by Jaclyn Jhin
B.B. launched a rubber band at Dan, who casually caught it in his left hand, dropping it into the wastebasket.
B.B. let out a big sigh. “It’s because I’m 46. She’s freaking out.”
“As she should be. You’re old as shit.”
Neither of them seemed to notice me squirm in my chair. They just carried on their exchange as if I wasn’t there. But that was all right with me. I didn’t understand the purpose of their dissing each other, but I’d gotten so used to it I usually let my thoughts wander while they threw their barbs back and forth.
This time, B.B.’s mentioning his own age made me think of my dad. B.B. and my dad had been buddies since high school. They were almost exactly the same age—or they would have been. What little Korean my dad spoke before he’d left for his English-teaching gig in Korea, he had absorbed by hanging around B.B.’s house.
“I’ve seen the hotties your mom brings in the door.” Dan threw his long legs over the side of his chair like he owned the place. He shook his wing-tipped shoes as he spoke with nervous energy. “You say you’re not gay, and I believe you, I guess. But I don’t understand what’s stopping you from taking all those gorgeous girls out.”
“First, I can pick out my own women, thank you very much—”
“So, why don’t you?”
“I do. I do. But whoever I date never seems to be good enough for my mom. And more important ...” He shot me a kind of apologetic look before lowering his voice. “I like blondes.”
Dan laughed hysterically. This might have been the funniest thing he ever heard. “Oh, well. Don’t we all?”
I felt my phone buzz in my back pocket, reminding me I had 50 emails to return, so I started to get up.
Dan finally noticed me. “Oh, hi, Kel. What’s going on?”
I opened my mouth to tell Dan my news, but before I could, he whipped out his phone and started typing. He leapt off the chair and strode to the door, his eyes glued to his screen. “I’m off. Got more Facebook stalking to do.”
Once Dan was gone, B.B. turned to me. “I’m taking you to lunch today.”
“Oh thanks, that’s really nice—”
“Have you read Tony Robbins’s books?” he asked, and I groaned inside. “He says, if we want to direct our lives, we must take control of our actions ...”
No, I hadn’t read Tony Robbins’s books, but I’d heard this lecture so many times before, I felt like I knew everything he’d ever written.
My phone beeped.
“Sorry, let me just check this.” I looked: two missed calls from Halmuni, and she’d sent me a text: CALL ME! 911.
“Sorry.” I quickly stood up. “Excuse me. I’ll be right back.”
I ran out of the office, darting through the doors to the outdoor plaza with my heart in my throat. The sun shone in my eyes, blurring my vision. Dialing Halmuni, I prayed everything was okay. In my mind, I apologized for my words about older people not understanding social media. I imagined horrible scenarios: an intruder, the kitchen caught on fire, she fell down the stairs. Pick up, pick up, pick up.
“Hola, Kelly,” she chirped happily. She had learned a few Spanish words from Housewives of Beverly Hills.
“Halmuni. What happened? You okay?” The breath trapped in my diaphragm released. I peered across the diamond-shaped plaza to men and women in pantsuits and blazers looking for someplace to sit and drink their paper cups of coffee. They had been a blur as I imagined Halmuni succumbing to some terrible demise.
“I need you go to McDonald’s.”
Now the strangers came into sharp focus. A couple gawked at me in bewilderment. I could only imagine how I looked. Sweat glistened on my face, and my hair fell into my eyes. I collapsed into a park bench beside the glittering business park pond.
My voice still shook. “Halmuni ...”
“What?” she asked innocently.
I sighed. It wasn’t worth it. “I told you that stuff’s bad for you.”
“That food cheap. They have dollar menu: McValue Fries. 2 Hot Apple Pies. McChicken Sandwich—”
As she rattled off her disturbing knowledge of the dollar menu, I noticed Mrs. Chu approaching with an attractive Korean woman beside her. I guessed this must be Nancy from her Facebook post.
Mrs. Chu always looked incredibly put together. She wore a black barrette in her short pixie-cut hair and a black billowing maxi dress with a small, white flower print with stylish shoes that weren’t too high. Her only jewelry was a statement necklace that matched her dress perfectly. She looked seriously hip for her age, and Nancy could’ve been her well-to-do daughter--her nervous, well-to-do-daughter.
Yes, I decided, Nancy was pretty amazing. Ballerina thin and very pretty, she wore a form-fitting dress with black stilettos. Her long brown hair was perfectly styled, and her manicured hand was currently in danger of being amputated by Mrs. Chu’s fierce grip.
I interrupted Halmuni’s McDonald’s order. “Halmuni, I gotta go.”
“You write that all down? You get it for me?”
“No, Halmuni. I’m not getting you junk food.”
“I old woman. I live day to day. Look at Trump, all the time his KFC and his McDonald’s, and he is big and healthy.”
Mrs. Chu halted in front of me. A nanosecond later, Nancy came to a breathless stop.
“Okay, fine,” I told Halmuni, “just text me what you want.”
“Text take too long. You just remember it.”
“Mrs. Chu’s here. Text me, okay? I gotta go, bye.”
I ended the call, and Mrs. Chu swooped me up. I felt her involving me in her game of pull-and-drag. “You’re coming with us,” she said. I desperately wanted to escape her, but my Korean politeness took over.
The three of us hit the lobby glass doors together, looking like the Korean version of Charlie’s Angels. Mrs. Chu pushed through. Whoosh! They shut behind us as she led us down the marble hallway. My coworkers watched us hurry past as if a live hand grenade was rolling down the hall.
I leaned forward to offer Nancy a sympathetic smile.
“Hi,” she breathed back. “I’m Nancy.”
“I know.” Aw, she seems nice. Poor thing.
“Byung-Chul,” Mrs. Chu shouted. “Come meet Nancy!”
I didn’t even have to look into his office to know the look on B.B.’s face. I imagined him searching his desk drawers, wondering if he could fit in any of them. I saw Nancy swallow. We waited for a good minute before B.B. sauntered out, all the color gone from his face. He didn’t even look at Nancy; he just stared at his mom.
“Byung, this is Nancy, Dr. Stephen Lee’s daughter. Isn’t she pretty?”
Nancy blushed, then held out her hand. I felt bad for her. If I was her age, I might’ve thought B.B. was cute too, but I already knew this was doomed for failure.
“Nancy just graduated from Ewha University, a top women’s college in Korea,” she added. “She’s visiting cousins in LA. In Seoul, she works at Samsung, in the marketing department. She speaks fluent English. I told her how awesome you were and that you two had to meet. She is ten years younger than you, but she doesn’t mind older men.”
It was obvious to me, and probably to Nancy, too, that B.B. would have run screaming down the corridor and leaped out the window, if only he hadn’t been afflicted with that same Korean courtesy. From my peripheral vision, I noticed Dan peeking outside his office. I worried he might slip on his puddle of drool.
Now it was B.B.’s turn to have his finer points described. “This is my handsome son,” said Mrs. Chu. “He doesn’t speak Korean, but he is a lawyer. You know how hard it is to be a lawyer? He graduated from Hastings Law School in San Francisco. He would have got into Harvard if he studied more, but he was too busy chasing girls. But Hastings is a very good law school, and this is his own practice. Such a successful guy to have his own practice, don’t you think?”
Nancy nodded. “Very impressive,” she said quietly, with only a hint of an accent.
Mrs. Chu beamed a
round at all the people who were listening, then waved to all of us. “Bye, Kelly. Bye, Nancy. I have an appointment now. Take her to lunch.”
“Mom,” B.B. called after her, “I don’t think I’ll have time today. I already told Kelly I’d take her out for lunch. She just got into Columbia.”
Mrs. Chu paused. “That’s amazing,” she said to me. “Your parents would be proud.”
“Thank you.”
Then Mrs. Chu straightened her skirt and looked up at B.B. “How perfect. Nancy likes food, too. Take her with you.”
Nancy started to interject, but Mrs. Chu put a hand on her arm. “The more the merrier, sweetie. Have a good time.”
Mrs. Chu disappeared out the glass doors, her heels clacking down the steps outside. Nancy and I turned back to B.B., who nervously rubbed his hands together. “My mom can be a bit ... pushy, if you can’t tell. And you can call me B.B. People remember my name better that way. B.B. Chu. like BBQ, you know? And well, we all love BBQ beef, right?”
I saw Dan shake his head, mouth “loser,” then close his door.
B.B. looked back and forth between Nancy and me.
I realized B.B. and I had automatically assumed the same posture: hands clenched in front of us, looking for a way out.
“So.” He opened his arms, flashing a grin. “Lunch then?”
* * *
B.B. took us to Fuji Grill, a Benihana-type Japanese restaurant where they cook the food right in front of you. We sat at the corner of the communal table: Nancy in the middle, and B.B. and I on the other side of Nancy. I felt like the ultimate third wheel—or deterrent, however you viewed the situation.
“We worked together one summer, fixing up houses,” B.B. said. He was in the middle of telling a story I had heard many times before but loved all the same because my father was its hero.
I could tell Nancy liked it, too. She kept her pretty eyes focused on B.B., not on the paunchy shrimp-flipping cook in the black apron. “So we show up to this woman’s house and tell her we’re here to fix her kitchen. We tell her we talked to her husband, and this is a big surprise for her. So she’s all happy, and we start tearing apart the kitchen. The husband comes in, takes a look around, and shouts, ‘What the hell are you doing to my cabinets?’ Paul had taken us to the wrong frickin’ house!”
Nancy chuckled as the dim, circular lights above us reflected off her jade earrings. I decided I liked her. She seemed calm, self-assured. I hoped B.B. might put aside his bias toward blondes for the afternoon.
The chef flipped our chicken, then scraped fried rice on our plates.
“Thank you,” we said in unison.
“So, that was Kelly’s dad for ya.” B.B. doused his bowl with a lake of soy sauce. “Luckily, Kelly’s a little more, um, straight-edged, I’d say. Responsible.”
Nancy looked over at me, and I could sense she wanted to ask about my father. But no Korean woman would ever be so forward as to ask, “Has your father passed away?”
Nancy skewered some chicken with her chopstick. “Did you guys get in trouble?”
“Nah.” B.B. gave her a twinkly-eyed smile. “Kelly’s dad said to the husband, ‘Sir, today’s your lucky day. You’ve just won free, remodeled cabinets.”
“No!”
“Yup. Paul said, ‘Normally, this would cost $2,000 and take a week, but we’re going to do it by the end of this afternoon—all for free.’ Of course, I started to protest. I was ready to tell the guy, ‘We’ll just put your cabinets back together for you, and no harm done.’ But Paul gave me that wink of his, and I knew he was playing all the angles.”
“What angle?” asked Nancy.
“Paul gave the guy our business card, and we ended up getting a bunch of referrals from him. That one mistake kept us busy all summer long—and made us a lot of money.”
“Sounds like a man who thinks on his feet.” Nancy kept her gaze on B.B. for a just a moment too long. Even I could tell she was trying to flirt with him.
B.B. broke off her glance, turning to me. “So, Kelly just got into Columbia. Found out yesterday.”
Nancy turned to me. “That’s nice.”
From the look in her eyes, I could tell she had forgotten I was here. Wow, twice in one day. A new record.
“Yes,” I said.
“You must be so excited.” She kept her eyes on her food.
“Kelly really needs to get away,” B.B. put in. “She needs to go party.”
I shook my head. “That’s not really my priority.”
“It should be,” B.B. said. “You’re 20 years old now. Get a boyfriend! Live a little!”
I didn’t necessarily disagree, although I didn’t know how much “living” I would be doing at Columbia.
“And don’t worry about Halmuni, either. I’ll keep an eye on her.”
“He’s close with my family,” I explained to Nancy.
Over this conversation, she had started checking her phone. “Uh-huh. Uh-huh.”
“Oh, here.” B.B. took a business card from of his pocket. “My friend Sophia runs a restaurant right by the university. She needs a hostess.”
My eyes must have lit up with joy, because B.B. happily slapped me on the shoulder as he shoveled more rice in his mouth.
I grabbed the card. “Wow, thanks so much.”
He washed down his food with a swallow of water. “Wish I could’ve gotten you work at an office.”
“No, no, this is great. I’ll take anything I can get.”
“That should be your mantra at parties.”
I gave him a look. Nancy glanced up from her phone with a chuckle. “I worked as a hostess for a while. It’s good if you can move up to a server position. You can make a lot of money off tips.”
“Plus, I thought you could use some practice talking to strangers,” B.B. said to me. “You’re gonna need strong interpersonal skills when you get in the courtroom.”
I could feel my face reddening. “I have decent interpersonal skills.”
B.B. stared at me with his “oh, gimme a break” look.
Nancy stared down at her plate.
“Don’t I?”
B.B. sipped his water.
“You’re sweet, but you’re shy,” Nancy said.
“Oh,” I muttered. Was it that obvious, even to someone I’d just met?
CHAPTER FOUR
As I was about to enter the security check at LAX to board my plane to NYC, Halmuni and B.B. were both there to say their goodbyes. Halmuni gave me a bag of snacks to eat on the flight - edamames and Korean Kimbap. Halmuni knew that these were my favourite snacks. I’ve loved Kimbap ever since I was young - they are addictive like Doritos; once you start with one, you have to finish the whole roll. Thank goodness, she didn’t include any Kimchee; otherwise, it would stink up the entire plane, I thought.
B.B. handed me a large, heavy, and very poorly wrapped box, which he insisted that I open before I board the plane. Inside was an Apple MacBook Pro.
“I got you top of the line - a MacBook Pro 15in with 512GB storage. Now you don’t need to use the crappy, old one that you’ve been using.”
“I don’t know what to say,” I said, genuinely surprised at the generosity of his gift. “This is the best present ever! Thank you, thank you! You are the best.” I hugged him and held the laptop across my chest tightly, never wanting to let it go.
“Byung Chul, you are good boy. You deserve good wife.” said Halmuni with a look of approval.
“It’s nothing. Kelly, you deserve it. Without your help in last two years, my files and bills would be a mess. Now get going before you miss your flight.” He lightly pushed me forward. I could see that the eyes were getting watery.
I knew he didn’t like it when I got emotional, but I couldn’t resist, I said, “Thank you Uncle B.B. I love you for everything you’ve done for us,” as I wrapped one my arm around him and the other around Halmuni, who nodded in agreement.
“Hey, your dad did so much for me. He would have done the same if I had a ki
d. And didn’t I tell you before, don’t call me Uncle - makes me feel old, even if it is to show respect.” He gave me a wink.
* * *
When I landed in JFK, I queued for a yellow taxi. I couldn’t believe how chaotic everything seemed. Everything seemed to happen in a mad rush - people walked faster, the cars were going in all different directions in hyper speed, and people seemed to have a supersonic style of speaking. Once I managed to get a taxi, I knew we were in NYC as soon as we exited Midtown Tunnel. I rolled down my window and watched the city dwellers and tourists alike charged at a frenetic pace, creating a walking, talking human traffic flow. Some were drinking Starbucks, others talking on their mobiles, and even a few joggers going for a run along the busy streets. Everyone seemed busy doing something.
Everywhere I looked, NYC seemed congested and overcrowded. The mobbed streets, the jungle of vast buildings side by side, all in the same greyish color. There was also a unique smell that was inescapable — the aroma of a mixture of various ethnic restaurants, numerous hot dog stands, flower shops, and fruit stands. Buses, trucks, private cars, taxis. Vehicles honked; cabbies with their windows rolled down cursed at the universe. On the sidewalks, city dwellers charged blindly, jabbering importantly into their phones. Meanwhile, tourists like me shuffled along, gawking up at the skyscrapers, watching the world through their cameras.
Back in LA, whenever I watched street sweepers or the multitude of cars chugging up congested neighborhood blocks, I’d felt alone, a mere pedestrian swallowed up in the vastness of the city. But there, pockets of greenery had provided a bit of relief. Here in New York, there was nothing but steel, concrete, and people so sealed off from each other they might as well have been made of steel and concrete, too.
But I had already fallen in love with this city. I already felt at home.
In Los Angeles, there were so many indecipherable signs, so many rules to observe, but always the expectation that it was your duty to obey them all. I’d always worried about parking Halmuni’s beat-up Honda in the wrong spot and being punished with a massive traffic ticket. As any Angeleno knows, violations can easily run hundreds of dollars just for overlapping the white lines. Maybe it was because we had no money to spare—or just because I’m hyper cautious—but I had always felt like I was encroaching on other people’s space whenever I stepped outside my door. Though I’d lived there all my life, LA wasn’t my town. Its streets belonged to someone else, and every step I took felt like someone was about to remind me I was out of place.