Girl on the Verge

by Pintip Dunn

  That’s where I come in. Miss Patsy provides the materials, and I get invaluable experience, another entry on my résumé, and the feel-good glow of hearing these little angels squeal.

  If I can keep said angels from combusting while they wait their turn.

  “How about a song?” Ash suggests desperately. “Or a game. Maybe you could draw on these coloring pages Kan brought? They have ballerinas, just like you! Here are a bunch of crayons. . . .”

  She might as well not have spoken. They turn up their super cute button noses and continue to wreck havoc. (God! All their noses are cute! How is that possible? I never had a nose like that. Mine is flat and flares at the bottom.) One girl tosses my scraps of fabric in the air, while another attempts to climb the musty curtains.

  Ash rushes over, pulling the girl down before she can fall on her head, and I glance at the clock. I only have fifteen more minutes to get them measured before class, and I’ve only finished one girl. What am I going to do?

  And then the door opens, and Ethan walks into the dance studio. The girls run to him like he’s a rock star. I don’t blame them. He looks kinda like a musical sensation with his tight black shirt and pants. Most of the guys at school wouldn’t be caught dead wearing clothes like that, but they suit him. Involuntarily, my eyes travel over his six-pack and the long, lean muscles of his thighs. Oh, yeah. They suit him, all right.

  He glances around the room, taking in Ash, who’s picking up the scraps of fabric, and me, with the measuring tape around my neck.

  “Want to play duck, duck, goose?” he asks the girls.

  Like magic, they shriek and arrange themselves in a circle on the floor.

  My mouth drops open, and I exchange a look with Ash. Are you kidding me? How on earth did he do that?

  He looks up to catch me watching and winks.

  I duck my head. My fingers shake as I measure the next girl. It was a wink, for god’s sake. Just a wink.

  “No wonder you like working here.” Ash drifts over to me. “He’s enough to convince me to give ballroom dancing a try.”

  “Shhh!” I say furiously. “He’ll hear you.”

  But he’s completely immersed in the game, his movements exaggerated as he taps a girl’s head and then tries valiantly to avoid being tagged. His arms pump the air, and his legs fly all over the place. And yet, the girls catch him every time, to gales of giggles.

  Once, the girl with the tiny braids slips and falls. Her hopes of tagging Ethan seem to evaporate, but when he reaches the open spot, he performs a victory dance, which involves a lot of butt shaking and fingers pointing in the air. As the other ducks roar with laughter, the girl picks herself off the floor and tags him out.

  The smile spreads across my face like dye seeping through fabric, and even Ash’s nudges can’t erase it. Ethan. Ethan Thorne. I’ve always known who he is, of course, although we’ve never been friends. You don’t go to a school like mine, in a town like Foxville, and not know all 120 kids in the graduating class. Hell, I was in the same kindergarten classroom with almost a quarter of my classmates.

  The next girl gets on the block, and I wrap the measuring tape around her waist, making sure it’s not twisted. All the while, I run through everything I know about Ethan. He’s a ballroom dancer. There’s no high school circuit in our state, so he’s a member of the community college dance team and travels to competitions nearly every weekend. He’s not part of the in-crowd—he’s a little too different for that—but he’s a cool and well-liked guy. I’ve heard some of the boys ribbing him about his dancing, but he just shrugs like the jokes roll right off his well-muscled back.

  I finish measuring the last girl, and Miss Patsy, the dance teacher and head of the studio, strides down the stairs. Ethan ushers his ducks into the empty classroom.

  Ash gives me a hug. “I have to go. I can’t avoid my house forever.” She rolls her eyes. “Thanks for letting me hang out.”

  “Thank you. I never would’ve gotten those girls measured without you.”

  “Nah. You’ve got your knight in black knit swooping down for the rescue.” She waggles her eyebrows, and I give her a shove. We both erupt into giggles.

  I promise to call her later and then retreat into a quiet classroom. All thoughts of Ethan fly out of my head. I sketch two different designs, one in ice blue and the other in hot pink, with lots of ruffles and flounces. And, of course, stiff tutus. Both designs are gorgeous. As I sketch, I wish I were a little girl again, so that I could wear these creations, too.

  When I finish, I realize the dance studio is deserted. Crap. I check my watch. It’s only seven, but these days, it gets dark early. I hadn’t realized it was so late. But no matter. This is a small town. Nothing ever happens in small towns. Right?

  Wrong. Nothing interesting ever happens in small towns, but crimes? Murders? Rapes? We’re no more immune than the urban areas. Just last week, a woman was assaulted as she jogged through the park at sunrise.

  Goose bumps erupt on my arms, and my heart crashes against my ribs. Ridiculous. I’m only nervous because it’s so quiet that you could hear a ballerina rise to en pointe.

  Still, I take out my car key and hold it with the sharp, metallic edge poking through my fist. Taking a deep breath, I cross the darkened studio. I am almost at the exit when Ethan emerges from the gloom.

  I jump. The key slides from my fingers and clanks against the floor. “Ethan! You’re still here?”

  Instead of responding, he picks up my key, hands it to me, and holds open the door. Not only is it dark outside, but the wind’s picked up, swirling bits of litter round and round the parking lot. The trees are shadowy skeletons, reaching their long, thin fingers toward me.

  I shiver. Small town. Nothing ever happens in a small town. I repeat the words to myself firmly and then turn to Ethan, who is locking the door.

  “Were you waiting for me?” I blurt out. “You didn’t have to do that. Miss Patsy gave me a key; I could’ve locked up.”

  “Not a problem.” He flashes a smile, one that seems as natural to him as breathing, and without another word walks to his car.

  I let out a breath I didn’t realize I was holding. Maybe he wasn’t waiting for me. Maybe he was busy with work, too, and it’s only a coincidence we happened to be leaving at the same time. At least I feel safe now, even if he’s thirty feet away in his battered Camry.

  Slowly, I make my way to my tangerine VW Bug. My dream car, even if it is secondhand and has a gazillion miles on it.

  The engine of the Camry ignites, and the headlights flicker on. But the car doesn’t leave. I get into my Bug and take a moment to slide my sketchbook securely into my backpack. Ethan is still there, still waiting. Only when I turn on the engine and drive out of the parking lot does his car follow, flashing its lights twice before turning in the opposite direction.

  I blink, staring at Ethan’s taillights too long in the rearview mirror. Huh. Maybe he was waiting to see me off safely, after all.

  You never know what can happen, small town or not.

  Chapter 2

  I walk into my house to the smell of my favorite meal. Nam phrik ka pi. Sliced eggplant dipped into beaten eggs and then fried, paired with a spicy sauce made from tamarind, chilies, lime, fish sauce, and shrimp paste. There’s no mistaking the scent because it smells like nothing else in this world.

  My mouth waters, and instantly, the Asian boy conversation with Izzy, Ash’s parents’ fighting, and Ethan’s chivalry disappear from my mind. A plate of hot rice and fried eggplant always makes me feel like everything’s going to be okay.

  I burst into the kitchen, my hair swinging against my shoulder blades. My grandmother is ladling slices of eggplant out of a pot of boiling oil and transferring them to a colander lined with paper towels. The slices are perfect. Fried to a golden brown, bits of egg curling around the edges. I snag a piece, bouncing the still-hot slice against my palm before taking a bite.

  Yum. The egg is crisp and savory, the eggplant center s
oft and mildly sweet.

  “Khun Yai, it’s like you read my mind.” I place a kiss on her cheek. “Are you sure you weren’t a fortune-teller in a previous life?”

  But she doesn’t smile, and she doesn’t call me luk lak. She doesn’t bat my hand away, and she doesn’t ask me if I have homework. Instead, she looks at me the way she did during the first few months after my father’s death.

  “I was cleaning your room,” she says in Thai. Even though her English is more than passable after four years in this country, this is how we always talk—her in Thai and me in English. And yet, we still manage to communicate perfectly. “I found an application for the Illinois Institute of Art.” She waves her spatula at the offending form on the kitchen table.

  Fear flashes across my stomach, and the eggplant lodges in my throat like a ball of packed rice. “You don’t need to clean my room,” I mutter. “None of my friends’ parents do that. Over here, kids pick up after themselves.”

  “Do not change the subject, Kanchana.”

  Uh-oh. My formal name. Not one of her endearments, not even my nickname, Kan, which my dad came up with himself in an attempt to create an American name. That’s probably the only reason I didn’t nix the name long ago: It’s one of the few reminders I still have of my Por. Too bad he didn’t know my elementary school years would be marked by my classmates elbowing each other and snickering. “Hey, Kan, did you use the can yet today? I drank a whole chocolate milk at lunch. Boy, do I need to use the can.”

  “It’s Kan,” I would say between clenched teeth. “Rhymes with Ron.”

  This, somehow, made them laugh even harder.

  “I thought you were going to apply to medical school next year. Follow in your mother’s footsteps.” Khun Yai turns off the stovetop and moves the pot of boiling oil to a cool burner. “We even decided on the list of twenty schools you would consider. This art institute wasn’t on the list.”

  “No, you decided,” I say, wondering how far I should go. How much I should confess. She’s already found the application. Is she ready to hear the truth—or at least part of it? “You can get a bachelor’s degree in fashion design there. And I . . . never wanted to be a doctor, anyway. The sight of blood makes me sick.”

  She lifts her eyebrows, adding lines to her already lined forehead. “Really? How come you never told me?”

  Maybe this time, she’ll understand what it’s like to be me, a girl straddling two worlds and fitting into neither. Maybe I should admit I’ve been designing clothes in secret for years. That my job at Miss Patsy’s is not as assistant/first aider but as seamstress /costume designer. Maybe she’ll see into my heart, where my hopes and dreams lie....

  “No matter,” she says crisply, turning to the colander and moving the slices of eggplant to a platter. “You’ll be a college professor, then.”

  Maybe not. My shoulders sag. Of course, she would default to the second most revered profession in the Thai culture.

  “A college academic?” I ask. “On what subject?”

  “Does it matter?”

  “That’s generally the way it works, Khun Yai. You become a professor because you want to spend the rest of your life studying a subject you love. Not because a PhD makes you look good to your neighbors!”

  She sighs and sticks the platter in the oven to stay warm. She begins to arrange raw vegetables on a plate, to serve with the nam phrik.

  “It’s my dream to design clothes, Khun Yai,” I say in a soft voice. I’d never reveal as much to Mae, but this is my grandmother. She strokes her soft hands over my hair when I’m sick and gets up early to cook me jok for breakfast. “Don’t you want me to follow my dream?”

  She makes a face like she’s had a bad mango. “You and your American passion. Dreams are useless if you can’t pay the bills. Provide for your family first. Give them real security. Once that’s done, you can dream all you want. Look at your mother. She cross-stitches in the evenings. I watch soap operas. You can design clothes in your spare time.”

  “Those are hobbies, Khun Yai. They aren’t careers.” How do I explain this to her? How do I convey the feeling I get when I turn a pile of raw materials into something beautiful, something real? “I’m happy when I’m designing. I feel like my truest self. Like this was why I was put on this earth.”

  “Oh, please.” Khun Yai doesn’t roll her eyes; she’s much too elegant for that. But I can see the roll in the hand on her hip, hear it in the lilt of her voice. “You are outdoing even the Americans. I hate to say it, but if you continue with this line of thinking, I won’t be able to give you our family heirloom.”

  I gape at her. “You would break tradition over something so minor?”

  “It’s not minor, and you know it.” She straightens to her full height, which is barely over five feet. I’ve got five inches on her, towering over her the way I loom over everyone in an elevator in Thailand, male or female. “My Khun Yai wanted the necklace bequeathed to my eldest granddaughter. But this granddaughter also needs to be a good Thai girl. Someone who understands and respects our culture and values.” Her eyes laser into me. “Not someone who questions her Khun Yai’s advice. Not a girl who wears tight jeans and low-cut blouses. Not someone who runs around gossiping about boys instead of doing her homework. That’s not what this necklace stands for. My Khun Yai wouldn’t have wanted her necklace to go to a farang.”

  My cheeks burn. A foreigner. I may be the daughter of Thai parents, but I was born and raised in America. Which means I’ll never be Thai enough. I’ll never be good enough.

  We stare at each other. I love my Khun Yai. I always have. She gave up her life in her native country to move to the States four years ago. And she did it for me. Well, it was also for my mom, in order to help her raise her child. But it was mostly for me. Her affection for me is without question.

  And yet, the gulf between us right now feels as wide as the ocean between Thailand and the United States. I don’t know how we’ll ever cross it.

  “Set the table,” Khun Yai finally says. Ultimatum issued. Subject closed. At least for the time being. “Your mother called. She’s bringing home a guest.”

  “One of the doctors?” I grab the silverware from the drawer. “Dr. Stanley or Dr. Roberts?”

  “She didn’t say.”

  I lay the spoon and fork at each place setting, making sure they match. There’s nothing I can do about the water glasses, however. My grandfather, when he was alive, was a hard man. He had to be, I guess, to leave his small Chinese village and immigrate to Thailand in search of prosperity. He didn’t allow us to eat soy sauce with our food, and we weren’t allowed to have water glasses at the table. All drinking was done after the meal, so we never had a need for matching glasses.

  “What if the guest doesn’t like Thai food?” I ask. I’m not trying to be belligerent. It’s not like we’re talking about pad thai here, something that’s accessible to the American palate. As delicious as it is, nam phrik ka pi is notoriously smelly to farangs.

  “Then, I will grill him some steak.” She opens the refrigerator door, revealing enough meat to feed our family for a week. “But first, he will try my Thai food.”

  I groan. For his sake, I hope our guest chokes down the eggplant. Khun Yai will be the gracious hostess, as she always is. But inside, she’ll be judging him. The surest way to offend her is to refuse to eat her food. Or to have too delicate an appetite. Or to impose any sort of weird restriction. We eat rice morning, noon, and night, so Khun Yai considers carb-free diets to be pure madness.

  The garage door grinds open. Mae is home.

  She walks into the kitchen, her white medical coat still fresh and unsullied even after ten hours of work. A white girl trails behind her, dragging a bulging suitcase that’s about to split at the seams. Khun Yai and I exchange startled looks, our strife forgotten. We assumed guest meant one of my mom’s colleagues.

  The girl is about my age, with mousy brown hair and muddy brown eyes. Even if she smiled, I’m not sur
e you could call her pretty. Her features are plain, her clothes plainer. A deep scar zigzags down her left cheek, like Harry Potter’s bolt of lightning, although it is not as pretty, not as neat. She studies the floor like it might open and swallow her at any moment.

  “Khun Mae, Kan,” my mother says. “This is Shelly. She’s going to be staying with us for a while.”

  Chapter 3

  Shelly Ambrose hardly heard Dr. Som’s words as the woman explained Shelly’s situation to her daughter and mother. She didn’t have to listen because she knew the facts by heart.

  Shelly’s mother had died a couple months ago.

  Shelly didn’t have any living relatives.

  Shelly was eighteen years old and thus ineligible for the foster care system.

  Shelly needed a place to live until she graduated from high school and found a decent job.

  With nowhere else to turn, Shelly had reached out to the woman the late Mrs. Ambrose had claimed was her angel: the doctor who’d performed an emergency C-section that saved both her and her baby’s lives. Shelly had never met the doctor herself, but Mrs. Ambrose had kept in touch with her over the years, and Dr. Som had been a constant reference in their conversations. The doctor’s last name was actually Pongsai, Shelly’s mother had explained, but since it was too hard to say, everyone just called her by her first name.

  These facts should’ve evoked a deep emotional response from Shelly. And maybe, once upon a time, they did. But not anymore.

  She’d once seen a documentary on sand tiger sharks. When they were embryos, these sharks ate their half-formed brothers and sisters to make room in the womb. They had to, so that they could grow large enough to fend off predators after their birth. It was survival of the fittest at its most bloodthirsty.

  She got that. She lived in an unfeeling world, and in order to survive, she couldn’t afford to get sentimental about anyone’s death. Even her mother’s.