“Jessica?” asks Chris, glancing up from the magazine.
“No, genius. Her mother.”
“Oh, right.”
Poor Chris. He’s very uncomfortable with all of this. But when I hear that Jessica’s mother is coming to see us, I get a warm, fuzzy, and powerful sensation in the center of my chest. This is right. It is part of the plan. I know it.
A couple of minutes later, a very attractive Asian woman with a body that looks like a Barbie doll’s comes out of the elevator. She’s wearing the same kinds of clothes we saw earlier today at the Bebe store — sexy jeans, wedge heels, and a tank top. Her shoulder-length hair has been bleached almost entirely blond on the top and is black underneath. It’s styled to flip up and out. Her makeup looks like it was perfect before she started crying, which she still is, in muffled sobs she tries hard to control. She has raccoon-smudge eyes and a red nose. She looks miserable. Tortured. I can see where Jessica gets her looks, though. They are both amazingly beautiful.
Jessica’s mom rushes to Haley and gives her a hug. She hugs Chris, too. I feel so weird all of a sudden. Then, without really knowing who I am outside of Haley’s introduction as one of Jessica’s friends, Mrs. Nguyen hugs me, too.
“I’m sorry,” she says. “I asked the doctors, and they said Jessica shouldn’t have visitors right now. She’s still heavily medicated and in and out of sleeping.”
“Is she okay?” asks Haley.
“She’s doing better.”
“Good,” I say.
“My poor Jessica!” Mrs. Nguyen’s face twists in pain. “They say she’s better, but she doesn’t look better to me. She looks so weak. So broken. I can’t believe this is happening to her.”
“She’ll be okay,” Haley nods.
Mrs. Nguyen releases herself from the hug with me and looks around. “Jessie really needs your love now,” she says. “She’s going to need a lot of love and support from all of us.”
Haley shoots me an awkward look and answers for all of us. “I know, Mrs. Nguyen. We’re here to love her and support her. That’s what friends are for.”
Chris looks at me with a question in his eyes. It’s sad how little parents really know about what’s going on in their own kid’s life sometimes. Mrs. Nguyen has no idea that her daughter tried to drown me. She has no idea that Chris and Jessica are hardly speaking anymore. And she has no idea that Jessica hates me or that I might have prevented this whole accident from taking place. She also has no idea that no matter how hard I try right now, I can’t really feel much love for her daughter.
Mrs. Nguyen smiles at all of us. “You are such great kids. Jessie’s so lucky to have friends like you. Thank you.”
I feel the ethereal calm of the coyotes come over me, and the amulet grows cold and then warm on my neck, over and over, three times. I am being guided by spirits. I can feel them here, protecting me.
“I’m sure the doctors know what they’re doing,” Haley reassures her.
Mrs. Nguyen’s face knots up with grief. “It’s terrible.” She starts to cry again. “She’s broken in so many places. They have tubes in and out of her everywhere. She’s unconscious.” She sniffles into a tissue and breathes deeply. “That’s why you can’t come up to see her. I’m sorry. I know she would get a lot of energy from you being there, knowing you care about her.” She starts to sob again. “They say she’ll be okay, but I can’t stand to see my child like this. It’s horrible. I just sat there when it happened, I saw it happen, I saw my baby crash, and there wasn’t anything I could do to help her.”
Haley holds Mrs. Nguyen again as the woman’s tiny body pulses with sobs. Not knowing what else to do, I put my hand on the woman’s shoulder. Chris looks like he’d rather be anywhere but here, but he puts his hand on her other shoulder, then slides it over to mine and gives it a squeeze.
Jessica’s mother gasps for air, the crying making it impossible for her to breathe properly. Haley looks at me over the top of Mrs. Nguyen’s head like she doesn’t know how to handle this. She looks like she might feel as guilty as I do. I feel sick with the images of Jessica broken and unconscious. And I realize that no matter how mean Jessica has been to me, she didn’t deserve this. Even more than that, Jessica’s mother doesn’t deserve this grief. I should have done so much more to warn Jessica. To stop this from happening.
“I’m sorry,” I say softly. “Please let Jessica know I’m here for her.”
“Oh, I will,” Mrs. Nguyen manages to respond. “Thank you.”
She looks kindly at me with her wet red eyes, and I realize that inside every grown-up is a little child. I understand that Mrs. Nguyen is a really good person and that she really, really loves her daughter. Sometimes you have to be kind to people you don’t like because of the good people who care about them. We are all connected in this web of life, of love, of hurt. This is why I was supposed to protect Jessica, even if she wasn’t nice to me. Because protecting her would have saved this other person from pain.
I reach out and hug Mrs. Nguyen again, with feeling. I want her to know I truly care. “She’s going to be okay,” I say. I am certain that Jessica will recover as I say it. As certain as I was about her having the crash in the first place.
“I don’t know. All I know is my daughter is up there fighting for her life.” Mrs. Nguyen points to the ceiling, grief contorting her face. “And I can’t do anything to help her.”
On my neck, the amulet grows warm again. I am filled with a peace and understanding that I’ve not felt before, and I realize I must never again be irresponsible with my gift. Jessica is going to be okay. I try to transmit this understanding to Mrs. Nguyen in the form of another hug. “Don’t worry,” I say. “Be strong for her. That’s what she needs now. And you have to believe me when I tell you she is going to be fine.”
Mrs. Nguyen releases herself from my embrace, looks at me, and smiles softly. “You’re right.” She dabs her eyes and swallows her tears. “I shouldn’t be like this. I should be strong for my baby.”
I feel Chris grab my hand. “You’re amazing,” he says softly in my ear.
As Jessica’s mother says goodbye and prepares to go back upstairs with a little more control over her anguish, I finally grasp what my grandmother has been trying to get me to understand. That I was sent here to look into Jessica’s mother’s eyes and understand that no matter what a person does in this world, someone loves them. All of us, haters and friends alike, are somebody’s children.
“Do you really think she’ll be all right?” asks Haley as we walk into the hallway, heading back to the Squeegeemobile.
“I’m convinced,” I say.
“Convinced, like, as seen-in-a-Paski-vision convinced?” she asks.
Chris puts his arm around me and kisses my cheek.
I loop my arm through Haley’s as the three of us walk. “Something like that.”
35
It’s Sunday, and I’m waiting in line with a bunch of other OC people to have breakfast at a Coco’s restaurant with my dad, Melanie, and the twins. Coco’s is kind of like a slightly nicer IHOP, with muffins. I’m trying to ignore the twins’ dear old dead grandma, who has decided to come along to gossip with me. In Japanese. Which I don’t understand. Like I’m going to stand here in the waiting area of the restaurant and tell everyone about it. Uh, no. I learned my lesson from telling Haley about the visions. I don’t need to give a roomful of strangers any reason to think I’m certifiably insane. I wish I knew how to say “go away” in Japanese. I’d do it right now. No, seriously, I would. I’m hoping she’ll eventually get comfy where she is and stop using me as some sort of celestial Morse-code machine. I tune her out for the moment and try to pay attention to Kerani.
“Boom!” he cries. “Splat! It was insane, the way she flipped and splatted all over the track, man.” He pancakes his hands together. An old couple in matching jogging suits moves away from him. I don’t blame them. He sounds like a total psycho.
This is gross. Kerani can’t stop
talking about what happened to Jessica in a horrified but fascinated way. The crash has been replayed over and over on all the sports channels, in “slo mo,” as Kerani says. It’s probably going to end up on one of those “worst road disaster” shows that sick people watch. Jessica looks like a rag doll in the footage, flopping hopelessly off the bike onto the dirt. Every time he says this, it makes me think again about how I could have saved her.
“Archuleta, party of five?” calls the hostess.
“Oh, right here! Here!” cries my dad in a voice entirely too loud. We all follow the waitress to a large round table and take our seats.
“Dude,” says Kerani as he opens his big, laminated menu with the photographs of the food just in case, I don’t know, people here don’t know how to read. “It was so messed up, the way she went splat.”
“That’s enough,” orders Melanie. “I don’t want to hear you speak that way about this again.”
“Why not?” asks Kerani.
“We don’t speak this way of another’s tragedy,” she says.
“I like that rule,” says my dad. He nuzzles Melanie’s neck.
“Eew?” I say under my breath. Dad ignores me.
Melanie turns to my father and says, “Do you know what you feel like having, sweetie?”
Kerani looks at me for support. I shrug.
“No one understands,” he grumbles.
Actually, I do. I understand. But right now I just want to order a mess of French toast with a side of sausage and chow down.
Keoni, meanwhile, can’t stop playing with his Game Boy. Dad can’t stop mooning over Melanie. For the record, my dad has dressed like a psycho, in these weird cowboy-looking jeans with British flags on the back pockets and a flowered shirt with pearly buttons on the pockets. People stare at us as we wait in the vestibule. Melanie is really like a female version of my dad, now that I think about it. She’s wearing ripped jeans and a funky old sweatshirt with hot-green canvas sneakers. Even so, I have a good feeling about her, and she asks me all the questions my dad always forgets to ask, like if I need money or how the school paper is going. Like right now.
“Made up your mind on breakfast?”
I smile at her. “French toast.”
Melanie grins back and points at me. “A girl with good taste. Me? I’m thinking eggs.”
At this, the grandmother starts in, loud. Ohayou. Tadaima. Shinpai shinaide, Pasquala. Nakanaide. Hontou ni ureshii. Kangeki shiteru.
As I try to ignore the voice from the Other Side, my father and Melanie kiss a couple of times, nothing sloppy, but still. It’s sort of disgusting. While I’m normally not, like, super-excited to see a scary tattooed woman with overly bleached hair and a smoker’s voice, it just so happens that this is what our waitress looks like, and I am relieved when she appears with her pad and pencil.
“What can I get you folks?”
Dad and Melanie stop kissing.
“Thank you, ma’am,” I say to the waitress.
“For what?”
“Never mind.”
“You need a few minutes?” she asks.
“No!” I cry. “Don’t go. I’m ready. French toast, please. And a side of sausage.”
Everyone else orders, too, and once the waitress has taken the menus away, my dad clears his throat in that way he has. “Kids,” he says. “Melanie and I wanted to let you know we’ve fallen in love with each other.”
Kerani, Keoni, and I all sort of stare at each other. I want to laugh, but I’m in control of my impulses. The twins, however? They do laugh. I blame their emotional desensitization on video games. But I like them for laughing anyway. I think they’re pretty smart, and brave, and weird.
“Duh,” says Kerani.
“I know you’re probably wondering why we had the need to tell you this,” adds Melanie, pretending her kids haven’t just laughed at her.
“Not really,” says Kerani.
“I was actually only wondering where my coffee refill is,” says Keoni.
“What are you doing drinking coffee?” my dad asks him.
“Drinking coffee,” Keoni answers. He and his brother chortle again.
Dad sighs. Melanie comforts him by placing her head on his shoulder. Ick. Dad says, “We wanted to tell you about us being in love so it wouldn’t be awkward for all of us.”
“Failed mission,” says Kerani.
“Abort, abort,” Keoni chimes in. They laugh again. They have their own strange twin sense of humor that I like.
Dad continues, “And we wanted to make sure it was okay with all of you before we take this any further.”
“Eew?” I say. “Too much information, stop! Please stop!”
Melanie’s mother butts in with: Monku iwanaide. She doesn’t sound happy with me.
“Emotionally,” says my dad. “Take this any further emotionally.”
“Thank God,” says Kerani.
“No physical details between parental units need be divulged at the breakfast table,” says Keoni.
“Or ever,” adds Kerani.
“We just wanted your blessing,” says Melanie.
“Because,” my dad finishes the thought for her, “we are planning to spend a lot of time together in the future.”
Kerani holds up his hand like the pope and makes the sign of the cross over the table. Our parents ignore him.
Dad says, “Melanie and I both agree that even though we would like to be in a relationship with each other, our kids come first.”
They look at us like they’re waiting for an answer. I don’t know exactly what they’re hoping we’ll say. Thankfully, my phone rings at this moment. I take it out of my silver handbag and look at the number on the caller ID. I don’t recognize it.
“Don’t answer that right now,” says Dad. “We’re having a serious discussion.”
I press the phone on. “Hello?” Dad and Melanie share an exasperated look.
I hear a brief silence on the other end of the line. Then a familiar feline voice. “Paski? It’s Jessica Nguyen.” Again, she draws out the A at the end of her name, Jessicaaaaaaahhhhh . . .
Oh my God. Just when you thought a moment could not possibly get any more awkward and strange. “How are you?”
“I’ve been better.”
“I’m so sorry,” I say. I wonder if she has breathing trouble from the body cast. Poor Jessica.
“I was calling to say —” She pauses. Sighs as if she is agonized. “I’m calling to say I’m sorry.”
“You are?” I fight the urge to swallow my tongue in shock. Across the table, Dad is staring me down. I know what he wants. He wants me to hang up and stop being so selfish.
Jessica coughs and laughs lightly to herself before speaking again. “My mom told me how you came by the hospital to see me. She said you were way nice to her, and you said nice things about me. So . . . I’m sorry for the whole thing with the pool.”
“You are?”
Jessica pauses before answering, like this is very hard for her. “Yeah. My mom really likes you. So I’m considering calling everyone important from school to tell them you’re cool,” she announces cheerily.
“You are?” Is that a good thing? Or is it something that’s only going to make me be more like the that kid I don’t want to be?
“Haley swears you tried to save my life or something,” she continues like she’s bored stiff. “I don’t know. But anyway, you’re okay. You’re not that bad. Everyone listens to me. So cheer up, you’re going to be popular now.”
“Uh, okay,” I say.
My dad makes a hand motion like he wants me to hang up the phone. I hold up my hand to ask him to wait. This is important. Or at least weird enough to seem important.
“I also had a favor I wanted you to do for me,” Jessicaaaaaaaaah says. “A favor that’s good for you and good for me. Mutually beneficial, as they say in the corporate world. But I want to ask you in person.”
“At the hospital?”
“No,” she says. “They se
nt me home. You have to come here. Today.”
“I don’t know if I can.” I could, of course. But I’m still terrified of Jessica.
“If you care about your future, you will,” she says. “Get a pen and write down my address. Now.”
I do as she says, then hang up and look at my dad and the others. I am very curious about what Jessica has to say, but afraid. I want to tell Dad, but I know he’d refuse to let me see her.
“Everything okay, Chinita?” my dad asks. Melanie’s mother, wherever she is, interrupts, and I end up repeating her words instead of my own.
“Watashi wa kamaimasen,” I say. Just to, like, shut her up. Because she wants me to say it. Melanie and the boys stare at me.
“My mother?” asks Melanie, a look of wonder on her face.
“I think so,” I say, glad to not have to tell my dad about Jessica. I have to go see her. I feel it. But I know it’s not smart to do so. But she did apologize, right? That’s a big step. And I’d love to be popular. Who wouldn’t? “She wants me to tell you mattaku sono toori.” I shrug and wait for the translation, adding, “She sounds pretty happy. Oh, she just said li kangae desu ne.”
“She is happy, yes.” Melanie beams. She hugs my father and says, “She thinks we’re doing the right thing. She likes you.”
Our meals come, and even though I wouldn’t want to admit it, I’m excited to sit at a table at Coco’s on a Sunday morning with my dad and his girlfriend’s family. I always wanted him to have a girlfriend, or a wife, and siblings could be nice. Oh, and a mom. I always wanted one of those, too. I mean, one of those who actually did things like call me “kiddo” and tell me nice things.
Dad cuts a pancake in two and folds the half in his mouth. Melanie watches and shakes her head. “Rudy,” she says. “Smaller bites, sweetheart. There are people watching.”
Dad smiles through the food and speaks with his mouth full. “Sorry.”
“Swallow before talking, please,” she adds.
Dad munches for a while, swallows, looks at me. “So you’re okay with this?”
Haters Page 24
