I called Brooklyn Union Gas, and a repairman was sent to our house. He was a heavyset African American man in a blue uniform that covered him from head to toe. The belt cut into his belly, and when he came in through the door, he looked around our apartment with pity in his teddy-bear eyes.
“I’m going to do my best for you folks, all right,” he said, “but I can’t promise nothing. That last guy really broke this thing up.”
“Please,” I said. I tried to keep the panic from my voice. “Please do your best.” My breath came out in white puffs. I didn’t know how we would even get through that night if he couldn’t fix the oven. The apartment had grown steadily colder with every day the oven remained broken. It was already getting dark outside and I could hear the wind gusting against the walls.
“I know, honey,” he said. “You and your mom just take it easy and I’ll try to figure this out.”
And he did. With his blunt fingers, he smoothed the pieces back into place and when the stove came to life again with a burst of blue flame, Ma clapped her hands from happiness.
She tried to give him a tip, only a dollar, but he folded the money gently back into her hand.
“You keep that,” he said in his slow, deep voice. “You get something nice for yourselves.”
I would have liked to have a man like that as my father.
Matt had dropped out of high school so he could work full-time. Now that he was working the entire day, he could often finish his work earlier and got to leave before we did. By then, I’d received special permission to take freshman and premed classes at Polytechnic University in Brooklyn. On the days when I had Polytech classes, which usually ended later in the afternoon, I sometimes saw Vivian waiting for him to leave when I had just arrived.
One spring day when I got to the factory in the early evening, Vivian was standing outside as usual, waiting for Matt to finish work. As was often the case, there was a group of Chinatown teenage boys huddled around her, and I was surprised to see one of them holding a large hanging plant. The acne-faced boy with the plant leaned toward Vivian and I saw the striped leaves sweep against her pretty cowboy boots. Then she murmured something to him and he immediately lifted the plant higher, so its leaves wouldn’t brush against the sidewalk. Of course, the plant was hers and he was just holding it for her.
The guys were busy trying to impress Vivian and they paid me no notice. I could hear they were speaking English, to seem cooler.
“Hi, Kimberly,” Vivian called as I approached the doorway.
“Hi,” I said.
A few of the boys looked up but dismissed me and turned back to her.
The door opened and out stepped Park. Staring at the ground as usual, he didn’t see me standing in front of the doorway and bumped into me behind. This set off the whole group of boys laughing. I saw that Park was wearing bright orange pants. His plaid shirt was buttoned wrong and it bunched up where it met his neck.
“Are you all right?” Vivian asked Park.
He didn’t reply and just tried to walk on, past the group.
One of the teenage boys, who was wearing a red bandanna on his head, stepped out in front of him. Like an imitation of a gangster in a bad movie, the boy said in accented English, “Lady asked you a question.” Then he switched into Chinese. “You, white disease.”
“Don’t call him that,” I said.
“Who made you his keeper?” Red Bandanna said.
“It’s not a problem,” Vivian said to him. She had a smile plastered to her face. She seemed unsure of what to do.
The boy pushed Park again, no doubt thinking that this would win him points with her. “Say a word.”
“Stop it,” I said.
He kept shoving Park. “C’mon. The lady asked you something, now you answer her. C’mon.” He punctuated each word with a push. Park’s eyes were looking in every direction, bewildered and disoriented.
Vivian just stood there, frozen.
I stood in front of Red Bandanna. “Stop it!” I reached up and pulled the cloth off his head. His hair tumbled out in matted locks. “Least he’s not so ugly that he’s made of essence of monkey.”
The whole gang laughed.
Underneath the wild strands of hair, he was red with fury. “Give that back!”
I tossed it in his face, then grabbed Park’s arm. “Run!”
We’d already taken a few steps. Red Bandanna was just about to race after us when I looked back and saw him get jerked by the scruff of his neck. He was yanked around to face Matt, who had just come outside.
“What are you doing with my little brother when you don’t even have a hole in your ass?” With his arms and fists clenched, Matt had swelled to twice his normal size, it seemed. He threw Red Bandanna to the ground, effortlessly.
“That your brother? Sorry, Matt, I didn’t recognize him.”
Now Matt pulled him off the floor again.
“You knew. You remains of a human being.”
There was a chorus now from the other guys. “Take it easy, Matt. He was just starting a child’s game, that’s all, it was just a prank.”
Matt looked like he wanted to hit him but instead, he dropped Red Bandanna abruptly onto the ground. “You’re not worth planting.” Matt meant he wasn’t worth the effort.
Red Bandanna scrambled up off the floor and the whole group fled, leaving Vivian standing there, still looking apologetic.
By this time, Park and I had come back within a safe distance.
“You guys all right?” Matt bent down and picked up one of my barrettes, which had fallen onto the sidewalk when Park and I had tried to escape. Gently, he clipped it back in my hair. It seemed to me that his hand lingered a moment longer than was necessary. His look to Vivian was cool. I saw she was almost in tears.
“Vivian tried to get them to stop too,” I said.
“Sure,” Matt said. He was still breathing heavily; I could almost feel the adrenaline draining from his body. He glanced at the plant, which had been abandoned on the ground, and turned to Vivian. “Your admirer took off without giving you your plant back.”
“Matt…” she said.
“Forget it,” he said. He picked up the plant and swung an arm around her. “Come on,” he said to Park, and the three of them left together.
Through the tall windows, the spring rain fell onto the trees in the distance. I was still tutoring Curt. Many of the kids were nervous about the upcoming standardized tests at the end of eleventh grade, and had already been enrolled in outside test courses for months. Curt’s parents had pressured him to do the same, but he’d gotten them to agree to extra tutoring by me in his school subjects instead. My own preparation for the tests was going to consist of filling in a few sample exercises in the booklets I received with my registration form, since I didn’t even have a book with practice tests.
We often met in the Art studio, where he spent so much time that the teachers allowed him to leave some of his work in the back. I’d gotten there early this lesson and was thinking about the upcoming SATs while I waited for him to be ready. I looked down at the studio floor, which was covered in paint splotches and wood shavings. I had to be careful not to step on the electric saw and sanding machine, which Curt often left lying around on the floor, still plugged in. The studio was filled with the smell of rain and cut wood and wallpaper glue.
Curt was using a paintbrush to smear a few pieces of wood with glue before our lesson started. He started telling me about a pair of shoes he’d found in the trash, which he was delighted to be wearing now.
“It is proof that serendipity does exist. They showed up just when I needed them.” He fit the pieces of wood together carefully and used a clamp to hold them in place.
I studied the shoes, peeking out from under his faded jeans. They were brown work boots, heels worn down. “Did you clean them first?”
“Nope.”
“It is not as fun to be poor as you think.”
“I’m trying to cast off the trappings of a wasted life.”
“Was it wasted? That your parents gave you a secure home?”
“They were both born with money. Trust-fund kid one marries trust-fund kid two.”
“I always thought editors were smart and thoughtful.”
“Nah. Well, maybe a little. What about your folks?”
“They married for love.”
I was wandering around and I noticed he’d thrown his jacket carelessly onto an easel. A sleeve lay on the floor. I picked up the jacket and felt the fine weaving with my finger, then turned it over and stroked the paisley silk lining. I hung it so that it wasn’t dragging on the floor.
Curt hadn’t even noticed. He was washing his hands at a small sink in the corner, then wiped them on his shirt. “So, thanks to my smart and thoughtful parents, I’m giving a party. Can you come?”
“I don’t think so,” I said automatically. This was what I always said to these kinds of invitations, or whenever the boys I kissed tried to see me outside of school. “I’m very busy.”
“Well, the party’s a bit because of you. My parents are so happy I haven’t flunked out yet. The party is meant to be positive psychological reinforcement before all the big tests hit.”
“I don’t know.”
“I couldn’t have done it without you. It’s almost your party. You can think of it as an extra-long tutoring session.”
I laughed. I was tempted. I’d never been to a party or a dance and this gave me an excuse for going. “Let me think about it.”
I found Annette at the theater. In addition to her small role, she was also pitching in as the stage manager for the current production. She was on the stage, walking toward a sofa set with a cane in her hand.
“I need a longer one,” she called to someone offstage. She had tied her puffy hair back with a blue ribbon.
“Annette.” I stood by the edge of the stage, feeling self-conscious under the bright lights.
“Hey!” She came forward and knelt by me so we could talk.
“Curt’s invited me to a party. What should I do?”
Her eyebrows seemed to shoot up to her hairline. “Are you thinking about going? Why? You never do!”
I started twisting the button on my blazer around. “I know. But I could. Not all the time. Just once.”
“Oh, you like him!” Her voice was loud in the theater.
“Shh! No! He’s just a friend. I guess it’s a bad idea.”
“No, I think it’s great for you to go to a party! You need to get out more.” Then she frowned. “But you never come to my plays or parties.”
“I know.” I sighed. I knew I was a difficult friend for Annette sometimes. This was why I always said no, because if I said yes once, I didn’t know how I would handle any of the invitations afterward. I could possibly convince Ma to let me go out at night once but not much more than that. It was just on impulse that I’d wanted to accept this invitation, and because he’d said that the party had something to do with me.
“Will you come to something of mine too?”
“I promise.”
Annette and I made our plans. Ma would never let me go to a party given by a boy. I would tell Ma I was sleeping over at Annette’s and then Annette and I would go together. I was sure it would be okay if she tagged along. I just needed to convince Ma.
Ma frowned. “Why do you suddenly want to sleep over at Annette’s house?”
“Ma, I’ve always wanted to. The other kids-you don’t know all the things they do, the freedom they have. I don’t ask, because you always say no.”
Ma studied me. “I know, it’s not easy for you.”
“We’ve known Annette for so long now. And you even met her family.”
“That’s true.” It had been a long time since my graduation from elementary school, but for Ma, it was important that she’d actually seen them once. Since then, Annette had been a constant presence only on the phone. “All right, but just this one time. Otherwise, she’ll want to…”
“She’ll want to come over here too,” I finished for her, but I was overjoyed. I would finally have a night of freedom.
“The inspectors are coming! The inspectors are coming!” Aunt Paula looked as flustered as I’d ever seen her.
She and Uncle Bob hurried through the factory as if they’d been caught in a hurricane. They swept clothing off counters, wielded brooms and dusting rags, but most important, they herded the children in front of them and swept them into small, secret places.
“Everyone under eighteen, out of sight!”
Aunt Paula grabbed me by the back of my shirt and practically threw me into one of the men’s rooms. She slammed the door behind me as I landed against someone’s shoulder. We both recoiled from the shock and then I realized it was Matt.
“Hey,” he said. “You okay?”
Before I could answer, the door opened again and three other kids were crammed in with us before the door banged shut again. They were much younger than we were.
The little boy had his head wedged into my underarm. The men’s room was filthy, with only a toilet and a washbasin. We knew we had to keep the lights out. Matt was jammed in between the washbasin and the wall. The rest of us all did our best to avoid the open toilet in the middle of the bathroom, which didn’t even have a seat or cover. To combat my usual painful sensitivity to Matt, I allowed a small girl to squeeze in between us.
Even with the girl there, Matt was still too close. If he moved his arm a bit, it would almost be as if he could touch me, but the other kids were also there, and now the little boy stuck next to the toilet was staring at it, riveted by its proximity.
“Don’t even think about it.” I heard Matt hiss above my head. “Hold it.”
The little boy pressed his legs together, his eyes wide. His clothes were matted with fabric dust. I reached out and brushed his hair with my hand. “It’ll be all right,” I murmured. “This will be over before you know it.”
A taller girl suddenly hissed: “There’s a roach moving in the sink!”
Matt and I both jumped a mile. He leaped away from the washbasin so fast that in a second he had switched places with the little boy on the other side of me, probably in an instinctive reaction to get to the door. I giggled to myself, realizing that he was as scared of insects as I was. The boy was now wedged next to the little girl, both of them jammed against the washbasin. He gave both Matt and me a disdainful look, then took a bit of paper out of his pocket and crushed the roach in the sink.
I sagged with relief now that it was dead. I kept my eyes closed. Matt smelled of sweat and aftershave and his chest was hard. I thought I could feel the thud of his heart underneath his thin T-shirt. They must have yanked him away from the steamers. Yet now that I had no choice but to stand there pressed against him, I could feel myself beginning to relax.
Suddenly, he gave a strangled cry, and I looked up. In the shadows, that child was dangling the piece of paper in front of us. I thought I could see the roach antennae waving above the tissue and the boy was grinning like a maniac. Caught by surprise, I screamed. Despite my daily exposure to roaches in our apartment, I was still as terrified of them as I had been at the beginning, probably even more so.
There was immediate thumping on the door. It was Uncle Bob’s voice. “Shut up in there! They’re almost in this area!”
At this, we all froze. Outside, we heard obsequious voices and even the hum of the machines seemed more subdued than usual. I could tell they were speaking English, though I couldn’t make out the words. We didn’t dare breathe for fear that we would be found out. Everyone knew the way Chinatown worked. Money had probably already changed hands to ensure a casual inspection, but we were still as afraid of being found out as the owners. If the factory was closed down, who would fill our rice bowls then?
My heart was now pounding as hard as Matt’s. The other children were squirming around, but I could only think about how his warm breath felt against my hair. Right in front of my eyes was the contrast of his rough cotton shirt and the smooth skin of his shoulder.
The murmur of English went on outside the door for what seemed to be a long time and then there were the usual factory noises. Finally, the door was opened and the other three kids toppled out and ran off.
Reluctantly, I recovered my own balance and swayed away from Matt, but then his hand was on my wrist.
“Wait,” he said. He reached out with his other arm and shut the door behind him. Then he pulled me toward him and I rested my forehead against his chest a moment. The familiar pain receded again, to be replaced by something languid and inexorable, as if I were riding the extended exhalation of a breath I hadn’t known I’d been holding. His fingertips were entwined in my hair, I could feel the warmth of them against my scalp, and then I was looking up at him. A shaft of light from the window in the door fell on his soft hair. His golden eyes were luminous in the half-dark, and finally, we were kissing in one long heat of melting, and the lush afternoon dissolved into yearning for Matt and Matt alone.
And when we were done with that kiss, there was another and then another, before Matt broke off to say, in a husky voice I’d never heard from him, “They’ll be looking for me.”
“Me too,” I breathed.
Then we kissed again and again before I made myself remember that he had a girlfriend and she wasn’t me. I wanted to be the one to end this. I pulled myself away. “All right, see you then.”
It took him a moment before his eyes focused again, as if he too were waking up from a dream, and then he said, “See you.”
He had his hand on the doorknob, then hesitated. Without meeting my eyes, he said, “Kimberly, my climbing can’t reach your heights.” Then he ducked his head and left.
I stood in the bathroom alone, with my hand supporting myself against the washbasin, shattered. I had made him think he wasn’t good enough for me, when in truth it was I who couldn’t compete for him.
After work that day, Vivian was waiting in her usual spot outside the factory. I’m ashamed to say I had trailed him downstairs, and I saw him go up to her and kiss her on the lips. When he glanced at me, quickly, guiltily, I knew he was conscious I was there. Then they left.
It may not seem like much-a few kisses in the dark-but it was enough to burn a hole like an ulcer in my heart.
I had nothing else, but I always had my pride. I was as kind to Park as I ever was, but I made a point of flirting with the other boys at the factory, especially when Matt could see. Matt himself, I treated with a cool friendliness. I pictured myself packed in a layer of ice so thick that nothing he did could reach me. Perhaps I imagined it, but I believe that Matt’s eyes often followed me during our work at the factory, that he horsed around more than usual when I was around, dropping down on the floor to do one-handed push-ups and the like, while I ignored him. Whatever he may have done, the bottom line was this: he’d chosen Vivian over me, and none of the little things he did to show me he cared about me could stack up high enough against this one fact.
I knew that Vivian was still waiting, every day after work. Fortunately, our staggered schedules meant that I didn’t always have to see her, but what I saw was enough. And to make things worse, I did like her. She seemed kind and thoughtful. It wasn’t her fault she was so gorgeous. How many images of them I have filed away in my soul: Matt with a package of treats-dried candied lotus seeds-hidden behind his back for her; the two of them seen from a distance, arms around each other’s waists, going into the herbal medicine store; once, I’d even caught sight of them together at temple, lighting incense sticks by the flame of the oil lamp and then kneeling next to each other to pray. How many ways can you be tortured by love?
I had finally confided in Annette, my eternal adviser, and she said, “What a relationship looks like on the outside isn’t the same as what it’s like on the inside. You can be more in love with someone in your mind than with the person you see every day.”
She was the only one who knew about my pain, but in a way, she understood it as something smaller than it was, Annette who was always hopelessly in love herself. But she urged me to move on and forget, which was exactly what I needed to hear.
The evening of Curt’s party, I went to Annette’s house early. I felt guilty about leaving Ma alone at the factory but I wanted to have some fun for once, like the other kids my own age.
Mrs. Avery kissed me on the cheek. “It’s so nice to see you again.”
I smiled. She was one of my favorite people, even though I hardly ever saw her.
Annette lent me an old outfit of hers that she’d outgrown. Although the cream-colored dress fit me well, it was shorter than anything I’d ever worn. It felt quite daring to have it swish above my bare knees. Luckily we were the same shoe size, so I could borrow a pair of her pumps. Then Annette did my makeup, but she’d practiced a lot since the movie theater. After she put gloss in my hair, I hardly recognized myself in the mirror.
“You’re gorgeous,” she said.
I turned around and hugged her. “You’re a great friend.”
Annette was wearing a hip dress with a multicolored print and a leather handbag of her mom’s.
I braided the front part of her hair back off her face. “You look beautiful too.”
Mrs. Avery drove us to Curt’s apartment, which was in the city, all the way east in the Seventies. A doorman came and opened our car door so Annette and I could get out. The air was warm, but a cool breeze swept in off the river. We waved good-bye to Mrs. Avery as we went into the revolving door. The doorman stood outside and pushed it for us so we didn’t have to do anything ourselves. Another doorman, behind the counter, told us how to get to Curt’s apartment when we were inside.
I tried not to gawk but Annette strode with her head held high, swinging her handbag on her arm like a lady. The elevators were next to an enormous display of flowers. I reached out a hand to feel a petal and realized they were all real.
“What do they do when the flowers fade?” I asked Annette.
“They get new ones, of course.”
What an expense that must be. When we got to Curt’s apartment and rang the doorbell, Curt opened the door. A blast of throbbing music filled the hallway.
“Hey, you made it.” His eyes stopped on me. “Wow.” It was different from his usual flirtatious look. He was staring at me as intensely as if I were a piece of sculpture.
I looked down at the rust-colored carpet, pleased. “Thanks. Annette helped.”
Behind me, Annette giggled.
“Come in. Throw anything you don’t want to carry in my parents’ bedroom.” Curt disappeared through a doorway.
So this was a party. All of the regular lights were out. I peered into the living room, where Curt had gone. Even in the darkness, I could tell their apartment was enormous, because the windows were so far away from where we were standing in the hallway. I could see the illumination from the city and lights on the East River in the distance.
There were already a lot of kids there. In one corner of the living room, a disco ball was spinning from the ceiling and some people were dancing, but everywhere else, it was dark except for small clusters of tea lights scattered around the room. I’d thought his parents might give a little speech about Curt, but there was no sign of them or any other adults.
“I think that’s someone from theater club,” Annette said, pointing at one of the dancing figures.
“Go ahead,” I said to Annette, speaking loudly to be heard over the music. “Give me your bag, I’ll put it away for you.”
She passed me her handbag, then went over to her friend. I felt my way down the hallway and opened the bedroom door. I flicked on the light. There was a pile of clothing and handbags on the mahogany bed. Suddenly, something shifted. I almost screamed, then realized that it was a boy from my year making out with some girl. He had his hands up her shirt and she was pulling on his hair.
He dragged his lips from hers and glared at me. “Do you mind?”
“Sorry!” I quickly shut off the light, threw Annette’s handbag onto the bed and left.
In the disco room, I found Annette chatting with a boy from the school newspaper. They were standing by a long counter that must have been a minibar. Annette made me a gin and tonic from the bottles on the bar, heavy on the tonic. The music was as loud as the machines at the factory. Annette pulled me onto the floor and we started to dance. It was my first time dancing to this kind of music, but I found I had a natural feel for it. A circle of people joined us, and after a while, Annette drifted off somewhere. Spinning around under the disco ball, I felt like a real American teenager.
I felt a hand on my shoulder. Curt. I wondered if he’d been watching me for a while. He took me by the hand and pulled me into the hallway.
“I want to show you something,” he said.
He led me to what must have been his bedroom. When he opened the door, a cloud of sweet smoke met us. A group of people were sitting in a circle on the floor around a large cluster of candles. It was much quieter here.
“You guys need to open the window,” he said.
“It is open,” Sheryl said, from her seat on the floor. I thought she looked surprised to see me, as did a few other people, but no one said anything.
Curt led me to a gap in the circle where we could sit down. One of the boys sitting there was someone I’d kissed a while back. The boy’s face lit up when he saw me, but Curt noticed as well and he seemed to deliberately place himself in between the two of us.
They were passing around a huge Chinese water pipe. It was about two feet high and I could see I’d need both hands to wrap around the diameter of the shaft. From the smell, I knew they weren’t smoking tobacco.
Annette popped her head in the door. “Kimberly, are you in here?”
“Hey,” I said.
Annette realized what was going on. “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine. You want to come in?” I was filled with curiosity and recklessness this evening. Other kids had the choice of giving in to temptation in the moment or waiting for the next opportunity. For me, there was no later. If I didn’t try this now, I might never get the chance again.
Annette made a face. “Yuck. No, thanks. I’ll see you.” And she closed the door again.
“That water pipe’s Chinese,” I whispered to Curt.
“I know.”
“Where did you get it?”
“I swiped it from my dad’s office. One of his authors in China sent it to him as a gift. Poor guy probably didn’t know what we use bons for here. My dad’s got so much stuff in there, I don’t think he ever missed it.”
When the water pipe came to me, I ran my finger over its intricate carvings. Everyone was looking at me from under their eyelashes, probably to watch the newcomer cough and not know how to take a hit. But I had seen plenty of men smoking water pipes in cafés in Hong Kong.
I put my mouth inside the wide shaft, so tightly that I created an airtight seal, held a lighter to the small metal bowl attached to the main shaft and inhaled through my mouth. I could hear the water bubbling as the smoke was pulled through it and then up into my mouth. I was prepared for the burn of the smoke and I held it in my lungs while I passed the pipe to Curt.
He was laughing. “You’re a natural. You should give up being a brain and become a pothead, like me.”
The pipe came around several times and I smoked and exhaled until I felt I had blown the memory of Matt into the distance. I lay back across the floor, my head spinning. I didn’t know where everyone else had gone, or perhaps they were still in the room. The prickle of the carpet against the back of my hair was extremely pleasant.
“You’ve never had a real kiss until you’ve been kissed stoned,” Curt said.
“All right,” I said, already having a great deal of fun turning my head from side to side.
Slowly, I felt Curt lean over me and capture my head in between his large hands. I felt his hair brush my face. Instead of giving me a quick kiss on the lips as I’d expected, he started by kissing my neck, the tender places underneath the jaw and behind the ear. My world was filled with the touch of his mouth, the scent of his hair. He started gently sucking on my earlobe.
“Mmmmm,” I murmured. “Does this still fall under ‘kissing’?”
In answer, he kissed me full on the lips, leisurely, as if he were savoring every moment. His kiss was soft and full: like a butterfly, it fluttered against the closed door of my heart and then was still.
Over the years, Uncle Bob’s leg had started bothering him more, and we saw him at the factory only now and then. Aunt Paula had taken over most of his duties. To keep up face, because it is so important for the man to appear to be the breadwinner, Aunt Paula told everyone he was working from home. At the factory, though, his office had become in practice Aunt Paula’s office.
All of our mail still went through Aunt Paula since that was the official address the school had for me. The first time she brought me one of my score reports, I knew she was hoping my scores would be low.
“I’m sure you did well, such a clever girl,” she said with seeming kindness. “Why don’t you open it?”
Fortunately, Ma happened to be in the bathroom then and I said, “I want to wait for Ma. I’ll do it later.”
Even though I was dying to open the envelope too, I turned and busied myself with some blouses until Aunt Paula reluctantly walked away. When Ma finally returned, I tore the envelope open and removed the thin piece of paper inside.
“Well, what did you get?” Ma asked.
Strangely enough, I couldn’t find my results. I held the small square of paper up to the light. “I don’t know. They must have made a mistake. There isn’t anything here. It just has the scores that are possible on the test.”
Suddenly, I heard Aunt Paula’s voice. She must have followed Ma back to our work area. “That’s ridiculous. Give it to me.”
She snatched the sheet of paper from my hand and stared at it. Slowly, a rash of red rose up her neck. “Stupid girl, those ARE your scores!”
“Oh.” I took the letter from her. I slowly realized I must have gotten perfect scores on the test. I hadn’t been able to find my results because my scores were a duplicate of the top scores possible.
I was still confused by the whole thing, and I said honestly, “I’m sorry I made your eyes red, Aunt Paula.”
Both she and Ma breathed in sharply.
“What!” Aunt Paula gave a shrill laugh. “Why would I be jealous because my niece does so well? What type of human being do you think I am?”
“No, I didn’t mean that. I, um…” I had made such a blunder I had to anesthetize my face.
“You crazy girl! I’m very proud of you!” She clasped her arm around my shoulders so hard it hurt.
“We’re both very proud,” Ma said, her eyes aglow.