The Way You Make Me Feel

by Maurene Goo

  We moved into the cemetery, currently the only place in the city with lush green grass. There was a winding path that took us to our destination, lit in intervals by torches. We wove between various tombstones—some modest brass plates laid into the earth, others ostentatious sculptures made of shiny black marble, and even the occasional cherub fountain marking the final resting place of some old rich person or another.

  Rose glanced around. “This is really strange, you know. Watching movies around all these dead people.”

  “Hey, the dead need to be entertained, too,” I said.

  We arrived at a big grassy lawn spread out in front of a giant wall where the movie would be projected. I beelined for a good spot in the center and tossed a couple of blankets down. People started mad-dashing around us for spots. These movie screenings were like Black Friday sales for movie buffs—sometimes I feared for my life. If I died by Converse stampede, I’d be one pissed-off ghost.

  I pulled out some miniature party hats the size of shot glasses. “We have to wear these.”

  Rose laughed and picked a mint green one with gold glitter trim. “Yes!”

  I put a purple one on Hamlet, adjusting the gold elastic behind his ears. “So handsome.”

  “Wait, I want to wear the pink one,” he said, reaching for it in the bag. “It matches my outfit better.” He was wearing an oatmeal-colored shirt flecked with pastel fibers and dark brown shorts. I was learning that Hamlet was quite the fussy dresser.

  Unlike me. I gestured down at my black denim cutoffs and ratty striped tank. “Give me that one, then. Purple will be stunning on me.”

  Once we were properly outfitted with tiny hats, I held up party blowers. “We have to get this out of our system now, or people will kill us during the movie.” After handing them to Rose and Hamlet, I blew so hard into mine that the honk echoed throughout the lawn. People threw dirty looks at us.

  “You love it!” I blew again.

  Rose hid her face behind her hand. “Oh my God.”

  Hamlet blew into his, but at a moderate volume. “I don’t want to get in trouble,” he said apologetically.

  I blew hard again. Rose flinched and sank down into her chair, separating her entire being from me. Hamlet laughed, and I honked and hummed in rapid succession along to “Happy Birthday.”

  Rose sank lower and lower into her chair, but Hamlet was laughing so hard his face matched the color of his tiny pink hat.

  While he was recovering, I pulled out a small cake that had Transformers toys all over it. It said “Happy Birthday, Son!” on it. This time Rose burst out laughing. “What the heck?”

  Hamlet placed candles in it, methodical and thoughtful in their placement so that they complemented the tiny robots and cars and things. I took out a lighter and lit the candles. “It’s not like there weren’t more appropriate cakes, but we thought this one provided the most entertainment.”

  “Good call,” she said, a grin still plastered on her face.

  We sang “Happy Birthday” to her, Hamlet in a low voice, kind of embarrassed the entire time. I, of course, sang with vibrato in a volume so loud that people around us starting joining in. By the end of it, there were, like, thirty voices wishing Rose a happy birthday.

  She couldn’t stop smiling after she blew out the candles. “Thanks, guys.”

  “You’re very welcome,” Hamlet said, already slicing the cake expertly. He handed her a slice on a My Little Pony paper plate with a plastic fork.

  Although we were sitting there eating a Transformers cake off of paper plates with colorful ponies on them, there was a conspicuous lack of irony in this moment. It was something I noticed every time I hung out with these guys because I had become so used to a certain behavior with Patrick and Felix. Where everything was a joke, a mockery, a way to separate ourselves from feeling stuff for real. It was easier not to feel the real stuff—and Patrick the slacker was all about easy. Felix, he was so preoccupied with being cool all the time. And Rose and Hamlet? I watched them set up the Connect 4 we had purchased at the dollar store and immediately throw themselves into it, competitive and serious within seconds.

  They were the opposite of that. They were all in.

  When the movie ended, we headed to Hamlet’s car. I held his hand in one hand and a lawn chair in the other.

  Rose stayed close to us as we walked down the dark paths toward the parking lot. She glanced around the headstones nervously. “I can’t believe I just watched that movie in the cemetery. I’m never going to fall asleep tonight.”

  That night, at two a.m., I texted her a gif of Linda Blair’s head spinning. I could practically hear her scream from miles away.

  CHAPTER 22

  The next weekend, I stood in front of the fan in the living room, letting it cool off my face. Summer in our apartment was the pits. We only had one of those window air conditioners, and it barely kept the living room cool, let alone the whole apartment.

  As we got more and more experienced with the truck, my dad let Rose and me each have some solo Sundays, since we only had one routine stop. And today, Rose was manning the KoBra. It was a rare day off together for my dad and me, and being hot and miserable was how we were spending it.

  My dad was draped across the sofa like a rag doll, trying not to move. Flo hadn’t left the cool porcelain of the bathtub in hours. We were like a Renaissance painting. Suddenly, my dad sprang up. “Ooh, let’s get naengmyeon!” Cold Korean buckwheat noodles, often served with slushy, icy beef broth. The best and only thing to eat on a hot summer day.

  My dad started to do an excited-for-food dance: pulling his cap down low and making weird, wobbly moves with his legs, while keeping his arms up at chest level.

  I hated it so much that I loved it. He stopped dancing long enough to ask, “Hey, do you mind if Kody comes along?”

  Yes.

  But my dad’s hopeful and nervous expression made me bite my tongue. And I never hung out with his girlfriends, so I knew it must be somewhat important. I plastered on a smile and said, “No, that’s cool.”

  A half hour later, we were all piled into my dad’s old rear-wheel-drive Nissan, still souped up from his racing days. You could hear us coming from a mile away. Kody had politely offered me shotgun, but my dad’s quick warning glance stopped me from taking it. “No, you go ahead.” I crammed myself into the tiny back seat instead, cursing her with every bump—my dad did not believe in suspension.

  We pulled into a packed strip mall—storefronts crowded with neon lettering in both Korean and English, the parking lot manned by two valet guys who somehow made sense of the automobile Tetris. The icy-cold AC hit us when we opened the glass double doors into the restaurant. I shivered instantly and noticed the patrons huddled over their big metal bowls, also shivering in their shorts and tanks.

  The smiling yet gruff hostess led us to our table, which was under a floating flat-screen TV playing K-pop videos. The tabletops were laid with paper place mats emblazoned with beer advertisements. “Hey, isn’t this the actress you have the hots for?” I asked Pai, pointing at the dewy face on the mat, being a brat in front of his girlfriend. Maybe it was the hot day or the pressure of meeting Kody, but I couldn’t stop myself.

  He peered down at it. “Nah.”

  “Plastic surgery confuses all.”

  Kody laughed and I allowed myself to be pleased for .5 seconds. My dad threw the little paper packaging for the metal chopsticks at me. “Hey! Not everyone gets plastic surgery.”

  “Maybe not, but probably every actress!” This was a common argument between us. Because I was one step further removed from Korea, my dad always felt super defensive about Korean culture. I liked to tease him about it to rile him up—especially about plastic surgery.

  Before my dad could answer, the server came over and asked for our orders. You had about thirty seconds to review a menu at K-Town restaurants.

  “We’ll get three mul naengmyeon,” my dad said, pointing at the menu just in case his Korean wasn’
t quite up to snuff. “And one galbi.” A meal with my dad was never complete unless we added more meat. In this case, grilled beef short ribs that would come out sizzling on a stone plate.

  “Did you want to ask your girlfriend if that’s what she wants?” I asked pointedly. Sometimes my dad could be such a dude.

  He looked chastised for a second, but Kody put her hand on his arm. “Oh, it’s fine. Adrian always orders at Korean places. And I order the sushi,” she said with a wink at him. They exchanged this intimate look that made me wrinkle my nose involuntarily.

  “You’re a sushi expert?” I asked politely, taking a swig of some of the cold barley tea the server handed us.

  Kody shrugged, her long brass earrings shaped like crescent moons jangling. “Kind of. I lived in Japan for a few years.”

  “She’s fluent in Japanese!” my dad bragged.

  Something about my dad’s pride made my stomach clench a little. The only time he talked like that was when it was about me.

  Our side dishes arrived—small bowls of white radish kimchi, regular cabbage kimchi, some potato salad with apple slices, and little marinated black beans. My dad and I dug into them, me going straight for the potato salad and my dad for the radish kimchi. “You can tell the quality of a Korean restaurant by its side dishes,” my dad often said. Side dishes were always free, so it was impressive when a restaurant took care to make them tasty.

  Kody picked up a slice of the cabbage kimchi. “So, Clara. Adrian tells me you’re doing a great job on the truck.”

  “Yeah, we’ve been killing it,” I said as I poked around the potato salad with my chopsticks until I found a slice of apple. I glanced at Kody. Maybe I could use her presence to my advantage. Pai might be in better spirits, or at the very least want to look nicer around her. “That reminds me, considering how well we’ve been doing, could I still meet Mãe in Tulum?” I opened my eyes as wide as they would go.

  Pai looked at me, annoyed. “Really? You want to bring that up now?”

  I had to give Kody credit, she was cool as a cucumber. We might as well have been talking about the weather, poking around the side dishes.

  “Why not? I’ve proven my worthiness, blah blah blah.”

  Pai made a face. “Are you kidding me?”

  Before I could answer, the server arrived with a tray holding three metal bowls of noodles, frosted over with the cold. Also on the tray was vinegar in a squeeze bottle and a little glass jar of Korean mustard. Before handing us our bowls, the server took out a pair of scissors from his apron pocket and cut the noodles—first left to right, then top to bottom.

  To avoid my dad, I took the mustard and spooned a tiny dollop into the icy beef broth. If you put more than that, there was the danger of lighting your entire brain on fire. Then I squeezed a healthy amount of vinegar in and mixed everything around with my chopsticks. We were silent for a few minutes as we dug into our food, and when the plate of sizzling galbi arrived we attacked that too without speaking. For all my chattiness, I had been taught to respect good food and give it my full attention. When I was able to catch my breath after inhaling my noodles, I looked up at my dad. “I think I’ve proven myself. It only seems fair to let me go.”

  Kody slurped her noodles.

  Pai put his chopsticks down. “That’s the problem, Shorty. You were supposed to learn something from this—not just get it over with to meet your mom at some resort.”

  I couldn’t believe it. He wanted to give me a lecture right now, in front of Kody. Who finally looked uncomfortable, by the way—picking up the bowl to take a sip of the soup so that her face was obscured from us. “I did learn something!”

  “Oh yeah? What?”

  Why was he being such a jerk right now? His combative tone immediately put me on the defensive. “I learned how to make a stupid pastel.”

  Pai was silent, his clean-shaven jaw clenched, his body very still. Kody moved toward him, and he immediately relaxed. Watching this interaction made me want to throw my bowl of noodles at them. Why did they suddenly feel so close together and me so far away? The table between us felt like an ocean.

  He eventually spoke. “Yeah. So no, you’re not going to Tulum.”

  “Pai!” The whine came out before I could stop it.

  Leaning forward, Pai pointed a chopstick at me. “It’s not just because you’re being a little butthole right now. It’s because your mom has nothing planned. Did she already book your flight? Because it would be really expensive this late in the game. No, she wouldn’t even think about that. She has no concept of money or responsibility.”

  My face burned. Pai’s feelings about my mom weren’t a surprise, but I didn’t want to hear them laid out in front of Kody, of all people. Suddenly I hated everything about her—starting with her shaggy haircut and ending with her on-trend black clogs.

  “We didn’t plan anything because you’ve been a total drag all summer, and I haven’t had a minute,” I said, keeping my voice low but feeling my anger build.

  Kody paled, and my dad pushed himself away from the table. “I’m getting the check.”

  The ride home was silent, and as soon as we parked, I muttered a good-bye to Kody, jumped out of the car, and ran up the stairs to the apartment. When I got to my room, I pulled my curtains aside and watched Kody hug my dad good-bye and then get into her own car. The need to talk to my mom was overwhelming. When I called her, it went to her voice mail. I didn’t do voice mail, so I texted her.

  Pai is a hard NOPE on Tulum

  I paced the room as I waited for her response. Minutes went by, the phone slippery in my sweaty palm. Phantom vibrations kept me checking it for a response.

  Eventually my dad knocked on my door. “Clara.”

  I ignored him.

  Another knock. “Open the door.”

  Dragging myself over to the door, I took a deep breath before opening it. “What?” I didn’t look him in the eye.

  He made a face. “Excuse me? You think you can be rude to me right now?”

  “Why not? You were rude earlier!”

  He raked a hand through his hair, agitated. “I’m sorry I called you a butthole.”

  “In front of Kody.”

  “Yes, in front of Kody.”

  “Butthole is reserved for family fights only.”

  He laughed, quick and low. “Yes, butthole is reserved for family.”

  I pulled at a piece of splintering wood in the doorjamb. “And I didn’t like you talking crap about Mãe in front of her, either.”

  “Understood.” He crossed his arms over his chest. “But you pushed me to it, Shorty. I wanted you and Kody to get to know each other, but you wouldn’t let it happen. Instead, you kept insisting on this Tulum thing.”

  A tiny crumb of remorse rattled through me, but it wasn’t enough to change my feelings. “Well, you’ve made your position clear. I texted Mãe to tell her I’m not going.”

  For a second, it looked like he wanted to apologize. But his mouth formed a line, the expression that made him look like a serious frog. “Listen, at the end of the summer, let’s go somewhere. Someplace way more fun than a bougie beach. It’ll be your reward for working hard all summer.”

  The sliver of wood I was pulling at pierced my skin and I hissed, pulling my finger back. My dad reached out and held my hand up toward the hallway light to get a better look. “Splinter. Let’s pull it out before it gets infected.”

  I sat on the edge of the tub as my dad picked at the splinter with a pair of tweezers that he dipped in alcohol. As we both stared intently at the tiny line of wood under the translucent layer of skin on my index finger, my phone vibrated next to me. I glanced down and saw it was my mom, finally.

  It was a simple, succinct .

  CHAPTER 23

  “What’s the deal? Your boyfriend’s a millionaire?”

  I flipped down the visor in Patrick’s car so the sun wasn’t blinding me. It was Tuesday and I had the day off, so I’d invited Felix, Patrick, and Cynthia to
a waterpark. That Hamlet’s mom happened to own. It was going to be real fun having them all meet for the first time. Rose included.

  I looked back at Felix to answer his question. “No. I mean, I don’t know. But his mom bought this totally bizarro bankrupt water park a couple years ago and it’s going to reopen next week. And we’re allowed to try out the rides before it does.”

  Cynthia’s frown was visible in the rearview mirror. “Didn’t you say his parents lived in China or something?”

  I pinched the bridge of my nose. CYNTHIA. “Yeah. They do. They bought it as an investment. Even Hamlet acknowledges it was weird, but apparently his mom always has these harebrained schemes.” I giggled, thinking about the last story he’d told me. “One time, she bought an American customer-service telemarketing office in Beijing but didn’t realize until weeks into it that it was for sex toys.” After a few seconds, I realized I was the only one laughing.

  The water park was about two hours inland from LA, so it was going to be a long ride. Hamlet and Rose were meeting us there. Initially I was going to drive with them, but I’d felt guilty and told these guys I would ride with them instead.

  The dead air in the car was making me have serious regrets.

  But then we blasted Prince and all was well as we drove on the desolate 210 freeway, passing brown hills, tract homes, and endless gas stations and fast-food stops. At one point, we stopped for In-N-Out because no road trip was complete without it.

  “So, is Rose your new bestie now?” Felix asked in a teasing tone as we dug into our burgers. I caught a hint of something else in there—a little hurt.

  Normally I would have denied it in a heartbeat, paired with a grade-A scoff. But it wasn’t really something I could deny. I’d hung out with Rose for about 80 percent of my summer break. And I liked doing it. I grabbed a fry off Felix’s tray, earning me a glare from Cynthia. “Rose is cool.”

  “Are you serious?” Cynthia asked, her cat-eye sunglasses lifting on her face as she wrinkled her nose.