by Ivy Adams
Izzy had come home the Saturday before school started to find her clique of friends permanently broken. Once seventh grade began, Germaine had clawed her way to the top of the social heap by spreading rumors about Piper and, to some extent, the rest of them, too.
Germaine had been such a believable villain. Was it possible that she was innocent?
Izzy pressed her fingers to her temple, trying to sort through her thoughts. “You’ve said so many horrible things about Piper. That’s not okay. Nothing she could have done—”
Germaine cut her off again. “Really? Nothing?” She stepped close, her voice dropping. “She took away my four best friends. Because of her, I went into the seventh grade with no one. I just did what I had to do to survive.” Germaine gave her a slow and appraising look. “I would have thought you, at least, would understand that.”
Germaine spun on her heel and stalked over to her table. She didn’t even look to see if Izzy followed her.
Izzy slunk back to her spot at the geek table. She wasn’t ready to betray her friends. Even if they had misjudged Germaine, Izzy sure as hell wasn’t ready to trust her—there was no way she was innocent in all this. Still, the suggestion that maybe they’d treated Germaine unjustly didn’t sit well with Izzy. She always thought of herself as being fair and open-minded. Was she wrong? Not only about herself, but about Germaine as well?
That night, when Izzy checked Facebook, there were no new messages from Cassidy, Mei, or Piper. There were, however, another hundred new fans of the page. Which was just freakin’ fantastic. Instead of not being kissed just in front of her friends, thousands of strangers also knew she was a total loser. Perfect.
She closed her Internet browser and opened up the essay she’d been working on for a scholarship application that was due in a few months. When it came to getting out of Paris next year, she was going to hit every resource she could.
After reading over what she’d written so far, she snarled at the screen. Pathetic. She sounded like a whiny loser, even to herself. She could just see those big red rejection stamps already.
She deleted the previous title, “The Benefits of Being Alone,” and typed in “On Being a Whiny, Pathetic Misfit.” But even with the sarcasm, she couldn’t think of any actual benefits to being a misfit. And as she stared at the essay, the conversation she’d had with Germaine kept echoing in her mind.
Why hadn’t she taken Germaine up on her offer? Why had she chosen to exile herself? Out of some misguided sense of loyalty to her friends? Why?
It’s not like they were being loyal to her. They were off in foreign countries. Seeing the sights. Kissing hot guys. Dropping pins all over that tiny map of the world. Lots and lots and lots of guys, if the kiss-o-meter was any indication. Steamy kisses for everyone except her.
It’s not like any of them were sitting around at home, contemplating her situation.
Besides, what if there was some truth to Germaine’s accusations?
Izzy opened the browser and popped back over to her personal Facebook page.
Messages
Between Izzy and Mei:
Izzy
What really happened between Piper and Germaine the summer they went off to camp? Are we sure that Piper didn’t steal Germaine’s guy?
A few seconds later Izzy’s mom called her down to dinner. There was a bone-dry hunk of chicken for the rest of the family, and Izzy had to content herself with a side of mushy vegetables. When she returned to her computer, Mei had already answered.
Mei
Are you insane? Yes, we’re sure. Piper would go ape shit if she found out you were even asking. What’s up???
Izzy
Nothing. Just …
She paused, fingers resting on the keyboard. Then she deleted the “just.”
Izzy
Nothing. How’s China?
Mei
Great. I miss y’all. I miss even saying ‘y’all.’ Gotta go to class. Talk later?
By the time Izzy had typed in her response, Mei had logged out. She checked her own wall again. It was depressingly blank. Even though she had nothing to report, she went over to the IKC page. Though more and more girls were posting, it was no one she knew. And right now she needed her friends.
Glancing down, she saw that Piper was also online.
Messages
Between Izzy and Piper:
Izzy
Pipes, you there? I need advice. I need to figure out who I can kiss.
Piper
Take a page from “Twilight” and flirt with the guy who sits next to you in science. Make sure you smell good.
Izzy
That’s the best you can do?
Piper
I’m really sorry, Iz. I’ve got to go. I have glassblowing class. I think I’m finally getting the hang of it!
Izzy stared in disbelief as Piper logged off. Izzy had been late for Shane’s concert the other day because she’d been giving Piper advice. And now, when she needed her most, Piper was too busy to even think about it.
Izzy frowned at the screen, something sour and ugly churning in her belly. Enough was enough.
Whatever had happened between Piper and Germaine, what did that really have to do with her? Piper was in Paris, having the time of her life, kissing more guys than even populated the city of Paris, Texas. Izzy would actually have to start kissing farm animals if she wanted to keep up.
She clicked through the Fans of the Paris High School Facebook page until she found Germaine’s wall. She typed a message furiously, then jabbed the Send key before she could change her mind.
Messages
Between Izzy and Germaine:
Izzy
Save me a seat at lunch tomorrow.
A second later, Germaine replied:
Germaine
Can’t wait!
Izzy slapped down the laptop lid before she changed her mind.
But she wasn’t going to feel guilty about what she’d done. Everyone knew high school was a jungle—you did what you could to survive. And she was tired of moping around. It was time to go on the offensive.
Dropping down onto her bed, she pulled out her spiral notebook from History, flipped to a blank page at the back and began to make a list.
Boys I Could Kiss:
She drew a line down the middle of the page. The left column she labeled “Local,” the right column, “International.” Even though this was the International Kissing Club, she started with the local column. That should be the easy one, right? But when she put her pen to the page, she only jotted down a single name: Tanner Colt.
She stared at the name, her pulse racing. Why had she done that? She couldn’t kiss …
No. That was ridiculous.
She scratched it out. And then went over it in permanent marker. Then tore the page out, crumpled it into a ball, and started over with a fresh page.
If there was one guy in Paris—in all of Texas, for that matter—that she absolutely could not kiss, it was Tanner.
She focused her attention on the international column. Surely not every guy within driving distance and under the age of twenty was a native Texan. Weren’t there some migrant workers on Tanner’s farm? And what about that blond guy who worked for them during the week? He didn’t talk much, but when he did, she thought she’d heard a faint accent. Besides, his name was Pieter Claussen. No red-blooded Texan would name their son that.
By the time she was done, she felt optimistic for the first time in weeks. She’d needed something fun to take her mind off her loneliness. Somehow, learning SAT vocabulary words just hadn’t cut it.
But this … this was something she could get behind. And she wasn’t a football coach’s daughter for nothing. She knew how to make a game plan.
Like her dad always said, “You plan the play and you play the plan.” She was guaranteed to score.
Better still, Invisabel Isabel would finally be seen.
IKC Fan Page
The Official Fan Page for the Interna
tional Kissing Club
15,481
people like this
IKC Page
Messages
Between Mei and Izzy:
Mei
Hey, Izzy, I’m about to do something that I thought was right, but now I’m not so sure.
Izzy
No! Don’t sleep with sk8ter boy!
Mei
Calm down! Not that!
Izzy
Then what? Whatever it is, don’t get arrested in Communist China.
Mei
It’s not that kind of bad. I just … I don’t want to hurt anybody, you know?
Izzy
Okay … Is not doing it going to hurt you? Sometimes you need to forget about what other people want and do what you need.
Mei
You’re right.
Izzy
You know you’re killing me here. Can you at least throw me a bone?
Mei
Sorry, Iz. If I tell you, I might lose my nerve. I’ll explain it all when I get back. But how’re you?
Izzy
Am making long list of kissing prospects.
Mei
Who’s on it?
Izzy
Random guys from Paris High.
Mei
Have you considered John?
Izzy
Eew! No. There are not enough degrees of separation. I would never kiss a fellow IKCer’s guy. Even if he’s an ex. But don’t worry, there are some guys who work with me that might be international.
Mei
Good luck. Post the points the second his lips leave yours. Now, I’ve got a date with a pizza.
Chapter 20
Mei
Mei thought she’d recognize the Social Welfare Institute where she’d lived before being adopted. She’d expected to feel some spark of remembrance. She’d lived there for nearly two years of her life. Surely it would seem familiar.
However, the campus didn’t stir even the faintest memories. Situated on the outskirts of town, the Dalian SWI was a series of squat modern buildings surrounded by a gray wall of concrete blocks. From the outside, it was no-nonsense and austere. She would have walked right past it if Guiran hadn’t been there with her, navigating via his phone.
In the yard, chickens roamed freely, pecking at the weed-strewn grass. She could see, back behind the main building, an extensive garden and a pigpen. She knew there was a school and a nursing home here at the SWI. Despite the obvious poverty, there were touches of cheer. A row of flowers planted by the door was standing up to the autumn chill better than she was. A cheerful mural was painted at the front entrance. And yet, Mei had to swallow back a lump of sorrow at the sight of the smiling bunny and happy grasshopper.
She and Guiran were welcomed warmly. The nannies offered her hugs and chattered brightly in a stream of Mandarin too fast for her to follow.
And yet nothing about the place seemed familiar. In all fairness, she’d been twenty-one months old when her parents brought her home, and Mei knew most people didn’t retain memories from that age. But she’d always considered herself above average. After all, she did remember the stitches she’d gotten on her chin when she was two and a half.
After a few minutes they were ushered inside. They were shown into the director’s office and left alone.
Guiran let her sit first and then plopped down in the extra chair, legs stretched out in front of him. Nerves ate away at Mei’s control. She sat upright, hands knotted on her lap, legs pressed together, knees bobbing.
The summer she was fourteen, they’d gone to Hawaii for vacation. She still remembered the cliff divers, the way they stood poised on the very edge of the earth, before they jumped off into oblivion, their bodies tautly arching before they plummeted down to the water. Mei felt like that. Like at any second she was going to dive headfirst into free fall.
Guiran placed his hand on hers. He had to force her fingers apart before he could slip her hand into his. He gave it a squeeze. She looked over at him and tried to match his smile with one of her own.
Her lips were still wavering with the effort when the door swung open and the director of the institute entered. The woman was lean, her expression pinched and disapproving. Back in Paris, Mei had read a ton of adoption stories online—it seemed like every family who adopted a child from China put up a blog about it. Everyone had described these kind and generous women who ran the SWIs. Of all the maternal types in China, this was the woman who ran hers? What luck.
Both Mei and Guiran jumped to their feet. There was something in the woman’s gaze that made Mei feel instantly inferior. Her spine stiffened as she automatically straightened her posture to deflect the director’s disapproval. From the corner of her eye, she saw Guiran do the same.
Seeing that, she nearly smiled. Who would have thought he’d had it in him? Normally there was a rebellious slouch to his posture. She tended to forget just how tall he was.
After giving both of them the once-over, the director spoke in brisk Mandarin. Even though Mei had been in China all this time, she still only caught about every third word. And they were all negative. God, she hoped the ones she didn’t know were the upbeat ones.
When Mei didn’t answer immediately, the woman arched one inky eyebrow.
“Could you slow down, please?” Mei asked in Mandarin, her voice sounding unusually small. “I’m still learning—”
The woman barked out a retort before Mei had a chance to finish. She turned to Guiran and delivered another speech in tones as icy as the dorm floor first thing in the morning. He responded, his tone respectful but not deferential.
When he paused, the woman frowned, her lips crimped in a line. He turned to Mei. “She says she doesn’t have the time to run errands for a selfish girl too disinterested in her own culture to even learn the language.”
Mei quickly swallowed her shock, then mustered her determination before meeting the woman’s eyes. She would not kowtow to a bully. She didn’t do it at home, and she was tired of doing it here. “Guiran, please tell her that I have been working my hardest, but that a language as beautiful and complex as Mandarin cannot be learned overnight. Then tell her I came a long way for this and that I appreciate her cooperation. And that I’m not leaving until she’s checked the records.”
The director’s gaze didn’t waver from Mei as Guiran repeated her words, though it did narrow a bit. She was obviously assessing Mei’s willingness to make a pain in the ass of herself. She must have realized that Mei wouldn’t let it go.
After a moment, she spoke. This answer was longer and more circuitous than the previous ones. Then with barely a backward glance, she left.
Guiran flashed Mei a reassuring smile and gestured toward the door. “She said her predecessors kept horrible records but that we can follow her and she’ll see what she can do.”
The director led them down a long hallway and up a flight of stairs. She paused at a door, unlocked it, and let them walk in. Obviously some kind of storage closet, since boxes lined the walls. Another flurry of Mandarin followed, accompanied by gesturing and pointing. Then the woman left Mei and Guiran standing alone in the tiny room.
Guiran flashed her one of his lopsided smiles. “Here are the records. The boxes near the bottom are probably the correct time period, if we want to search through them.”
Mei sucked in a deep breath, the air stale with the musty scent of aging paper. Guiran, obviously not cursed with the same anxiety, dug right in, shifting boxes around to get to the ones the director had indicated. A moment later, he had five stacked by the door for them to start on.
As Guiran opened the first file, Mei felt her heart sink. A few of the pages were typed, the ink faded and blurred from an ancient printer. Others were handwritten. All were very difficult to read. She’d made herself a cheat sheet with a few key Mandarin phrases, her birthday, adoption date. Her name. That was about the extent of her ability to read Mandarin. And that was typed Mandarin. Not handwritten.
She st
ared at the boxes, dread clutching her throat. “This is impossible. It’s going to take forever to read through these!”
Guiran just smiled. “You Americans are so impatient.”
She glared, unfairly taking out her disappointment on him. “Let me guess, the journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step?”
He smiled, gesturing to one of the boxes. “Or the journey of a thousand files.”
She groaned. “That’s so cheesy.”
He just laughed and flipped open a folder.
Starting on the next box, she was gladder than ever that she wasn’t doing this alone. And at least she didn’t feel like bursting into tears anymore.
Three hours later, her back ached, her eyesight was starting to blur, and it felt like half the dust in China had crawled up her nostrils. The stack of discarded files in front of Guiran was about five times taller than the one in front of her.
Frustrated, she dropped another folder—this one had been misfiled and wasn’t even from the correct decade—and arched her arms over her head, stretching the muscles around her spine.
She looked at Guiran to find him watching her and she paused, midstretch. He swallowed, then said, “Not it, huh?”
“Nope.” Feeling oddly self-conscious, she tugged at the hem of her shirt, which had ridden up. “I think I need a break. My legs fell asleep about two hours ago, and I’ve lost all feeling below the waist. You want to go find a drink?”
He shook his head. “You bring me back something. I want to get through this box first.”
Mei ventured out into the hall alone. The front stairs would take her past the director’s office. Hoping to avoid Dao-Ming’s adult clone, she went searching for a back staircase instead, which she hoped would lead her straight to the kitchen. She wandered aimlessly for a minute, down one hall, past the windows that overlooked the fenced-in backyard. From the window, she could see a path leading to another building. There were kids out playing in the yard and she didn’t linger too long. Not all the babies were adopted; some lived their whole childhoods here, until they aged out at fourteen. She couldn’t think too long about them. So she hurried past and down the hall. Just as she’d spotted another staircase, she heard the sound of a crying baby coming from one of the rooms.