Kimchi & Calamari (8 page)

“Y
ou're in big trouble, Joseph. Mommy and Daddy are talking about you on the patio, and Daddy's Mad Meter is on,” Gina announced in her Channel Five reporter voice. Frazer was at her side, drooling as usual.

I'd missed Dad's gourmet feast, though I noticed a foil-covered plate was left for me on the stove. The kitchen smelled more like garlic than broccoli now. It made me realize how hungry I was.

I poured myself a glass of orange juice. Then I zapped my dinner in the microwave. Gina came over and parked
herself next to me at the kitchen table with a bag of Oreos and a glass of milk. Eeyore sat next to her on the chair.

“Where's Sophie?” I asked as I sprinkled red pepper on my steaming linguini.

“At Kaylie Heinz's bowling party. She always gets invited to birthday parties and I don't.”

“Kaylie plays soccer with Sophie, that's why,” I said.

“Or maybe it's because kids think I'm a double-squared dork.” She sulked, her eyes looking down from behind her glasses.

Gina kept pulling apart her Oreos, scooping the filling out with her pinkie fingernail, licking the chocolate shells, and clumping them in a pile. It looked nasty, but I have to admit I prefer the cream to those dry Frisbees too.

I started to tune Gina's whining out after a while. Here I was facing an academic felony, and she was carrying on about her lagging second-grade social life. Big deal.

“I wish I were adopted like you, Joseph,” Gina said.

That got my attention. “Why?”

“'Cause it makes you special. Everyone compares me to Sophie. We learned about antonyms in school today, like fat and skinny, hot and cold. Sophie and me, we're
twin antonyms. She's chocolate chip cookie dough ice cream and I'm boring vanilla.”

“You wouldn't want to be the same as Sophie,” I said.

“Yes I would.” She grabbed another Oreo and banged it on the kitchen table. It broke and fell to the floor. “See? Even eating cookies is a tragedy for me!”

I stifled a laugh. “Having clone Sophies would be like sticking two fighting fish in the same tank. Besides, different doesn't mean you're not as good.”

She kept shaking her head. I knew that whatever I said was going to sound lame, like a parent insisting “you tried your best” after you got cut from the team.

Hadn't I felt second-rate when Gina and Sophie were born? I remember looking down at their cute little faces in their matching wicker bassinets, wondering if Mom and Dad would still call
me
their baby. Nonna Sculletti said the twins had Sculletti noses, and Nonna Calderaro called them the picture of Dad. Of course, no one said any of that about me.

As I got up to refill my glass, I thought about an Italian saying Nonna Calderaro uses: Only the spoon knows what's stirring the pot. I had adoption stuff on my mind, and meanwhile, Gina, the cutest tadpole from Mom and Dad's own gene pool, had her own identity crisis. Who knew?

“Okay, here's something that makes Gina Calderaro special in my book. Nobody sings ‘Hakuna Matata' like you. Keep it up, and you just might get into Disney University.”

A smile slowly crossed Gina's face. “I love singing. You really think I'm good?”

“You bet your donkey.” I tugged on Eeyore's floppy ear.

“There's no such place as Disney University, Joseph,” she said with her mouth showing mashed cookie.

“Says who? I read about this geeky guy who graduated first in his class from Disney U. He wore glasses and had a twin, too. Now he's got the lead on Broadway in
Beauty and the Beast
.”

Gina was giggling now, her long hair swinging forward and almost falling into her glass of milk.

“He's a lot hairier than you, but you've got time.” I swiped the last unlicked Oreo.

“Mommy said the Y is offering kids' singing lessons starting this month. She says she'll sign me up if I promise not to change my mind like last year, after she paid.”

“Go for it, Gina,” I said.

Then I saw Mom and Dad stand up from their patio chairs. They looked as if they were coming my way, so I headed out of their way. Upstairs.

 

I was in bed reading an oldie-but-goodie comic, “The Revenge of the Green Goblin,” when I heard the knock. Actually it was more like
knock-knock-BANG!
, which could only mean one thing: Mom was on a rampage.

Since dinner I'd felt like a gunfighter readying myself for a showdown. Not only was the waiting stressful, but I had indigestion from the creamy broccoli sauce.

Mom barged in. “Talk to me about this essay,” she demanded, her arms crossed over her checkered nightgown.

“Didn't Dad give you the
Reader's Digest
version?”

She grabbed a sock off the floor and flung it at me. “What were you thinking, making up that story?”

Mom started pacing, which isn't easy to do in my room. Gina and Sophie have the longer room, which gives Mom more space. Then she started pouring on the guilt gravy—how she's never hidden anything from me, how she's always tried to be truthful, and how come I wasn't honest in my essay.

“What, we embarrass you, is that it?” she shouted, her hands flailing up and down like railroad crossing signs. “Your father is so upset, he barely touched his dinner—and he made it!”

“I didn't mean to hurt anyone, Mom.”

She kept shaking her head. Without makeup her skin looked chalky against her dark eyes, and that made her seem even madder.

“It was a dumb mistake. I'm sorry.” I stared at my stack of comic books underneath the nightstand.

“You know what plagiarism is, Joseph?”

“This isn't plagiarism, Mom. I wrote the story myself. I didn't copy it.”

“But that man wasn't your grandfather. You stole him from a book! Your father and I decided that for lying, you're sentenced to a weekend of yard work. No going over to Nash's house, no TV, and no video games.”

I pouted my lips, but actually I'd gotten off easy. Maybe Mom was going light on me because she knew how bad I'd get hassled at school. They might suspend me, or even expel me. Then I'd have to go to a reform school with psychopaths who'd cut off my ears if I didn't hand over my lunch money.

Mom walked toward the door, but then she stopped. “Lying, trouble in school—this isn't like you, Joseph. You're adopted, and that's perfectly fine. Why didn't you tell the truth?” She rubbed her eyelids with her fingertips.

“I don't
know
the whole truth, Mom,” I said. “Sometimes I look in the mirror and wish I knew more about
the kid staring back. It's nothing against you and Dad.”

“Mom! We're out of toothpaste!” Gina yelled from the bathroom.

“You want to know more about yourself, being Korean? Is that it?”

I nodded and thought about the Internet posting. Wondered if I should've told Mom about that too.

“I understand that, honey. And deep down, your father can too. He has a heart bigger than the ladder on his truck, but he's pigheaded. You're his oldest and only son, Joseph. I swear, sometimes he forgets that you're adopted.”

“It's not like I got a vote,” I said.

“Joseph, adopting you was one of the most wonderful days of my life. Your father's, too,” she said, and her eyes filled up with tears. My hands trembled against my comic book.

“Your father…well, I know he's hard to talk to sometimes, but that doesn't mean he doesn't accept you for who you are,” she added.

“But you're speaking
for
him, Mom. Dad never talks like that, and that's part of the problem.”

“Well, maybe I am speaking for him, but after being married to your father for twenty years, I know his every thought.”

“Will someone help me? I need toothpaste!” Gina shouted like she was drowning.

“Stop yelling! Geez Louise, it's on the shelf under the sink,” Mom snapped. Then she flipped on my night-light.

“I wish you'd talked to me about your essay,” she said, a bit softer. “We could've figured something out together. I would've tried to help.”

“Will you talk to Mrs. Peroutka for me?” I asked. “Explain how I'm adopted so we can fix this?”

“Joseph, my job isn't to fix everything for you. My job is to help you deal with life's messy parts. I'm sorry, but you'll have to talk to your teacher yourself.”

Ugh. Just thinking about walking into Mrs. Peroutka's class made my stomach hurt again. Facing her. Facing everyone. Like how Susan Amber must have felt last year when she got caught rigging the yearbook's “cutest smile” vote for herself.

“Capisce?”
Mom asked.

I nodded.
“Capisce.”

“No more stolen relatives. Go see your teacher on Monday morning with a big shovel and dig yourself out of this hole.”

F
orty-eight hours without TV and video games felt like cruel and unusual punishment. And what made it even worse was dreading Monday, my day of reckoning. I kept rehearsing what I'd tell Mrs. Peroutka. I even had a nightmare that after I'd fessed up, a CNN reporter stuck a microphone in my face and shouted, “So, was being adopted what corrupted you?”

After social studies ended, I waited until the last kid left the room to come clean. Mrs. Peroutka was erasing the chalkboard when I approached her. Shoving my sweaty hands in my shorts pockets, I plunged right into
my confession of how I made up the Sohn Kee Chung story.

When I finished, I put on my sorry face I use when I lose the house key or forget to throw the clothes in the dryer for Mom. Mrs. Peroutka was ancient and demanding, but I could tell she cared about her students. I didn't like disappointing her.

But Mrs. Peroutka didn't raise her eyebrows or reach for her red pen and grade book. Instead she barraged me with a bunch of deep questions.

“Out of all the famous Koreans to be related to, why did you choose Sohn Kee Chung?” she asked.

I shrugged my shoulders. “He seemed brave, a cross between a jock and a rebel.”

“How so?”

I told her about Korea's occupation, and how Sohn Kee Chung had to run wearing a Japanese jersey. “Some Koreans were upset with him for running. Like it was
his
fault that his country got invaded.”

“That was a difficult time for Korea,” she said, nodding.

“But even with the Japanese threatening him, he never missed a chance to tell reporters that Korea was his mother country,” I added.

Mrs. Peroutka kept asking questions, and I had
answers. I was surprised how much I remembered from that library book.

Then she kicked in with the self-examining stuff. “Why do you think I assigned this essay, Joseph?”

“So someone from our school can win the contest?” I was joking, sort of.

She frowned, and I wished I'd zipped my lips.

“I want my students to spend time thinking about their families, living and deceased. Sometimes it feels like the here and now is all that matters, but we have legacies that help shape who we are. I think about my relatives on my mother's side. They were Polish Jews who came to America to escape persecution. They never took for granted the freedom they made a difficult journey to discover.”

She paused, then added, “Did this essay make you curious about yourself?”

I nodded. It had made me curious enough to query the world about my birth via the Internet. But it had also unleashed epic problems, kind of like the demons inside Pandora's box.

Mrs. Peroutka continued probing. “In what way?”

“It just added to it. Being adopted makes me wonder about stuff anyway. I wish I could
stop
wondering.”

“Good for you that you wonder, Joseph. It's a sign of a
maturing mind,” she said with a smile. Suddenly I had a feeling that I wouldn't be spending the afternoon in detention after all.

I glanced out the door of the classroom. Yongsu passed by and waved wildly.

“Joseph, it sounds as if you can't write about your biological lineage right now. But it seems to me that you
are
quite reflective about your past, your family, and your origins. And I bet you've already started discovering some things about what it means to be Korean.”

The one-minute-until-you're-late bell rang, but Mrs. Peroutka kept going. “I think the circumstances justify my giving you a second chance. Your makeup essay can address your ethnicity and other aspects of your identity—including your adoption, if you want. It doesn't have to be about your blood relations,” she added, wiping chalk from her hands.

“Thanks, Mrs. Peroutka,” I said. “I mean…well, for listening to me.”

I owed her that. She'd given me a do-over when she could've sliced the you-flunk guillotine on my neck.

“One more thing, Joseph,” she called as I started to leave. “Your revised essay is due next Tuesday. And while I enjoy your storytelling, I expect nonfiction this time.”

 

I stood in the express checkout lane that night feeling half-and-half, like the cream Mom sent me in for. I felt half relieved that I'd made my confession, and half crummy that the truth was out. Rumors were spreading at school that I'd bought an essay over the Internet and tried to pass it off as my own. As if. We're not even
online
at my house.

Just as I put the cream, bread, and Capicola ham on the conveyor belt, Kelly walked into the supermarket.

For a second I pretended not to see her, what with all the talk going around about me. But no, Kelly and I were friends. She'd understand. So as soon as I paid the cashier, I walked over to her in the floral section. We hadn't talked since she'd asked me about playing miniature golf, and I wondered if we were still on.

I tapped her on the shoulder. “What's up, MVP?”

“Nothing,” she snapped back without looking at me. Her arms were crossed, and she kept staring at the bouquets on the $5.99 display rack.

“Whatsamatta?” I rested the grocery bag on the floor.

“You're a big liar, that's what. I heard about your fake essay. And to think I fell for your ‘I'm adopted and writing letters to my birth family' story.”

She kept staring at those flowers. I felt like jumping up on the display just to get her attention.

Dad told me once how President Nixon lied and had to leave the White House in disgrace because of a scandal called Watergate. Looking at Kelly's scowling face, I realized that I was caught up in Essaygate.

“I wasn't lying, Kelly. I
am
adopted. And if I wanted to impress you, I would've come up with a much better story. Trust me.”

No response.

“Listen, I couldn't write the essay because I don't know my birth family,” I said, staring down at my sneakers. “My parents don't know anything either, and I panicked.”

Finally she looked at me. “You told me you were writing back and forth with your family in Korea,” she said.

“I want to…I mean, I'm going to. It's complicated.”

“I don't respect dishonest people,” she declared. And she walked past me so fast that I felt a breeze.

That was when I felt my blood really starting to boil, as Aunt Foxy says. How dare she suggest I'm dishonest! Last year I found five dollars wedged in the seat on the school bus and I turned it in to the bus driver.

Besides, Kelly didn't have a clue what it was like being adopted. Not a clue.

I marched right up beside her, next to a giant cactus. “Know what, Kelly? I don't respect golden girls who rush
to judge others without checking the facts. And by the way, I'll pass on miniature golf this weekend. I've got commitments.” Then I picked up the grocery bag and headed toward the automatic exit door.

Like Dad, I mixed metaphors, but I got my point across.

Then the door shut behind me. On Kelly and any wish I had for us to go to the Farewell Formal together.