

  “Was it someone on your team?” Kha asked.

  “No, it was someone from Cocopa Middle, but the girl hates me, and Coach said she won’t put me in the game when we play against them again.” Not that Coach put her in the game much to begin with.

  “One time,” Ma repeated, shaking her head.