by Rose Kent
“Unlike my fifth and sixth periods, no one here earned less than a B. Each of you shared fascinating details about your family’s legacy.”
Phew. I had at least a B. That was decent, but I wanted an A.
I glanced at Steve. He flashed me a metal mouth smile. That B meant a get-out-of-summer-school-free pass for him.
Mrs. Peroutka walked from desk to desk, placing the papers facedown. “Before you read my comments, I want to say something that I didn’t tell you earlier, mostly because I hoped you’d write from the heart.”
Then she explained that she had the difficult task of selecting what she considered to be the finest essay from all her students. That essay would be entered in a national essay contest that complemented our heritage unit. The decision was especially difficult, she said, because of all the wonderful writing.
“I can only submit one essay for the contest, but I intend to display all of them at the Celebrating Our Heritage Night next week. And I was hoping that some of you would read excerpts for your families that night as well.”
No thanks, I thought. I’ll pass on that ordeal.
Mrs. Peroutka’s eyes twinkled behind her glasses. “I’m pleased to announce that I’ve selected Joseph Calderaro’s inspiring story about his grandfather Sohn Kee Chung, the Olympian.”
Gulp. Me? The winner? My armpits got sweaty like I’d been doing pull-ups. My cheeks felt like they’d been slapped. And dread burned in my throat like I’d swallowed too many jalapeño peppers.
The class was silent, and then everyone started clapping.
“Way to go, Timpani Man!” Steve cheered.
“An Olympian?” Robyn called out. “I’ve suffered through the mile run with you. Who knew you had running genes?”
Mrs. Peroutka kept smiling, but I couldn’t even look her in the eye. I couldn’t say a word, even though everyone stared at me, expecting to hear something. My stomach convulsed like I’d drunk a milkshake without taking a lactose pill.
Lucky for me, the fire alarm sounded off and we filed out of class. Usually fire drills are the high point of a day, total time wasters, but not today. As the kids and teachers stood around waiting by the tennis courts, I avoided eye contact with everybody, as if I had a giant zit on my nose.
“You rock, Joseph. You must be way proud of your grandfather,” Robyn whispered while Mrs. Peroutka counted heads.
“Thanks,” I said, sheepishly.
“And I thought it was impressive that my uncle won five thousand dollars at the Monmouth Park Racetrack. Speaking of horses, why did the horse go behind the tree?” she asked.
I shrugged.
“To change his jockeys!”
Robyn waited for me to laugh or come back with my own lame joke. But I stood quietly, pretending to take the fire drill seriously, even though we were allowed to talk now.
But I couldn’t pretend I didn’t hear my name being called—loud.
“Congrats, Joseph!” Kelly yelled across the crowd of kids talking.
I nodded. What else could I do? Everyone looked at me, probably wondering what I’d done and why a girl like Kelly cared.
The assistant principal gave the hand signal that the fire drill was over, and everyone funneled back into school. Fate had it that my class reached the door just as Kelly’s did.
“I just heard your essay won, and that you wrote about your grandfather, the Olympic star. Wow! Did your Korean family tell you all that?”
I stared at the back of the head in front of me. “Sort of.”
“A gold-medal-winning relative. That is sooo cool,” she said.
“Thanks.” If only you knew, I thought.
“Well, if you feel like celebrating, I’m going miniature golfing next Saturday with a bunch of my friends. You can come if you want.”
Kelly was inviting me to hang out with her? Meanwhile I felt like Chicken Little with the sky falling down.
“Maybe” is all I could manage to squeak in return.
On the way home I kept thinking about ways to get out of this mess. Confess over dinner? No way. Mom and Dad would lose it right between the antipasto and the main course. Worse, I could almost feel the weight of their disappointment already, since dishonesty is a big no-no for us Calderaros. Ask Mrs. Peroutka to withdraw me as the winner? Then she’d want to know why. Do nothing? Nah, I couldn’t live with my sleazy secret forever. I’d be like that eighties rock group Aunt Foxy told me about, Milli Vanilli. She said they made millions of dollars by lip-synching other people’s music, but eventually the truth came out and they had to face their own music.
On top of all that, I was feeling guilty—about forgery, history tampering, or whatever crime it was that I’d committed. Dad always bragged that I was a straight-as-a-ruler kid. It used to be true.
As I walked up the driveway, this random quote popped into my head. It was something our teacher made us memorize last year after we finished reading Shakespeare’s Othello:
“Oh, what a tangled web we weave,
When first we practice to deceive!”
Even Spider-Man couldn’t untangle this web.
Who Cares About Mark Twain?
The house stank like broccoli when I walked in the doorway. Dad was in the kitchen wearing the chef’s apron Mom had given him for Father’s Day. He was home early, he said, because a customer had cancelled at the last minute. Usually that made Dad furious, but today he seemed cheery, like maybe he didn’t want to be up on a ladder with dirty water running down his forearms, washing some doctor’s windows on a Friday afternoon.
He was standing over a pot of boiling water. “Tonight we feast on linguini with creamy broccoli sauce, salad drizzled with balsamic vinegar, and bruschetta. Deliziosa cena!”
Dad doesn’t cook all that often, but when he does, he goes all out. Opera music was playing in the family room. Blasting, actually.
“Want a sample?” he asked as he stirred the sauce.
“Maybe later.” At that moment no meal in the world could get me drooling. My stomach still felt like someone was wringing it out with bare hands.
I knew I had to level about what I’d done.
One on one is easier than two on one when you’re breaking bad news to parents. I decided to tell Dad first and Mom later, when she got home.
I pulled a kitchen stool close to the counter, where Dad was chopping onions and garlic, and sat down.
“I did something you’re not going to be happy about, Dad.” I spoke loudly over the mezzo-soprano.
Dad stopped chopping.
“Remember that essay I had to write about my ancestors?”
He nodded.
“Well, I didn’t know anything about my Korean relatives, so I sort of made up a story about my grandfather…in Korea.”
“What do you mean, ‘made it up’?”
“I wrote about this Korean runner named Sohn Kee Chung who won a gold medal at the Olympics in 1936. That part’s true. Thing is, I said he was my grandfather. And now my essay won a contest.”
The timer went off, and Dad carried the pot over to the sink and drained the pasta. He was shaking his head while the steam rose from the colander.
“You’re an honest kid, Joseph. Why’d you do that? You could have written ten pages about Grandpa Calderaro and his tailor shop.”
“I told you already, it’s supposed to be about my heritage, not yours.”
“You know what Mark Twain said about telling the truth?” Dad asked.
Of course I didn’t give a rat’s poop about what Mark Twain said in whatever classic Dad had read. I said nothing.
“He said, ‘If you tell the truth, you don’t have to remember anything.’”
“Then how come the telling part doesn’t work when it comes to me being adopted!” I yelled.
Dad’s face tensed up, and the Mad Meter started pulsing fast like the maracas in “La Cucaracha.” “You think being adopted gives you the right to disrespect me?”
Respect had nothing to do with it
. “You don’t understand and you won’t talk about anything.” I shook my head and crossed my arms.
“How can you say this isn’t your real family? I’ve tried to be the best father I can be for you, Joseph. That’s what I understand. Every day I go out there and break my back for you and your sisters. So does your mother. That’s family!”
Dad stomped over to the family room and turned the music down. Meanwhile, his temper rose way up with his voice.
“I’ve never been dishonest about your adoption, Joseph. The truth is, Mom and I know very little. That’s how it is in Korea!”
I could yell too. “It’s not just about what you know, Dad! Why can’t you deal with who I am? I couldn’t count on you to help me write one lousy essay. Last time I checked, being adopted wasn’t a crime, but you sure act like it is!”
I stormed upstairs and slammed my bedroom door. Then I opened my socks-and-underwear drawer, grabbed the box with the corno, and threw it across the room. Whack! It hit my Amazing Spider-Man poster and fell behind my bed. The poster came crashing down behind it. Even the coolest superhero had collapsed from the stress of living in this house.
I walked to Nash’s house, but nobody was home. Then I headed toward Shear Impressions, but turned around. I didn’t want to face Mom yet.
Somehow I ended up at the Jiffy Wash.
“Yongsu’s out back,” Mrs. Han said, carrying a stack of shirts and jerking her head in that direction.
I was heading for the door when Ok-hee walked in.
“Mrs. Peroutka told my class that you won the essay contest,” she said with an unexpected smile.
I nodded, wishing I could disappear between the hangers of shrink-wrapped clothes.
“My essay was about my great-grandmother in Taegu. She made beautiful mother-of-pearl jewelry boxes. What did you write about?”
“Miscellaneous Korean stuff,” I said. Ok-hee was finally acting normal, not superior, but this topic was off limits.
A customer walked in with a blanket in her arms, and Mrs. Han turned around.
“I’d like to read your essay,” Ok-hee said.
Double geez.
“Sorry, left it at school. See ya!” I said, tearing out of there faster than the Flash, the quickest dude in the comic book universe.
Yongsu was in the parking lot, fooling around with an old skateboard he’d found next to the Dumpster. He got us root beers from the fridge, and we hung out for a while. We didn’t talk about school, Korea, or anything, really. I just watched him try skateboard jumps and wipe out a lot. He took so many spills that we started counting them and laughing.
I almost forgot about that lousy essay. Almost.
Pouring on the Guilt Gravy
“You’re in big trouble, Joseph. Mommy and Daddy are talking about you on the patio, and Daddy’s Mad Meter is on,” Gina announced in her Channel Five reporter voice. Frazer was at her side, drooling as usual.
I’d missed Dad’s gourmet feast, though I noticed a foil-covered plate was left for me on the stove. The kitchen smelled more like garlic than broccoli now. It made me realize how hungry I was.
I poured myself a glass of orange juice. Then I zapped my dinner in the microwave. Gina came over and parked herself next to me at the kitchen table with a bag of Oreos and a glass of milk. Eeyore sat next to her on the chair.
“Where’s Sophie?” I asked as I sprinkled red pepper on my steaming linguini.
“At Kaylie Heinz’s bowling party. She always gets invited to birthday parties and I don’t.”
“Kaylie plays soccer with Sophie, that’s why,” I said.
“Or maybe it’s because kids think I’m a double-squared dork.” She sulked, her eyes looking down from behind her glasses.
Gina kept pulling apart her Oreos, scooping the filling out with her pinkie fingernail, licking the chocolate shells, and clumping them in a pile. It looked nasty, but I have to admit I prefer the cream to those dry Frisbees too.
I started to tune Gina’s whining out after a while. Here I was facing an academic felony, and she was carrying on about her lagging second-grade social life. Big deal.
“I wish I were adopted like you, Joseph,” Gina said.
That got my attention. “Why?”
“’Cause it makes you special. Everyone compares me to Sophie. We learned about antonyms in school today, like fat and skinny, hot and cold. Sophie and me, we’re twin antonyms. She’s chocolate chip cookie dough ice cream and I’m boring vanilla.”
“You wouldn’t want to be the same as Sophie,” I said.
“Yes I would.” She grabbed another Oreo and banged it on the kitchen table. It broke and fell to the floor. “See? Even eating cookies is a tragedy for me!”
I stifled a laugh. “Having clone Sophies would be like sticking two fighting fish in the same tank. Besides, different doesn’t mean you’re not as good.”
She kept shaking her head. I knew that whatever I said was going to sound lame, like a parent insisting “you tried your best” after you got cut from the team.
Hadn’t I felt second-rate when Gina and Sophie were born? I remember looking down at their cute little faces in their matching wicker bassinets, wondering if Mom and Dad would still call me their baby. Nonna Sculletti said the twins had Sculletti noses, and Nonna Calderaro called them the picture of Dad. Of course, no one said any of that about me.
As I got up to refill my glass, I thought about an Italian saying Nonna Calderaro uses: Only the spoon knows what’s stirring the pot. I had adoption stuff on my mind, and meanwhile, Gina, the cutest tadpole from Mom and Dad’s own gene pool, had her own identity crisis. Who knew?
“Okay, here’s something that makes Gina Calderaro special in my book. Nobody sings ‘Hakuna Matata’ like you. Keep it up, and you just might get into Disney University.”
A smile slowly crossed Gina’s face. “I love singing. You really think I’m good?”
“You bet your donkey.” I tugged on Eeyore’s floppy ear.
“There’s no such place as Disney University, Joseph,” she said with her mouth showing mashed cookie.
“Says who? I read about this geeky guy who graduated first in his class from Disney U. He wore glasses and had a twin, too. Now he’s got the lead on Broadway in Beauty and the Beast.”
Gina was giggling now, her long hair swinging forward and almost falling into her glass of milk.
“He’s a lot hairier than you, but you’ve got time.” I swiped the last unlicked Oreo.
“Mommy said the Y is offering kids’ singing lessons starting this month. She says she’ll sign me up if I promise not to change my mind like last year, after she paid.”
“Go for it, Gina,” I said.
Then I saw Mom and Dad stand up from their patio chairs. They looked as if they were coming my way, so I headed out of their way. Upstairs.
I was in bed reading an oldie-but-goodie comic, “The Revenge of the Green Goblin,” when I heard the knock. Actually it was more like knock-knock-BANG!, which could only mean one thing: Mom was on a rampage.
Since dinner I’d felt like a gunfighter readying myself for a showdown. Not only was the waiting stressful, but I had indigestion from the creamy broccoli sauce.
Mom barged in. “Talk to me about this essay,” she demanded, her arms crossed over her checkered nightgown.
“Didn’t Dad give you the Reader’s Digest version?”
She grabbed a sock off the floor and flung it at me. “What were you thinking, making up that story?”
Mom started pacing, which isn’t easy to do in my room. Gina and Sophie have the longer room, which gives Mom more space. Then she started pouring on the guilt gravy—how she’s never hidden anything from me, how she’s always tried to be truthful, and how come I wasn’t honest in my essay.
“What, we embarrass you, is that it?” she shouted, her hands flailing up and down like railroad crossing signs. “Your father is so upset, he barely touched his dinner—and he made it!”
“I didn�
��t mean to hurt anyone, Mom.”
She kept shaking her head. Without makeup her skin looked chalky against her dark eyes, and that made her seem even madder.
“It was a dumb mistake. I’m sorry.” I stared at my stack of comic books underneath the nightstand.
“You know what plagiarism is, Joseph?”
“This isn’t plagiarism, Mom. I wrote the story myself. I didn’t copy it.”
“But that man wasn’t your grandfather. You stole him from a book! Your father and I decided that for lying, you’re sentenced to a weekend of yard work. No going over to Nash’s house, no TV, and no video games.”
I pouted my lips, but actually I’d gotten off easy. Maybe Mom was going light on me because she knew how bad I’d get hassled at school. They might suspend me, or even expel me. Then I’d have to go to a reform school with psychopaths who’d cut off my ears if I didn’t hand over my lunch money.
Mom walked toward the door, but then she stopped. “Lying, trouble in school—this isn’t like you, Joseph. You’re adopted, and that’s perfectly fine. Why didn’t you tell the truth?” She rubbed her eyelids with her fingertips.
“I don’t know the whole truth, Mom,” I said. “Sometimes I look in the mirror and wish I knew more about the kid staring back. It’s nothing against you and Dad.”
“Mom! We’re out of toothpaste!” Gina yelled from the bathroom.
“You want to know more about yourself, being Korean? Is that it?”
I nodded and thought about the Internet posting. Wondered if I should’ve told Mom about that too.
“I understand that, honey. And deep down, your father can too. He has a heart bigger than the ladder on his truck, but he’s pigheaded. You’re his oldest and only son, Joseph. I swear, sometimes he forgets that you’re adopted.”
“It’s not like I got a vote,” I said.
“Joseph, adopting you was one of the most wonderful days of my life. Your father’s, too,” she said, and her eyes filled up with tears. My hands trembled against my comic book.
“Your father…well, I know he’s hard to talk to sometimes, but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t accept you for who you are,” she added.