Page 84 of I Hope This Doesn't Find
Ma and I walk in the opposite direction, where the senior classrooms are. The wide gray corridors are already pretty crowded with parents and students, some heading in, some weaving their way out. Just as I expected, a few people’s eyes slide to my stiff skirt and too-big blazer, a mixture of pity and amusement flickering over their faces before they avert their gazes.
I lift my chin high. Walk faster.
This is fine.
We couldn’t reach my homeroom fast enough.
It’s loud inside. Classmates everywhere, teachers waiting behind rows of desks. None of them say hi to me, and I don’t say hi to them either.
Even though school started almost a month ago, I haven’t really gotten to know anyone. All the names and faces and classes kind of just blur together. The way I see it, we’ll be graduating in less than a year anyway. There’s no reason toput myself out there, as my past teachers all loved to recommend, and get attached to people only to grow apart months later. With Ma’s job moving us around all the time, it’s already happened too many times for me to keep track: that slow, painful, far-too-predictable transition from strangers to acquaintances to friends back to strangers the second I leave the school behind me.
I’d be a masochist to put myself through it again.
Besides, there are fewer than thirty kids in my whole year level, and everyone’s clearly formed their own cliques already. To my right, a group of girls are squealing and embracing like it’s been years since they last saw one another, not hours. And somewhere behind me, another group is deep in conversation, switching between three languages—English, Korean, and something else—within every sentence as if it’s the most natural thing in the world.
Pretty on-brand for an international school, I guess.
“Ah! Look who it is!”
My English and homeroom teacher, Mr. Lee, waves me over, his eyes bright behind his thick, oversized glasses. He’s been cursed with this round baby face and unruly gray-streaked hair, which has the combined, disorienting effect of making him look like he could either be in his early thirties or late fifties.
“Have a seat, have a seat,” he says briskly, motioning to two chairs on the other side of his desk. Then his attention goes to Ma, and his expression grows more benevolent. The way someone would look at a cute kid in the park. “And this is … Eliza’s mother, I’m assuming.”
“Yes. I’m Eva Yu,” Ma says, instantly easing into the chirpy Work Voice she uses around white people, her accent flattened to sound more American. She extends a manicured hand. “It’s lovely to meet you.”
Mr. Lee’s brows furrow a little as he shakes it, and furrow farther when he realizes how strong her grip is. I can tell he’s trying to match up his impression of Ma with whatever preconceived idea he had of her, just based on the non-Western surname.
Ma lets go first, sitting back with a small, self-satisfied smile.
She’s enjoying this, I know. She’s always enjoyed surprising people, which happens often, because people are always underestimating her. Part of the reason she got into consulting in the first place was because a friend joked that she’d never survive in the corporate world.
“Now …” Mr. Lee clears his throat. Turns to me again. “Since you’re new to this, let’s just go over the rules real quick, yeah?” He doesn’t wait for me to respond. “In the next ten minutes or so, I’ll be talking to your mother about your academic performance in your English classes so far, your learning attitude, possible areas for improvement—yada yada ya. No interrupting, asking questions, or drawing attention to yourself until the very end, when I call on you. Is that clear?”
And people wonder why teenagers tend to have authority issues.
“Ah, I see you’ve already got the hang of it,” Mr. Lee says cheerfully, waving a hand at my stony face.
I let my gaze and attention wander.
Then, across the room, I spot one of the few people here I do recognize.
Caz Song.
For all my lack of effort, it’d be hardnotto have at least some idea of who he is: Model. Actor. God—if you were to go by the way everyone gushes over him and follows his every move, despite him never actuallydoinganything apart from standing around and looking obnoxiously pretty. Even now, in this depressing, heavily supervised setting, a substantial crowd of students has already gathered around him, their mouths agape. One girl’s clutching her side in hysterical laughter at a joke he probably never made.
I resist the urge to roll my eyes.
I’ve never really understood the hype around him, unless it’s from a purely aesthetic perspective. Thereisthis certain elegance to the cut of his jaw, the slight pout of his lips, the sharp, lean angles of his frame. His dark hair and darker eyes. It’s not like his features are inhumanly perfect or anything, but together, they justwork.
Still, I get the sense that he’s every bit as aware of this as all his adoring fans, which kind of ruins it. And of course the press loves him; just the other day, I stumbled across some article that deemed him one of the “Rising Stars of the Chinese Entertainment Industry.”
He’s leaning against the back wall now, hands shoved into pockets. This seems to be his natural state: leaning on something—doors, lockers, tables, you name it—as if he can’t be bothered standing upright on his own.
But I’ve been staring too hard, too long. Caz looks up, sensing my gaze.
I quickly look away. Tune back into the interview, just in time to hear Mr. Lee say:
“Her English is really quite good—”
