Outrun the Moon(16)

I think back to when we stood at the top of the cemetery as we did after every Easter dinner. That night, I pointed out St. Clare’s steeple, visible from the southern slope. “You asked me if I’d eaten a ling ji.” The medicinal “spirit” mushrooms sometimes give people hallucinations.

A smile plays around Tom’s mouth, but his eyes are like distant stars. “There is nothing you can’t have if you want it badly enough.” There’s an ache in his voice that squeezes my heart.

“You are daai daam, too. You don’t need Mr. Wright’s permission to build your own airplane, you know.”

“No.” He gives me a wry smile. “Just my father’s.”

His words hang between us for a moment. Both of us shoulder the weight of our fathers’ expectations, but for him it is worse, as the herbalist’s only son and with his mother gone, too. As children, we would help Ah-Suk separate herbs into jars, bickering over who had to touch the deer phalluses and squirrel feces. But even as Tom grew older, he never developed an interest in Chinese medicine the way his father had hoped.

He wrings his cap. “I’d better finish unloading.”

“Sure.” I try not to let my disappointment show. Silence, which usually feels like an old friend, now squirms between us.

He rakes a hand through his stiff mop, then replaces his cap. “Tell Jack we’re still on for kite flying this weekend.”

Impulsively, I hug him. “Oh, Tom, that will mean a lot to him. Thank you.”

“Don’t be polite,” he says, meaning you’re welcome.

His breath is warm and sweet.

The first time Tom kissed me, I was twelve, and he was thirteen. I persuaded him to go swimming with me at the beach, though it didn’t take much effort—the day was hot enough to melt the dailies off the wall. The ocean roared as we stood on a crescent of sand. I was suddenly very aware of how small I was, a speck of pepper waiting to go in the stew. Tom hesitated, but I grabbed his hand. “Come on, you tortoise,” I teased. “Don’t be scared; I won’t let you go.” But before we could venture farther, a wave crashed over us, and we were spun into the ocean. Water stung my eyes and filled my nose. I thought for sure it was the end.

Just when I couldn’t hold my breath any longer, the ocean spit us out. We lay heaving on the sand, limbs entangled. As he gazed at me, water dripped from his face onto mine. He lifted my hand to show me that although I had let go, he had not. “Remind me never to listen to you again,” he said in a surly voice before sliding his salty lips over mine.

It was more a kiss of relief, of joy at surviving, of the need to feel something warm and alive. It never happened again after that, though I often wished for it.

As I do now.

He lets me go. I pick my way back down the length of the pier and I could swear his eyes follow me. But when I turn around, Tom has returned to his work, his strong back flexing as he heaves a crate onto his pull wagon.





6



LATER THAT NIGHT, MA, JACK, AND I WAIT on the corner of Dupont and Stockton for Monsieur Du Lac’s automobile. Ba doesn’t see me off, citing too much work, but I know it’s because he has already given as much approval as he can give. Ma catches me looking in the direction of the laundry shop and tsks her tongue. “New shoes take time for working in.”

A small crowd has collected around us to observe the spectacle of me in my fine navy dress. It is one of four that Monsieur Du Lac had delivered, along with a cream-colored shawl, black stockings, black boots, and a smart-looking felt hat. I look like a proper St. Clare’s girl, at least from the neck down.

The dainty Ling-Ling and her shrewd mother peer through the window of Number Nine Bakery. Despite my efforts to ignore the buzz around me, a few comments from the mostly male crowd get through.

“She’s going to some fancy school up on Nob Hill.”

I groan. Chinese people think anything of value must be located on Nob Hill.

“Must cost a lot of money.”

“They don’t have money. Maybe she has caught the eye of a wealthy man’s son.”

“Mercy? Her cheeks are round but not the rest of her. No one wants to hold a spring onion at night.”

“She’s easier on the eyes than your sorry wife.”

Ma turns around and barks, “If you keep talking nonsense, your tongues will fly out of your mouths like bats from a cave.”

Instantly, the chatter stops. No one wants to cross a fortune-teller, especially one as formidable as Ma.

Ling-Ling minces up to me bearing a tiny square of steamed cake, and all eyes shift to her silk-clad figure. Though her feet are not bound, she likes to walk as if they are to make herself more attractive. Her ma follows behind like a dragon’s barbed tail. “Sister, you are looking as fresh as a bubbling spring,” Ling-Ling simpers. “I have brought you some prosperity cake for your voyage.”

I take the waxy package with the cake, which is burned on one side and would’ve been thrown out, anyway. Ma makes a noise at the back of her throat. They just wanted an excuse to poke around in my business. “Ling-Ling, Auntie, you are too generous.”

“It grieves us to see you go. But I am sure you will have many admirers in your new life.” Ling-Ling’s eyelashes flutter coyly. It is said that she rubs her face with the pearly sliver of an abalone shell every day for a lustrous countenance.