Starry Eyes(2)

Until last fall, when we started talking again during lunchtime at school.

“Would be good for you to spend some time outside,” Mom says, fiddling with her dark hair as she continues to persuade me to go on this crazy camping trip.

“The Perseid meteor shower is happening next week,” I remind her.

She knows I am a strict planner. Unexpected twists and surprises throw me off my game, and everything about this camping—sorry, glamping—trip is making me very, very anxious.

Mom makes a thoughtful noise. “You could bring your telescope to the glamping compound. Stars at night, hiking trails in the day.”

Hiking sounds like something Reagan could be into. She has rock-hard thighs and washboard abs. I practically get winded walking two blocks to the coffee shop, a fact of which I’d like to remind Mom, but she switches gears and plays the guilt card.

“Mrs. Reid says Reagan’s been having a really tough time this summer,” she says. “She’s worried about her. I think she’s hoping this trip will help cheer her up after what happened at the trials in June.”

Reagan fell (I’m talking splat, face-plant) and didn’t place in the Olympic track trials. It was her big shot for moving forward. She basically has no chance at the next summer Olympics and will have to wait four more years. Her family was heartbroken. Even so, it surprises me to hear that her mother is worried about her.

Another thought crosses my mind. “Did Mrs. Reid ask me to go on this trip, or did you hustle her into inviting me?”

A sheepish smile lifts my mom’s lips. “A little from column A, little from column B.”

I quietly drop my head against the front desk.

“Come on,” she says, shaking my shoulder slowly until I lift my head again. “She was surprised Reagan hadn’t asked you already, so clearly they’ve discussed you coming along. And maybe you and Reagan both need this. She’s struggling to get her mojo back. And you’re always saying you feel like an outsider in her pack of friends, so here’s your chance to spend some time with them out of school. You should be falling down at my feet,” Mom teases. “How about a little, Thank you, coolest mom ever, for schmoozing me into the event of the summer. You’re my hero, Joy Everhart?” She clasps her hands to her heart dramatically.

“You’re so weird,” I mumble, pretending to be apathetic.

She grins. “Aren’t you lucky I am?”

Actually, yes. I know that she genuinely wants me to be happy and would do just about anything for me. Joy is actually my stepmom. My birth mother died unexpectedly of an aneurysm when I was eight, back when we lived across the Bay in San Francisco. Then my dad suddenly decided he wanted to be a massage therapist and spent all the life insurance money on getting licensed. He’s impulsive like that. Anyway, he met Joy at an alternative medicine convention. They got hitched a few months later, and we all moved here to Melita Hills, where they rented out space for this clinic and an apartment next door.

Sure, at the ripe age of thirty-eight, Joy is several years younger than my father, and because she’s Korean-American, I’ve had to deal with genius observations from bigoted people, pointing out the obvious: that she’s not my real mom. As if I weren’t aware that she’s Asian and I’m so Western and pale, I’m rocking an actual vitamin D deficiency. To be honest, in my mind, Joy is my mom now. My memories of Life Before Joy are slippery. Over the years, I’ve grown far closer to her than I am to my dad. She’s supportive and encouraging. I just wish she were a touch less granola and chipper.

But this time, as much as I hate to admit it, her enthusiasm about the glamping trip might be warranted. Spending quality time outside of school with Reagan’s inner circle would definitely strengthen my social standing, which always feels as if it’s in danger of collapsing when I’m hanging around people who have more money or popularity. I’d like to feel more comfortable around them. Around Reagan, too. I just wish she’d asked me to go camping herself, instead of her mother.

The clinic’s front door swings open and my father breezes into the waiting room, freshly shaved and dark hair neatly slicked back. “Zorie, did Mr. Wiley call?”

“He canceled today’s massage appointment,” I inform him. “But he rescheduled for a half session on Thursday.”

A half session is half an hour, and half an hour equals half the money, but my father quickly masks his disappointment. You could tell him his best friend just died, and he’d pivot toward a meet-up at the racquetball club without breaking a sweat. Diamond Dan, people call him. All sparkle and glitz.

“Did Mr. Wiley say why he couldn’t make it?” he asks.

“An emergency at one of his restaurants,” I report. “A TV chef is stopping by to film a segment.”

Mr. Wiley is one my dad’s best clients. Like most of the people who come here, he has money burning a hole in his wallet and can afford above-average prices for massage or acupuncture. Our wellness clinic is the best in Melita Hills, and my mom has even been written up in the San Francisco Chronicle as one of the Bay Area’s top acupuncturists—“well worth a trip across the Bay Bridge.” My parents charge clients accordingly.

It’s just that the number of those clients has been slowly but surely dwindling over the last year. The primary cause of that dwindling, and the object of my dad’s anger, is the business that set up shop in the adjoining space. To our shared mortification, we are now located next to a store that sells adult toys.