by Liu, Cynthea
Chapter Nine
The next afternoon, Cece got back to her room, reeling from the day’s classes. All of her professors had starting talking about midterms, and Professor Hu went on and on about how topics for the final paper would be due in a couple of weeks: “choose wise—forty percent!” To top it off, Cece still had a mountain of work to do that night, which included finishing a paper for archaeology and studying for a language quiz. She tossed her backpack onto her desk and sank into her chair. Then she glanced at Jess’s side of the room. Everything was the same as yesterday, except the skirt that had been on Jess’s desk was now hanging from her closet door. That made two days in a row that Cece hadn’t seen her roommate. Jess was probably with Lisa. Or hanging out with Will.
Will. When was the last time she daydreamed about him? She pictured him in that cute baby blue polo and sighed.
Cece opened her laptop and worked for a couple of hours to finish her paper, and just as she was about to open her language textbook, someone knocked at the door.
Cece got up, thinking it was probably Kallyn, wanting to hang out.
She opened the door and found Will standing in front of her. Her heart beat faster. “Hey, Will.”
“Hey, Cece.” He glanced over her shoulder. “Is Jess here?”
“Um, I thought she was with you or Lisa.”
“She was with me. But I sorta upset her, and I was hoping she came back here.” He sighed. “I’ll check with Lisa then.” He turned to leave. “Actually, Cece, can I talk to you about this? I could use a girl’s opinion.”
“Uh . . . ” Cece wasn’t sure she wanted to act as counselor for Will and Jess’s relationship, but she couldn’t exactly say no either. “Sure.” She let him in. “So what happened?”
Will sat in Jess’s desk chair. “Well. . . I’m sure it’s no surprise to anyone that Jess and I have been hanging out a lot.”
“Yeah,” Cece said. Did he have to remind her?
“And the thing is. . .well, she was kinda driving me crazy. I mean, like in a bad way.”
“Really?” Cece said.
“Yeah. Everywhere I turned, there she was. Look, don’t get me wrong, Cece. I’m not knocking your roommate. Jess is a great friend. She’s cool. But in doses, you know?”
Cece nodded. “I think I understand.”
“Anyway, we were hanging out in my room, and I finally got the nerve to tell her I needed some space. And that’s when she got upset and stormed out.” Will let out a breath. “So what should I do?”
Cece bit her lip. She was so out of her element. How could she possibly give Will advice about Jess when she totally liked him? “I’d let her calm down first, maybe? You’re probably the last person she wants to see now.”
“Yeah...” he agreed.
“I’m sure this will work itself out somehow.” That sounded good.
“All right, Cece. Wait, then talk.” Will got up. “Thanks.”
“Sure.”
He started for the door, then turned back. “I’ve been meaning to ask . . . how are things with, uh, Beijing?”
Cece smiled. “Good. I think everything’s under control. And your parents?”
“It’s been pretty quiet. Dad probably hasn’t broken the news yet.” He glanced at the door. “Well, I’d better go.”
“Right.”
But he made no move to leave. He only looked at her for what seemed like a really long time. Finally, he said, “Seriously, if you need anything, let me know.”
Cece tucked her hair behind her ear, feeling the weight of his gaze. “Thanks, Will.”
Suddenly, the door opened, and Cece and Will turned.
Jessica was standing there, a stunned look on her face. She glanced at Cece, then Will. “I thought somebody needed some space. Whatever!”
“Jess—” Will said.
The door closed as quickly as it had opened.
Cece got up. “I’ll talk to her.”
“Let me go with you.”
“No.” She opened the door. “I think you’d better stay here.”
Before Will could respond, Cece hurried after Jess, who was already near the elevators. “Jess, wait!” She caught up to her.
Jess turned around, glaring. “I have never been so embarrassed!” She pushed the button for the elevator. “If Will and you are hooking up, why didn’t you just tell me instead of going behind my back?”
“Jess, we aren’t hooking up—”
“Don’t try to deny it, Cece.” She pressed the button some more. “I knew something was going on since that night at karaoke.” She looked toward the ceiling. “I’ve been so stupid! You’ve liked him this whole time, haven’t you?”
Cece couldn’t answer.
The elevator dinged open.
“You know what?” Jess stepped in. “Don’t bother telling me. Your silence says it all.”
Cece could only stare at her as the doors closed.
That night, Cece met with Kallyn in the student lounge in her dorm. They sat on the couch while Cece relayed what had happened from the moment Will showed up at her door to Jess leaving in the elevator. “So Jess knows you like Will now, huh?” Kallyn said.
“I didn’t deny it,” Cece replied, “and after she was gone, Will and I decided we’d better just lay off. You should have seen how mad she was.”
“And now she thinks you guys have something going on.”
“Yup.”
“But you kinda do, don’t you?”
Cece stiffened. “Excuse me?”
“The way you described how he lingered in your room, how he looked at you just before Jess showed up—that didn’t sound like nothing to me. He likes you, Cece.”
“He hardly knows me. Maybe he was just being nice.”
“Please. You like him, and you hardly know him. Are you just being nice?”
“No, but . . . ”
“But what?”
“Well, if he likes me so much, why hasn’t he asked me out?”
“Uh... what have we just been talking about? He’s been with Jess twenty-four/seven since the program started. And if that’s not the sole reason, then maybe you haven’t given him any idea that you’re interested. Have you sent out any smoke signals?”
Cece nodded. “I have.”
Kallyn raised an eyebrow. “Since when?”
“Um . . . when I went out to the club. We touched knees. And then during karaoke, I joked around with him.”
Kallyn laughed. “Yeah, that’s smoke signals. There’s your problem. Everyone knows that guys are dumb when it comes to reading girls. And I’m guessing you are about as hard to read as a Chinese textbook. So get out there and start flirting.”
Cece shook her head. “Bad idea. Not now.”
“Why not?”
“Jess.”
“What about her?”
“Hello, Kallyn. If I start hitting on Will—if I even knew how—it would make Jess ballistic, and with Beijing barely over a week away, I seriously don’t need that right now. I want things calm, peaceful, sane. So let’s just talk about what I’m supposed to do next about Jess, okay?
“Fine.” Kallyn sat forward. “You keep doing nothing.”
“Nothing?”
“Well, you certainly won’t apologize to her because what would you be apologizing for? And you can’t lie to her and say you don’t like Will when you already admitted to it, in not so many words. Seriously, aside from escaping the country, you have no other choices. So keep sitting it out. See what happens.”
Cece thought it over. “Sit it out, like, forever?”
“Yup.”
Cece leaned back in her chair. “Okay, at least that’s easy.”
The next day, Cece went to the theater to meet her project team. As she opened the door, she wondered if Jess would be there. Or if she did show up, would she claw her eyes out or what? When Cece walked in, everyone but her roommate was there, and she felt a little relieved.
“So, Cece, where’s Jessica?” Alex sai
d.
Cece shrugged. “Um, I’m not sure.”
“I think she’ll be here,” Will said. “I just talked to her this morning.” He gave Cece a reassuring look.
Interesting. Maybe he somehow fixed the situation.
“All right,” Alex said. “We’ll wait.”
Chris kicked his feet up on the chair in front of him. “I’m in no hurry.”
Just then, the doors to the theater swung open, and Jess strolled in, looking better than ever. “Hey, everybody.”
She came down the aisle and took a seat next to Cece. “So, what topic did we get?
Cece stared at Jess.
“What’s up, Cece?” Jess said.
“Um, not much.” What exactly had Will said to her?
“I checked the board yesterday,” Alex said. “We got our number-one choice—the Emperor.”
“Excellent.” Jess leaned back and studied her fingernails. It was like nothing had happened the night before. Cece decided she’d have to figure it out later. She turned her attention to the meeting.
“So, I took the liberty of doing some research last night.” Alex pulled A History of China from his backpack. “I think we need to get acquainted with who Qin Shi Huang really was.” He passed the book to Chris, who opened it to a bookmarked page.
“One of the most interesting things I learned,” Alex continued, “was that the guy was a total nut.”
Chris looked at the book. “And kind of ugly, too.” He passed it to Jess, who quickly handed it to Cece. Cece thumbed through the pages and read the headers. “Succession to the Empire,” “Achievements and Miles-tones”...
“So what made this guy so whacko?” Chris asked.
“The man was brutal,” Alex said. “Killed anyone who got in his way. He amassed a huge army and basically subdued all of the warring states in China. And once he unified China, he began this quest to discover how to live forever. He even started eating mercury, thinking it would make him immortal. Of course, all that did was made him sick and even crazier until he eventually died.”
Cece stopped flipping through the book. “That’s pretty horrible,” she said. “But what does all of that have to do with anthropology?”
That’s when Alex leaned in, as if Cece had asked precisely the right question. “Well, you know the Terra Cotta Warriors, the archaeological dig we’re going to see next week?”
“Yeah.”
“Qin Shi Huang would have never built an army of that scale if he didn’t believe in the afterlife in a big way. And if you don’t understand what the guy had been thinking, you wouldn’t really know what that whole site is about.”
“So,” Chris said, “what we cover in our documentary is how this man’s craziness resulted in the Terra Cotta Warriors?
“Not exactly,” Alex replied. “But I think we can find a way to talk about the culture of living in that time period. What people believed then and how the Terra Cotta Warriors are a physical representation of those beliefs.”
“I see what you’re saying,” Will said. “In our film, we could focus on at least two fields within anthropology: culture and archaeology.”
Cece nodded. “Sounds good to me.”
“Great,” Alex said. “We have a plan. Jess, you agree?”
Jess yawned. “Just tell me what I need to do.”
“Okay.” Alex pulled out a notepad. “Let’s start by divvying up responsibilities....”
The team spent the next couple of hours thinking of everything they would need for a completed project, then assigned roles. They agreed that everyone would participate in the filming. Alex and Chris would be in charge of the script, Cece would work on the subtitles, and Will would take care of the set. Jess volunteered for the costumes.
“So tomorrow,” Alex said, wrapping up the meeting, “let’s take in as much as we can when we visit the Terra Cotta Warriors. If no one minds, I’ll take the video camera first and get footage that we can use in our film later.”
No one objected, and they all packed up. Cece put away her notebook and noticed Jess was waiting for her in the aisle. “Let’s go, Cece,” Jess said.
Cece’s forehead wrinkled. Were they back on good terms? She slung her purse onto her shoulder, and they walked out, heading for the dorms.
“Okay, Jess,” Cece said, “what’s going on? Just yesterday, you acted like you were ready to kill me and Will.”
“I know,” Jess said. “And I’m sorry about that.” She sounded sincere. “I realize you have nothing to do with this.”
Cece began to relax. Thank goodness.
“I mean, sure, at first I was convinced you were after Will behind my back. But after I stopped to think about it, that’s silly. You’ve been nothing but a friend to me, and with all that studying you do and given all the time I was with Will, how would you have had the opportunity?”
“Right.” Cece said, glad that Jess was seeing the truth. Well, most of it anyway.
“Of course, Will found me this morning and tried to explain the same thing. But all that did was solidify what I was thinking already . . . . ”
“And what was that?” Cece said.
“That I should be mad at him, of course. The guy totally led me on, then tossed me to the street like I didn’t matter. What a waste of time! Seriously, just being in the same room with him is torture.”
“Okay, but now I’m confused. If you’re mad at him, why did you just act like nothing had happened?”
“Well, obviously, we made up. At least that’s what he thinks. I told him we shouldn’t let anything get in the way of our friendship. Even space. Wasn’t that big of me?”
“So you’re not crushing on him anymore.”
“No way. Besides, I’m beginning to think Chris is much more my speed. Did you notice how he looked at me during the meeting? Now that guy has taste.”
Cece stopped walking and stared at Jessica. Unbelievable. The girl could turn her emotions on and off just like that.
“Cece, stop looking at me like that.”
“I’m just trying to figure you out, that’s all.”
“C,” Jess continued toward the dorm, “you should know by now that someone like me can’t be so easily figured out.”
The next morning, Cece had a moment to check her e-mail before she had to meet the group for their excursion to the Terra Cotta Warriors and Horses.
------------------------ To: [email protected]
From: [email protected]
Subject: Mom alert, Mom alert!
Hey Chica,
I bumped into your mother at the mall. She totally tried to fish some info out of me. She asked if I’d heard from you, saying something like, “Cece must be having too much fun to e-mail her mother. Maybe you’ve heard from her? I hear she’s going to Beijing next week.”
I’m not really sure what I said because I was too busy thinking, don’t tell her about the orphanage, DON’T TELL HER ABOUT THE ORPHANAGE. I think I blubbered something like, “Have you tried calling?”
She sorta blushed and said she had. So contact her, The Great Call of China please. Your mom is so sweet and I would die if she ever found out I was hiding something from her. I think I won’t go to the mall again until you come back. Thanks a lot!
Love,
Al
Cece wrote Alison back, thanking her for keeping up her cover. Mom had called? She took the cell from her backpack and realized she never powered it on. No wonder she hadn’t known. She filled Alison in on her plans for the orphanage. She also relayed the whole Jess and Will saga. Next, she composed an e-mail to her mother, apologizing for being so hard to reach and explaining it away with details about all of the schoolwork she had to do. This time she ended her message with extra hugs and kisses, but she knew that it wouldn’t be enough to keep her mother from worrying. Cece sighed, then grabbed her purse and headed out to meet the group.
She boarded the bus and sat beside Kallyn for the ninety-minute trip out of the city.
“
So, what’s the deal with Jess?” Kallyn said in a low voice. “I’m surprised that she’s even within ten feet of Will.”
Cece glanced behind her. Jess was sitting next to Will, but she seemed to be focusing her attention on Chris. “Well, Jess talked to me yesterday, and apparently, she is trying to be the bigger person by pretending to be Will’s friend—don’t tell me how weird that sounds—I know. And I’ve been deemed an innocent party in the whole fiasco. And get this—you see that guy she’s talking to? Chris?”
“Yeah. Wait a second, don’t tell me. He’s the next victim.”
“Uh-huh.”
“Man, Jessica is something else.”
Cece nodded. “Tell me about it.”
The bus made its way out of the bustling city, taking a highway into the countryside. From the window, Cece saw miles of flat grassland that looked barely touched, except for the occasional groupings of shacks or signs hinting at civilization nearby. As they drew closer to their destination, the landscape turned into something that resembled suburbia.
Soon, they pulled into a large parking lot, and Cece and Kallyn got off, eager to take in this magnificent place they had seen only in pictures until now. Mark made an announcement to the group. “It will be a long walk from here,” he warned. “Xi’an has put a lot of energy into building a commercial area between the lot and the museum. Resist shopping now. We’ll give you time to look around afterward.” He and Jenny led the group through an area that looked like a fancy outdoor mall. Restaurants and shops flanked both sides of the main pedestrian path, and the path itself was decorated with abstract statues and fountains. In addition to the retail stores, vendors with makeshift tables stood displaying souvenirs, ranging from beautiful paper kites to ubiquitous replicas of the Terra Cotta Warriors.
Once the group arrived at the museum complex, Cece stood before a wide-open square with modern-looking buildings on the left and right, and one larger, domed building in front. Flowers decorated the center of the square. Jenny and Mark stood before the flowers, and Jenny began the tour. “The Terra Cotta Warriors and Horses you are about to see are funerary statues created in 246 B.C. for Qin Shi Huang, the first emperor of unified China. The site was discovered by farmers who were digging a well in 1974. Since its discovery, archaeologists have excavated more than seven thousand warriors, horses, and weapons. We will begin by visiting Pit One, the largest of the three pits open to the public.”
