A Korean girl is a living paradox. Two things at once seemingly contradictory, but apparently not. Hard and determined to achieve, soft and eager to fit in. Closed to distraction, open to culture. Flowering, wilting.
Carla is little contradiction. She is singular in her conviction. American girls exceed their bounds. In the letters Carla wrote me she told me she could feel wherever I was, what chair I was sitting in. She wrote that she was that chair, could feel my legs on her legs. Her imagination was scary detailed: the hairs on my legs soft, my butt going onto her, the curve of her lap, a perfect fit. She imagined so much heat between her lap and my butt, we were both slick. I almost slid off her, my chair. Her letters over the summer held no ambiguity, no contradiction. I cannot imagine my sister imagining such a thing.
Never write things down. Could be used against you.
Five things needed for class. Associate one thing with each finger. Thumb is bowl. Index finger is cold can. Third finger, the hand that’s needed for the demonstration. Fourth, the mouth that’s needed. Fifth, soap with glycerin. Bowl, can, hand, mouth, soap. Move the fingers as I walk down the hall to the lab, and I won’t forget.
“Mr. Song, Mr. Song,” Tommy Underwood yelling. “Come quick.” His shirt untucked, his hair every which way. What a crop of Second Formers.
The sound of something, air, a torch, the compression of gas through small opening, loud, getting louder. Tommy opens the door to the lab. The metal stands on the table, little crosses. The hoses for gas. The beakers and dishes and stink of formaldehyde. Donny Zurkus and his minions. They pinned Kyle to a lab table, a frog.
Safety goggles across Donny’s face. Blowtorch in hand. They rigged something up. Blowtorch to glass funnel, glass funnel to stand, object in funnel, dripping, funnel to tube to Kyle’s ear. He’s spread out on his back. Five kids pinning him.
“Boys,” I say. Two kids holding his legs down, they look up.
“Zurkus,” I say, and I walk up behind Donny, grab both his shoulders. Clammy in his dress shirt, big muscle boy. Don’t spin, don’t aim that blow torch somewhere else. I hold him in place. His head pops up. Busted.
“What the hell?” Donny says. He turns to look over his shoulder, but he can’t see me right behind him. Between my hands, his body twists. You’re not going anywhere, Mr. Shit.
“Zurkus. Turn the torch off.”
“But we’re working.” His voice louder than the torch. He looks at the other boys. They look at the table. Kyle is laid out on the slab, pinned, but no hands pin him.
Donny Zurkus turns the knob on the blowtorch, flame off. I let go of his shoulders. He takes his goggles off. I about flatten him.
“Mr. Zurkus,” I say, “What do you think you’re doing?”
“English. You know Hamlet?”
“Don’t give me that.”
“Honest. You know, the part where Claudius kills Hamlet Senior? No way you can kill somebody through the ear like that. We were checking the real world implications, you know?” He looks at his minions. The boys in his minion look down. Kyle doesn’t move.
Donny and the lingo. Admissions tours. Brochures. Tim-Tim’s ambassador.
“We were only using wax. See?” And Donny gestures with the blunt end of the blow torch, now turned off, to the glass funnel with wax melting in it.
Nothing moves, and everything else is in the shelves along two walls, the Pyrex measuring glasses, the thermometers, Petri dishes, all the tubes and wire and balls. Microscopes on their stands.
“Bull, Mr. Zurkus,” I say.
“But it’s true, Mr. Song,” Donny says. “It’s not fair. You’re not giving us a chance.” His voice gets girly.
“Report to the headmaster, all of you.”
“I’ll miss practice.”
“Mr. Zurkus, you may miss many things. Go.” I look at Kyle. Safety goggles slide across the table. Donny Muscle-Boy with Big Moves. Door swings open. He probably flips me the bird. The other boys go out the door after him.
Good riddance.
Inventory of the shelves. Still everything looks in its place. I have to clean this pigsty. Mr. Lazy Song. Mr. Disorganized. Not like Kim.
We never had to share a room, not like most FOB kids. Old Korean clothes, cramped American quarters. Our parents worked hard to get a real house. My room, messy with books. Kim’s room, dolls in boxes, matching outfits. Pink bed made perfect.
When she started to bleed, got the purpura all over after falling, playing at foursquare, when she didn’t stop bleeding, I folded her clothes for her, made stacks in her drawers. Older brother. Nothing much I could do.
Kyle still stretched on the table. The same position. His face tipped away from me. His khakis dirty. His tie pulled tight to the side. One flap of his collar up. He could be a rag doll, nothing Kim would play with. Too dirty.
“Mr. Harney,” I say, “time to go.” The kid must be shaken. No chance against the others. Five Fifth Formers pinning him down. Almost torched his grease for hair.
“Okay, Mr. Harney, you can get up now,” but he doesn’t move. Inertia. He’s always pale, so this is nothing new. But he’s extra white. Better check.
I step up to the table, and the cold top presses against my waist. Black stone, the best Du Ponts could get for scholar boys taking lab science. Du Ponts know labs. These labs made perfect once Sam Omura graduated. Sam the wonder scientist, the best Tim-Tim’s produced. My hand goes for Kyle’s forehead.
“Kyle,” I say. My hand two inches from his forehead.
His eyes open, and my hand catches his forehead as he jumps. He starts up with a scream. A whole lung full of air shoved out his throat. It’s animal. Sweaty skin, I press his head down with my hand. I keep his head down. His head about to explode under my hand.
“Kyle,” I say in the middle of his scream. “Kyle, it’s okay,” and I have to get loud. His back straight, his legs kick out, bucking on the lab table.
Three screams, and he stops.
He falls back on the lab table, flattens. This time his face turns toward me to look, really look. His frog eyes open. He could be in formaldehyde.
“Come on, Kyle,” I say. That scream at any moment. “Time to see the nurse.” Kyle drags his torso up. An old man. Shifts his legs to the table’s edge. Waits. “As if,” Carla might say, “as if a nurse can fix him.” His legs dangle. A little boy. His feet not even close to the ground. He leans forward, his hands on the edge, his arms straight.
Kim and I, we sat at the edge of the pool, feet in the water. I threw stuff in the pool. She told me not to, Dad would get mad. Sometimes Americans thought we were twins, not two years apart. She caught on to English much quicker than I did. She swam in the pool more than I did, and when she got sick, I felt guilty for that summer I was so jealous of her.
“Kyle, let’s go,” I say. Third law. This kid can’t be touched without touching. He looks down at his feet dangling, and he says nothing, makes no funny noises. What if there were a way to have motion without resistance, a perfect surface on which an object could be propelled? What if there were no drag or imbalance? What if kids could grow that way?