Gadget Girl

by Suzanne Kamata

  I stand there blinking for a moment, imagining my superheroine travelling all over the country. “Thanks.” I step out of the way.

  Mom is humming as we go back to the car. “I want to celebrate finishing the sculpture,” she says. “And I want to thank you for being my model. How about I take you shopping?”

  “Yeah, sure.” To tell the truth, shopping’s not my favorite thing. It takes forever for me to try on clothes, and then there are the crowds and the little kids staring. But Mom isn’t always so free and easy with her credit card. I need to take advantage of this opportunity.

  The clothing district is down by the riverfront, near the building which once housed the Grand Theater. Now it’s a restaurant with a marquee, but at one time it was like a ballroom, with a chandelier hanging from the ceiling. Whitney would have loved watching movies there.

  A few doors down, there’s a café owned by former hippies who sell cups of organic coffee and desserts made with carob. They also host local acoustic musicians and travelling folk singers.

  Mom and I hit up one of the more expensive clothing boutiques. The mannequins in the window are in turquoise sequins and pink taffeta and daring strapless knee-high black dresses. It’s prom season. Some girls from my class will probably be shopping here for the end-of-the-year middle school dance, but not me. When I see those dresses—all that tulle and sparkle—I want to run (ha!) back to the car and bury my head in the seat cushions.

  Normally, I’m partial to dark colors. Black. Midnight blue. I read about Japanese Bunraku puppeteers who wear black clothes and hoods while maneuvering three-foot-high puppets across the stage. Because they’re in black, the audience doesn’t really notice them. Wearing black is like being in the dark. It makes you hard to see. Almost invisible.

  Unfortunately, there seems to be nothing black or indigo or even grey in this store. I spy a rack of swirly patchwork skirts and make my way toward them. I take a skirt off the rack and hold it up to my waist. It’s white, but appliquéd with bright red and yellow flowers. It’s totally Salma Hayek in Frida! Frida Kahlo was this Jewish-Mexican painter whose leg was shrunken from polio. (As part of Mom’s campaign to Help Aiko Feel Good About Herself, I have been introduced to any number of potential mixed-race role models.) Frida wore bright skirts to cover her bad leg, or maybe to distract from her disability. Maybe this skirt could do the same for me. I find a couple more that I like and show them to Mom.

  “Those are pretty,” she agrees, and takes them to the counter. It’s too much of a drama to try them on here in the store. We’ll take these home and if they don’t fit, Mom will bring them back.

  If we’re very, very lucky, I’ll be able to put them in my suitcase and wear them in Japan.

  5

  Friday, sixth period. I’m sitting at my table, waiting for art to begin. Normally this would be my favorite class, but today I just want it to be over with. My stomach is going through the spin cycle, and my left arm is jerking, like it does when I get nervous.

  Within the next five minutes, Mom will walk through the door. I’m hoping that she won’t embarrass me. Better yet, she’ll totally ignore me and I can pretend that I’m invisible. I look away from the door, trying to distract myself.

  Mr. Hodge, the art teacher, has taped our last assignment—tissue paper collages in shades of blue—all over the walls. Kind of a lame project, if you ask me, though Madison Fox managed to make hers look like a hydrangea. I pasted my blue tissue paper squares in the shape of handprints and called the collage “My Father’s Hands.” Although Mr. Hodge frowned when I told him the title, I got an A. But truly, tissue paper is not my medium. I’m a pen-and-ink kind of girl.

  The bell rings, and in stumbles Chad Renquist, male model and class heartthrob. His last big gig was modeling running gear for the catalog of a sporting goods store in Grand Rapids. He’s not the kind of guy you’d figure would choose art as an elective, but then again, his work is pretty good. Maybe he’s a closet Picasso. His collage is a fairly convincing self-portrait: “Blue Chad.”

  Since I’m not part of Chad’s world, I can pretty much stare at him whenever I want to. His hair is clipped neatly around his ears now, and he’s got broad shoulders and chocolate eyes. On a warm day like today, when he’s wearing short sleeves, you can see his biceps, hard as apples, and the veins popping out on his forearms. He obviously lifts weights. He also obviously has a girlfriend—head cheerleader Madison Fox.

  Chad goes over to talk to Madison for a moment. She’s another of the Beautiful Ones. They laugh about something, then Chad goes back to the table where he usually sits, far away from me, and drops into his chair just as the teacher arrives.

  Mr. Hodge likes to make an entrance. He goes off to the faculty lounge between classes and changes his smock or whatever, then waits till we’re all seated before he bursts through the door. He comes in today with a magazine in one hand and slowly surveys the room.

  “Good afternoon, my minions,” he booms. “Today, as you may recall, we have a special guest.”

  I sink down in my seat. My left arm starts to spaz a little, so I grab onto it with my right hand.

  “Laina Cassidy, whom most of you know is Aiko’s mother, has agreed to come in today and talk to us about sculpting.” At this point, he opens the magazine, which just hit the newsstands days ago, and holds it up to show us Mom, posing in her studio. She’s wearing an evening gown and clutching a chisel. Her face is buried under gobs of makeup and her hair is messy, but perfect. It’s so staged.

  “That’s Aiko’s mom?” Jason Tran blurts out. His family moved here last fall from Muskegon. He’s probably the only one in this class who’s never seen my mother. He looks from the magazine to me and back again, his mouth hanging open in surprise.

  I get that a lot. Strangers often assume I’m adopted because we look nothing alike. My eyes and hair are dark, and my forehead is sort of broad. Also, I’ve got short, thick eyebrows which I definitely didn’t inherit from the Cassidy side of the family.

  Suddenly everybody’s looking at me. I grab my arm tighter and will myself to disappear. Mr. Hodge, get control of your class.

  He must mind-read because he loudly clears his throat, drawing everyone’s attention away from me. “Laina is very, very busy,” he says, “so we’re lucky that she was willing to take time out of her schedule to share with us today.”

  I smirk. Believe me, it doesn’t take much to get “Laina” into a classroom. And I’m guessing that Mr. Hodge’s reasons for inviting her to speak to our class are beyond just exposing us to educational opportunities.

  “Well, then,” he says, straightening the lapels of his white lab coat. “Without further ado, I give you the brilliant Laina Cassidy.”

  I take a deep breath as the door opens and she walks in.

  Laina—Mom—is carrying a big cardboard box. Mr. Hodge hurries over to relieve her of her burden. While he’s setting it on the table, her eyes dart around until she finds me. She gives me a little smile and then looks away. I’ve made her promise not to single me out. I’m pretty sure she won’t yank me to the front of the class to use as a volunteer. I let go of my arm. The spasms have stopped. Everyone is looking at my mother now. No one is paying any attention to me. Just the way I like it.

  “A lot of people think that sculptors take a chunk of rock and just start chipping away,” Mom begins, “but nothing could be further from the truth.”

  She takes out a pad of paper and a pencil and starts sketching the student in front of her, who just happens to be Chad.

  “I start with a drawing of my subject,” she says. “Sometimes I draw from life, other times from photographs. And sometimes, I just use my imagination.”

  She is silent for a few minutes, her pencil busily scratching away, and then she stops and shows us what she’s done.

  “Oooh,” the class says. In just a few minutes, she has captured the essence of Chad—the high cheekbones, the slight smirk, the dimpled chin. Everyone thinks she is amazi
ng.

  I understand that my mother is extremely talented. She can, as one critic wrote, make a rock look soft. Her sculptures are full of curves, rounded knees and elbows and soft bellies. I’m proud of what she does, but at the same time I wish that her art didn’t involve me.

  Mom lays the pad on the table and reaches into her box again. This time, she pulls out a hunk of Styrofoam and an instrument that looks like a torture device.

  “I like to make a model out of this stuff first,” she says, holding up the white Styrofoam. “I use a macchinetta to measure for where and how deep to carve. This kind of thing has been used by sculptors since classical times.”

  “The actual carving is done with hammers and chisels.” She takes an air-powered hammer out of her box and shows it to the class. “At the end, for finer work, I use files and rasps. Sometimes sandpaper.”

  She goes on a little more about foundries and casting and bronze, and then begins showing photos of her work—sculptures of a child with Down syndrome, a pregnant woman without arms, conjoined twins.

  “So often, images of people with different kinds of bodies are used to induce pity,” Mom says.

  A few gazes slide my way, and I can sense others trying not to look at me. Even Chad starts to squirm a little.

  “Have you seen those telethons where kids in braces and wheelchairs are paraded on the screen?” Mom continues. “The idea is to make people feel sorry for them. My goal is to show the human form in its infinite variety and remind people that all bodies are beautiful.”

  Here is my moment. I raise my hand.

  Mr. Hodge seems puzzled, but he calls on me anyway. “Yes, Aiko?”

  “May I use the hall pass?”

  The corner of his mouth twitches. I can tell he’s annoyed, but he hands it over. What’s he going to do? He can’t exactly chew me out with Mom right there. And she’s in artist mode, so it’s not like she’s not going to scold me.

  I grab my backpack, sling it over my shoulder, and head out the door.

  Mr. Hodge puts out another call for questions, and then everyone’s looking at Mom again.

  The hallway is deserted. Good. I pull the zipper on my backpack and reach inside. I grab a handful of the latest issue of Gadget Girl and leave a few on the windowsill. I tuck a copy into the potted plant next to the drinking fountain, and then push through the door to the girls’ bathroom and leave a pile on the counter, hoping they don’t get wet. Out in the hallway again, I listen for footsteps. Nothing. I put my ear against the boys’ bathroom door. Nothing, again. I slip inside and leave a few copies there, too.

  When I finally go back to class, Mom is at the tail end of her presentation.

  She’s showing the class an image of a pair of hands sculpted into the ASL sign for “love.” Good. I missed Aiko, En Pointe and The Birthday Series. Or maybe she didn’t show them at all.

  6

  After the bell, Mom takes a look at the collages on the wall. She pauses politely before each one, nodding slightly, as if she’s been struck by some deep insight in “Blue Chad” or “Summer Sky,” as if we are all mini Monets soon to be immortalized in museum collections. When she gets to mine, her shoulders sag. She tosses back her hair in a show of nonchalance, but I know better. She doesn’t like it when I bring up my father in conversation. Nor, it seems, in my art.

  She doesn’t say anything to me, though. Not then. Instead, she corners me and whispers, “I’m going to have a cup of coffee with Mr. Hodge in the faculty lounge. I’ll be waiting in the parking lot after school to give you a ride home.”

  “Okay,” I say. “See you.”

  Next is English, the last class of the day. Whitney has the seat next to mine.

  “How did it go?” she asks.

  “Could have been worse,” I say. “At least she didn’t wear one of her artist outfits.” When she holds an exhibit, she always shows up in caftans and turbans or outrageous gowns.

  “I think your mom has great fashion sense,” she says.

  I roll my eyes. Sometimes I wish she was frumpy and fat. And I wish she didn’t try so hard to stand out. In books and movies, Japanese women are always polite and demure. I often wonder if Mom had been more low-key and didn’t try to draw so much attention to herself, if my parents would still be together. And then maybe we’d all be living in Japan, where my Asian looks would be normal, not like here where just about everyone is descended from the Dutch or the Poles. The only minority students in the eighth grade are me, Linda Green, who was adopted as a baby from Korea, and Jason Tran, whose parents were boat people from Vietnam.

  Being an artist myself, I understand my mother’s need to create. And I get that if not for her art, we might be foraging for roots and berries. Those sculptures put food on the table and clothes on my back. But wouldn’t it be cool if she could have a dual identity? Sort of like Clark Kent/Superman or Selina Kyle/Catwoman? Or even Lisa Cook, the high school girl in my magnum opus who morphs into Gadget Girl when her superheroine skills are needed? My mother could be an ordinary mom when she picks me up from school, and switch into some flashy wig and costume when she changes the world with her sculptures.

  I know that it’s possible to make a splash while keeping a low profile. Gadget Girl’s month-old web page already has 250 hits, but I only printed one hundred copies of the last edition. No one knows that I’m her creator. Well, except for Whitney, that is. And her brother, Nathan. Of course people are curious. They want to know who’s drawing the manga. They post questions: “Are you male or female?” “Where do you live?” But I never reply. I like being mysterious. Plus, my life is nobody’s business. I’d rather have the work speak for itself.

  In the same way, I’m sure Mom’s work could get by without her evening gowns and her magazine interviews. I’ll bet if she tried hard enough, she could blend in here. I’ll bet if she toned her act down and I learned how not to limp, we could even fit in over in Japan.

  7

  That evening, as soon as we finish dinner, Mom rushes to turn on the stereo.

  “It’s time for Raoul’s show.” She turns up the volume and we hear the intro music to “Around the World with Raoul.”

  “Good evening.” His voice is smooth and mellow. “Tonight we’ll be travelling along the Silk Road via the music of the group Turku. Imagine yourself on a flying carpet, floating from China to the Mediterranean Sea, making stops along the Caspian shore, the plains of Mongolia and the Persian plateau. We’ll be following the ancient trade route used to convey silks and spices. ”

  Next, he introduces the different instruments that we will be hearing—an oud and a saz (which are kind of like lutes), zils (also known as finger cymbals), and the violin. He explains that the first song is a traditional spoon dance celebrating the grape harvest in Anatolia.

  I wonder if there is a Japanese song for the indigo harvest. I wonder if my little seed would like this music. I hurry to my room to get my pot. Maybe the vibrations will cause it to sprout. I put it in front of a speaker.

  “How’s it doing?” Mom asks. Although she doesn’t know of my farm girl ambitions, she knows about my plant. She even helped me find the seeds.

  “Still waiting,” I say.

  She sticks her finger in the dirt and loosens it up a bit. Maybe that’ll help.

  We set the table to the next song, a melody that gallops like hoofbeats. Raoul explains that it’s a traditional Kurdish song from the city of Kermanshah in Iran. Note to self: check out a map later.

  First thing in the morning, I take a look at my pot. Could it be? I close my eyes, then open them again. Sure enough, there is a tender green sprout peeking out of the dirt. It must love that Turkish music. Finally, I’ve found the secret! I’m on the verge of success!

  I spritz the soil with water and rotate the planter again. It’s sunny already—a great day for growing indigo.

  I’ve learned a lot about indigo over the months of this experiment. For example, in some parts of India, people used to drink juice ma
de from the leaves of the indigo plant to treat rabies. Also, some people think that indigo is good medicine for epilepsy, bronchitis, premature greying, and depression. Who knows? Maybe it could even help my leg.

  I don’t know that I’d want to drink the stuff, but if my plan succeeds, I’m going to harvest the leaves and dye a handkerchief or something. And then I’ll give it to my father.

  raoul

  “I try so hard not to think that I am a stranger in a strange land. But I know that I stand out.”

  —Martha Raddatz

  8

  At lunchtime the next day, I meet up with Whitney in front of her locker. The inside door of her locker is plastered with movie stars’ pictures. While she’s willing to sit through Technicolor, she likes the black-and-white movies from the Golden Age of Hollywood the best. As we make our way to the cafeteria, she starts telling me about some old flick she saw last night on cable—something with hippos and Ava Gardner. I’m trying to tune in, but I’m distracted by the noises behind us—shhhhh-thump! shhhh-thump! followed by the laughter of boys. Without even looking, I know that a couple of jocks are at our backs, imitating my imperfect gait, the slight drag of my left leg before I plant it firmly down.

  Whitney suddenly goes silent, and I realize that she’s become aware of them, too. Most of the time we don’t talk about my limp. We pretend that it doesn’t matter, that we’re both basically the same. But at times like this, the fantasy evaporates. I don’t need to look at her to know that the sparkle has faded from her eyes.

  “Just ignore them,” I whisper.

  Which would be easy to do if my bum leg didn’t choose that exact moment to give way. Great.

  Whitney grabs for my arm, but she’s too late. All of a sudden, I’m down on the parquet floor, my books and sack lunch strewn across the hallway, in the path of hungry students. I see someone’s Doc Marten come down on the brown paper bag, crushing my tuna-on-rye. A sneaker kicks my notebook against the wall—accidental, I’m sure, but still, it’s like a boot to my heart. The stream of students parts and flows around us.