Frankly in Love (Frankly in Love, #1)(33)

“Why spanking?” Mom furrows her brow and retreats, and our table of Limbos is left alone once more.

“Hashtag keep it one hundred YOLO swipe right,” says John, who is terrible with slang.

We all look at him for a moment until he settles down.

Andrew reaches out with both hands to clasp Joy’s shoulder and mine. “You have our word. You crazy kids.”

“Are they so crazy, though?” says Ella. “We all just want to love who we want to love.”

And with that, Ella has brought the table to a profound place. I can feel it. I know the others can, too, for whatever secret reasons they have in their hearts. It doesn’t so much matter what our specific secrets are. What matters more is the fact that we have to keep space for so many of them, all the time. We all sit and nod for a moment, letting Ella’s words float before us.

We all just want to love who we want to love.





chapter 13


thank you booleet




The next day I call Mom at The Store to ask if she wants to oh, you know, host a little barbecue party on Saturday, and without even saying yes she goes into Mom Mode: she’ll have to leave The Store early to get the meat, stay up a little later the night before preparing and marinating, get Dad to clean the grill, and so on. She’s so busy muttering her to-do list to herself that she literally hangs up on me.

She acts like it’s going to be this huge pain. But the truth is: Mom loves the chance to host my friends. Because she knows (a) they aren’t judgmental, (b) they’re American kids who will gush over every bite, and (c) she can be openly proud of her cooking without having to fake humility for once like she does with a Korean audience.

I pause, then tap away at my phone.

Heads up, I say. I’m throwing a barbecue party, but I am intentionally not inviting you because the package will be present.

Aha, says Joy. The package I just didn’t want you to hear about it from someone else.

Keep our stories straight, roger that, says Joy. Over and out Then Saturday comes. I wake up later than usual, just before noon. I pad downstairs to hunt for milk and cereal in the kitchen. In the fridge sits a hulking silver bowl of marinating meat waiting to be grilled.

Brit begins peppering me with messages.

5pm, right? Ish?

What should I wear?

Sure I shouldn’t bring a dessert or anything?

Each message strikes my thick, stupid skull like a pebble slung by a shitty little magical imp that I can’t shake. My nerves jangle anew. Frankly, this feels dangerous. Too risky, frankly.

“Shut up with the franklys,” I shout to no one.

Mom gets home early from her a.m. shift at The Store. Dad stays at The Store, because—you guessed it—Dad has never missed a day of work at The Store for almost as long as me and Hanna have been alive. Mom puts on an apron, this freebie she got from the beer distributor with the mentally incongruous image of a bikini girl wearing a fuzzy hat and hugging a giant beer bottle, along with the words GRIZZLY BEER GRAB A COLD ONE.

“I beg you to not wear that,” I say.

Mom looks down at the bikini girl. “Why? It’s brand-new one. Miguel give me free.”

“Does it go inside out?”

Mom unties it, flips it over, and ties it again. “What’s the matter with you?”

“Nothing.”

“Your teacher coming tonight?”

“No.”

“Just friends?”

“Just friends,” I say. The words taste terrible.

Just friends just friends justfriendsjustfriendsjustfriends “Help me,” says Mom, and when I slide the heavy cold hemisphere of meat out of the fridge, I realize that whatever happens next, I am responsible for.

I help set out the bowls and bowls of banchan: kimchi, lotus root, cucumber kimchi, acorn jelly, spinach, bean sprouts, potato salad, roasted anchovies, all that good stuff. A kaleidoscope of dishes, a feast in wait. While Mom chops stuff up, I carefully cover each banchan bowl with plastic wrap. Then I look up: it’s almost three o’clock.

How is it almost three o’clock?

“I haven’t showered yet,” I say to no one.

“Aigu, stink boy,” says Mom. “You so stink.”

Mom is trying to be funny, so I give her a little laugh just to be a good son. But panic is rising in me. People will be arriving soon. Brit will be arriving soon.

“I’ll be right back,” I say, and leap up the stairs.

I let the steam fill the shower. I don’t really wash. I just let the hot water run over my back for a long time. I start writing at the top of the glass shower door.

B-R-I-T

B-R-I-T

When I rinse the letters away with the showerhead, I realize that some finger oil has stuck to the glass so that when it fogs, her name is still slightly visible.

This means something. Brit Means something. This means that when I step out of this white fog, things will be different. Mom will see Brit—really see her—and Brit will be great, and they’ll make each other laugh. Later that night in bed, Mom will report her astonishing findings to Dad: Brit so nice, she having so big eyes, same like Joy. More better than Joy. Dad will grumble at first, but when he sees the light of realization in Mom’s eyes, he will relent.

American girl, they okay.

When Mom-n-Dad say American, they mean white. When they refer to themselves—or me—they say hanguksaram, or Korean. I never call myself just Korean. I call myself Korean-American, always leading first with Korean or Asian, then the silent hyphen, then ending with American. Never just American.