“I suppose $1,000 would be an acceptable compromise, Mr. Wang. We will, of course, still have to send you a bill for the time that Grace has boarded so far this year—”
He cut in. “But this not possible to sell for $1,000, and there are no other students who need one, right? You can’t give old one to a new student even if someone transfer. All you do with this is donate to the shelter, which give school tax write-off of $990, which mean you pay a little bit less taxes. Maybe $75 less? So this computer now worth almost nothing to you—just $75. Maybe not even.” He hauled up Grace’s suitcase, then pulled a roll of cash out of his pocket. “Here, I give you $300, it almost like the school make money.” He peeled off three bills and thrust them towards Brownie, who took them hesitantly. They were old, Grace noticed, like they’d come from the ’80s. Grace jumped up, laptop and backup drive already shoved back into their satchel home, and grabbed the rest of her bags.
“Bye, Brownie! Thanks for everything!” In a giddy rush, Grace ran down the steps, waving a hand backwards as her father bumped along behind her, the suitcase wheels banging against each step. She looked back and he was grinning wildly, the sun glinting off his reflective lenses, knees akimbo as he charged forward. She wanted to say something else, something that would just make the headmistress fall over with fury, something that the other kids would hear and repeat to one another until it became legendary, but she was almost at the bottom of the steps and her mind was a pure, pulsating blank. Leaping off the last two steps and onto the driveway, she turned and shouted: “Tell Rachel I killed myself!”
Laughing at her own stupid bravado, Grace raced herself to the car and stopped by the back, not even out of breath. Half a minute later, her father slammed into her with a hug and pulled open the back door.
“Back full,” he said, tossing her bags in as Ama shook her head and arranged them on the floor in front of her. “Say hi to your auntie, Grace.” She leaned in the open window of the front passenger seat and gave Barbra their usual quick, no-pucker kiss on the cheek and then stood on her knees in the backseat so she could reach Ama over the pile of luggage.
“Eh, wo men ba Andrew fang zai na li ya?” asked Ama.
Charles started up the car.
Uh-oh. Brownie was heading down the stairs towards them, clipping along in her pointy brown boots. If Grace’s last name was Brown, she would never, ever wear the color; same with Green or Gold, though it would be hard never to wear Black. Grace leaned over the front seat, the wheel of her suitcase jamming into her hip as she pointed up at Brownie, and urged, “Daddy, go, go, go!”
“Daddy pretty good, right Gracie?”
“Ah bao, what did you do?” asked Babs.
“Oh, he did good. Really good.” Feeling daring, Grace patted her father on the head. “Who needs money! Right, Daddy?” She giggled, and said, quick, “He stole a computer!”
“No, no, no,” protested Charles, putting a hand on Babs’s arm, “I buy it! Just for very good price.”
“Dad, you have to go! Faster!” He shifted his hand back on the wheel and swerved towards the gates.
Grace turned as her father sped out of the lot so that she could see Brownie out of the rear window. She almost expected the headmistress to wave her fist in the air like a vanquished supervillain, then drop to her knees and raise both arms to the sky as balled-up hundred-dollar bills tumbled from her hands.
Well, three of them, anyway.
Really, this was all starting to feel like a movie or something, like a scenario that Saina and Andrew would come up with and make her act out under their direction until it all ended in tears. Hers, mostly, but sometimes Andrew’s, too. Like it could all be some elaborate practical joke. The possibility spun itself together in Grace’s mind, a cotton candy cloud that sweetened the embarrassment of the past day.
Maybe! She turned around and sat down with a bounce, feeling encouraged as she fastened her seat belt. Maybe this was why her siblings had been reluctant to tell her about the inheritance, why she didn’t even know that there was a Talk and a Lunch. And, after all, didn’t this make so much more sense than the cover story? That her father had lost everything?
Ridiculous. Impossible.
Maybe Brownie was actually in on it. Actually, Brownie probably resented her. No one who had money would ever be stuck working at some boarding school in Santa Barbara, not even teaching, just . . . administrating. If Brownie knew, then that meant she’d been keeping the secret during the whole computer exchange; it all just made Grace feel more conspiratorial glee at the way her father had come out on top.