Page 26 of Next Time Will Be Our Turn
My heart twisted at the thought of Mama losing her office in her very own clinic. I looked down at my plate of delicious Indonesian food that Mama had cooked. Suddenly, I didn’t feel much like eating any of it.
“Your papa said, ‘Might as well give him your office. It’s not like you’re getting any patients.’ And it’s true. I don’t have patients to speak of. And I’m not the exception to the rule. My best friend went to law school. Is she practicing law now? Of course not. She’s doing the work of a paralegal while her husband takes on high-profile cases. It’s just the way of the world, sweetheart. Do you understand?”
I nodded.
“Have you met any good boys here? Anyone with potential? You know, your cousin Ryan found his wife at PCC. Like I said before, plenty of Chinese-Indo kids from really good families here.”
“Really, Mom?” Iris said again. “Can I just remind you once again that Magnolia is only seventeen? Are you expecting her to get married next year?”
Mama glowered at her. “Auntie Shireen’s Bella just got engaged to Jackson Citra, and she’s only eighteen. And now she’s set to marry a billionaire. Are you so jealous of your sister that you don’t want that for her?”
“I’m not jealous of her,” Iris spat.
I wanted to cover my ears and hide. Instead, I blurted out, “I’ve made some really good friends.”
“Oh?” Mama said.
“Some guy who creeps on younger girls does not count as a friend,” Iris muttered.
“What guy?” Mama said.
Oh god. The last thing I wanted to do was tell Mama about James. Even though he hadn’t done anything wrong or been creepy or anything, I felt guilty about hanging out with him and having a crush on him. He wasn’t someone my parents would approve of—he was neither Chinese-Indonesian nor did he come from money. He was ambitious; he majored in engineering and was very bright, but Mama had made it clear that there was nothing admirable about having to struggle to get to the top.
“Nothing,” I said quickly. I searched my mind for a way to deflect from James. “People from badminton and class, and one of them even lives in our complex.”
“Great, the weird neighbor,” Iris said.
“What weird neighbor?”
I glared at Iris, but she pretended not to see. At least we were no longer on the topic of boys. “This white girl who’s like a million years older than her,” she said. At the mention of “girl,” Mama visibly relaxed. It was the whole reason why I’d brought up Ellery: girls were safe, platonic, didn’t threaten Mama’s ambitions of finding us good, rich husbands.
“Ellery is nineteen. Well, twenty now. We’re good friends.”
Mama frowned, spearing a piece of beef rendang. “You’re friends with a twenty-year-old girl? That’s interesting. I hope she’s not teaching you yang ngga-ngga. You know these Americans, they get very funny ideas sometimes.”
“Ngga-ngga” meant “improper.” I thought of Ellery and her girlfriend Trish and quickly focused on my plate of food so that Mama wouldn’t see my cheeks turning red. “No. She’s a really good person.”
“You should invite her to lunch here,” Mama said. “I would like to meet your friends.”
“God,” Iris groaned. “Do we have to?”
“I would like to meet your friends too, Iris,” Mama said.
“Over my dead body.”
My mind raced, turning over the thought of Ellery here, in our little apartment, with Mama and Iris. Prodding at the image and finding a million ways it could go wrong. But despite all of my concerns, at the end of the day, I was surprised to find that I did want Ellery to come here. I wanted to show Mama this part of my life, to present Ellery to her and say, “Look, Mama, isn’t she marvelous? Isn’t she just the most wonderful person you’ve ever met?” I wanted Mama to smile and say, “I understand now.”
I wasn’t even sure what I wanted her to understand; I hardly understood it myself, this part of me that lurked in dark corners, quietly waiting for the light to reveal its thrashing self to the world.
• • •
“She’s cooking spaghetti with meat sauce for us,” I said to Ellery as she drove us home from school.
“Aww, I was hoping she’d cook some Indonesian food.”
“Something exotic?” I said.
“Yeah-huh!”
