Frankly in Love (Frankly in Love, #1)(46)

“Your eyes are brown,” says Joy.

“They’re black,” I say.

“No, they’re brown,” says Joy. She turns my head in the light and peers closer. “Mhm, brown.”

My whole life, I think, I have been wrong about my own eyes.

“Whoa,” says a voice.

It’s Q.

Joy and I separate. “Hey,” I say.

Q examines my face. “You’ve been crying.”

“I have indeed, old chum.”

“Cry away, I say. Let it all out. How’s your dad doing?”

“He’s gonna be fine. We just got the medical intel.”

“My fingers should help with your swollen face, due to my perennially poor circulation,” says Q, and places a palm over my left cheek.

“Hey, I have bad circulation too,” cries Joy. She offers her hand for Q to feel, and he’s impressed. She places it on my right cheek.

We’re a strange trio, under the cube of light like this.

I take out my phone and begin texting.

“That’s not Brit, is it?” says Q.

“No, because then she would want to come here—” says Joy.

“And then nuh-duh-duh-dee-duh,” says Q, nodding.

Hey, Dad got shot at The Store. We’re at the hospital now. Perforated lung, but he should be okay. Doctors are in wait-and-see mode.

I wait and wait. Two long minutes go by. No one responds slower than Hanna. It’s not just the time difference.

So the official word is he’ll be okay? she says finally.

Yep, he’ll be okay for sure. Mom’s not even worried.

That’s rare lol

I just figured you should know.

Actually . . . mom already emailed me (!) But thanks Franks This is a first. Mom hasn’t written Hanna in forever. So all it took was Dad getting shot, huh, I say.

You’re positive Dad’s gonna be okay

Positive.

Absolutely sure

Yes, Big Sister Hanna.

Then tell him I’ve completed my conversion to full black, says Hanna.

I laugh so hard, Joy and Q struggle to keep my cheeks cool. Then they read Hanna’s message and start laughing, too.

Racist, I say.

Just turning my tears into funny hunny My thumbs hesitate. I’ve never said this part before.

I love you, big sis, I say.

And instantly, fastest she’s ever responded, Hanna says back: I love you too boo Hopefully I’ll get to see you soon, she adds.

You’re coming home?

I wait and wait, but Hanna doesn’t respond.

“Aw,” says Joy, and gives my cheek a squeeze.

The meaning of the words I love you could not be clearer in my mind. Much clearer than earlier tonight with Brit, and shaped differently. I say the words because I know—we both know—that one day Mom-n-Dad will be no more, and neither will House Li as the world knows it. It will become something else.

It’ll be just me and Hanna, piecing together our memories of our crazy parents to see how complete a picture we can manage. It will of course never be complete. It will of course be mostly inaccurate. We will of course screw the whole thing up.

And once we eventually grow old and go, that’ll be that.





chapter 17


maybe it’s different



I open my eyes.

All my joints feel frozen. My left foot is completely asleep. I feel someone touching my face, then realize it’s my own hand, which has also gone completely asleep. I look down to see my body curled like a pretzel into one of the hard seats in the waiting area.

Outside, dawn is breaking.

My mouth tastes like stale Nachitos. “What time is it?”

Q and Joy duck into my field of vision. Their mouths are quivering with barely contained laughter.

Finally they can no longer hold it. “Bahahahahahahahah,” they say.

I sit up and my body lights up with sharp tingles. “What?”

Now it’s the staff’s turn to laugh.

“Good morning, Sleeping Beauty,” says the nurse from before. It looks like his shift is over. “Your dad’s being discharged now.”

I stand and almost immediately fall. “How long was I asleep?”

Joy and Q are still laughing. “Long enough.”

Then Joy aims a sheepish finger at a nearby mirror. When I go to look at it, I see my face has been covered in multicolored scribbles.

Not scribbles. Signatures.

“I had the whole ER staff sign your face,” said Joy. “You snored for four hours straight through the whole thing.”

“We love you, Frank,” says the reception woman behind the glass.

“Your dad’s gonna be just fine,” says someone else.

“It’s on, the story’s on,” says the reception woman. She tap-tap-taps a remote to increase the volume on a nearby TV.

“We begin Wake Up! LA today with a night of terror last night in Hancock,” says the TV, “where police say a man in his midthirties went on a shooting rampage at four separate establishments, injuring five.”

“Huh,” I say. A shot of Fiesta Hoy Market briefly appears, then a photo of a white guy with eyes gone dead.

“The suspect is undergoing questioning by detectives as well as forensic psychologists,” says the TV.