Page 45 of It's in the Contract
I love it here.
Suzy glances from me to Zeke. “I’ve been bored to death.” Suzy looks over her shoulder. “I’m taking a break!” she calls to her mom. Suzy unties her apron and slings it over the back of a chair. Mrs. Jeong sees us and waves before turning back to take someone’s order. The clanging of pots and pans and the sound of a sizzling grill tells me that Suzy’s dad is cooking in the back.
We make our way to an open table near the window, Zeke following behind me hesitantly. I wonder if he’s nervous about the food or about being with Suzy or something else. I take a seat in a high-backed black chair with a red cushion, and Zeke takes the chair next to mine. Suzy sits across from me. I don’t even need to scan the menu, but I pick one up so Zeke doesn’t feel awkward.
He studies the menu with a furrowed brow and a serious look. “I can’t even pronounce any of this stuff. And what is a fried pig trotter?”
“Don’t order that,” Suzy says. She and I exchange smiles.
“Don’t worry,” I say. “We’ll order for us all.”
When Suzy’s mom gets a minute to help us, she bustles over. Her thick hair is cut short, and her eyebrows are perfect. I bet she doesn’t even have to get microblading done. She wears a black apron over a collared, pale pink blouse.
“Annyeonghaseyo, Mrs. Jeong,” I say, “hello” in Korean.
Mrs. Jeong smiles. “Callie-shi, it’sOmma-nim, not ‘Mrs. Jeong’, remember? Good to see you. Way too long since you and Soo Yun eat here,” she says in her accent. She turns to Zeke. “You are?”
“This is my friend, Zeke,” I say. “He just moved here, and he’s never tried Korean food.”
She smiles. “Oh, we fix that. You girls want usual?”
I nod, and Suzy grins. “Thanks,Omma!”
She takes our menus and leaves.
“What am I getting into?” Zeke asks.
“Just wait,” I say. I hope he likes it. Have we talked it up too much? What if he’s a down home, meat, potatoes, and gravy kind of guy?
“So.” Suzy turns to me. “Check. These. Out.” Suzy reaches into her purse and pulls out a voter’s badge. It’s green and white—our school colors—and the words “Vote Callie for Queen” are printed across the button in big, bold letters.
I gasp. “I love it! Did you make these?”
Suzy looks pleased. “I did. Do you like them?”
“I love them! We can hand them out in school on Monday.”
Suzy turns to Zeke. “Callie is going to win Homecoming Queen this year and steal the title from that horrible Brielle.”
The conversation in the restaurant swells around us, and a burly Asian man with a mustache laughs loudly across the room.
“We ran into Brielle earlier,” Zeke says. “She’s . . . wow.”
Suzy makes a disgusted sound. “Someone has to take that girl down a few notches. Speaking of that, have you seen this?” Suzy whips out her phone with a look of delight.
I scan the site she’s pulled up. The voting page.
I gasp. “I’m ahead!” Suzy and I squeal.
Hana and Beth have around forty votes each, and Brielle has a hundred and fifteen. My votes seem to be accumulating faster than anyone’s; I’m beating her at a hundred and twenty-five.
My heart soars. “This is working!” Take that, Miss 200K.
Suzy puts her phone away. “So, Zeke, what do you like to do for fun?”
Zeke launches, without shame, into a description of his D&D game, telling Suzy, who shows polite interest, about the campaign he and his brothers are running right now. I watch him with a smile, happy to see him happy. He’s so himself and not ashamed of it.
Suzy nods. “I can see how that could be a fun game.”
