by An Na
“Owww!” Joyce yelled. God, beauty hurt.
Joyce flew out of the bathroom and raced into the courtyard. Small groups were gathered together in conversation. Some people’s eyes turned in her direction when she stepped onto the shaded area. Joyce found herself studying everyone’s lips, looking for words like Helen and gay. She frantically scoured the yard for Helen. On a far bench, Sam and Gina sat talking and laughing. Joyce rushed over.
“Hey,” Joyce said breathlessly, “have you seen Helen?”
Gina turned to her with a smile until she saw Joyce’s face. “Joyce, what happened to your eyes?”
“They fell. I’ll explain later,” Joyce said.
“Joyce, we can fix them. I have more tape,” Gina said, standing up.
“It doesn’t matter anymore. You have to help me find Helen.”
“Joyce,” Gina said, “calm down. What’s going on? Is something wrong with Helen?”
Joyce bit her bottom lip, trying to contain all the thoughts jamming into her mind. Everywhere she looked, more and more faces seemed to be glancing in Joyce’s direction, lips whispering. The news was spreading.
“I need to find Helen,” Joyce said.
Gina stood up in alarm. “Okay, Joyce. Let’s go.”
Sam stood up as well, and the three of them walked from area to area, combing the faces for Helen. Joyce continued to see the looks, hear the whispers, as she passed. With each glance, Joyce stood up straighter. With every conversation that suddenly hushed as she approached, she added a swing to her hips. Who did these people think they were to talk about Helen like she had a disease or something? Joyce walked through the church like she owned the place.
As she stepped inside the fellowship hall, Joyce froze as soon as she saw John standing near the door, eating a chocolate doughnut. Somehow the sight of him and chocolate together was just enough to make Joyce stumble and crumble to the ground. Gina caught her right before her ass hit the floor.
John rushed over. “Whoa. Are you okay?” He took her hand and helped her up.
Joyce immediately felt her face flush red. “I’m such a klutz,” she said.
John smiled. “I seem to inspire that reaction in you.”
“Huh?” Joyce said.
“You’re always falling down when you see me.”
Joyce groaned and laughed. John smiled down at her and in that moment, she realized that John didn’t even notice that anything was different about her. And without the folds, Joyce felt like herself around him instead of some coy cheerleader-type character.
“Can I get you a doughnut?” John offered.
Joyce stared into his eyes for a second. This had to be dream. “No, I’m okay,” she said.
“Joyce,” Gina called out, “Helen is in the kitchen.”
Joyce refocused her attention. “I’ll catch you later,” she said and stepped away from John.
John pointed his finger at her. “No. I’ll catch you later. That’s a promise.”
Joyce walked away with a shake of her head. He was kind of a dork. Joyce smiled. She could really fall for him.
Helen was in the kitchen with Uhmma and a few of the other women, cleaning up the dishes. Joyce raced over to her and muttered urgently, “We have to talk.”
Helen continued drying a dish. “What’s up, Joyce?”
“Privately,” Joyce said.
Helen tilted her head but handed Uhmma the dish before following Joyce to the back of the kitchen.
“I heard some women talking about you,” Joyce whispered.
“What do you mean?” Helen said, her eyes on the floor.
“They said your name and then gay.”
Helen covered her mouth with her hand. After a moment, she raised her eyes and fired off angrily, “Damn it, Joyce. I knew Gina would talk.”
Joyce stepped back. “Helen,” Joyce started to explain.
“That blabbermouth friend of yours,” Helen said, her jaw clenching and unclenching.
“Helen, I never got the chance to tell Gina. It wasn’t her.”
Helen’s eyes wrinkled in confusion. “Then who was it? I don’t understand who would want to spread that news about me. Are you sure you heard correctly?”
Joyce nodded. She could tell Helen about Lisa and John later.
Helen turned away. Uhmma saw the look on Helen’s face and left the two ladies she was speaking with and came over to them.
“What is wrong, Helen?” Uhmma asked.
“Joyce said she heard some women talking about me in the bathroom.”
Uhmma touched Helen’s face. “What do you want to do?”
“I just want to go home. I don’t want to deal with this here, now.”
Uhmma quickly shed the apron and waved good-bye to the women.
The three of them stepped out into the fellowship hall, and this time Joyce knew for sure that she was not imagining things. Almost every pair of eyes turned and glanced over at them. Uhmma reached out and grasped each daughter’s hand and with her head perfectly poised, walked them through the hall and out into the courtyard.
Gomo was sitting with some of her older lady friends and as soon as she saw Uhmma with Helen and Joyce, she stood up. Her friends glanced from Gomo to Uhmma and then back to Gomo. Uhmma paused for a second in her step, but then she strode forward. Gomo blocked Uhmma’s path.
Gomo whispered, “If you had made Helen keep dating Mr. Moon, we would not have to face these ugly rumors.”
Uhmma turned to Gomo, her face calm and for once unconcerned with anything Gomo had said. “They are not rumors.”
Gomo’s eyes widened in shock.
“Please, Gomo, I will explain everything back at home. This is not the place to have such an important conversation. Our family is what matters the most right now. You have always said this, and it is still true. We are a family, and we must support and help one another.”
Gomo lowered her eyes. Uhmma waited, her eyes softening as Gomo struggled to compose herself. Even though half of Gomo’s face was frozen, even Joyce could see the lines of pain wrinkling the few areas that could move.
Apa and Andy came rushing over from the far playground near the parking lot, with Sam right behind them.
“Yuh-boh,” Apa said, “is everything all right?”
Uhmma nodded tightly and then glanced at Gomo, who was standing off to the side, clutching her purse, immobile and mute, while her eyes darted from family member to family member.
Sam walked up and stood near Gina, who glanced at him with a grateful smile. Mrs. Lee, when she noticed her friends and daughter gathered together, stopped conversing with the pastor’s wife and walked over to them. The entire family gathered together in a tight circle around Helen. Joyce could feel Helen’s body trembling next to her, so she reached out and took Helen’s hand. All around them the congregation continued to ripple with whispers while they stood silently in the eye of the storm. Helen kept her head up, refusing to let anyone see her upset. Joyce glanced over at a small circle of people standing on the lawn laughing especially loud. Lisa Yim and her friends. Joyce found herself longing for a dart to aim at Lisa’s chest. Andy caught her gaze and narrowed his eyes at Lisa.
“Let us go,” Uhmma said quietly and began to move forward. The group followed her lead and headed for the stairs that led down to the parking lot. Gomo stepped forward and joined the family, gesturing to her friends to follow. The older ladies fell into step behind Gomo. Some people called out their good-byes as the family slowly exited the courtyard. Others reached out and shook Apa’s hand or bowed to Gomo and the elder ladies.
John and his father were standing off to the side watching everything unfold with puzzled looks on their faces. It had definitely been a while since they had experienced a Sunday at the Korean church. As Joyce passed John, she peeked over at him and caught his eyes. John raised two fingers in a peace sign and winked.
This time, Joyce winked back.
Just as everyone was heading down the steps, Andy broke
from the group, running quickly across the lawn. He did a commando tumble-roll move and then aimed his squirt gun right at Lisa Yim. He fired off two rounds of some syrupy substance that clung and slowly dripped down the front of her dress. Bull’s-eye.
Lisa stared down at her chest and began to scream. Andy took off running and joined the family again.
“What’s in there?” Joyce asked, half hoping he wouldn’t tell her, since she had almost been sprayed by the same stuff just the other day.
“I crushed all my shark liver extract pills and loaded them into my gun,” Andy said. “I was saving it for Tom Koh, but he was sick today.”
“You are so gross,” Joyce said with a grin. “Good aim.”
Andy pointed at himself. “And Uhmma thought those video games would just rot my brain.”
NINETEEN
joyce sat in Dr. Reiner’s outpatient operating room, the crinkle of her paper gown as loud as the boom of her heartbeat in her ears. This was it. The final moment before she would enter her cocoon to emerge as a gorgeous new butterfly. Joyce worried the front of her gown as she waited for Dr. Reiner to enter. To keep her mind off the imminent procedure, she tried to imagine what Gina was doing right then. Probably shopping for a new dress to wear to the opening of Sam’s show the next day. Joyce stared up at the lights and started counting all the fixtures. Gina was out there having fun while Joyce sat here waiting to get cut up. The thought of sitting around at home the next few days, woozy on painkillers, did not seem very glamorous.
Joyce swung her legs and took deep breaths through her mouth to quell the nausea that arose instantly at the thought of all that pain. She tried to imagine what Helen was doing. Packing. Helen was probably getting all her books and clothes together to move into the dorms. Joyce smiled at the thought of Helen’s face glowing with anticipation. For the first time, Helen was going to have a life of her own. It had been a long time since Joyce remembered seeing her sister so happy. And for the first time in her whole life, Joyce was going to have her own room.
Darn! Joyce punched the padded bed she was sitting on. She was going to miss out on the shopping sprees Gomo had promised to help decorate Helen’s and Joyce’s new rooms. She knew Gomo would take her after she was well enough to go out, but shopping with Helen and Gomo would have been much more enjoyable. Argh!
It would only be a few weeks of recuperation, but even that time seemed endless compared to all that Joyce would be missing and had missed while she had been so preoccupied with the way she looked. The longer she sat there waiting, the more it felt like life was moving forward without her. Joyce bit her lower lip. And what if John called? How was she going to explain why she couldn’t see him for a while? He would show up at church and she wouldn’t be there to talk to him. But Lisa Yim would be there for sure. Joyce stared pinching the fat above her knees. That Lisa Yim would use every trick she knew to get John.
Joyce sighed. What was taking so long? She jumped off the bed and started to pace. What was she doing here waiting anyway? Was this what she really wanted? She had believed the folds would make her more attractive and confident, but it was feeling more and more like an obstacle to all the things that she really wanted to be doing. Who was this girl, woman, young adult sitting here waiting to change? Did this define her? And if she didn’t really know herself, know what was true to her, then how could she begin to permanently change her face? Would she regret it later? Joyce didn’t know. And that was a problem.
Joyce stood up and grabbed the back of her gown to keep her butt covered up and stepped out into the hall.
“Excuse me,” she called out. “Excuse me.”
Gomo and Uhmma were looking at magazines when Joyce walked out into the waiting room, dressed in her regular clothes.
Uhmma stood up and rushed to her side. “Did something go wrong, Joyce?”
Gomo dropped her magazine on the coffee table. “She could not do it.”
Joyce shook her head. “I don’t want my eyes to look any different. I don’t care about getting a san-gah-pu-rhee. I thought it was what I wanted to help me look better and feel good about myself, but I’m tired of being obsessed with how I look. I’m okay with being just me. And I have a lot of other things I want to do this summer.”
Uhmma nodded.
Gomo stepped forward. “Would you like me to reschedule Dr. Rie-ne-or? Maybe this is not the best time for you.”
Joyce bowed to Gomo and said, “Gam-sah-ham-nee-da, Gomo. I appreciate your offer, but this is who I am.” Joyce looked down at herself. “I might not be the prettiest or the smartest or even know what I want to be someday, but I do know what’s important to me right now.” Joyce paused, nervously glancing at Uhmma before asking Gomo a question. “I have a request, Gomo. Instead of paying for me to get my eyes done, can you use the money to help Gina get clear braces for her teeth instead?”
Gomo tilted her head in confusion. “You want me to help Gina with her braces?”
Uhmma’s eyes softened as she studied her younger daughter’s face.
Joyce nodded. “It would make Gina’s year.”
Gomo thought it over. “I see no problem with that.”
Uhmma smiled at Joyce. “Mrs. Lee will be very happy for the help.”
Gomo reached out and patted Joyce’s shoulders. “You are just like me. Such a big heart.”
Joyce grinned. It wasn’t so bad to be like Michael, after all. Besides, if Joyce ever wanted the folds back in her eyes, she had some glue that Dr. Reiner had happily provided for her. Joyce reached behind her and patted the bump in her back pocket. Who knew when she might need a shot of adventure? There was no harm in having a little fun.