I'm Ok

by Patti Kim

  PERMANENT MARKER: $0. (Borrow one of Ms. Lincoln’s Sharpie markers. She has a box full of them on her desk.)

  TAPE: $0. (Use Ms. Lincoln’s tape. She keeps rolls of masking tape in her supply closet.)

  TIME: $0. (Set up appointments during my free time before school, during lunch and recess, after school, and on weekends and holidays.)

  PRIDE: $0. (Braiding hair is not going to look cool. But a man has to do what a man has to do. I must socially prepare myself. My manhood will be brought into question. But what greater duty does a man have than to provide for his family? And I’ll get to touch girls. How many boys at school get to touch girls and get paid for it? And the girls will like me for making their hair look so beautiful. Who needs boys when you can have a flock of girls following you around with cash in hand? I must focus on the money. I must press on toward the goal to win the prize. Philippians 3:14.)

  Step #5: Get money to cover initial expenses.

  (Since my initial expenses amount to $0, skip this step and go on to the next.)

  Step #6: Design advertisements and business cards.

  (My flyer.)

  Do you want to be beautiful?

  Do you want to be pretty?

  Do you want to be popular?

  If yes is your answer,

  GET BRAIDED BY OK.

  Call 555-6627.

  Don’t delay! Treat yourself today!

  [Place a picture of Medusa with crazy, unruly snake hair here and label it “Before.”]

  [Place a picture of Medusa with the same head of snakes but braided nice and neatly here and label it “After.”]

  (My business card.)

  GET BRAIDED BY OK

  555-6627

  By appointment only

  Step #7: Tell people about your business.

  (Hang flyers on the church bulletin board and at school. Braid the hair of the most popular girl in church: Mi Young Kim. Braid the hair of the most popular girl in my class: Cassandra Cruz. Offer them a one-time free braiding session, because if they get their hair done by Ok, every girl will want it too. Mi Young and Cassandra will spread the word. Word of mouth is the best advertisement. They’ll tell two friends, and they’ll tell two friends, and so on and so on. I’ll be known as the braid-meister, the braidiac, the braid whiz. Appointments will have to be booked weeks in advance. They’ll fight over me. Girls, girls, I only have two hands. Once demand is high and supply is low, charge more.)

  Step #8: Keep track of your money.

  (During all my seven years of schooling, I’ve earned nothing but As in math. I’m in the advanced math class with seventh and some eighth graders. I think I can keep track of my money. During my first week open for business, I anticipate one appointment. I’m keeping my expectations low. It’s the secret to happiness. It prevents disappointment, depression, and failure. One appointment means fifteen dollars. During the second week I expect two appointments. By then Cassandra and Mi Young will have spread the word. Two appointments means thirty dollars. That’s a lot of money. During the third week I think it’s reasonable to predict three appointments, which means forty-five dollars. By the end of my first month, I can make over one hundred dollars.

  (Underestimation is fine, but I do need to prepare myself for possible exponential growth. Whatever money I earn, I first give to my mother to help pay rent and bills. Once the basics are taken care of, I can treat myself. I want new jeans. I want new shoes. I want Nikes, the goddess of victory on my feet. I want a real haircut from a real barber. No more Ŏmma cutting my hair with her sewing scissors. I want the deluxe fifty-five-dollar school picture package with the two eight-by-tens and, like, hundreds of those wallet-size photos of me with my new professionally cut head of hair. I can glue those onto my business cards. I want to take my mother out to a fancy restaurant where we can order steak. I want my own private jet. I’ll fly us to Korea, where we can show off to our family how rich we are, all because of me. I want a bicycle. I want sunglasses like the ones Mr. Rufus wears. I want a violin. I want a dog.)

  • • •

  Keeping my head lowered, I open my eyes. My pants are too short. Socks show. My fake Chucks are too tight. The duct tape covering the holes from the inside is starting to peel off. If only money grew like I do. If only we could keep up with each other. For every inch, twenty dollars. For every pound, a fifty. Then I wouldn’t eye the cash on the offering plate that’s coming my way. Lead me not into temptation. As I hold the offering plate, I sniff the bills and hesitate before passing it along.

  seven

  We’re moving from our two-bedroom on Sixty-Fourth to a one-bedroom on Sixty-Eighth. The apartment has the same layout, same balcony, is within the same Parkside Gardens complex, but minus a bedroom, minus the view of the creek, and minus one hundred dollars on rent. We’re higher up, moving from the second floor to the third. I guess you can say we’re moving up in the world. It’s a shorter walk to the bus stop. The place smells like Clorox. The view is of a parking lot.

  I can feel the walls closing in on me. My world shrinks. But my mother says we have to do this. We have to save money. We need money, money, money. It’s either this or no electricity or no telephone or no three meals. That hundred-dollar prize for winning the talent show would come in handy just about now.

  She also sold my father’s 1972 Mercury Cougar XR7 to the eager Deacon Koh, the church widower who’s crazy about fellowshipping with my mother. He has skin that’s cratered like the moon. He has beady eyes. His first wife died in Korea. Cause of death is unknown. His second wife died in America a couple of years ago. Cause of death was cancer. He doesn’t have any children. He’s got “desperate for a wife” wallpapered all over him. He’s on the hunt for wife number three. He’s rich. Depending on whom you’re eavesdropping on, he’s either a businessman or a life insurance agent. No one knows for sure, and no one bothers to investigate because he gives money to the church and does a lot, like sing in the choir and play the guitar and count the offering money and give rides to old people and fellowship with the widows. I smell a crook. I’ve noticed him offering my mother coffee. Hey, creep, she doesn’t drink coffee. He tries to strike up a conversation about the sermon and the weather. He tries to talk to her about the stages of grief and feeling your feelings and letting go and moving on. I guess he talked her into selling my father’s car. Or she talked him into buying it. She hated that car.

  My father loved that old car. It was the green of the grass that grows on the White House lawn. It had a white vinyl top that matched the white driving cap he wore to hide his thinning hair. I was with him the night he picked it up from Pete’s Garage. Just the two of us taking care of the manly business of buying an antique car. He refused to call it used. It was antique. It was historical. I stood behind my father as he offered the long-haired Pete, who had hands as tarred up as his own, a wad of cash for a set of keys. He drove it home with the windows down, with me riding next to him on the passenger side. The seat cradled me. I was too low and couldn’t see much of what was outside, but I didn’t even try to hang out the window or edge myself up for a better view, because I wanted to stay close to my dad. His right hand shifted gears. His left hand palmed the steering wheel. His feet pumped the pedals as if in some dance. He was free and in control and driving toward possibilities. He didn’t smile, just as Clint would never have smiled, but he looked happy, like things were finally going his way. I nestled into the passenger seat, feeling every vibration and jerk, and committed my father’s new mood to memory.

  If my mother would learn to drive, we could have kept the car. But she refuses. I tell her that driving would make her free. No more waiting for buses or catching cabs or walking in the rain or running late or hitchhiking or begging for rides. She could go to the store whenever she wanted. But she won’t learn, not after what happened before. Once upon a time, my father did try to teach her how to drive. She had even gotten her learner’s permit. She was practicing at the Safeway parking lot. She thought the
car was in reverse, but it wasn’t. She ran into a parked car, smashing its headlight. My father called her an idiot, yelled at her, took over the wheel, and raced out of there like it was a getaway. Hit and run. She cried. He told her to shut up. I crouched on the floor of the backseat, scared my mother would get kicked out of the country.

  I can see why she’d wanted to get rid of my father’s car. Sure, we need the money, but that Cougar was a sore reminder of how my father had belittled her and how she’d failed.

  “You take the bedroom,” my mother says, unpacking a box in the kitchen.

  “No, I like it here,” I say, and sit down on my mattress in the dining area.

  “Don’t be crazy. A son needs his own room,” she says, and blows her nose. I think she’s crying.

  “I do have my own room. I have all this to myself. Besides, I like being next to the kitchen, and I like having the TV right here. This is the best,” I say.

  “No, it’s not,” she says, turning on the faucet.

  “Ŏmma, it’s okay. This is good,” I say.

  “How can you say this is good? This is bad. This is bad. I feel so sorry,” she says.

  “No, don’t feel sorry. This isn’t bad. This is better. This is much better than the other place,” I say, bouncing on the mattress.

  “You’re throwing up dust. Don’t bounce,” she says.

  “It smells better here,” I say, and stop bouncing.

  “It smells like a hospital.”

  “It’s brighter. You were always complaining about how dark it was over on that side. We’re on the bright side now,” I say.

  She wipes the countertop, not saying anything, her back to me. I push the mattress into the corner and start unpacking my trash bag of stuff. My mother throws the sponge into the sink, rushes to the bathroom, and shuts the door. She’s sad. She’s crying. I don’t know what to do. I go to the kitchen, pick up the sponge, and finish cleaning the counter. I check the phone for a dial tone. It works. I switch the light on and off. It works. I check the dead bolt on the door. It works. I slide open the balcony door, step out, and slide it shut. It works.

  The air outside is crisp and sharp. The sun shines. I lean over the railing and look out at the parking lot. Three kids play basketball with a hoop made from a bottomless bucket tied to a sign. They could use one more player to even the teams out. Maybe I can play.

  Who am I kidding? I can’t play basketball. I tried shooting hoops with my father once, and I couldn’t make a single basket. I was too short. My father told me that you don’t have to be tall to play well on a team. Make up for it with speed. All you need to do is get the ball to the tall kid who can shoot. I don’t know if anyone would want me on his team.

  I hear barking. I look down. On the balcony below ours sits a big dog, staring up at me. He’s brown with black spots and looks just like Scooby Doo. I smile and wave, wondering if he might help me solve the mystery of the missing father. His tail wags, as if welcoming me to the building.

  eight

  Ms. Lincoln stands at the board, telling the class to “put the correct em-PHA-sis on the correct syl-LA-ble.” We chuckle. The school secretary’s voice chimes into the room through the intercom. “Ms. Lincoln, can you send Oak Lee down to the office? The principal wants to have a talk.”

  “Awwww,” the class says.

  “Will do,” the teacher says, then looks at me and nods.

  This is the first time I’ve been called to the principal’s office. I walk quickly. Sweaty palms. Accelerated heart rate. Heavy breathing. I’m in trouble. The hall is empty and quiet. The glossy, bloodred cinder-block walls make me think of the flames of hell, where there shall be nonstop weeping and gnashing of teeth for all of eternity. The water fountain cycles on. The GET BRAIDED BY OK flyer I taped above the fountain is gone. Two plus two equals four. This summoning has something to do with my braiding business.

  “Good afternoon, Ms. Bierman,” I say, stepping into the main office. The place smells of Enjoli, the eight-hour perfume for the twenty-four-hour woman. I know exactly how it smells because I sprayed it on myself at Peoples Drug Store. The free-sample bottle had a sticker on it that said TRY ME. So I did. I reeked of Enjoli all day long.

  “Hello there, Oak! And how are you today?” she says.

  “Fine, thank you. And you?”

  “I’m fine too. You can go right in, dear. She’s expecting you.”

  I step into the principal’s office. Without looking up from the important papers she’s signing with her fancy silver pen, Mrs. Farmer says, “Go ahead and shut the door.” I shut the door.

  The light in her office is nothing like the light that the fluorescent tubes give off in the rest of the school building. On her desk stands a lamp that casts a soft spotlight over her work, leaving the rest of the room in shadows. It’s soap-opera light, the kind of dimness people get all romantic in. It’s supposed to be calming and relaxing, but it has the opposite effect on me. I’m nervous like I’m being chugged up a roller coaster. I’ve never ridden one before, but I’ve seen enough of them on TV to know I hate roller coasters.

  “Sit down,” she says. I sit down.

  Principal Farmer is the exact opposite of her secretary. While Ms. Bierman is plump and soft, exuding permissiveness and generosity, Mrs. Farmer is thin and hard. She isn’t going to put up with any of your nonsense. I wonder if she wears No nonsense panty hose. She certainly doesn’t wear Enjoli perfume, although she looks like the twenty-four-hour woman, with the framed college diploma hanging behind her, along with pictures of her husband, kids, and dog back there in the shadows. Bet she has a nice house. Everyone knows she drives a nice car. Her shiny black Cadillac is parked in the designated principal’s space. Principal Farmer is a real twenty-four-hour woman, and she doesn’t need some eight-hour perfume to make her feel like one. If Mrs. Farmer has a fragrance, it’s the smell of a yardstick. She smells like a yardstick and has all the functions of one: to measure, threaten, and punish.

  “What is this all about?” she says, looking up at me. She puts down her fancy silver pen and picks up my flyers, all five copies of them.

  “I’m sorry,” I say. The magic words of appeasement to get me out of here fast. Standard response when you’re in trouble. Don’t say too much. Like in an interrogation room. Should I ask for a lawyer? Where’s Trent Bedderman when you need him?

  “It won’t happen again. I promise,” I say.

  “Can you answer my question?”

  “I’m sorry, but what was the question again?”

  “What is this all about?”

  “It’s about trying to make some money,” I say.

  “You do understand there are rules in the student guidebook about soliciting to the student body without approval from authorities,” she says.

  “I didn’t know that, ma’am. I’m sorry. It won’t happen again,” I say again. I want to tell her everyone sells stuff to everyone around here. Candy, gum, homework, tests, smelly stickers, puffy stickers, cigarettes, matches, firecrackers, glue, pencils with those annoying pom-poms on the ends, all sorts of stupid junk behind her back, and here I am selling a service as beneficial and beautifying as braiding hair out in the open, and she puts an end to it.

  “I will not tolerate my school turning into some black market,” she says.

  “No, ma’am,” I say.

  “I am well aware of the prohibited business transactions taking place on my school property, and I plan on putting an end to all of it,” she says, and leans back in her chair. I stare down at my sorry duct-taped Chucks. I hear her open a desk drawer. “Do you own one of these?”

  I take a peek. Mrs. Farmer holds one of those pom-pom pencils. She wags it as she would a finger. Naughty. Naughty. Naughty. The orange pom-pom head bobs.

  “No, ma’am,” I say.

  “Do you know who’s been selling these silly things?” she says.

  “No, ma’am,” I say, looking her straight in the eyes. Avoiding eye contact is a sure sign o
f lying, so I make sure our eyes meet. I know who sells them, but I’m not telling. Her glasses, which are chained around her neck, hang off the tip of her nose. She takes them off and lets them hang against her chest like a bib. I look back down at my sad imitation Chucks. I need to get out of here. “Mrs. Farmer?” I ask.

  “Yeeees,” she says, leaning closer to me. She thinks I’m going to snitch.

  “I’m sorry, but may I please go to the bathroom? I drank a lot today,” I say, pressing my knees together.

  She leans back and sighs in disappointment. “Very well, but no more of this,” she says, tapping the pom-pom pencil on my flyers. “Consider this a warning. Next time I call your parents. Understand?”

  “Yes, ma’am,” I say, pressing my knees together and making the I’m going to piss right here, right now face.

  “Close the door on your way out,” she says.

  “Thank you,” I say, and leave.

  With each step back to the classroom, my shame turns to anger. Call my parents. I dare you, Principal Farmer. My father is dead. My mother won’t understand what you’re talking about. I’ll need to translate. I’ll tell her you called to congratulate me on making Principal’s List again and again and again. Straight As. We are so proud of Ok. Ok is an excellent student. Ok will succeed in life.

  Call my parents. Good luck with that, Principal Farmer. Our phone might get turned off because we can’t pay our bills. We’re poor. You don’t get it because you drive a shiny black Cadillac, and your family is all intact, like in the framed photograph in your own private office, where you control the lighting and summon model students like myself to torture them.

  What did I ever do wrong? I’ve never gotten detention. I’ve never made trouble. I’ve never been called to your office. Who cares if kids are selling pom-pom pencils? What’s wrong with that? It shows initiative and entrepreneurship. Why don’t you leave us alone? Why don’t you crack down on the bullies and the cheaters and the school-skippers and whoever’s drawing swastikas on the bathroom walls?