Cilla Lee-Jenkins--This Book Is a Classic

by Susan Tan

  So I was happy I’d said it.

  Even if that wasn’t really what I felt.

  Because I couldn’t stop thinking about Paul’s family. His Very Impressive, High-Powered, perfect Chinese family.

  I imagined them all speaking the same language, and knowing the same Traditions, and eating with the chopsticks that waiters set out for them whenever they walked in.

  And even though Auntie Eva said that there are lots of ways to be Chinese, I’m not so sure.

  And sometimes, I wonder if I’ll ever be Impressive and Classic and Chinese enough to be in Auntie Eva’s new family.

  All these worries bubbled up inside me.

  But Auntie Eva was so happy.

  And so excited for her Big Day.

  Which was hers, not mine.

  So just as she finished my braid, I leaned back against her and put my head on her shoulder and said, “Ngoh oi neih.” Which is Chinese for “I love you.” Just like my Nai Nai had taught me.

  “Ngoh oi neih,” she said, putting her arm around me and leaning her head against mine.

  And, at least just then, that seemed to be enough.

  11

  THE WHEELS ON THE BUS DRIVE TO BURGER PLANET

  My mom says Gwendolyn is such a little person now.

  Which is weird.

  But also true.

  When Gwendolyn was born, she was so small that I could carry her with one arm. (Or I could have, if I’d been allowed to. My parents had A LOT of rules about how I could hold babies, and they all involved two hands.)

  But now, Gwendolyn is SO MUCH bigger. She can sit up on her own and crawl (she’s very fast, and my dad calls her a “speed demon”). And she can even walk, if you hold her hands to keep her up. She eats fruit and small pieces of cheese and likes to hold her own spoon. And she LOVES her hair, and every morning I help her brush it, which makes her laugh and say “Rara!”

  So I’ll say, “Yes, Gwendolyn—hair! But what are you?”

  She still hasn’t given me an answer, but we’re working on it.

  Gwendolyn’s learning lots of new words too, though NONE of them are “Cilla.” Words like “uh-oh.” And “gwoth” (gross). And, worst of all, “no.”

  Which is a word that Gwendolyn says A LOT.

  For example, when we had a family dinner at Grandma and Grandpa Jenkins’s house last week, a few days before we left for Auntie Eva’s wedding, “no” was pretty much the only thing Gwendolyn said. She didn’t want to sit in her high chair, she didn’t want to drink from her new sippy cup, and when my dad handed her a spoon, she yelled, “No!” and threw it, which scared Daisy and made her jump off Nai Nai’s lap to hide behind my legs.

  Then Gwendolyn didn’t want to sit with anyone but my mom, not even when my dad, Nai Nai, or Grandma Jenkins tried to take her. Then I tried to take her because I know all the songs she likes, but when I sat down with her, she squirmed and pushed against me and said, “NO! Mama!”

  Which wasn’t very nice.

  Grandma Jenkins says it’s just a phase, and my dad said, “Well, she’s stubborn, just like her mother.”

  Then Ye Ye said, “Well, I don’t know, I remember a certain four-year-old who drew on the white couch with permanent marker and then tried to blame it on his little sister. Who was just a few weeks old at the time.”

  And then my dad didn’t know what to say and got quiet, and my mom said, “What?! Tell me everything!”

  Ye Ye and I giggled, and then there were some GREAT stories. So I guess that made up for it.

  At dinner we talked about all of our trips, because we’re all getting to the wedding in different ways. Nai Nai and Ye Ye are driving down early to help Auntie Eva get ready. Grandma and Grandpa Jenkins are taking a plane to the wedding, which is exciting because Grandpa Jenkins promised to bring me a bag of peanuts from the airplane. And we’re driving too, just before the wedding.

  Everyone was excited, though I wish Nai Nai or Ye Ye or my dad had said more about the wedding to prepare Grandma Jenkins. Because I think she’s expecting a Traditional Jenkins wedding, with hats and lots of forks in the right places and fewer chopsticks.

  But when I said, “Ye Ye, tell Grandma Jenkins about the tea,” he just said, “Oh, yes, there will be a tea ceremony,” and Grandma Jenkins said, “Lovely.” So now I worry that she’s expecting fancy tea and saucers and little sandwiches on plates, so I think I actually made things worse, not better.

  But at least we all had a good time.

  And Daisy most of all, because now I, Grandpa Jenkins, and Nai Nai try to sneakily feed her scraps under the table.

  * * *

  Now we’re in the car again, on the way to Auntie Eva’s wedding. Leaving for the trip was kind of sad because I had to say goodbye to Colleen, and we won’t see each other for THREE WEEKS, because she’s going away to a soccer camp just before I get back. But she says she’ll send me letters while she’s gone, and I’ve promised to save her a petal from my basket, so at least we have some things to look forward to.

  The fact that Gwendolyn says “no” to everything now means that there’s not quite as much “Wheels on the Bus” this trip (though it’s still her favorite, and she still says “buh!” A LOT). And I have to admit that her talking is making the car ride more fun. So far, I’ve taught her “tu-new!” (tunnel), “caw” (car), and “Bgah-Pan!” (Burger Planet). (Though you’ll notice that all these words have a common Theme, which is that NONE of them is even CLOSE to Cilla.)

  But she’s learning quickly. And I taught her to say “Burger Planet” because there are Burger Planets EVERYWHERE and Gwendolyn LOVES them. Which goes to show that she has good taste in (some of) the words she uses.

  Burger Planets have been an EXCELLENT Theme during this trip, even though my mom keeps saying, “I swear, if I never see another Burger Planet again, it will be too soon.” But I think we keep going there so Gwendolyn and I can run around in the playspace. Plus it’s the best, so that helps.

  We stopped at a Burger Planet yesterday, actually. And after we ate, we went to the playground and I made a new friend.

  At first I was going to play by myself.

  But then my dad took Gwendolyn to the little kid area, and I found myself looking at the kids in the ball pit, and it looked really fun.

  “Do you want me to walk over with you?” my mom asked.

  “Yes, please,” I said, and I took her hand.

  Just as we walked up, I saw a girl standing by the entrance to the ball pit, about my age, with her mom and dad behind her.

  She saw me. I smiled. And then she smiled.

  So I didn’t even need my mom to come with me after all. I went up to her, all by myself, and asked her to play.

  My new friend’s name was Emily Fong. She was very nice, and she really liked playing Lava Rescue in the ball pit. And our parents got along and even sat together.

  Emily doesn’t have a younger sister or brother and really wanted to play with Gwendolyn. So after a while, we went to sit with her in the toddler area, and my dad went to talk with her parents close by.

  We were playing a block game and making our blocks spin very fast for Gwendolyn when a man who was standing nearby with his own kids came over to us.

  “Wow, what great sisters,” he said, motioning to us all.

  “Um,” I said. Emily and I looked at each other uncertainly.

  “Not really,” I said.

  “Yeah.” Emily nodded. “It’s like I don’t even know her.”

  “Ooookay.” The man laughed uncertainly.

  My dad walked over to see what was going on.

  “Oh, hi,” the man said. “I was just saying what a beautiful family you have. How far apart are they?”

  “No idea,” my dad answered, honestly.

  “Oooookay,” the man said again, now really confused. And then he walked away as Emily and I started to giggle. My dad smiled at us, shook his head, and walked back to sit with the grown-ups.

  “You were really
funny,” I said to Emily.

  “Well, so were you,” she said.

  “It’s so weird how that happens.” I sighed.

  “Yeah.” Emily sighed. “Tell me about it.”

  “Yah!” Gwendolyn sighed and shook her head just like us, because she clearly wanted to play too.

  So we laughed and went to play with the spinning blocks again.

  And the more we played, the stranger it all seemed, because we clearly weren’t all sisters, I thought, as we ran around the toddler play area. First off, we didn’t look alike at all, other than the fact that both of our dads are Chinese and our moms aren’t. But there were lots of things that were really different about us, like Emily’s freckles and green eyes and curly light brown hair. (Gwendolyn and I have none of these things, which is too bad because I LOVE the word “freckle” and think they’d be exciting to have.)

  But it was more than that, too. Emily doesn’t spend that much time with little kids. So when Gwendolyn started to Fuss, she thought something was wrong and didn’t understand that she was just bored and we needed to distract her with a different game. And when Emily played peekaboo with Gwendolyn, she didn’t understand that you have to wait and create just the right amount of Suspense, long enough to make Gwendolyn giggle, short enough that she doesn’t forget you’re there. And Emily didn’t know that we had to watch Gwendolyn every second, because she crawls very fast, and she was REALLY impressed when I caught Gwendolyn every time she tried to speed-crawl to the big kids’ area.

  And if that man had just been looking, and actually seeing us, he would have known right away who the actual sisters were.

  * * *

  So it was nice, after we’d said goodbye to Emily (which was sad, and I wish we lived closer together), when my dad said, “Gwendolyn was having the best time with you today. We could hear her laughing from across the play space.”

  “Thanks,” I said with a smile as I climbed into my seat.

  “Well, thank you,” he said as he finished buckling Gwendolyn in. “You’re a great big sister.”

  The car started again, and I listened to its humming sounds. I thought about my dad and Auntie Eva, and how she always asks my dad for advice, and how they always make sure to visit each other on birthdays and call when they know the other is upset. And I wondered if that would happen when I was older and Gwendolyn could talk and (finally) say my name.

  I wondered what she’ll be like, and what I’ll be like. And if people will be able to see that we’re sisters. I wondered if I’ll know the right things to say to her, and the right advice to give her, and if I’ll be able to take care of her when she’s grown-up and her own person.

  And I would have thought about all of this some more, but just then, Batman flew into my lap.

  “Buh!” Gwendolyn said from her car seat, looking at me with a hopeful smile. “Buh!”

  So I smiled, and my dad laughed, and my mom sighed.

  And at least just then, I knew exactly what to do.

  12

  THE UNEXPECTED

  A rehearsal dinner is (yet) another wedding Tradition. It’s all about making sure that everything goes just how you imagined it (which is another way of saying perfectly). So as you can maybe guess, I approve of this and wish we could have rehearsals for more things in life, like maybe relay races, and math tests, and making new friends, because then everything would be just like it should be all the time.

  Which would be nice.

  On the night of the rehearsal dinner, I wore a purple dress that my mom had helped me choose, and Gwendolyn wore a bright pink dress with yellow polka dots and matching barrettes. My mom let me brush Gwendolyn’s hair and put it in pigtails, and she giggled and said “Rara!” and then “Bah-man!” So I made sure she had him with her to keep her company at dinner.

  While I got ready, I practiced one of the Chinese sentences my Nai Nai had taught me, saying it over and over in my head. I must have looked nervous, because my mom asked if I wanted to practice my flower girl walk. And when I did, she clapped and said, “Perfect! See, sweetheart? Nothing to worry about.”

  But she was wrong.

  We drove up to a big, beautiful brick building. When we walked in the front door, I saw Nai Nai in her blue dress and Ye Ye in a white shirt and the red-striped tie I’d helped him pick. And then I turned around and saw—

  “Auntie Eva!” I went running.

  “Cilla!” She picked me up and spun me around (like always). She looked BEAUTIFUL in a white dress that wasn’t her wedding one (or at least I hoped not). Because even though it was pretty, it was short and not glittery, and there was no lace anywhere.

  Then Auntie Eva put me down and turned to a smiling man in a blue shirt who’d just walked up next to her.

  “Cilla,” Auntie Eva said, “this is Paul.”

  Paul was tall with black hair and smiling, crinkly eyes. He seemed very nice.

  “Hello,” I said, and my voice had gone a bit whispery. I tried to smile but I couldn’t quite. Because I knew this was it.

  My chance.

  The moment I’d imagined so perfectly.

  I took a deep breath and stood very straight and remembered the words my Nai Nai had taught me, and the few extra ones I’d asked Melvin to help me with.

  “GU JEUNG, NEI HO MAH! NGOH HO GO HING GIEN DOE NEI!” I said perfectly, just like I’d been taught. (Well, maybe a little louder than I’d been taught.) This means, “Hello, Uncle! I’m very happy to meet you!” Or, “HELLO, UNCLE! I’M VERY HAPPY TO MEET YOU!” if you want to get technical. I held my breath.

  Paul blinked.

  I blinked.

  He smiled, a bit uncertainly.

  I smiled, a bit uncertainly.

  And I felt my heart pounding and a nervous feeling in my stomach. Had I said it wrong? Was my accent bad? Had I ruined my chance to be in Auntie Eva’s new family the very first time I met her new husband?

  “Um…,” Paul said, looking down at me and then sideways at Auntie Eva, who had her hand over her mouth and a funny expression on her face. “So…,” he said.

  My heart raced.

  “So … I’m Korean,” he said finally.

  “WHAT?” I said.

  And Auntie Eva started to laugh.

  “I’m sorry, I thought you knew that,” she said, bending down to put her hands on my shoulders. “Paul doesn’t speak any Chinese. But that was so sweet of you!”

  She gave me a BIG hug.

  And then, as I stood there too stunned to move, she told Paul what I had said.

  “I’m so happy to meet you too, Cilla.” Paul smiled down at me. “Eva’s told me all about you. And your Chinese sounded much better than mine. I learned a few sentences so I could greet your Nai Nai and Ye Ye, and your E-Pah and E-Gung. But,” he said, leaning in like it was a secret, “I TOTALLY messed things up. They were all nice about it, so I think I made an okay impression. But don’t tell anyone,” he said, making a funny, scared kind of face.

  Then I giggled, and he and Auntie Eva laughed. He held out his hand, and I shook it. Just like a grown-up would.

  * * *

  The rest of the night went pretty much as expected. Nai Nai loved my surprise when Auntie Eva told her about it and said my Chinese had been perfect. And during the rehearsal, someone told me just where to stand and when to walk. I walked slowly and in a straight line, just like my mom and dad had shown me. And my Nai Nai and Ye Ye hummed a wedding song when they practiced walking Auntie Eva down the aisle, and it made her sniffle, but in a nice way.

  Later, at the rehearsal dinner, Auntie Eva introduced me to Paul’s mom and dad, Mr. and Mrs. Kim. They seemed nice, and I tried to remember all my manners and shook their hands too. And it was actually a relief not to worry about Traditions and if they’d be upset if I didn’t know them all. Though they were very quiet, and Mrs. Kim had a stern face and I wondered if that was how she always looked or if she was just Not Happy right now. And I noticed that she and Mr. Kim were sitting by Nai Nai
and Ye Ye, but they didn’t seem to have much to talk about. Which was strange, because Ye Ye tells the best stories, so dinner with him always has talking and laughing.

  I got distracted, though, and stopped watching Nai Nai and Ye Ye’s table because I was busy playing with Paul’s cousin Noah, the boy I’d seen in the picture who I’d thought was Paul’s brother. (Technically, Noah told me, he’s Paul’s second cousin. I thought this meant he was Paul’s second cousin ever, but then my mom explained that it means one of his parents is Paul’s cousin. So that was another expression I’d had no idea about, and I wonder why people can’t actually just say what they mean.)

  Anyway, Noah’s younger than I am and will be carrying the rings, just like Alien-Face McGee did.

  “You’re different than I’d thought you’d be,” I told him while we waited for dinner. “Auntie Eva showed us a fancy picture of you all, sitting in a restaurant.”

  Noah rolled his eyes.

  “Oh, that was for my harabeoji’s birthday party. That’s ‘grandpa’ in Korean. We were at his favorite Korean restaurant, and my mom made me put gel in my hair and everything, and it was SO GROSS. And I spilled tea on myself right afterward, so it really wasn’t worth all the ironing and getting new fancy clothes.”

  I giggled because I knew exactly what that felt like.

  Noah was fun to play with, and when he didn’t know what the foods were at the rehearsal dinner (it was a Chinese banquet, like my dad had said it would be), I explained them to him and recommended all my favorites. And then he kept saying things like “Wait until you see the Korean outfits they wear tomorrow” and “Wait until you meet my Auntie Jenny and Uncle Mike” and “You’re going to love my cousin Sammy. He’ll be there tomorrow too, and you two will definitely be friends!”

  Noah was impressed by the banquet, especially when he realized there would be more than six courses, and he LOVED the roast duck, lobster, abalone, and noodles. Though not the jellyfish, which is fair, because they’re kind of funny-looking and you really have to get used to the taste. Not to mention the texture.