Wing Jones(28)

“OK,” says Monica. “I’ll come over.”





CHAPTER 16


If LaoLao is surprised to see me walk in with Monica, she doesn’t say anything. She’s sitting at the kitchen table filling dumplings. The table is covered with flour, delicate dumpling wrappers, and balls of the minced pork filling.

“You want to help?” she asks Monica. Monica nods and sits, helping LaoLao pinch the dumplings shut. I sit down next to her, and for the first time since I’ve started running, I’m content doing something else.

“No, no, no. All wrong.” LaoLao reaches over and takes Monica’s most recent dumpling. It looks more like a pyramid. “Fingers must be gentle and firm,” says LaoLao. “Like this.”

Monica nods and redoes her dumpling.

LaoLao grunts. “Yes. Better.”

After a while Monica stands. “Can I use your phone?”

“You don’t have to ask for something like that,” I say.

As she walks out of the kitchen, I see her glance down the hallway, toward Marcus’s room. His door is still shut. I haven’t been back in there since the night of the accident when my dragon and lioness first came back. I don’t know if anyone’s been in there.

I’m not trying to eavesdrop, but Monica’s voice raises so suddenly and so shrilly it’s impossible not to. “Daddy, I’m having dinner at the Joneses’ house. All right?”

I resist the urge to pick up the other phone to hear what her father is saying back to her, but whatever it is, it makes Monica raise her voice even more.

“I don’t care,” she says. And then, “Daddy, they’re my family! Don’t say that.”

A pause.

“Well, fine! Maybe I won’t come home tonight.” She slams down the receiver, startling LaoLao so much that she nearly drops the dumpling she’s filling.

Monica comes back in and sits down in the chair. “Wing? Do you think I could stay here tonight?”

Monica could have slept in Marcus’s room. But she didn’t ask to. She didn’t even ask to see it. Instead, she’s sleeping in my room. On a blow-up air mattress. Like we’re having a sleepover. I watch her brush out her long hair and put on moisturizer. It’s like having a sister.

“Is your dad mad?” I ask.

Monica blows out of the side of her mouth, sending her bangs up into the air. She looks a little bit like a pony. “That’s an understatement,” she says.

“Why doesn’t he like Marcus?”

“Because he’s black,” Monica answers immediately and without shame.

“He’s also Chinese,” I offer.

“I don’t think that helps,” says Monica. “And also, he doesn’t like that I pay for stuff for us.” She looks away from me, voice lowered. “I don’t mind. I’ve got money from my grandparents and from working last summer. And I know Marcus can’t get a job during the school year because he’s always got practice. And I know how it is for your mom. But my daddy … he says it isn’t right for a girl to be buying dinner.” She pauses again and I close my eyes, embarrassed that Marcus couldn’t afford to take Monica out the way she deserves. “Wing! I don’t care. I promise. That is total bullshit. Like a woman can’t buy a man dinner. I’m not some simpering Southern belle, no matter what my daddy thinks or what he wants.” Her Southern accent is getting heavier with every word. “I had gotten used to it. Almost. The snide comments. The glares. The threats that there was no way in hell he would pay for my wedding, and possibly wouldn’t even walk me down the aisle. Sometimes, when he’d had a beer or two, he would come around. Not about Marcus, but about me being his daughter, and tell me that he loved me no matter what. But then, after the accident … I thought it was bad before. But really, he was holding in all this awful vitriol.”

“What does vitriol mean?” I ask. It sounds awful.

“Wing, you gotta start studying your SAT vocab,” says Monica. “Vitriol is like … verbal poison. Literally an acid, but people can be full of it too. And my daddy is just brimming with it. Especially when it comes to Marcus. I’ve been telling him for so many years that Marcus is a good guy. More than a good guy, that he’s a great guy. But now … now he’ll never believe me.” She pulls her sleeping bag up over her head and when she finally speaks her voice comes out muffled. “I don’t even know if I believe me anymore.”





CHAPTER 17


I didn’t think my dragon and my lioness would come in my room with Monica in here, but my lioness wakes me up by nuzzling my feet, and I spy my dragon’s eyes glowing in the dark. She’s squeezed into the small space between Monica’s air mattress and the door.

“Go away,” I whisper. “I can’t go running tonight!”

My lioness growls softly and tugs on my pajama bottoms with her teeth, and my dragon snorts. I fling back my covers.

“Fine,” I whisper. I’m glad they woke me up. I want to run. I look over at Monica, who’s sprawled out on the air mattress, hair everywhere. I think she’s snoring.

I wonder if I can get up without her noticing.

Get up and get dressed and get out the door.