Yolk(22)

“How many times have I told you, it’s the same fucking soybeans.” I wave the bag of pods in his face. “Japanese curry comes from a brick. Restaurant udon isn’t from scratch, either. Jesus.”

Why is he so dense? I take the almond milk and his oat coffee creamer.

On my tiptoes, I fling open the snack cupboard and hit pay dirt. I grab the economy-size five-pack brick of Shin Ramyun Black by the corner of the plastic bag and fling it onto the counter.

“You’re not taking that,” he says, stepping closer, trapping me between him and the counter behind me. He’s wearing his Birkenstocks in the house, which he swears he doesn’t wear outside when he totally does. “I bought it. You don’t even eat ramyun anymore, remember? It makes you bloated.”

That he calls it ramyun, the way Koreans pronounce it, sets me aflame. I shudder at Jeremy’s entire schtick. The way he was so proud of how he knew how to use chopsticks before we met. Or how showy he was about loving spicy food until the time we got hot pot and he ordered stunt-spice levels and had fire shits for a week. Plus, he’s constantly passing off my tastes as his own. I overheard him tell a girl that Kinokuniya was his favorite bookstore though he’d never even heard of it until I took him.

“Are you breaking up with me?” He runs his hand through his hair, riffling it out a little. This tic of preening almost makes me shudder. Watching him self-consciously finger his eroding hairline disgusts me. I let him see my revulsion.

“I can’t break up with you,” I tell him, shoving everything into bags. “We obviously aren’t together. It’s like how you can’t fire me.”

“Wow,” he drawls. “Okay. But you’re legally obligated to give me time. I paid rent.”

“You paid rent once. Two months ago. It’s October.” I’m light-headed that we’re finally talking about money again.

“You have to give me at least thirty days,” he says crisply. “It’s New York law.”

“I’ll give you a week.”

He nods at the neck of the bottle sticking out of my blue tote. “Maggi’s European, you know. Knorr’s Swiss.”

I can practically hear the fissure in my brain. It’s as if every splinter of frustration from every nonconfrontational moment in my entire life forms this dense thorny morning star of rage that I’m desperate to hurl at him.

“Fuck you, Jeremy!” I scream inches from his face, and push him with the hand still holding the instant noodles. “You don’t get to have this! In fact, you don’t get to have any of this anymore.” I hate how I’ve upgraded this fuckstick’s life in any way. Especially this way. That this asshole now knows how superior Shin Ramyun Black is to regular Shin Ramyun by the grace of an extra flavor packet and all that bonus garlic.

This fucker doesn’t deserve bonus garlic.

“If I so much as see you at H Mart”—I get right in his face—“or even Sunrise Mart, I will fucking ruin you.”





chapter 13


My head is hot, my ears flooded with blood. Something’s biting into my palm, and I look down to find a tangle of iPhone charger cables clutched in my fevered fingers. Two are his. One of the dangling white cubes is even labeled J in blue Sharpie. Jesus Christ, Jeremy’s a dipshit. It makes me laugh that both our names start with J. My mind hones in on the memory of when I told him Koreans don’t get BO because we have dry earwax and not wet like most people. Later, when we went to get dumplings with his boys, he kept raising my arm up by the wrist and smelling my armpit in front of them, saying, “Seriously, get in there. She smells like air!” I socked him but felt secretly proud. It made me feel thin and virtuous to smell like nothing.

When the car pulls up, one of the IKEA bags lurches painfully into my shin.

I click the seat belt fastener a few times before realizing I never buckled myself in.

I stagger through the lobby, looking like a bag lady.

June buzzes me through, but when I get to her floor, she takes a look at my stuff. “What happened?”

“It was a boyfriend,” I tell her. “He was a scumbag.”

“You shouldn’t have left,” says June, blocking her door.

“You’re the one who’s always saying I shouldn’t waste my time with these guys!” I panic momentarily that she won’t let me in.

“Not like this.” She’s wearing pj’s and her face is creased.

“Were you asleep?”

She ignores my concern. “Dummy, do you know how much harder it is to get him out now?”

“But…” I glance down at my hands helplessly. They’re lashed red from the heavy bag handles.

“Christ, Jayne.” She crosses her arms and gives me a hard look. “You know I have a doctor’s appointment in the morning.”

The tears come without warning. “I’m sorry,” I whimper. “I know this is the worst possible timing, but if you just let me stay for tonight. I promise…”

“Is he on the lease?”

“He’s going to leave,” I insist. “I told him he had to by the end of the week. I completely lit into him.”

Her eyes drop to my bags again. “Dude, did you only bring groceries?”

“Please, June.”