Mrs. Park nodded solemnly. “It’s a tough time for everyone in your grade. SATs are coming up, college apps are around the corner. I don’t know how you kids these days handle so much pressure. It was easier for us when we were young.”
Mr. Park clapped me on the shoulder. “We’re just glad you could make it. And so is Yunie. She was getting really lonely without you.”
I winced upon hearing that. Then I did a mental backtrack to confirm exactly how much time I had been spending with my best friend in recent weeks, and I winced much harder at the result.
Compared to how entwined we normally were, I’d basically cut her off. And she hadn’t said a word. She’d picked up that I had something else going on and left me to it.
I was a terrible friend. Or at the very least, acting like one.
I’d make it up to her after the performance. Right now I had to focus on being a terrible daughter.
“My dad should be here somewhere,” I said. “Have you seen him?”
Mr. Park arced his arm to mimic the curve of the hallway. “He’s around the corner. I saw him talking to another student from your school.”
I said goodbye to Yunie’s parents with a big smile on my face that vanished instantly the moment I turned around. Quentin, I thought with murder on my mind. Whatever had passed between us on my doorstep didn’t give him the right to sneak in here with magic. To introduce himself to my father without me being there. I stomped around the hallway to the other side of the auditorium and found Dad talking to . . .
Androu?
“Oh hey,” he said.
I blinked a couple of times. “I didn’t invite you,” I blurted out.
Androu took my rudeness in stride—as if he had girls greeting him with insults all the time. “My cousin who lives in the city is performing tonight. He’s a timpanist. Holds a beat like superglue.”
“Androu here was filling me in on your volleyball season,” Dad said. “He’s a big fan of yours.” Then he made the most obvious, over-the-top wink possible.
I stood there, catching flies with my mouth. The silence emanating from my throat was so thick that Androu coughed and excused himself to go to the bathroom.
Once he was gone, Dad turned to me with a twinkle in his eye. “I knew there was a boy,” he said. “Given how mopey you were at the gym? There had to be a boy.”
This . . . this wasn’t so bad. Of all the misunderstandings.
“You should tell me about these things,” Dad said. “You know I don’t judge like your mother. I’m okay with you dating.”
I could triage this. The patient was stable.
“We have to have ‘the talk’ though; I won’t have you making irresponsible choices.” He tried to say it sternly but couldn’t hide his glee at getting to check off one of those American-style parenting milestones he’d read so much about in magazines. I wasn’t sure if he fully understood what “the talk” entailed.
Androu came back. “We’ll save it for later,” Dad whispered.
“So yeah,” Androu said, doing his best to ignore my father’s blatant winking again. “I didn’t know Yunie was performing tonight. Wild, huh? We should plan to go to more concerts together. It’d be fun.”
Dad was about to joyously agree, but then he suddenly deflated, his high spirits gone with the wind. There was only one person who could make him go one-hundred-to-zero just like that. And she was right behind me.
My mother didn’t say anything in greeting. She glanced at me. Then my father. Then up at Androu.
EKG flatline. Code Blue.
“I found a space,” she announced.
She hadn’t bumbled into us. She could have easily avoided this encounter. Every previous indication she’d given said that was her preference. And yet here she was, claiming this patch of land for Spain. I abandoned all hope of understanding this woman for what must have been the fiftieth time.
Mom craned her head forward. None of us knew what she was doing until the gesture stirred something deep and lost in my father. He pecked her on the cheek and then they both returned to their stations.
“Androu, this is Genie’s mother,” Dad said. He meant to gently prod my classmate forward, but the motion resembled a Spartan raising his shield against a hail of stones.
Androu gallantly bent at the waist to shake her hand. “Hello Mrs. Lo. It’s a pleasure to finally meet you.”
Mom was mildly placated in the sense that the new person she had to greet was at least polite and handsome. But then Androu, that sweet summer child, ruined all hope of a clean escape.
“I’d love to take you and Genie up on that offer for dinner at your place,” he said. “I hear your cooking is legendary.”
In his mind he was only continuing the last conversational thread we had. He had no idea what boundaries he was stepping over.
“Oh, so she’s making invitations to people I’ve never met now,” Mom said. She turned to me like a doll in a horror movie. “I suppose I can’t decline, can I?”
Dad rushed in to try and douse the flames, but he was holding a jug of gasoline, not water. “Androu is Genie’s very good friend,” he said. With emphasis on the very good.
This did not compute with Mom. According to her programming, there was only ever supposed to be one boy at a time holding the Most Favored Nation spot. Preferably the same boy throughout my entire life.
“I thought Quentin was your very good friend,” she said.
This was new. Tonight I got to discover the face Mom made when she thought I was being a hussy. Never mind the fact that her idea of promiscuity would be outdated in Victorian England.
“Quentin?” Dad said. “Who’s Quentin?”
“I see now why you didn’t want to invite him,” Mom said. “It would expose the double life you’ve been leading.”
Androu, still out of sync, postured up valiantly at the mention of Quentin’s name. “Don’t worry, Mr. and Mrs. Lo. If that guy’s still bothering Genie at school, I’ll put a stop to it. She can count on me. Right?” He nudged me with his elbow.
He was prodding a corpse. My soul had left my body a long time ago. It had flown to the top of Mount Can’t Even, planted its flag, and dissipated into the stratosphere.
An usher came over and told us it was time for the performance to start. We all made shows of pulling out our tickets, as if they contained our queue spots for a kidney. Androu smiled and bumped my stub with his.
“Oh hey,” he said. “I think we’re sitting together!”
Androu and I went in first while Mom made her last-minute hellos to Yunie’s parents. We picked our way through the narrow aisles like cranes in the mud until we found our seats.
The chair backs in front of us were too close, and they jammed our knees to the side. Tall people problems. He and I had that in common at least.
Androu chuckled to himself.
“What is it?” I asked.
“Oh, it’s just—sorry if I’m being offensive, but that whole thing with your Mom and Dad out there. It felt like the stereotype was true. Asian parents not really showing a lot of affection in public.”