4. She reminded me to kihap about a billion times.
THE PART WHERE IT WENT FROM T TO WORSE
On Saturday, Dad and I were running late. The door to taekwondo was closed when I got there. I wondered if I should knock or just open it.
I pressed my ear to the door. People were moving around, and Master Kim was saying, “Charyut! Attention!”
Shoot muffins! I was late. If people were moving around, I’d missed meditation.
I rested my hand on the door handle for a second, took a deep breath, and pressed down.
The rest of the students were lined up, facing Master Kim, and standing at attention. I stepped inside, and the door closed itself behind me with a whoosh click.
A few heads turned my way and then quickly snapped forward. I could feel my ears burn.
Master Kim waved me to the front.
Every eyeball in the room was on me. It was like the time at school when I was balancing a full pencil cup on the back of my hand and it accidentally tipped over right in the middle of science class. I wanted to disappear then, too.
I stopped a few feet away from the first row. Master Kim motioned to me again. My knees wobbling, I walked up to him and bowed.
Master Kim returned my bow and spoke in a clear, low voice. “A good martial artist is respectful. And being respectful means being on time. When you are late to class, you must ask for permission to join.”
I tried to swallow, but it was hard since my throat was sand dry. “May I join class, sir?”
“You may,” Master Kim said. “Do twenty push-ups and then join the back row.”
Twenty push-ups? Ugh.
I went to the edge of the room and did my push-ups while Master Kim led the rest of the students through warm-ups. At least they weren’t staring at me.
After we stretched, Master Kim told us to run some laps. I fell in line behind an orange belt and kept my eyes on his heels. After a lap, I noticed someone with long, easy strides pass me on the right. Madison. Just great.
You’re doing this for a reason, I reminded myself. Think CAKE.
As I did my last lap, I glanced Master Kim’s way. He was standing in the front of the room, holding a three-ring binder and writing something down. Maybe he was taking attendance.
Or maybe he was marking a great big, fat T for tardy next to my name.
We practiced kicks and blocks in the air, and afterward Master Kim told us to make a line in front of him. (I made sure I was as far away from Madison as possible.) Then he went to his equipment bag and pulled out a pair of black mitts. They reminded me of a catcher’s glove.
“Sweet!” I heard the boy behind me say under his breath. His voice flipped a switch inside me and I got excited, too, even though I didn’t know what was going on.
“We’re going to work on punching,” Master Kim told the class. He asked the black belt to show us the proper way to put our thumbs across the outside of our fingers. (Tucking them inside meant, apparently, a surefire trip to the ER for a busted thumb.) And then she showed us how to rotate our wrists the last second of the punch for maximum power.
Maximum power sounded cool. Like some kind of comic book hero. Don’t worry. Max Power will save the day!
Master Kim put a mitt on each hand and held them up. When it was our turn, we were supposed to stand in fighting position, jab with our front hand, and then punch with our back hand and kihap. The line moved quickly.
When it was my turn, I took aim and threw my two punches.
Thud! Thud!
The punching mitts were harder than a catcher’s glove. My knuckles hurt, but in a good way, if that makes sense.
I ran to the back of the line and bounced on my toes. I got two more turns, and each time it was: Look out, mitts. Thud! Thud!
When I got to the back of the line for the third time, my hands and legs were twitchy with energy. I wanted to keep practicing, so I turned to the boy behind me and threw a few jabs and punches in the air at him.
“Eliza!” Master Kim’s voice was sharp. Everyone froze.
“A word,” Master Kim said as he motioned to the back of the room. He bowed, handed the mitts to the black belt, and asked her to take over.
I walked to the spot. My wobbly knees came back.
Master Kim put his hands behind his back and lowered his gaze until it sat like a brick on my head.
“Your martial-art skills are never to be used against an innocent person or in a playful manner,” he said. “Is that clear?”
I wished I’d had a turtle shell on my back instead of a dobok. “Yes sir.”
“If you forget, you will be asked to leave class and not allowed to return.”
“Yes sir.”
Master Kim pointed to the wall. “Take a seat. You need to sit out the rest of the drill.”
My whole body deflated, and I slid down against the wall as Master Kim walked back to the front of the room.
A few of the kids snuck looks my way. I pretended not to see them and tried not to think about crying. But not thinking about crying is like not thinking about scratching an itch, and I had to sniff a few times.
Where was Max Power when you needed him?
ADIOS, MUCHACHOS
When I got home, I wadded up my dobok and threw it on the closet floor. Then I sat down on my bed. A sob bubbled up, but I swallowed it back.
Master Kim hated me.
Stupid Madison Green was in the class. Madison! The girl who put dumb swirls instead of dots over her “i’s”.
My dobok was still itchy.
I couldn’t do any of the kicks the right way.
I was torturing myself for nothing. Tony was off, all happy in the cake class without me. He hadn’t called or e-mailed or anything since we’d run into each other at the community center. That’d been over two whole weeks ago.
I don’t care what Tony does. I don’t care what Mom and Dad think!
And that’s when I made the decision.
I quit.
MY NEW COAT
Mom says decisions are like coats because they weigh on your shoulders. So whenever Sam or I have a big decision to make, Mom says we should wear it for a while to see how it feels.
I put “quitting taekwondo” on and wore it for the rest of the afternoon. It felt good. So I decided to wear it to dinner, too.
I would present my case to Mom and Dad. They couldn’t expect me to stick it out any longer. I wasn’t a quitter. I really tried. I’d gone to five whole classes! That should count for something. I was just pursuing other options. The cake-decorating class was where I belonged. And maybe Tony’s “okay” had been a good okay. Maybe opening our own bakery someday was still the plan.
I’d work on Dad first. He was usually the softie.
I took a breath and headed for the kitchen. Right off the bat there was a problem.
Dad wasn’t there.
“Your father is at the library, studying,” Mom said. (Mom called him “your father” when she was annoyed with him.)
I plunked down in the chair. Mom must have stopped at the grocery store and splurged on steaks and deli potato salad. But I wasn’t hungry. That made me feel guilty on top of nervous.
I was going to tell her about quitting.
I was.
I’d worn the decision awhile like she said, and it felt right.
But when I was jabbing my fork at my salad, Mom said, “Eliza, I need your dobok. I’m doing a load of whites tonight.”
I should have said, “I don’t need it anymore. I’ve decided to pursue other options.”
But that’s not what I said. I said, “I’ll bring it down later.”
THAT’S WHEN I MADE ANOTHER DECISION
I’d tell Mom and Dad about quitting when they were together.
PLAN B
I didn’t find Mom and Dad together on Sunday. I didn’t find them together on Monday or Tuesday night, either.
On Wednesday morning, Mom didn’t have to work, and Dad didn’t have class until the afternoon. Mom mad
e her famous chocolate-chip pancakes. Sam was still in bed.
It was just the three of us.
Time was running out. I had taekwondo class that afternoon. The moment was perfect, but now that it was here, the speech I’d rehearsed flew out of my head.
I’m quitting.
It was two words. No big deal.
Only I remembered. Dad had said, “Losers quit when they’re tired. Winners quit when they’ve won.” And Mom had laughed.
“You okay?” Dad asked.
“Yeah. You look a bit pale,” Mom said. “I hope you’re not coming down with something.”
And that’s when I suddenly decided to go to Plan C.
“My stomach kind of hurts,” I said.
It wasn’t a perfect plan. For one thing, Mom whisked away my pancakes before I could finish them. And I ended up on the couch for the entire day with a bucket next to me, which made me a little queasy for real. But I also got to sip on Sprite with a bendy straw. And Mom rubbed my feet before she got up to clean the bathrooms.
I wondered, If I got mysteriously sick every Wednesday and Saturday would my parents notice?
OKAY. SO HERE’S WHEN I WAS GONNA MAKE MY BIG ANNOUNCEMENT FOR REAL
1. When Mom and Dad were together.
2. And when Mom wasn’t tired from work, and Dad wasn’t grumpy from studying.
3. And when Sam wasn’t around to tease me about being a loser quitter.
4. Later.
JULY FOURTH
It was a miracle. I made a complete recovery by Saturday. There was no taekwondo class because of the holiday, so my family went to the Yankee Doodle Doo-Dah at the local park.
The high-school drum line was performing at the festival, and Dad and I were on our way to hear Sam play. Mom was the official band nurse during marching season, so she went to help, in case someone passed out from the heat or dropped a drum on their toe.
As Dad and I snaked our way through the crowd, I heard a familiar voice: “Charyut!”
Master Kim was wearing his dobok, standing beside a large square of mats. On the mats were about a dozen students, including several black belts. I recognized one of the black belts. She helped out in class. I recognized one of the colored belts, too. Madison.
Master Kim had the group show off some kicks. One of them was crescent kick. Even though I’d never admit it to her, Madison was kind of awesome at it. Her leg swung up and around in front of her face like it was a whip. She could kick someone in the head if she wanted. No problem.
When the group was done with the kicks, the audience clapped. Then Master Kim told the crowd, “The black belts here today have trained for many years.”
He held out two boards in front of him, and one of the black belts came onto the mats. I recognized her from class. Her name was Abigail. She moved the boards up a little higher and stared them down like they were an enemy. And then she stepped into fighting position and—“Yah!”—broke the boards with her palm. The crowd oohed and clapped again.
“Come on, Eliza,” Dad said as he tugged on my elbow. “We gotta go. The band will be starting soon.”
“Just a sec,” I said.
Dad checked his watch, which was his way of agreeing without actually agreeing.
Master Kim had two boys get down on their hands and knees, side by side. Abigail walked away until she was about fifteen feet from them. Master Kim went to the other side of the boys and stood four or five feet away. He crouched in a deep front stance and held out a board in front of his chest.
The black belts on the ground lowered their heads.
Master Kim turned his head away.
The crowd grew quiet.
Abigail took a deep breath and stared at the board so hard that it looked like she was trying to break it with her mind. Then she let out a sharp ha! and was off, running straight toward the board.
Right before she got to the first boy, Abigail turned into a flying ninja. Her front leg shot out, and her back leg tucked up under her body. She was like a human arrow. When her front heel struck the board she let out another ha! and the board cracked in two. I clapped along with the crowd.
My first thought was: Did she really just do that?
My second thought was: I wish I could do that.
My third thought was: Oh, yeah. I’m quitting.
LET THERE BE CAKE
After we listened to Sam play, Dad and I headed toward Harrison Hall, the air-conditioned building on the edge of the park. (Mom hung back to help one of the drummers who was stung by a bee.) This is what I’d been waiting for all day. Every year the community festival held the Let There Be Cake contest for amateur bakers from 4:00 to 6:00. The community got to vote for the fan favorite. Unfortunately you had to be over eighteen to enter.
As we walked in, the cool air made my hot, sweaty skin tingle. The smell of frosting was pure heaven, and I’m pretty sure I did a happy sigh without thinking about it because Dad looked at me and grinned. Everywhere you looked, there were tables covered with cakes.
The tables were grouped by category. I lost track of how many. There were wedding cakes, birthday cakes, crooked cakes, character cakes (someone had made a three-headed Fluffy dog from Harry Potter!), cakes shaped like real-life objects, and regular round cakes.
My favorite category was Miniature Cakes. They weren’t cupcakes but small-scale versions of cakes. And they were amazing! I had a hard time choosing which one to vote for. In the end, I picked the one that looked like a doll-size pink top hat with a blue and green butterfly sitting on top. The fondant was perfectly smooth. Around the brim, the baker had put pea-size balls of frosting painted like pearls.
But what was really neat about the mini-hat cake was that it was missing a slice. And inside there were seven mini-layers—each in a different color of the rainbow! It must have taken the baker forever to figure out how to do that just right.
I wondered which cake Tony would vote for. I knew his parents were helping judge the contest. But I hadn’t seen them. Or him. When we made up (sooner or later), Tony and I would have to plan out what kinds of cakes we’d make in our shop. I hoped he liked the idea of a rainbow-layer one.
Dad said we could come back after dinner to see who won. Then he said he needed to use the restroom before we left.
“I’ll just get a drink and wait for you,” I told him.
There was a fountain near the restrooms. I stood behind a mother as she took turns holding her three kids up to get some water. All the kids looked younger than six. They were cute. A little cranky, though. But that was understandable. Crowds make me cranky, too, sometimes. I made a silly face at the littlest kid to try to get him to laugh.
The mother turned to me. “I’m sorry this is taking so long,” she said to me with a weary smile.
“It’s okay,” I told her. “I’m not in any hurry.”
“Now that’s refreshing!” someone behind me said.
There was something about the woman’s voice that was familiar. I turned around and nearly fainted dead away. It was Sweet Caroline! She was wearing a dazzling smile and badge that said JUDGE.
“A lot of young people today have given up on common courtesy,” she said, looking right at me.
Sweet Caroline was standing here. Talking to me.
My brain was a jar of marbles that someone had just spilled on the floor. I tried to grab one of the thoughts rolling around so I could say something.
“Your show is my favorite,” I said.
Sweet Caroline’s smile got even more dazzling as she extended her hand. “Why, thank you!” she said. “I love meeting fans.”
I shook her hand. It was small and soft.
“I’m sorry I can’t stay and chat,” Sweet Caroline said. “I’m judging the contest. Have you voted for your favorite yet?”
I told her that I had.
“Wonderful! Well, enjoy the rest of your day.”
“Thank you,” I said. “You too.”
As Sweet Caroline walked away, she wav
ed. “Remember,” she said. “Be sweet . . .”
“. . . to everyone you meet!” I called after her.
She laughed, which made me feel light as angel-food cake.
OPERATION
NEW PLAN
Stretched out in bed that night, I thought of a hundred things I could have said to Sweet Caroline. And I came up with a hundred different ways our meeting could have ended. Like Sweet Caroline inviting me to help judge and us running into Tony and him being jealous.
I also thought about the rainbow-layered cake. The baker must have spent a lot of time practicing. Just like Flying Ninja Girl had to. It must have taken her years of training to do that cool board break.
Hmm.
Had I really put in enough time at taekwondo? I was pretty sure Mom and Dad wouldn’t think so.
Now that I knew for sure Sweet Caroline would like me, I wanted to take her class even more. If that was possible.
And there was only one way to do that.
JUST LIKE THAT
I made sure I was early to class the following week. And even though most of the kids were hanging out, talking or practicing, I spent the few minutes figuring out who I was supposed to stand next to when class started so I could line up right away. I needed to make a good impression. At least Madison wasn’t in class. Maybe she’d gone on vacation for the rest of the summer. I could only hope.
I wondered if Master Kim would still be mad at me. It’s not like I’d never been in trouble before. In fact, I got into trouble at school a lot when I was younger. But I never got used to it. I knew most of my old teachers didn’t like having me in class much. I could tell because when I walked into the classroom their mouths would say, “I’m glad you’re here!” But their eyes said it wasn’t true.
I wondered what Master Kim’s eyes would say.
Speaking of Master Kim, he marched into the room at that precise moment. His voice boomed, “Class, jong yul! Line up!”
Eliza Bing Is (NOT) a Big, Fat Quitter Page 5
