Chapter One

The penny arcs out, out, out…and then vanishes into the inky black waves that crash and unfurl against the coarse strip of beach. The Gulf of Thailand might be bigger, more dramatic, than any wishing well. But it swallows my desperate hope just as thoroughly. Just as uselessly.

I march across the wet sand, in my white canvas sneakers, trying to convince myself not to count my steps. Taking my shoes off is out of the question. My bare feet haven’t touched any kind of ground in four years.

It’s okay. It will be okay. It has to be okay.

If I tell myself enough times, maybe I’ll actually believe it. Even though my long-time therapist has failed to convince me otherwise. Even if the hollow in my chest proves that there are some things that will never be okay, no matter how much effort we pour into “living for the moment” or “creating lasting memories.”

I leave the beach and trudge up the steps to our private villa, pausing to wash my feet in a basin of water. I laboriously dry every inch of my feet and then trade in my sneakers for a pair of satiny house slippers. When I walk inside, Mama’s sitting on the white-and-green striped couch.

“Ah, so Alaia lives!” she sings out. “I was beginning to think you were trying to steal my thunder, young lady. Not fair, when I had to suffer three rounds of chemo to get this close to dying.”

“That’s not funny, Mama.” And it’s not. But I’m just as guilty as Papa, just as guilty as the grief counselors, because I force my lips up anyway.

This is Mama’s last trip. Her final wish. A vacation with her family in Koh Samui, where she was born, while she’s still healthy enough to enjoy it.

And damn it, she will enjoy it. If it’s the last thing I do, I will make Mama smile 121 times on this trip.

Her face catches the glow of the recessed lights. Her skin is still smooth, with only a few lines around her tapered eyes to reveal her age. With only a pallor to her light brown skin that betrays her illness. A Thai silk scarf is tied around her head. After her surgery, Papa bought a dozen scarves from her favorite silk house, each one brighter and more cheerful than the last.

It’s as though he can keep Mama alive by the brilliance of those colors alone.

Mama flicks the peacock-feather ends out of her face as I sit down on the other end of the couch. “Maybe I don’t want to be wise and appropriate all the time. Did you ever think of that?”

My heart twinges. Already, our family, neighbors, and friends talk about Mama in the hallowed tones of the dead. Celebrating every award she’s ever won, tallying the patients she’s saved. Putting her on a pedestal on which only the deceased can balance.

“I’m no saint,” Mama continues. “No matter how much it comforts A-ma to think of me that way.”

“Maybe you really are that good,” I venture. “Maybe you truly are that kind.”

Her face softens, and she presses her hand against mine. I don’t like touch, as a general rule—it makes me feel like I have bugs crawling under my skin. But Mama’s touch is warm, comforting. Safe. Much like Mama herself. I don’t know what I’ll do when I no longer have access to it.

Blinking rapidly, I look away and scan the room. Whoever decorated this villa did not have an eye for symmetry. The painting of an ocean liner is askew, the potted plants are a few inches off-center, and white shells are scattered haphazardly on the glass coffee table. I am itching with all my might to fix the disorder.

Don’t, Alaia. If you fix one thing, it will tempt you to fix more. Do not squander this moment with Mama. You don’t know how many you have left.

Despite my pep talk, I reach out my hand automatically. I move one seashell so that it’s perfectly aligned with another—and I would’ve moved a second and a third and a fourth—but Mama clears her throat.

Guiltily, I pull my hands away, my cheeks flushing hot at being caught. “I know. I know.”

Mama just looks at me, her eyes gentle with understanding.

Lining up the seashells will not make me safer. I know that. And yet, logic can’t stop the feeling that rises in me. It’s like the universe is out of balance, the seashells a cosmic event that distorts my reality, and nothing can be right until I return the chaos to order.

I grit my teeth. With incredible effort, I walk to the end table and pick up Mama’s medicine box. Shaking the assortment of orange, white, and light blue pills into my palm, I offer them to Mama.

It’s my job to prepare Mama’s medication. She used to do it for me when I was a little girl, giving me my pills every night, without fail. Now, it’s my turn to return the favor.

Just then, the doorknob rattles and Papa walks in with a guy who looks slightly older than my seventeen years.

Mama perks up, and I try to figure out what to do with my hands. The guy is cute, no doubt about it.

He’s incredibly tall, with black, close-cropped hair and a muscular body. Strong jaw, sharp cheekbones. A nose that flares slightly at the bottom, and golden brown eyes framed by thick lashes.

What strikes me most about him, however, is that he looks biracial, like me. Maybe he, too, has an Asian mom and a white dad, or vice versa.

“Alaia. Sweetheart. I’d like you to meet Bodin,” Papa says. We’ve only been here a couple of days, and Papa’s cheeks already radiate sun-kissed. “He’s the boatswain on our yacht tour tomorrow, and he stopped by to introduce himself.”

“How lovely,” Mama says, eyes bright.

Bodin crosses the tile in a few long strides and bends his head over prayer-clasped hands in a wai, the Thai greeting of respect. “It’s wonderful to meet you, Pa Moh,” he says smoothly to Mama. “I will take good care of you and your family tomorrow.”

Pa Moh, Auntie doctor. Two honorifics in one phrase, befitting the respect the Thai people have for both elders and physicians.

This guy knows exactly what he’s doing.

I guess Mama falls for it because she pats his shoulder, each light tap broadcasting to me a message that’s as clear as the chlorinated pool water. See here? See how nice this boy is? How polite. How handsome.

“I’m looking forward to it,” she responds. “And since we’re leaving so early, I should turn in. Would you mind walking Bodin out, Alaia? I’d like Papa to help me up the stairs.”

My eyes widen. By her second statement, my heart’s pounding furiously against my chest. Seriously? She’s picking now to play matchmaker? This trip is about her, about us, spending meaningful time together. Not about me awkwardly flirting with a boy who will ultimately have no significance in my life.

But there’s only one response, and that’s the polite one. “I’d be happy to.”

Mama beams. “Wonderful. That way, you young people can get to know each other.”

I bend down to hug her good night. “Do not play the death card,” I mutter in her ear. “It’s painfully unattractive.”

“I’m not playing anything.” Her eyes flash. “It’s all true. I do want you settled. And I really am…dying.”

Her voice cracks on the last word, along with my heart. Annoyance forgotten, I kneel in front of her, dropping my head on her lap. She threads her fingers through my hair like she wants to keep the strands forever.

“I love you, Mama,” I say, and she smiles.

Six, I think. I’ve made her smile six times this trip. I wish I could magic away her cancer this easily.

She and Papa leave, and I beckon Bodin toward the front door. We walk outside into the balmy night. The palm trees sway gently in the breeze, and a million stars stud the black blanket of sky, making the short lamps that light the way redundant. Thailand even smells different than America—hot and sultry and somehow safe, even though I only visit A-ma and the rest of my extended family once a year.

“I’m sorry about your mom,” Bodin says, his voice low and scratchy, as we stop at the edge of the curving driveway. “I know how it feels to lose someone, too.”

Our gazes meet, and my chest gives a swift, hard bump—the ache of one lonely person recognizing another.

“Who did you lose?” I ask, although it’s none of my business. But I can’t help it. The pain in his eyes wipes out every nicety Mama’s ever taught me.

His jaw tightens. “It was a long time ago.”

A minute passes, maybe two, as I try to figure out how to smooth over the awkward moment.

I’m just about to blurt out a goodbye and run back inside when he looks up, his smile easygoing once more. The transition is so smooth, so seamless, that I have to blink.

“See those seven stars shining in the sky?” He points, neatly changing the subject. The warmth of his tone makes my stomach fall to the rocky beach. Because I’ve seen his real face now. Glimpsed his actual emotions. And so, I recognize the tone for what it is: the fake one he uses to win over tourists.

“You may know them as the Pleiades or the Seven Sisters,” he continues. “But here in Thailand, we call those stars the mother hen and her six chicks.”

The light from the lamps flickers over his face, highlighting some of his features and shadowing others, as he starts to tell me the legend.

An elderly couple wanted to make merit by providing a meal for a monk. Their pet, a mother hen, was happy to give her life for the good duty of feeding the monk, but her six chicks cried and pleaded with her to stay with them. The next day, the hen was boiled…and out of love for their mother, the baby chicks jumped into the pot after her. Because of their deep, abiding love for one another, the mother hen and her chicks were reincarnated as stars in the sky.

It is a lovely story, a poignant one. I’m sure I’ll never look at this constellation the same way again. And he’s a wonderful storyteller, his voice weaving magic, encouraging me to succumb to the wonder of it all. That must be the one he uses when he gives tours.

“That’s super tragic and super touching, all at the same time,” I say.

“As folktales often are,” he agrees, an indentation appearing on his cheek. Of course he would have a dimple.

For a moment, I yearn for a different life. One where my mother isn’t dying. One where I’m free to have a meaningless holiday fling. One where I’m actually confident enough to pursue it. But there’s no point in wishing for the impossible.

He returns his attention to the sky. “Tomorrow we’ll see the wildest things,” he muses. “Homes nestled high on the rocky islands. The people who live there have to bring even their drinking water over by boat. Other islands are a little bigger, with a restaurant, maybe a few stores. Still others are so remote that they have yet to be discovered.”

“Then how do we know they’re there?” I ask.

“Rumors. Speculation.” He slides a glance at me. “Do you believe in legends, Alaia?”

“I don’t know.” I’ve never really thought about it. “But the best lies have an element of truth. These stories are so old, they’re probably based on something. Right?”

He nods, as though pleased by my answer. “Thailand runs through your blood. A country of folktales and legends, of myths and superstition. Some people dismiss the old beliefs as simply that: old. But not me. Not you. We know better.”

I shiver. My logical side blames the sudden gust of wind, but my deeper gut acknowledges the true source: the piercing timbre of his voice, the raw candor in his eyes. An old soul, this one. I’m not used to guys my age being this deep, but I kinda like it.

A screech pulls me from my thoughts, followed by a cacophony of barks, chirps, and clicks.

“What is that?”

He flinches. “That’s the sound of two chingchok lizards fighting on the wall.”

“So?” I ask, not understanding the reluctance in his tone. “Why does it make you look like you want to hide behind the palm tree?”

He shakes his head, as though he doesn’t want to answer, but the noise crescendos. The lizards must be nearing the climax of their duel.

“The fighting is an omen of evil,” he says haltingly. “It foretells that your family will suffer illness, maybe even death, in the near future.”

I shrug with a nonchalance I don’t feel. Have never felt. “Mama has cancer. It’s terminal. I don’t need a pair of chingchoks to tell me that she’s going to die.”

“No, not just Pah Moh.” He chews on his lip, as though debating whether to continue. “You shouldn’t take this to heart. Ultimately, it’s just a couple of reptiles in their natural habitat. But the omen…well, it’s meant to apply to your entire family.”