Our Missing Hearts (22)

Watch where you’re fucking going, chink, he hears, and a big hand catches his shoulder, shoves him to the ground.

It happens so quickly then that he doesn’t piece it together until later. It only becomes clear in the aftermath, as he lies there on the damp grass, winded, cold smudges of mud caked to his palms and knees. There is the man who pushed him, running away, one hand clutching his bloody nose. There on the sidewalk is one fat red droplet, like a splash of paint on the concrete. There, standing over him, is his father, looking down at him as if from a very great height.

You okay? his father says, and Bird nods, and his father reaches down a hand, its knuckles red and raw. His father, he realizes, is a big man, too, though he doesn’t seem it: soft voiced, bashfully stooped, he seems smaller than he is, but in college he ran track, he’s broad and tall and sturdy. Fast enough to race back to a son in danger. Strong enough to punch someone threatening his child.

Let’s go home, his father says, helping him to his feet.

Neither of them speaks until they’re back at the dorm.

Dad, Bird says, as they enter the lobby.

Not now, is all his father says, heading for the stairwell. Let’s get upstairs first.



* * *



? ? ?

    When they reach their own floor, his father shuts and bolts the door of the apartment behind them.

You have to be careful, he says, grabbing Bird by the shoulders, and Bird bristles.

I didn’t do anything. He pushed me—

But his father shakes his head. That man, he says, he’s not the only one like that out there. They’ll see your face and that’s all the provocation they need. And this library stunt—

His father stops.

You usually follow the rules, he says.

It was just a book.

I’m responsible if you get in trouble, Noah. Do you know how bad this could have been?

I’m sorry, Bird says, but his father doesn’t seem to be listening. He has braced himself for shouting, for parental rage, but his father’s voice is a seething hiss and somehow Bird finds this more terrifying.

They could have fired me, he says. The library isn’t open to just anyone, you know. You have to be a researcher. They have to watch who they let in. The university gets a lot of leeway because of its reputation, but they’re not immune. If someone caused trouble and they traced it back to a book they got here—

He shakes his head.

And if I lost my job we’d lose this apartment, too. You know that, right?

Bird hadn’t, and a chill washes over him.

Worse than that. If they realized you got it, and decided to take a closer look at us—at you—

His father has never hit him, not even a spanking, but he stares at Bird with such violent intensity that Bird flinches, preparing for a blow. Then with a jerk his father yanks Bird into his arms, so hard the breath flies out of him. Holds him tightly in a shaking embrace.

And suddenly, a door clicks open in Bird’s mind. Why his father is always so cautious, why he’s always nagging Bird to follow this particular route or that, to not go off on his own. How his father reached him so fast. It isn’t just dangerous to research China, or go looking for Japanese folktales. It’s dangerous to look like him, always has been. It’s dangerous to be his mother’s child, in more ways than one. His father has always known it, has always been braced for something like this, always on a hair trigger for what inevitably would happen to his son. What he’s afraid of: that one day someone will see Bird’s face and see an enemy. That someone will see him as his mother’s son, in blood or in deed, and take him away.

He puts his arms around his father, and his father’s tighten around him.

That man in the pizza place, Bird says, slowly. What did he say?

He’s one of us. His father’s voice is half muffled against Bird’s hair and buzzes inside Bird’s skull. And he’s right. What he meant was, these kinds of things—they might happen to you, too.

His father’s arms loosen, and he holds Bird at arm’s length.

Noah, he says. That’s why I keep telling you, keep a low profile. Don’t do anything to call attention to yourself.

Okay, Bird says.

His father goes to the sink, begins to run cold water over his bruised knuckles. And because it feels like the door between them is still ajar, Bird sets his palm against it. Pushes.

Did my mother like cats? he asks.

His father stops. What, he says, as if Bird has spoken in another language, one of the few he doesn’t know.

Cats, Bird repeats. Did she like them.

His father shuts off the water. Where is this coming from? he says.

I just want to know, Bird says. Did she?

His father glances quickly around the room, his habit whenever Bird’s mother comes up. Outside, all quiet, only the occasional siren passing.

Cats, he says, looking down at his raw and reddened hand. She did. She adored them.

He looks at Bird searchingly, with a gaze more pointed than Bird has seen in a long time. Like he’s spotted something unusual in Bird’s face, like a sheath has been removed.

Miu, his father says slowly. Her surname.

He writes the character in the dust on the top of the bookshelf: a square crisscrossed to represent a field, two smaller crosses sprouting from the top.

    苗