They go back and forth like it’s a competition.
I glue my eyes to my plate and think about my pending application with Prism until something Uncle Max says makes me feel ill.
“You guys will get to meet her soon, now that I’ll be staying here for a few months while I get back on my feet.”
I don’t say a word.
I look at Taro—he’s chewing and chewing and chewing and pretending he doesn’t know what’s going on.
I look at Shoji—his eyes flick up from his hidden book for a sliver of a moment. It’s short-lived sympathy.
And then I look at Mom.
She avoids my stare, probably because she knows I’m imagining they are lasers and whatever I look at will be forced to spontaneously combust.
“Is that a problem, Kiko?” Uncle Max’s voice is like steel. He’s talking to me like I’m the brat who isn’t getting my way. When I look around, Taro and Shoji are looking at me the same way.
Why? they’re thinking. Why do you always have to make everything worse?
But it’s not me. Why doesn’t anyone else ever see it? I’m not asking for the world—I just want to be heard, by the one person who is supposed to listen.
“Mom,” I start.
She slams her hands on the table, and my entire body jumps back in alarm. Maybe I did manage to make her spontaneously combust after all.
Tears fill her eyes, and it takes only a second before her whole mouth is contorted and she’s ugly-crying like she’s just had her heart broken.
I don’t blink.
Mom presses her face into her hands, and Uncle Max rubs her back like she’s an exhausted, overworked mother dealing with a bratty, deadbeat teenager.
“I do so much for these kids. They don’t appreciate anything,” she sobs into her palms.
“Don’t get upset, Angie,” Uncle Max says. He flashes his eyes toward me. “Your mom works so hard, and she never asks for anything in return. You guys need to start being nicer to her.”
But this has nothing to do with Mom, and she knows it. She’s making this about her so she doesn’t have to listen to me.
She can’t be the villain if she’s the victim.
I look at my brothers. I wish they’d help me.
Taro shakes his head. Shoji is looking around for his escape. Why? they’re thinking. Why can’t you blend in like us? Stay in the background. Don’t question anything. Just be invisible. Just be quiet.
But I don’t want to be invisible to Mom. I want to be able to tell her how I feel.
I want her to care.
But she doesn’t. Because she blames me for Dad. Because she wishes I was different.
Because I’m not good enough for her.
It’s not fair.
I don’t finish eating. I rush to my room before I start crying in front of everyone at the table.
• • •
Why would she do this? She knows he’s a total creep. She knows what he did to me. How could she let him back into this house knowing what he’s really like?
It’s been more than an hour since dinner, and I still can’t calm down.
Mom doesn’t knock—she opens the door and walks in, and by the look on her face, she was hoping to catch me crying or feeling sorry for myself. I think she not-so-secretly finds it hilarious when other people are upset.
“Do you want to talk?” she asks, half smirking.
“This isn’t funny.” I stare at her, not crying or feeling sorry for myself. I’m just mad.
“I know that,” Mom says. She closes the door and walks over to my bed, sitting down beside me like we’re former friends who don’t know how to act around each other. “I don’t think it’s funny. I smile when things are awkward.”
I shake my head and don’t respond. Everything I want to say to her is drenched with rage. She would use it against me for the rest of my life if I let it slip out.
“Look, I don’t know what happened between you and Max, but if we’re all going to be living together you need to—” she starts.
“You do know,” I interrupt angrily. “You know exactly what happened.”
“No,” she corrects. “I know your side of the story.”
My shoulders shake violently. “Are you saying you don’t believe me?”
She lets out a sigh. “I’m not saying that. I’m not saying anything, really. I just think you were very young when this ‘event’ happened”—she scratches the air with her fingers—“and maybe it’s not fair to put so much blame on Max.”
“Who else gets the blame? Me?” I ask with a knot in my throat.
“Kiko, would you please stop making this so difficult. I mean, it’s not like he did anything that horrible to you.”
WHAT I WANT TO SAY:
“It’s disgusting that you’d actually make excuses about what your brother did to your own daughter. It’s disgusting that you’re questioning whether I’m even telling the truth. It’s disgusting. You’re disgusting.”
WHAT I ACTUALLY SAY:
“Get out of my room, Mom. Get out!”
I throw myself up from the bed and hot tears pour from my eyes. I tear open my bedroom door and ball my hands up so tight that my fingernails cut into my skin.
She hesitates at first, and for a second I think she’s going to yell at me for shouting at her, but eventually she shakes her head dismissively and leaves.
I slam the door behind her, and the bedroom walls vibrate. I listen to her footsteps move toward the stairs, and when she speaks I know she must have run into my brothers.
“She is so sensitive,” she says loudly. “You can’t say anything to her without her flipping out.”
• • •
I paint a woman who steals hearts, but none of them fit the hole inside her empty, black chest.
CHAPTER TWELVE
It’s been two days since I found out Uncle Max is moving in. Mom and I have been avoiding each other, which usually lasts a few days. When we don’t talk, it feels like we’re no longer a part of each other’s life. It feels like we’re complete strangers. It feels more like the truth.
But today she’s downstairs screaming at someone on the phone. Someone didn’t let her use their stapler after she bought everyone doughnuts last week—seriously, I’m not making that up—and her shrieking voice is making my chest tight.
It reminds me that I’m stuck with her—she’s unavoidable, even when I’m ignoring her, because Mom is an actual black hole. She swallows up everything around her so that everything light suddenly becomes dark.
For someone who talks about positivity so much, Mom is the most negative person I know.
I feel like my shoulders weigh more than the rest of my body, and if I don’t get out of the house and into the open air I’m going to suffocate.
I text Emery to see if she wants to meet up for coffee, and she texts back pretty quickly that she’ll be there in fifteen minutes. She doesn’t have to say it, but I know she hates being at home as much as I do.
When I see her in the parking lot, she’s still in the middle of tying up her frizzy hair with a scarf. “Too lazy to straighten it today,” she says. She’s wearing a purple dress with knee-high boots and an oversize crescent necklace. Most of her tattoos run up and down her forearms, with the exception of the turtle on her shoulder blade.
I asked her once what her tattoos meant, and she told me art doesn’t have to mean anything—it can just be pretty.
We have different ideas about art, but I think it’s cool. There’s something inspiring about how casual Emery can be about things I take so seriously that I could die over them.
“I like your hair frizzy,” I point out.
Emery pretend punches my shoulder. “Aw, thanks!”
When we get inside, Emery hovers over the pastry counter while I order the same drink I always do, because a vanilla chai latte makes the world feel better.
“What’s your name?” the curly-haired barista asks.
“Kiko,” I reply.
> She hesitates, her black marker hovering over the giant cup with uncertainty. She was expecting something simpler to process.
“Sorry. It’s Japanese,” I apologize. I always apologize to people when my name confuses them. I have no idea why; I just feel like I’m supposed to. “It’s K-I-K-O.”
The girl scratches my name in. When her coworker calls me for my drink, the cup reads “Kiki.”
I sit in the corner with Kiki’s drink, and Emery sits across from me with an orange and cranberry muffin and a giant latte.
“Want some?” she offers, holding the muffin toward me.
I shake my head and sip my tea. “Did you book your flight yet?”
She tightens the corners of her mouth. “Yeah. I leave on Monday.”
I feel like someone has punched me in the chest. “Seriously?”
She nods. “That’s why I want you to come with me to get the tattoo. This is, like, my going-away weekend.”
“You mean ‘good-bye’ weekend,” I correct. “You’re lucky. I wish I was leaving for Prism early.”
Emery’s eyes widen. “You got in? Why didn’t you tell me?”
I wave a hand in the air quickly, like I’m trying to erase what I’ve said. “No, no, no. I didn’t. I haven’t gotten a letter yet. I just meant I wish I didn’t have to stay here for the summer by myself.” I don’t know how I’m going to get through it without Emery, but at least getting an acceptance letter from Prism will keep me sane until I can move out.
“I worry about you sometimes, Kiko.”
“What do you mean?”
She shrugs. “You don’t really do things on your own. I’m worried you’re going to spend the next few months hiding out in your room not talking to anyone. Plus, you know, your mom.” She trails her finger along the edge of the table. Her nails are painted green today, with black stars on her thumbs. “She has a way of making you feel so insecure; I worry it’s her way of trying to keep you close. It’s not healthy.”
Neither is living across the hall from Uncle Max, but I don’t tell her that part. Telling her would require me to say the words out loud, and I haven’t done that since the day I told Mom and ruined my family forever.
“That’s why I need Prism,” I say at last.
She’s quiet for a moment, studying her half-eaten muffin like she’s waiting for it to jump up and dance across the table. “But what happens when Prism isn’t there anymore? What happens if you graduate? Or if you don’t—” She stops herself.
I know what she’s trying to say. What if I don’t get in? What will I do then, when all my hopes of making things better are in the same basket marked ART SCHOOL? I rely on these things to make me happy—art, Prism, even Emery. Without them, I’m not sure what I would do.
That’s why I have to get in.
“I’m sorry. I don’t mean to be so moody. I just think about you here by yourself all summer and it’s kind of depressing.” Emery raises her eyebrows and gives me a gentle grin.
“I’ll probably work extra hours at the bookstore once school is over. Trust me, I’m not going to be sitting at home with my mom feeling sorry for myself,” I say. I’ll probably be getting my portfolio ready for Prism. There won’t be any time to be sad.
“God, your mom. Whenever I meet her she acts like the nicest person in the world, and then you tell me stories and I honestly think she’s bipolar.” Emery takes another drink.
“I don’t think she’s bipolar. Something—but not that.”
“Well, I know where to get some lithium if she ever wants any,” Emery says dryly. She never says it directly, but I’m pretty sure her dad is a drug dealer. She knows way too many names of prescription pills—even for someone with an interest in medical school.
It was never just art that bonded Emery and me as friends. It was our families, too. Because even though Emery is so much better at dealing with it, she knows what it feels like to have parents that aren’t interested. She knows what it feels like to want to run away. She knows how badly—how desperately—I need to get into Prism, because she knows what it feels like to be afraid that staying in this town will feel the same as dying.
I make a face at her. “I would pay you actual money to be the one to tell my mom she needs medication.”
Emery laughs and brings her hand to her mouth. “You don’t think anyone’s told her that before? Not even your dad?”
I shake my head slowly. “Not a chance. A sirloin steak doesn’t try to reason with a dragon.”
She tilts her head back and laughs. “What does that even mean?”
I laugh, too, even though it’s too true to be really funny. Nobody can reason with Mom—not even Dad, when they were married. Maybe that’s part of the reason he left. Because he couldn’t get her to listen. Because he couldn’t get her to care. About him, about me. Maybe he just wanted out.
And I know I should be mad at him for that, but I’m not. I get it. I want out too.
Emery’s phone rings. “Oh, it’s my mom. Give me a second?” She plugs her finger against her ear and speaks into the phone. “Hello?”
Their conversation seems serious from the start, so I pull out my phone and search the Internet for photos of Prism. It will make Emery feel like I’m not paying attention, and it will make me feel happy.
Because Prism is the most beautiful building I’ve ever seen in my life.
Huge glass windows in lopsided shapes, cube-shaped offices, color schemes like aqua and fuchsia and marigold, which have never once made it past my mother’s beige limitations on interior design.
Prism is an enormous, colorful honeycomb, full of the most creative little worker bees in the history of the universe. Some people dream about going to Juilliard or Yale or Hogwarts, even. Because they’re prestigious and magical and a dream.
Prism has always been my dream, ever since the day I googled art schools and saw how colorful it all was—the website, the campus, and the students. Plus, it’s in New York, which is basically the art capital of the United States. I knew how much I needed it—to be a part of such a beautiful school and be taught by some of the greatest art teachers in the country. And I need it now, more than ever.
I picture my dorm room. I picture my roommate.
I bet we’d get along—both of us at a school because we love art so much we want to spend the rest of our lives doing it. How could we not get along?
She probably wouldn’t even care that I’m half Japanese and don’t fit in anywhere. In New York, people probably don’t need to be told twice how to spell Kiko. They’ve probably met a thousand Kikos before.
It’ll be my new beginning away from Mom and away from the memories and guilt I desperately want to escape.
I swipe through their website about clubs and societies and after-school activities. They have a forum section, too, where prospective students ask all kinds of questions about student life and whatever else they want to know.
And then I see it.
This post:
I have a question about the housing guidelines, as I just received my acceptance letter in the mail this morning.
I don’t read the rest. I don’t need to. Because the post was written yesterday.
My eyes shoot up toward Emery. She’s still on the phone, her eyes full of sadness.
I can’t leave her. Not right now.
When she hangs up, she pushes her hands against her eyes and groans like she’s full of tension and wants to get it out. “Why does family have to be so much work?”
“Anything I can do to help?” I have to make an effort to slow my voice down. My heart is beating so fast that I’m worried I won’t be able to contain my excitement.
She looks up weakly. “Can you make my parents nicer people?”
“If I knew that trick, I’d have used it by now,” I say.
Emery talks about her parents, and moving away, and how badly she wants to get into medical school, even if only to prove that she’s different from the rest of her family. Even
tually, she changes the subject to Gemma and Cassidy and how neither of them have big dreams to move away. And when she tells me about Cassidy’s plan to hook up with one of her crushes before the summer is over, I can’t hold it in anymore.
“People have been getting their acceptance letters into Prism,” I blurt out. “I just read it on the forums. That means—”
“Go check your mail!” Emery squeals, pushing her empty cup aside. “Why did you wait so long to say something?”
I fidget in my seat. “I didn’t want to just leave you.”
“I would’ve left you.” Emery smirks. “Your assignment this summer is to grow some serious ladyballs, Kiko.”
I twist my mouth. “Why do people always use ‘balls’ as the epitome of bravery? Like, we have to ‘grow balls’ if we want to be strong.”
“Because,” Emery says too loudly, “saying ‘grow some serious ovaries’ doesn’t really have the same ring to it.”
A few people turn toward us and look at our table, and I feel my face flush.
“Oh my God.” Covering my face with one hand, I stand up and laugh awkwardly. “Okay, I’m leaving. Good-bye.”
“Text me as soon as you open that letter!” Emery shouts after me.
The drive home kills me. Every red light is torture. Every stop sign causes me physical pain.
People are already getting their acceptance letters into Prism.
That means . . .
I burst into my house like my body is literally on fire.
The TV is on, which means someone is downstairs, which means it’s probably Mom. With the exception of Taro’s fixation on the refrigerator, the three of us tend to migrate to our own spaces when we’re inside the house.
Mom’s perched on the couch like she’s meditating, except her eyes are wide open and she’s staring right at me.
“Did the mail come today?” I ask, breaking the ice that never truly goes away between us.
“It’s on the counter,” she says stiffly.
I can tell from her face—it’s here. My letter from Prism is here.
I find the envelope with Prism’s logo in the corner—three circles positioned like they’re part of a bigger triangle. It’s thin. That’s a bad sign. I know it is. My gut knows it too, because now I feel like I haven’t eaten in weeks and I’m about to fall to pieces. But more important, the envelope isn’t sealed.
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