Frankly in Love (Frankly in Love, #1)(26)

“Angle your hands just right for liftoff,” I say.

“I’m trying,” says Brit, laughing this far-off laugh that sounds a little like crying.

“Liftoff, liftoff,” I shout.

At the red door, which I now clearly see as red and not brown, we kiss one last time before the silver dog butt. I dance down her steps and do not fall or falter once.

I drive home and park outside to keep the garage door rattle from waking everyone. I slip off my shoes and align them perfectly with Mom-n-Dad’s in the glossy brown tiled entranceway.

When I get to my bedroom, someone has left my desk lamp on to help me see in the dark, and my bed is perfectly made. I flop onto it and begin slipping into sleep when I remember to send one quick message.

Confirming, back at base now.

Me too, back at base and in bed, says Joy.

How did it go?

Really great, says Joy. I felt like Cinderella liberated past curfew.

And you didn’t turn into a pumpkin.

Ha! How was B?

Gangbusters, I say. A perfect night.

Well highfive then

Highfive indeed.

And Joy sends me an animated picture of two soccer players attempting a high five, failing, and smacking each other in the face simultaneously.

“Good night, Joy,” I say, before falling into a clear, deep sleep.





chapter 11


gem swapping




At The Store the next day I am useless. I forget to bag things, I give out the wrong change, I stare right past customers’ eyes.

“You terrible,” says Dad, laughing with glee. “Right now you in so-called state of perpetual distraction.”

But he’s not mad or anything. He just laughs and laughs, because he thinks I’m dating Joy Song.

Brit and I text for a bit later that night, but not as much as you’d think. It’s like we both want to save it up for Monday when we see each other again at school. So I bid her good night, retrieve Brit’s dad’s gift—the small round tin—and open it to reveal a small spool of old audiotape. I carefully mount it onto an old portable Sony reel-to-reel from my collection of audio equipment. I begin digitizing my favorite clips. At one point, I hear Brit’s mom’s voice amid the screeching din of the subway car.

Look at those two, she says.

Get yourselves a room, says another male voice. Brit’s dad.

Are we like that? she says.

Well, I sure as hell hope so, he says.

They sound a little like me and Brit. I wonder: what did Mom-n-Dad sound like when they were courting, as Brit’s dad put it? There’s no recording; even if there were, it’d all be in Korean. Which I guess could get translated. But would it still feel the same?

Monday rolls around. In Calculus, Brit drops her eraser and I pick it up for her.

“Thank you,” she says, eyes ablaze.

“You’re welcome,” I say.

“Well, you two are cordial,” says Mr. Soft, with a perplexed look like someone may have just farted roses. “Okay, turkeys, brief history of the farce that is the modern SAT.”

Class ends. I give Brit a long parting look, and she holds it until she vanishes around a corner.

“Amore,” says Q. He claps his hands. “So. Blood Keep ended badly. Paul Olmo’s mage is dead.”

I shoot Q a look. A character dying is a big deal, and unlike in video games it’s permanent. “No shit. What happened?”

Q shrugs. “Got greedy. He’s been running this scam where he ripped off our party’s gems and swapped in fake ones so no one noticed. But oh, they did.”

“Paul did this?” Paul turned in loose wallets to the lost and found. Paul didn’t steal.

“The party offered him an ultimatum: battle them or preserve some of his dignity through suicide.”

“Jesus.”

“You think you know people,” says Q, breathing mist onto his glasses.

I can see two dozen gem-shaped metaphors incoming, and I just have to laugh.

Just then Joy Song emerges from the crowd, eating from a bag of gigantic grapes. I know these grapes. They’re called wang-podo. Wang is Korean for king size, and podo just means grapes. Anyway, I think Koreans have a thing for really super-big grapes.

Joy sticks her tongue out and sidearms a wang grape—thwack—onto my neck.

“Fuck,” I say, laughing.

“Hahahahaahehehehahahaha,” says Joy.

I pick up the grape and fling it at her.

“Aaaaaaa,” says Joy, and runs away. But she looks back to share a grin with me.

Q just gives me a sober look. “Oooookay?”

“Well,” I say, struggling for words. “We’re family friends, right? But we got to talk with each other at a Gathering, like really talk, and it turns out she’s super cool.”

“Uh-huh,” says Q, still with that look.

“Don’t think with your mouth open,” I say.

Later, I’m driving us to Q’s house. Tonight is chicken tetrazzini, but with Louisiana hot sauce because only someone with the taste buds of a baby would eat that shit plain.

“So, you like Brit,” says Q slowly.

I swim the car side to side. “I like Brit, yes.”

“Then what was that whole Joy thing?”