The Great Wall of Lucy Wu

by Wendy Wan-Long Shang

  “Hi, Lucy,” he said. His voice was light and careful, like footsteps on eggshells. “I am Mr. Chen. Your aunt has told us so much about you! I understand you are quite a basketball player.”

  “Thank you,” I said, surprised. Yi Po had been talking about my basketball?

  “I hope you don’t mind us here,” he went on. “The community center where we usually play had to close for some plumbing work. Your aunt said you wouldn’t mind if we came here.”

  I looked over at Yi Po. She was looking at Mr. Chen. Did she have a crush on him? Did he have a crush on her?

  I turned back to Mr. Chen, summoning up my best impression of a good Chinese hostess. “No, no, not at all,” I said. “We’re delighted you’re here.” I looked around the room. What would Mom do? What would Po Po have done? Then I got an idea. I went back to the kitchen and found some little bowls and put some Chinese treats in them — the ones that have about six layers of wrapping on them. I took the bowls back out and put one on each table.

  Most of the players were too focused on their game to pay much attention to the snack. But some of the ladies patted my arm and said Thank you or You are so good! I tried to act casual, like I hosted groups of mah-jongg-playing old people all the time, but on my way out of the room, I caught a glimpse of Yi Po. She seemed intent on arranging her tiles, but she was sitting up a little bit straighter and had an unusually pleased look on her face.

  Maybe I wasn’t ever going to be as perfect as Regina when it came to Chinese social events. But I figured I wasn’t doing half-bad.

  The next day we had a scrimmage against a team called the Avalanche. If Yi Po’s mah-jongg party was all about politeness and hospitality, the scrimmage was about pain and hostility.

  The main problem was the other team’s point guard, a girl named Petra. Petra was one of those players that make me wonder if she’s an older player sneaking on to a U-13 team. She looked about sixteen and made of brick. She probably outweighed me by fifty pounds.

  When Petra came barreling down the court, it was hard to defend against her. I tried stealing the ball but she just blew by me. Coach Mike had a different idea. He wanted me to set my defense so that Petra would run into me and get a charge called on her.

  What Coach Mike didn’t seem to understand was that I felt like I was about to be hit by an eighteen-wheeler. When I ducked out of Petra’s way at the last second, Coach Mike pulled me out of the game. “Look, Lucy, sometimes you’re going to get knocked down. That’s just going to happen. You’ve got to take it, okay?”

  I nodded, even though I wasn’t excited about the idea. And I was relieved when Petra hurt her ankle and sat out the rest of the game.

  After the game, though, Madison had other ideas. She invited herself over to my house, and we sat upstairs, talking about it.

  “I could have gotten really hurt,” I said defensively. “That’s all.”

  “Physical pain is no match for the pain of losing,” said Madison. The Avalanche had beaten us by thirteen points. “Get up.”

  There was barely enough room for the two of us to turn around. Madison grabbed my desk and pulled it over to the wall. “Move the bookcase by your bed, and we’ll have some room to practice,” she said.

  I had gotten so used to the wall I’d kind of forgotten that I could move it. Still, Madison had a point to make and it was too dark outside to play. I slid the bookcase over to the wall.

  Madison tried to push a pile of magazines under my bed with her foot, only to find a collection of shoes. “Um, do you think maybe things are getting out of hand in here?” she asked.

  I grabbed the magazines and dropped them by the stairs so I’d remember to put them in the recycling bin later. Then I put all my dirty clothes in the hamper, stacked up the books on my desk, and put my shoes away. Now we had room to play.

  Madison had me stand at one end of the bedroom. “The trash can is the hoop, and you’re defending. I’m coming and you’re going to draw the charge.”

  Madison clutched a ball of crunched-up paper and came toward the basket. When I realized she was trying to come in from the right, I moved into position. Wham! Madison tried to take a shot but it flew wide to the left.

  “Ow!” I yelled. I rubbed my backside. I had crashed into plenty of people before, but letting someone run into me on purpose seemed to hurt more.

  “What’s going on up here?” asked Mom. She was standing in the doorway with Yi Po. “It looks like a tornado has come through here.”

  “Oh, we were just practicing drawing a charge. You know, getting the foul called on the other person,” said Madison cheerfully. “Lucy just did great!”

  “Yay. Me.” I groaned.

  Yi Po motioned for us to run the play again. I got up — maybe Yi Po would see how tough it was to draw a foul. This time, Madison tried to use my desk chair to set a screen. I beat her to the spot in front of the basket and set my defense.

  “Jameson goes in for the two,” yelled Madison.

  Bam! Madison slammed into me full force. The closet door shuddered as I crashed into it and then hit the floor. The paper ball went in.

  I looked to Yi Po for sympathy.

  “Zhan qi lai,” she told me. She looked amused.

  “What’d she just say?” asked Madison.

  “She just told me to get up,” I said, surprised by Yi Po’s lack of sympathy. I got up on my feet, slowly. I felt like there should be a Lucy-shaped dent on the floor.

  Yi Po pantomimed falling and then slapping the floor. She wanted us to run the play again and for me to slap the floor when I fell. Madison grinned and nodded before I had a chance to say anything.

  Bam! Down I went. This time, though, I slapped the floor. The fall didn’t feel so bad. I jumped back up.

  Again, said Yi Po.

  We ran the play four more times, and each time, I got better at taking the blow by slapping the floor. Yi Po didn’t have to say zhan qi lai any more. I was getting up.

  After Madison left, I grabbed the corner of the desk to put it back. Yi Po was in the bathroom, getting ready for bed, and I didn’t want to hold her up. But as I looked around the room, I realized that even with all my stuff jammed against the walls, the room had begun to feel better. The space was like a deep breath, calming and energizing at the same time. It probably hadn’t hurt that I’d put a few things away, either.

  When Yi Po came to bed, she looked around the room approvingly. I had pushed my desk into one corner, and then put the bookshelf between the bed and the desk. The space between us was wide open now, except for a few dust bunnies on the floor.

  In the early morning hours the next day, I could have sworn I heard the fwap-fwaps of someone darting down the middle of the room in slippers, a wsssk of paper ricocheting into the trash can, and a very small, satisfied laugh.

  Meanwhile, at school, it seemed that all everyone talked about was the basketball game, ten days away. Are you going to play? Are you going to try out for captain? Who do you think will win? None of the teachers would say who was going to be on their basketball team — I guess they were trying to psych us out. We all agreed that Mr. Bellock, the computer lab teacher, was definitely playing because he was the youngest teacher and one of the few male teachers in the whole school. We also agreed that Mrs. Jurgensen, one of the third-grade teachers, would not be playing because she was almost a hundred years old.

  Every time I heard someone ask, Are you trying out for captain? I nearly jumped out of my seat. Between keeping an eye out for Sloane’s tricks and figuring out what I would do if I actually became captain, it was hard to focus on what was going on in class. The common denominator between four-fifteenths and seven thirty-sixths? The capital of Hungary? The main categories of scientific classification?

  Who had time for this when I couldn’t figure out whether it was better or worse to make captain? If I didn’t make captain, the pressure would be off and Sloane would probably back off for the rest of the year. But I wouldn’t be captain. If I did
make captain, Sloane might just make things worse. Oh, yeah — and then there was the small matter of winning the game.

  I was distracted by these thoughts on Saturday, at the last Chinese class before the game, too, until Jessie gave me a hard shove. “Pay attention,” she hissed. “We have to act this out next week.” She was still waiting to get her video phone.

  Today’s idiom was There are no 300 taels of silver here. It was actually a pretty funny one — it reminded me of those stupid criminal stories on the news sometimes. Jing Lao Shi explained that a tael was a Chinese ounce. This guy, Zhang the Third, stole 300 taels of silver. He was afraid someone else would steal from him, so he buried them in his garden. Then he put up a sign saying, Nobody buried 300 taels of silver here. Duh!

  Zhang’s neighbor saw what Zhang had done, so he dug up the silver and took it. But then he put up a sign saying, And your neighbor didn’t steal the silver buried here! So to say there are no 300 taels of silver buried here means that a person who tries to hide something ends up giving himself away by protesting his innocence.

  Jessie, who had appointed herself the leader of our group, assigned the parts. “You’ll be the guy who buries the silver,” she said, pointing to Adam. “You can be the thief who digs it up,” she told Liane. “You make the signs, in Chinese, okay?” she told me.

  “Um, okay,” I said, squinting at the handout.

  Jessie shook her head as if a fly was buzzing around it. “These idioms are so weird, you know? Like, when would you actually say any of these things?”

  “I don’t think they’re that weird,” I responded. “That one we did on the first day, dong shi xi su, eating in the east, sleeping in the west? That’s kind of like saying, having your cake and eating it, too.” Is that me, defending the Chinese language?

  “Or the one about the old man who loses his horse?” Adam chimed in. “That’s like, every cloud has a silver lining.”

  “Well, yeah,” agreed Jessie, “except in the Chinese version, the silver lining might be made out of lead paint.”

  By the time Chinese school was over, my brain was practically overflowing. Make the signs for next week. How many decent shooters are going to be on the basketball team? What if I make captain and we lose?

  I nearly walked right past Harrison. He was hanging out by the trophy case, where we usually talked for a few minutes, or as I called it, the best part of Chinese school.

  “Lucy! Hey, Lucy!” Harrison was sticking his hand in my face before I realized what I was doing.

  “What? Oh, Harrison. Hi!” I stopped walking and turned around. For a moment I forgot to be nervous around him.

  “So is it true?” asked Harrison. “I heard you’re going out for captain.”

  “Yeah, I guess,” I said. Then suddenly I added, “Though I’ve been dealing with some folks who don’t think short Chinese people should get too wrapped up in basketball.”

  Harrison laughed. “Like who?” Harrison was definitely not short. I guessed he was already as tall as Ms. Phelps.

  I looked down, suddenly fascinated by the linoleum floor. That was stupid of me. Nothing good could possibly come from bringing up Sloane. “People,” I said. For all I knew, Harrison liked her.

  “I guess people have never heard of Willie ‘Woo Woo’ Wong, then,” said Harrison.

  “Who?”

  Harrison grinned. “There’s a park named after this guy in San Francisco, where I used to live. Willie ‘Woo Woo’ Wong. He was short and Chinese. He played at USF.”

  “You are totally making this up.” But I knew he was telling the truth. I could tell.

  “Look it up if you don’t believe me. He was supposed to have a killer set shot.”

  We reached the top of the stairway and Harrison gave me one of those smiles, the one where his one dimple comes out. I felt like I was the only person in the world.

  “You just forgot one little problem,” teased Harrison.

  “What?”

  “The captain is going to be a boy. Not some girl!”

  “Harrison!” I gave him a playful shove.

  Big mistake.

  “Boys … huh!” Harrison didn’t get to finish his sentence. His foot slipped off the top of the step.

  “Harrison!” I shrieked. I lunged forward and tried to grab his hand.

  Harrison grabbed for the railing, but his backpack yanked him off balance. He half-stumbled, half-tripped down the short flight of stairs, his legs twisting in completely unnatural directions.

  As quickly as it had started, Harrison was at the bottom of the stairs. I ran down the steps.

  “Are you okay?” I asked, trying to keep my voice from getting too shrieky.

  Harrison shook his head slowly. “Can you do me a favor? Can you go find my mom?”

  Madison came over that afternoon so we could practice for the game. I told her the basics of what happened. Harrison’s mom and Jing Lao Shi ended up having to help Harrison leave the building. He said he couldn’t put any weight on his right ankle, so he limped out between the two of them.

  I left out the part about the shove, and I tried not to sound like I was obsessing over it. Except I was. I had looked up his phone number in the school directory and had almost dialed it so many times that I’d memorized his number. I didn’t tell her how I apologized a hundred times. Maybe he hated me.

  I tried to concentrate on shooting. It was great having a net on the new hoop — the ball dropped down straight instead of bouncing wildly off the driveway. We played one-on-one and then did free throws. I got eight in a row.

  “How do you do that?” asked Madison.

  I shook my head. “I’m not sure. It’s like I do better when I turn off my brain and let my body take over.”

  “That doesn’t make any sense.”

  I tried to explain it. “It’s like walking, right? You just do it now, you don’t think about it. If you thought too hard about it — how do I bend my knees? where do I put my foot? — you’d probably trip a lot more than if you just did it.”

  “Whatever you’re doing, just make sure you do it on Friday.”

  Friday was six days away. Did Sloane have any more tricks up her sleeve?

  “Maybe Sloane will back off, now that she knows you won’t quit,” said Madison. It was as if she could read my mind.

  “Uh-huh,” I muttered. Fat chance.

  “Let’s do ten more,” suggested Madison. “Then I’ve got to go.”

  But talking about Sloane had unsettled my brain. My arms shook and the ball flew awkwardly through the air and bounced off the top of the backboard. Airrrrr balllll!

  I looked up Willie “Woo Woo” Wong that night. Harrison was telling the truth. Willie Woo Wong was five foot five and was called “the biggest little man in basketball.” He was nicknamed “Woo Woo” because that’s what the crowds used to yell when he played. Some people said that Willie Wong had a perfect set shot, and he once scored sixty-five points over three games during a tournament.

  Way to go, Harrison, I thought. Then, I hope you’re okay.

  Sunday started off as a quiet day. No basketball practice or Chinese school. No one fell down the stairs. Kenny went out with some friends. Mom and Yi Po had tea in the kitchen while I watched TV. Dad sat in the dining room and read the paper.

  Suddenly, Dad came charging out of the dining room. “Do you know where Kenneth is?” he demanded. This was not good — Dad never says Kenneth.

  “No,” said Mom. “What’s wrong, Steve? Has something happened?”

  Dad pointed at the paper. On the front of the paper, there was a photograph of a group of high school students. The caption read Roosevelt High School Mathwhiz Team Moves on to Regionals. Kenny was nowhere in the picture.

  “Maybe Kenny just missed the day they were taking pictures,” I said hopefully.

  “Maybe,” said Dad grimly. Mom shook her head.

  I closed my eyes and tried to send Kenny a telepathic message. Kenny, stay away!

  Kenny didn
’t get my message — no one ever does. Right as Mom was bringing dinner to the table, Kenny came in. “Hey, guys, what’s up? Sorry I’m late — lost track of time.”

  “You are in trouble,” I said to Kenny under my breath. “There was a picture of the Mathwhiz team in the paper and you weren’t in it.”

  “Oh, boy.” Kenny’s shoulders sagged, deflating. “I was afraid something like this might happen.”

  “So you …” I stopped when Mom came in and saw Kenny.

  “Hi, Mom,” Kenny said weakly. “Can I help with anything?”

  “Everything’s taken care of,” said Mom, frowning. “Lucy, call your Dad and Yi Po.”

  When my parents get mad, they don’t get mad in the same way. My mom gets very cold and unemotional, while my dad turns red and raises his voice.

  Mom slid the newspaper across the table. “I’d like you to explain this, Kenneth.”

  Dad leaned over and stabbed the paper with his finger. “And you’d better have a very good explanation!”

  They both stared at Kenny. Kenny stared at his plate.

  “Did you miss the day of the photograph?” asked Mom.

  Kenny shook his head. “I’m not on the Mathwhiz team anymore.”

  “But … but …” Dad scrabbled for the right words. “Your dream … Mathwhiz was your ticket to a good engineering school.” My parents were always talking about Kenny becoming an engineer, like my mom, and what amazing school he would go to. They would recite the names like a Buddhist chant — MIT, Caltech, Stanford, Harvey Mudd …

  Kenny’s voice was small but clear. “It’s not my dream — I’m not sure it ever was. I’ll keep taking the upper-level classes at school, but I’m not doing Mathwhiz anymore.”

  “You have a gift,” said Dad at the same time Mom said, “What will you do now?”

  “I want,” said Kenny, “to study history.”

  I could swear that I heard a whooshing sound in the room as both my parents inhaled at the same time. They had been fine with Regina being a Chinese Studies major, but she didn’t have a gift for math like Kenny. In Chinese families, kids with math talents like Kenny don’t become historians. They become doctors or engineers. It’s practically a law.