part eleven: out into the out

This last story shouldn't take too long to write.

Someone was shaking me. "Hey."
I shifted in my sleep. Damn, my back was stiff.
"Psst. Xiu Li."
I jolted and woke up.
I don't know what time it was. It was pitch black in the closet, with the exception of a thin line of yellow light creeping in from under the door.

"Morning, Annalisa," I said cheerily, but softly. "You look marvelous."
We both giggled. I felt guilty about how happy I was. I was still kinda on this little fantasy kick about being together back in the housenook. Am I terrible?

I tried to fix my hair in the dark. I eventually gave up. It's short anyway, right? Nobody actually cares. I wasn't envious of Annalisa's long hair, either.
Suddenly, the light blinded us. Mr. DuBolaire opened the door, shoved some food in, and then shut the door. I could still feel the imprints of the light on the backs of my eyes. I blinked, looking at the nonexistent neon silhouette of Mr. DuBolaire inside my eyelids.

It struck me how odd it was that a man who'd gone through so much to be with his daughter would keep her locked away in a closet. It was almost fairytale-like, except for the fact that Mr. DuBolaire was Annalisa's dad and not a wicked witch. I really need to work on my analogies.

We sat there and chatted for a little while, mostly about education. It doesn't seem like the first thing you'd talk about if you were locked in a closet with someone. But Annalisa hadn't been to school in a long time. I told her about Arjun and our chemistry project, and the things we were doing in lit class, and other simple inane things that she was completely unfamiliar with.
"You talk about Arjun a lot," she noted.
"He's my other best friend," I joked.
Eventually we got bored and started playing Truth or Dare.

"Truth or dare, Annalisa?"
"Um... truth."
Darn. I hate it when someone says truth and you don't actually have a truth to give them. I was going to make her lick a coat hanger.
"Uh, okay... something you're insecure about."
"My identity." She answered quickly. "I have no idea who the hell I'm supposed to be."
"Easy," I said. "You're Annalisa."
"Yeah, but Patterson or DuBolaire?"
"Both." I sounded pretty confident, and I was glad she couldn't see my face. "You're both. You can be whichever you want to be."
There was a pause.
"Oh. I'm smiling, by the way," she said. I laughed. "I am, too."
She giggled. "Truth or dare?"
"Dare."
"I dare you to yell something offensive at DuBolaire. Through the door, of course."

I'm going to skip the part in which I had to yell an insult about Mr. DuBolaire's sexual prowess.

It came back around to me. "Truth or dare?"
"Truth."
I was disappointed.
"Okay, here's one for you," I said. "Why do you keep saying truth?"
There was a long pause. "Do I?"
"Yeah," I said. "You haven't picked dare once. And all I was gonna do was make you lick a freaking coat hanger."
That made her laugh. "No, that's not it."
"Then what is it?" Something in her tone was weird.
"I'm half-hoping for you to ask me a certain question," she said.
That was intriguing. "Ooh, what?"
She laughed maniacally and a little too loudly. "Truth or dare?"
"Truth!" I said. "Because I'm not afraid to pick both options!"
"What did you think I was going to say?"
Oh, damn. How was I supposed to answer that?
"That's not fair," I said. "I have no idea what you were going to say."
"I think you do, though," she said. "Or, at least, I hope you do."
"What the hell do you mean?" I asked. "You want me to tell you what I thought you wanted me to ask you?"
"Sounds about right." She was enjoying my annoyance.
"So there's a right answer?"
"Well, yes and no."
"Yes and no?! Come on, Annalisa, what are you talking about?"
"Your guess can't be wrong, because it's what you thought I was going to say. But there is a right answer about what I was actually going to say."
"You're getting way too cryptic."
"You're hiding something," she countered.
"I'm hiding something? I'm not the one who was 'half-hoping you'd ask me a certain question.'"
"Yeah, and I'm not the one avoiding answering a simple guess."
"That's because I don't have a guess!"
"Oh, I think you do!"
She was enjoying herself. I was actually getting mad, though.
"What the hell, Annalisa!? What shit could you possibly be hiding from me?"
"What do you think I'm hiding? Really, Xiu Li?"
"So NOW I'm supposed to be able to read your mind?"
"No. You're supposed to be able to read my body language!"
"Why? I can't even freaking see you! It's dark!"
"Yeah, and you're blind to the obvious!"
"WHAT OBVIOUS?" I was yelling by now. I hoped DuBolaire wasn't listening too closely.
"Oh my God, why are you yelling?" said Annalisa.
"Because I'm pissed off!" I shouted. "And you won't tell me what the hell you're talking about!"
"Because I was trying to see if you knew!"
"KNEW WHAT?"
Annalisa didn't say anything. Then she dropped her voice to a whisper.
"I was trying to see if you knew that I like you."

Oh. Did she mean it... like that? I wasn't sure.

"Well, I like you, too," I said. "What's the big deal?"
"No," she said, really sadly, "I like you. A lot."

Oh.

"So that's what you wanted me to ask?"
She didn't say anything.
"You wanted me to ask if you liked me?"
Annalisa remained silent.
"I can't see you moving your head."
"I'm nodding," she said.
I felt around in the air and put my hand on top of her head. Then I used that knowledge to figure out where her face was.
I leaned over and kissed her on the cheek. Then I put my head on her shoulder.
"I think I like you, too," I told her.
"What about Arjun?" she asked quietly.
I busted out laughing. "Arjun is gay, Annalisa."
"Oh." I'd never seen her this shy before. At least not without the added hostility.

We sat there in the dark for awhile. I know that sounds sketchy, but nothing actually happened. She kissed me on the cheek once and we held hands for awhile. It was essentially an awkward first date. But dark. And in a stinky closet.

We went back to talking about other things for awhile, but then the conversation would drift back to that. I was actually getting worried that everything would just stay awkward. And then, in the middle of an awkward silence, I heard muffled shouting.

And then a rattling. And then the door swung open. My dad, the people from his post office, and Arjun were standing right there. My brain hurt from suddenly processing so much light. Dad came over and hugged me.

Annalisa stood up and offered me her hand. I stood up. It was nice to actually be able to see her. She looked absolutely gorgeous, despite having oily hair and dirty skin. I'd missed seeing that face just as much as I'd missed talking to it. And I temporarily... forgot that my dad and Arjun and the police guy and some other people were there. I didn't bother to stop myself. I wrapped my arms around Annalisa's neck and kissed her.

I hung in limbo for a second, scared out of my mind, before Annalisa kissed me back. It wasn't even a long kiss. Not a makey-outey kiss. Just a kiss that acknowledged the fact that I'd kinda fallen for her a little bit while I lived in a tunnel under the city.

I looked up. Dad looked super awkward.
Arjun didn't.

He sauntered up with the world's most obnoxious face on.
"Xiu Li Zheng," he said, "you are the world's--"
he punched me--
"biggest--"
he punched my other arm--
"hypocrite."
I just grinned.

We went back to the apartment after awhile, and I talked a lot to Arjun. Apparently it was actually his doing that freed us and got Mr. DuBolaire thrown in jail. I thanked him profusely. I wondered what had ever happened to that detective we hired.

Dad let Annalisa spend the night. He was actually in a pretty good mood.

I fell asleep, completely overjoyed that she was only one wall away from me.

Things were getting better.

part ten: it was a valiant effort, anyway

When I woke up, I was bored almost immediately. Not that I would've even been at school yet, since it was slightly before 5 in the morning, but in anticipation of the complete lack of... other people in my day. If I'd only been suspended, maybe I would've gone to have some fun with Arjun, or gone to look again for Annalisa or something. But I was suspended and grounded. The thought was so demoralizing that I briefly considered staying in bed. But the pipes drive me crazy, and I wasn't about to stay in there and listen to that. I went into the main room, ungracefully tossed myself onto the couch, and picked up the remote. 


After flipping channels for about ten minutes, I concluded that I wasn't going to watch TV at all if the most interesting thing on there was the morning news about a man with his hand stuck in a vending machine. You think I'm making it up, but I'm totally not. Anyway, so I shut off the TV and allowed my mind to go searching for other ideas of things to do. I guessed that maybe I could read a book. I'm not really a super reading-loving person. But I was really bored. So I started reading this random sci-fi novel that I found, and got comfy on the couch with it.


Eventually, Dad walked into the room. He didn't notice me at first, but then he took a double-take.
"Are you... reading, Xiu Li?" He looked bemused. 
I nodded, not wanting to talk over the pipes. Those would be finished soon, though.
"I haven't seen you do that since you learned how."
"Shut up," I told him.
"Is the TV really that bad?"
"This morning? Yes. Just boring news."
He just shook his head and laughed at me. I felt it was time to change the subject.
"So," I said awkwardly. "What am I doing today?"
I almost wanted him to make me do something, just so that I wouldn't be completely bored. I felt that my life as a grounded child was almost more delinquent than my life as an underground street urchin. That was a bit ironic.


My somewhat pathetic prayers were answered, because he responded, "I need you to help me at work again."
"Do I have to run another postal route?" I was surprised to hear myself actually excited about this. In hindsight, though, it really wasn't that bad. 
He noticed my excitement. "I'll give you a solid maybe. Now come into the kitchen. We're going to make breakfast."
Sounded good to me. I followed Dad into the kitchen, and we made french toast while blasting 80s rap music. Parental bonding! How touching.

We sat down after making the french toast to eat it (duh) and had a nice conversation about the ski area prank. I explained about the pranking that Arjun and I had been doing. He actually seemed pretty entertained by my stories, and I had to stop myself from asking him about the things Nova had told me.


It honestly seemed not at all like Dad to have done something that extreme as a prank. He was always... low-key. I tried and failed to imagine what he would've been like at my age, before he suddenly decided to be a parent. 


We finished breakfast and walked over to the post office. It was nice outside this early in the morning, but I figured it'd be hot later, so I was just wearing a tank top. Not that that's actually relevant to anything. Why did I write that?


People seemed to be in quite a gung-ho mood this morning. Maybe because their careers depended on it. I almost wondered why these people were fighting so hard for a job I knew they hadn't had for that long. But I figured that was the negative attitude that no one wanted around. So I made myself shut up.


Dad had a lot of fundraisers planned. Honestly, a lot of them sounded pretty stupid, but I didn't get a chance to tell him that, because he took me up on my earlier offer of running a mail route. Oh, wait? Did I say a mail route? What I meant by that was all the mail routes. Here's how it happened. My dad wanted Curt and Marjorie on other fundraising projects of some kind, but he didn't want to further jeopardize the reputation of the establishment with the USPS, so he made sure that all the mail would still be delivered. I barely stopped myself from asking him if it wouldn't be more jeopardizing to put the entire town's mail in the hands of one suspended sophomore without a learner's permit. 


I was obviously pretty angry at him, but I got what he was doing and why. I went out back and started looking at all the mail I had to deliver. Honestly, this was ridiculous. I couldn't even fit all of it into one truck. I was going to have to come back for more later. No lunch break for me, I guessed.
I wasn't even going to ask about the lunch break. I made a cynical bet to myself that it's not like Dad would really care anyway.


I grabbed the keys to the same truck I'd driven yesterday, loaded up as much mail as would possibly fit in one truck, and made myself a mental note of how I would have to drive. I ended up planning on a snakelike pattern. Maybe not the most efficient thing that I could've done, but I needed to come up with something before I wasted valuable daylight time pointlessly optimizing. 
I hopped in the driver's seat, started it up, and drove out of the parking lot, buckling my seat belt as I went. 


The stupid thing about mail routes is that you really can't speed things up a lot. You can't speed too much, because on average, you're only driving twenty feet at a time. Even so, I felt less nervous if I tried. I would throw the envelopes mercilessly in the mailbox, slam the door shut and the flag down, and then go screeching down the street to the next destination. It was really hectic. I got some insane looks, and I made a conscious effort to try to look like I knew what I was doing. I'm pretty sure that didn't work, though, since at one point a cop stopped me and asked me not if I was old enough to drive the truck, but if I could please confirm somehow that I hadn't stolen the truck. 
I told him that if I'd stolen the truck, it'd be unlikely that I would go around town delivering the mail. He didn't seem to like that too much, but he let me off with a warning, a glare, and an order to "calm my ass down" about delivering the "goddamn envelopes." It was, after all, the "age of the internet," so "I couldn't have that much shit to deliver, could I?"
I learned the important lesson that you don't make snarky comments to cops. Although I'd already had experience with running from them, so I'm pretty sure it could've been worse. Good thing I'm adorable, right? Except really not. I was really sweaty, pissed, and I don't exactly have pigtails.


I swung back by the post office to get more mail. I'm not sure what time it was by that time, but I noticed Bill was making phone calls and looking angrier than I'd ever seen him before. I didn't pay too much attention, though. I threw all of the empty mail baskets back into the room where they're kept (I excel at specificity) and then exchanged them for the heavy, full baskets of dead trees with patterned ink splotches. Those being letters. 


Actually, just for the sake of redeeming myself about my earlier irrelevancy, I would like to point out that I was sweating profusely at this point, and was really glad that I'd chosen to wear a tank top. Ha! Didn't see that tie-in coming, did you?


I completed my second mail route without much extra ado, although I did get pissed at the glued-shut mail box from the day before. I dumped their mail on the sidewalk. That's probably illegal, but they obviously didn't want any mail anyway! 


Maybe the sun was getting to me. 
I finished up as fast as I could and pulled back into the post office parking lot with sweat dripping down in between my boobs. I felt completely disgusting. Angry at my dad, angry at the mail, and angry at myself. I don't even know why. 


I stormed back in and felt slightly relieved almost immediately by the air conditioning. Dad saw me come in and looked overjoyed. "Xiu Li!" He went to hug me, but I gave him a look. He handed me a sandwich instead. I sat down and began to eat it while he gave me further instructions. "I need you to help with fundraisers now."
Seriously! What the hell! Hadn't I helped enough?
Apparently not. "I want you to take one of the mail baskets and stand on the corner with a sign. You'll have to make the sign, but it doesn't need to be that complicated. Just something like "save the post office!" or something along those lines." 
"You're kidding me."
He just stared at me. "No, I'm not. We're trying everything."
"I have to go panhandle for the U.S. Postal Service?" Now I was pissing him off.
"Xiu Li Zheng. Go make a damn sign and get out of here. You're the one who got suspended in the first place."


I found a large sheet of paper and borrowed a couple of highlighters from Bill. I really could've used Arjun's help with the sign-making, but he wasn't there. The product of my hurried labors was a large piece of cardboard with a paper cover that read "SAVE THE POST OFFICE!!!"
Maybe the exclamation points were overkill.
I didn't give a damn.


I grabbed my makeshift sign and one of the knocked over post baskets from my earlier antics and went down the block. Where would be a good location for advertising?
Despite my teenage sense of public embarrassment screaming in protest, I concluded that the corner out in front of Castle Apartments was probably the best bet. I pocketed my dignity in my sweaty jeans, set up the basket, and made an effort to actually get psyched about saving the post office.


My first half an hour was miserable. I'm pretty sure the world knew I was just a pissed teenager with a sign, and I don't even know if they would've given me money otherwise. I jumped up and down. "SAVE!" I gasped. "SAVE THE POST OFFICE!" A pedestrian walking by threw in a quarter. One guy offered me ten dollars to shut up. I considered taking it, but I knew I couldn't.


I had to make some kind of change in my morale. I hated this job more than anything (it certainly made me feel inclined to step it up in my schoolwork, that's for sure), but for that very reason, I wasn't going to let nothing come of it.


So I started getting crazy. I decided I should at least be entertaining. So I began to sing. I don't know what came over me. I just started singing, show-tune style, like my life was a musical. I sang about how my father had struggled through so much with the post office, only to have it ripped from his hands by the next town over. I sang about the joy of getting a letter when you were lonely. I made up at least 11 different songs about mail, postage, stamps, trucks, the post office itself, and Dad. And people actually threw some money into my bucket. I was kind of proud. I took it as a boost in self-esteem regarding my singing abilities. 


But my throat started to get sore and people started to complain. I needed a new idea. 


I pretended that this was some weird manifestation of school rivalry with the next town over. I listed loudly all the ways in which DuBolaire had inflicted pain on the family. I recited everything I'd ever memorized, including some of the more embarrassing ones. I did as many pushups as I could and hoped someone would sponsor me. I pretended to be homeless. I tried miming. I handed out hugs, compliments, and handshakes. I gave people directions. I signed more autographs (that one didn't get me a lot of money.) I tried stand-up comedy, imitating people who walked by, and hired myself out as a splendid conversationalist for the lonely. Individually, none of my acts actually got me a lot of money. But it made a lot of people smile, and the combined effort had the effect of exhausting me. Oh, and I made a pretty sizable profit. The blind guy across the street looked at me admiringly. Or maybe he didn't. I don't even know.


It was pretty well into the evening by now. I took my profits, thanked no one in particular, and headed back down the street to the post office. 


Dad was in there, but he scarcely seemed to notice my presence. I gave him the money, and he thanked me, but his head wasn't in the game. He let me keep the change. 


I was getting kind of scared for him. Earlier I'd been angry, but now it was just saddening to watch. Everything he said had a glaze of panic over it. He was so desperate. I told him I was going to go home, but he didn't say anything. 


I said good night to the rest of the people there and started walking home. I got more and more pissed off as I walked. This was all completely DuBolaire's fault. Because of him, I'd run from the police, embarrassed myself on a street corner, and watch my dad unravel as he held on to his job for dear life. This guy was completely twisted. I didn't even completely understand what was going on, but I thought I owed it to Dad to try and stop it.


After all, I was suspended anyway. What else was I gonna do? Go watch more TV? Or not?
I made up my mind and headed over to the bus stop. With the spare change from my street corner acting, I hopped on the bus and took it over to DuBolaire's post office. 

Well. It wasn't that easy. I got off the bus and asked some random woman where the post office was. She grinned. "What is it with people and the post office today? Earlier there was some protester guy that then some man made leave! Anyway, it's only a block from here. Go straight that way; you can't miss it."
I thanked her and went on my way. I was feeling vengeful. It was rematch time.

I walked into the post office, thankful that they hadn't closed yet. It was probably about to, though. There weren't very many people in there. I walked up to a uniformed person and asked if I could speak to the postmaster. He must've heard the tone in my voice. "Are you sure?"
"Positive," I said. "I'm a representative from the next town over."
"Oh, lord," said the man tiredly, and directed me to Mr. DuBolaire's office.

The door was standing open. I peeked in, but there didn't seem to be anyone in there. I stepped in, with the intention of sitting in a chair.
"You found me out, didn't you?"
I turned around. Mr. DuBolaire was standing right there, and he'd shut the door. I hadn't even heard it. A chill ran down my spine.
"I don't know what you're talking about," I said, letting some of my uncertainty show. "I'm here for a rematch."
"A rematch?" He smiled. "We'll see about that." He opened the door again. Two guys came in.
"I'm guessing you're here because you know my little secret," he went on. I had no clue what he meant by that. How was his blackmailing Dad supposed to be a secret? But the two men were closing in on me now. Had he paid them off or what?
"You son of a bitch," I hissed. "Leaving my dad to clean up all your shit!" I took a swing at him, and missed. The guys grabbed my arms behind my back before I could get another shot. I struggled, but I already knew I couldn't get away. What was he doing? Even though I was mad, I was pretty confused, too. I hadn't even told him what I was here for! 

"Calm yourself, please," he said. "I'm truly sorry I have to do this to you, but I can't let you go blabbing about my secrets. At very least, I think you and little Miss DuBolaire have some catching up to do."

He notices that I'm confused. "I'll let you and little Miss DuBolaire catch up, then." What the hell? I was completely in the dark.


At that moment, with Mr. DuBolaire chuckling, the two guys threw me in his office closet. Then I was literally completely in the dark. I'd gone from being an aggressor to a prisoner in less than two minutes, and I had no idea how it had happened.

As if that wasn't confusing enough, as I was thrust into the closet, there was just enough time as the door swung shut and locked for me to notice I wasn't alone in there. A silhouette was seated in the corner, huddled on the floor and looking incredibly pathetic.

I couldn't make a sound. I was trying to put all the pieces together, but I couldn't do it. He'd said I needed to catch up with Miss DuBolaire...

She spoke before I could make myself say anything.
"Who's there?" She was as scared as I was. "Who are you?"
I was so overwhelmed. I sniffled, and then started to cry, all at once. She gasped. "No. Who are you? Why are you--"
I collapsed next to her on the floor of the closet and put my head on her shoulder.
A tear fell down onto my nose. It wasn't mine. Then she turned and held me.
"Xiu Li." She spoke softly now. "What are you doing here?"
I didn't answer. I just kept crying into her shoulder. She hugged me even more tightly, rocking slightly.
When I finally did speak, it came out in an almost inaudible whisper.
"Annalisa, I'm sorry."
I buried my face in her shoulder.
"It's okay," she said, even though I didn't believe her. "It's okay."

* * *

We sat there long after I stopped crying. My imagination kicked in in the dark. I was back in the housenook. Nothing was wrong. It had all been a dream. But it wasn't. Finally, Annalisa spoke.
"Are you okay?"
"I think so," I said. "Why am I in here? Why are you in here?" I paused, disgusted with how pathetic I sounded. "What's going on?"
"It's a long story," she said. I laughed bitterly. "I'm assuming I have awhile," I told her. "Go ahead."

"Well," she started, "when you went and hid, the police took me away."
"I know," I said. "I saw." I didn't tell her any of the details.
"But instead of taking me to the police station, they took me to this random other building. I had no idea where I was. I felt like I'd been kidnapped. They put a bag over my head and everything. I sat in there for a little while, and they brought me food a couple of times. I actually managed to escape, and I found a different spot in the tunnels to hide. But they found me again, maybe a day or so later, and they put me back in the car and brought me here. Just waltzed me right into the post office. They let me see where I was and everything. And then they brought me to Mr. DuBolaire. I walked into his office with these two guys who were dressed as post office officials, and I had no idea what was going on. I didn't know if he was going to rape me, kill me, or sell my organs. But I never would've expected what he actually told me."

She paused. "He just got up from his desk and hugged me. Then he said that he was happy to finally meet me. I was really confused. And that's when things got weird."

"Go on," I said.
"I'll tell you like he told me," she said. "He suddenly looked really wistful, and then it was flashback time. 'I had a girlfriend in the eighth grade,' he told me. 'I loved her. She was beautiful. And one thing led to another and Elaine, that was her name, got pregnant. I was overjoyed, because I knew we were going to spend the rest of our life together. But she wasn't so happy, and neither were her parents. Elaine wanted to give the baby up for adoption.' At this point, I was wondering why this was relevant."
"No kidding," I said.
"Next, it got even weirder. He went on, 'I wanted to keep the baby. So when she finally gave birth to her, a beautiful baby girl named Jane, I tried to stop Elaine from giving her up. But she tricked me, and she came to school one day and told me she'd taken her somewhere I'd never find her. So for the first two years of high school, I focused entirely on trying to track her down. And I did. I found our daughter in an orphanage a few towns over. She was such a lovely little girl, and so well-settled at the orphanage. I tried to adopt her for myself, but they told me I was too young. It was tragic.'"

"'So when I was 18, they said I could adopt her within a year. But I got greedy. That wasn't good enough for me. So I tried to steal her. I connected the electrical tunnels under the city to the orphanage myself, and snuck in one night when everyone was sleeping. But Jane cried, as four-year-olds do, and I got caught. They put a restraining order against me. I tried working around, but it was hard for me to find a steady job. Either way, I knew I had to get my daughter. I waited for eight more years before I had any other successes. I was 26, and she was 12. So I found a couple of people and hired them to do my dirty work. The plan was simple. They would go and pretend to adopt my daughter, and then once the deed was done, I would take her for myself. But they were swindlers. They took my money and then didn't show up to pick her up.'"

I was starting to understand DuBolaire's story, and I could hear in Annalisa's tone of voice that she understood very well, too.
"As soon as he said that, I knew he must be talking about me," she said. "It all clicked. I'd been trying to put that thought out of my mind, saying Jane was a common name, but the coincidence was too strong by this point." I hugged her.

"The story's not over," she said. "He kept going: 'Suddenly, my daughter disappeared. I had no idea where she had gone. She wasn't at the orphanage, and she wasn't with my hired couple. She had disappeared. For the next five years, I hired people to search the entire city for Jane Patterson. I went through so much to get so little. And then!' He cackled a little at this point. 'And then your darling friend came into the post office and fought with me. The police didn't catch her, and I didn't think anything of it, until I saw her hanging around with my daughter. You, my dear.' As if I hadn't already figured that out. So when my men saw you two descending into my tunnels, I knew exactly what I had to do.' And they took me. They never wanted you anyway, Xiu Li."

I was shocked. "That's... incredibly creepy, Annalisa."
I heard her sarcastic face through the dark. "Ya think?"
"So he's holding you in the closet?"
"Until he can figure out what to do with me, yeah." Annalisa paused again. "Why are you here?"
"I think DuBolaire thought that I knew about this," I said. "Really I just came to kick him in the balls for maybe shutting down my dad's post office."

"Ah."

I didn't respond. I was too busy thinking.

Annalisa.

Annalisa DuBolaire. This was terrible. Her entire life had been essentially wrecked by the same man who'd wrecked mine.
"I'm so sorry, Annalisa."
"Why?" she said. "It doesn't change who I am. He's not my father. He's just a psycho who shares some of my genetics." Then she stopped. "Do you mind if we talk about something else, though?"

So we ignored it all. I'd missed her dreadfully, and we talked about school and Arjun. I told her about all my pranks, and about mail routes. She talked a little about some funny things she'd heard from in the closet, but she really didn't have a lot of other stories. Mostly, I talked. She laughed at the right times, and got pissed at the right times, and asked good questions. It kept continuously hitting me more and more just how much I'd missed her.


We talked for hours. I didn't know how long it had been, or if it was dark out. I barely even thought about Dad. Eventually, though, we fell asleep. On the floor of the closet.

I'd never felt more confused or more at home.

part nine: a couple hours of fame, a couple days of shame

I woke up, like I do every morning. But something was different. What was it?
Oh. There wasn't any pipe banging. Why wasn't there? That was odd.

I looked at my clock. 4:40. Apparently it just hadn't started yet. Had I really just woken up of my own accord at such a ghastly hour of the morning? Apparently I had. Apparently. So I tried to go back to sleep. That actually was proving successful when suddenly, a soft whooshing noise started from the floor above. This was shortly followed by, you guessed it, an abysmally loud metallic banging noise. I groaned and swung my feet off the bed.

It was so early. Getting up early felt so weird now without swim practice. That train of thought reminded me of Arjun's master plan from yesterday, and I made to go across the room to my dresser and grab my phone. I tripped over my sheets very ungracefully, narrowly avoided a faceplant, and got halfway through telling the sheets off before I realized Dad might hear me, even over the banging. I was yelling at them pretty loudly. It was early, okay?

Without further ado (seeing as there'd already been quite a bit of ado), I picked up my phone and turned it on. I had no text messages. Lovely. Now what was I supposed to do? I flopped over backwards on the bed and pretended I was listening to an avant-garde movie soundtrack instead of the fruits of Ms. Lannes' Room 704 shower.

But I don't like avant-garde music.

I noticed there was a notebook under my dresser, so I sat up without tripping over the sheets, walked over, and picked it up. I spent the next half-hour or so making a little stop-motion stick figure guy jump around in the corners of the pages.

Baaaack and forth and back and forth. I was so bored. I sat there flipping the corners of the pages of my notebook for God knows how long. It wasn't even that I'm easily entertained. I was just completely lacking in things to do.

I opened the door and walked out into the living room, where I flopped down on the couch. I landed on the remote, which decided to put on one of those stupid cartoon shows. I lay there and tolerated the animated shit for about ten minutes, until the episode ended, and then I felt around under my butt and got the remote to change the channel. As always, there was nothing on.

Dad got up and left without even seeming to notice my existence. Something was definitely going on with him, but I could hardly ask, since he'd already left. Whatever. He'd tell me eventually if it was important.

After what seemed to me to be an eternity, I got ready to go to school. Arjun hadn't texted me or anything, but I still felt compelled to do something. Just for fun, I went through my closet. There was nothing of interest. In fact, it was even devoid of dust, as surprising as that seems. I was not to be deterred, though; I went into Dad's room and scouted through his stuff as well. Can you say that? Scouting through someone's stuff? I don't even know. But whatever. The point is, I did find something of interest in Dad's closet: an old pair of roller skates.

Perfect.

I put them on and tried to skate around, but seeing as much of our apartment is carpeted, that wasn't very effective. I took them off until I'd gone all the way down the stairs (that would've been a nice way to die, but I wasn't particularly interested in that this morning) and then put them back on and proceeded to skate to school.

I'm not sure whose skates they were; maybe they were Dad's, but I suppose I should mention that they certainly weren't mine. I had never skated before in my life. How do you stop on roller skates? I came up with a solution, and although it was effective, it was kind of painful: I just aimed for the nearest phone pole and collided with it every time I was in need of brakes. Needless to say, both my knees were beautifully mangled by the time I got to school.

The bell rang before I got there, but everyone was still making their way into the building at the time, so I managed to catch Arjun with a quick glance. He pointed at his knee and looked concerned at me, but he was swept up in the crowd of pushing and shoving students before I could try to mime back.

I skated into the school, much to the amusement of a few younger students. By the time I got all my stuff and got to class, the tardy bell was two minutes past ringing. On the bright side, I wasn't that bad at skating. I glided into math class and used my desk to brake and sit down in one beautifully fluid movement.

The teacher opened her mouth, and then shut it again. "Xiu Li Zheng. Are you wearing roller skates?"
"Yes'm," I said, and the class giggled collectively.
"Would you care to explain why you're wearing roller skates, or would you rather tell the front office?"
"I couldn't find my shoes," I said cleverly. Most everyone laughed. Hana didn't, I noticed.
"Do you not have another pair of shoes?"
"Nope." Damn, suddenly I was the class clown. I was enjoying this.
"I think it's better that you go barefoot, then," said Ms. Harrison.
With the entire class watching me silently, I took off the skates and set them next to my desk.

The rest of math class was fairly uneventful. I carefully avoided Hana's gaze to reduce suspicion, but not too much as to look suspicious. From the few glances I did get, I noticed that she looked unusually frazzled, although that might have just been because I was hoping she would be.

The rat was nowhere to be seen. I worried a bit for its health. Was Hana one of those odd people who is terrified enough of things to mutally brurder them? Crap. Brutally murder?

When the bell rang after math, I stood up a little too fast and split the newly forming scabs on my kneecaps. I yelped and sat back down. Then Hana laughed.

She'd definitely found the rat, I decided. But I stood up slowly and meandered painfully down the hall to chemistry. Arjun was waiting at the door. "Babs!"
"You know you're the only one who calls me that."
He ignored my comment, as usual. "So, we gotta coordinate this prank. I've made a poster for the ski area, and I bought a bunch of fake snow."
I hadn't even thought that far ahead. I hung my head in shame.
"I roller skated into math today?" I offered.
He grinned at me. "Not bad. But anyway, we're gonna skip the last five minutes of chemistry to prank the teachers' lounge. That's when the fewest teachers hang around."
I wanted to ask him how he knew that, but class was starting.
While we worked on the worksheet of the day, we consolidated our paper stash for the autographing prank. I was actually much more excited for that than I was for the ski area prank, but I didn't tell Arjun that.

We kept a careful eye on the time, and 10 minutes before the end of chemistry, Arjun asked to go to the bathroom. Thankfully, Frank (well, her name is Miss Frank, but we all call her Frank) let him go without any trouble, so I felt pretty assured that things would work out. Three minutes later, I went up to her and asked if I could go to the bathroom.
"You can go when Arjun comes back," she said. I hadn't thought of that. What to do, what to do...
"Um, but, it's really urgent."
She eyed me skeptically. "Urgent? Then why didn't you ask before?"
There are two things that I really hate to do. Well, there are more than that. Let me rephrase. Things I hate to do include (but are not limited to) exploiting my femininity and lying. But--
"Miss Frank, um. I think I might have just, you know. Um. I think it's my time of the month?"
At least the mere embarrassment of lying and telling a teacher about a fictional period was enough to get me blushing. Thank God it worked.
"Oh! Well, go ahead." She lowered her voice. "Do you need a Midol or anything? You can go to the nurse after if you want."
That kind of made me feel terrible, since I was sort of exploiting the fact that she was a really cool teacher.
"Maybe," I said. "Thanks!"
I left the room, trying to walk slightly awkwardly.
As soon as I'd rounded the corner of the hallway, I sprinted as fast as I could to the teacher's lounge. Arjun was already there with his banner. It was actually very well done; the words "SKI AREA" were crafted expertly and emblazoned over a rough sketch of a mountain range.
"I didn't know you had an artistic side, Arjun."
He winked. "I didn't know you were a liar."
"What? How did you know? You weren't even..."
"My locker is right outside of the classroom. I saw you talking to her on the way back from getting the fake snow." Arjun grinned. "You sure you don't need a Midol?"
"Shut up," I told him. "Where's the fake snow? We only have five minutes to do this thing."
He gestured at a surprisingly large bag of white fluff.
"If you start distributing that, I can deal with the banner."
I looked around. I couldn't even begin to formulate an escape plan for if a teacher showed up. We were just gonna have to risk it.
So I threw fake snow all over the entrance to the teachers' lounge, and Arjun hung up the banner.
"How much time do we have now?" he asked, slapping down the final piece of tape. I looked at the clock down the hall and squinted.
"Four seconds," I said.
We both ran.

By the time the bell finished ringing and kids started coming out of class, I was far enough away from the scene that it didn't look too suspicious. At least, that's what I told myself. I walked into Lit no later and no earlier than I usually did, and my day was significantly improved by hearing Hana say, "and it was so furry and ratty and I bet it had rabies." The entire group shuddered collectively. "Ew," said Shannon G.
"How did it even get there?" said Carrie.
"I wish I knew. I guess some bitch put it in there."
"Maybe it's a guy who likes you," said Ruby.
"Oh, my god, Ruby. That's so stupid," Carrie told her. "Why would a guy put a rat in a girl's locker just to hit on her?"
"Guys are mysterious?" said Ruby to no one in particular.
"What if it was Xiu Li?" said Shannon T.
I busied myself with the warm-up and stopped looking at them. "Maybe," said Hana. "but I don't know. She has been acting weird."
"I heard she wore ice skates to math class," said Ruby.
Did they know I was in the room?
Thankfully, class started shortly thereafter. I was proud to hear about my rat prank being a success, though.

When I got to lunch, Arjun had already hung up a poster on our usual table. I could tell he'd tried to make it look different from the Ski Area poster. It was just blue all-caps lettering that read, "Autograph Signing, Today Only."

I sat down next to him, and we divided our paper stash in half. Then we waited.

The first fifteen minutes went by without anything happening at all. I was kinda getting nervous, too. The point of this prank was to be funny and give out autographs, not to prove to the entire world just how unpopular Arjun and I were.
Just as I was starting to freak out, this freshman kid came up to our table. "Why are you signing autographs?"
I didn't have an answer, but thankfully, Arjun did.
"If you have to ask," he said, "maybe you shouldn't get one."
The girl looked a little confused. "Well," she said. "Can I have your autograph?"
There was a silence.
Oh! She was looking at me!
My autograph!
I signed a piece of paper for her, flourishing my X really obnoxiously.
She smiled faintly at us and walked away.

"Well, we got one," said Arjun glumly.
But we needn't have worried. Two seniors came over, laughing. "Two autographs, please," said the taller of the two guys. We obliged, and it was amazing how fast things happened after that. People always make fun of seniors for overstating their importance a bit, but it's really not that much of an exaggeration. Suddenly all of the underclassmen thought autographs were hilarious.

Our table was completely mobbed for the rest of lunch. I barely had time to snarf down my food. Oh, that's fun! Say "snarf" out loud. Now why are people looking at you? HA! But I'm getting sidetracked. I perfected my signature. Our hands cramped up and there were still more students vying for the ink droppings of our holy pens. I'm pretty sure we gave autographs to every person in the cafeteria with the exception of a few bitter sophomores. The teachers looked at us strangely, but I think they concluded we were just part of some sort of club.

When my wrist had just started to go numb, the bell for the end of lunch rang. We signed a couple more autographs and then cleaned up the table, laughing and joking about just how amazingly successful our pranks had been so far. Honestly, I'd almost forgotten about the ski area prank until we were most of the way down the hallway from the cafeteria.

As we turned the corner, though, it would've been hard not to remember, since the vicinity of the teachers' lounge was completely swamped in chaos.

First of all, some moron had apparently had the idea to go get huge coolers of ice and dump them everywhere to enhance the effect. Everyone was throwing fake snow at each other. Two kids were fighting in the teachers' lounge itself, but none of the administrators could actually get through due to the sheer number of kids going nuts in the way of the doorway. Someone had spray-painted a black diamond on the wall next to the door, and I swear to God one kid actually had a pair of skis.
Arjun and I didn't even look at each other. We just kept walking.
I was completely freaked out by this, naturally. What would've normally been a harmless prank had somehow become a riotlike mob of craziness. I thought it best not to say anything, so Arjun and I split off for fourth period without saying a single word.

Boy, was I jumpy in class. Every time the door opened, I half-expected someone to jump out and yell "IT WAS HER! SHE DID IT!", but it would only be another late student or some kid checking out for a dentist appointment. I was really fidgety, and I couldn't focus. I was so concentrated on trying to hide my guiltiness that I was accentuating it. But I needn't have worried so much, because about thirty minutes into class, this administrator lady came in with a little slip of paper. She apologized to the class for interrupting, and then looked up at the teacher. "I'm here for Julie Zheng?"
Shit, shit, DAMN. HELL DAMN DAMN.
The teacher pointed to me.
"Actually," said I, so eloquently, "it's Xiu Li. With a "sh." Not a "j." Xiu Li."
As if I'd had any doubts as to why I was being pulled out of class, the administrator shot me the monarch of all stank faces.
"Yes, ma'am," I said. I got up and walked out of the classroom.

In elementary school, when this happens, everyone goes "oooooooooooooh." But in high school, nobody said a word. It made it worse, almost. Like I was going to the gallows instead of the principal's office. Let's have a moment of silence for Xiu Li Zheng.


She didn't waste any time in getting to the point. As soon as we were out of the classroom, Administrator Woman asked, "Are you responsible for that?" She gestured down the hallway in the direction of the ski prank. "You mean the ski area thing?" I asked.

A million possible lies went through my head. I didn't do it. I was in class. False. Nah, I heard it was Hana. Evil and implausible. No, I saw it, but I have no idea how it got there. Stupid. I lost it, though, and when it all came down to it, I answered honestly. "Yes."

I thought it best not to mention Arjun, but I should've known. I walked into the office and was offered a chair right next to him.
The administrator woman left, and I was left alone in the room with Arjun whilst we awaited our punishment.
"Hi," I said glumly.
"Hey there," said Arjun sarcastically.
Neither one of us knew what to say. I sighed. Arjun echoed my sigh. "Oops," he said.
"Yeah," I replied. "Oops."
I guess we were both in shock about it. I had no idea what to say, even, but a thought occurred to me.
"Are we still gonna be pranksters?"
"Sure, why not," said Arjun. "I mean, as long as we make sure they can't get... out of hand, I think it's okay to play a couple of pranks now and then. On the other hand, Babs, you're making the assumption that neither one of us is about to be expelled."

We chatted idly about unimportant things for a little while, and eventually the woman came back and sat down at her desk. I braced myself for a talking to, but she didn't really say anything.
I was pretty surprised when Dad came in a few minutes later, though. Boy, did he look pissed.
"Hello," he said. It was scary as hell, too. I was wondering a little bit if his anger was entirely my fault, and I wished that I'd had the good sense to ask him about what had been wrong that morning. But now it was too late. Dad didn't usually get that angry at me, though. He's pretty easygoing.
"Hi, Dad," I said. He glared at me and then spoke to the administrator woman. "So what's going on here?"
She looked up. "Your daughter," she said, "turned the teachers' lounge into a ski area."
Wow, that did sound pretty bad. Arjun apparently thought so, too, because he retorted, "It wasn't entirely her!" When everyone stared at him, he feebly finished, "I helped."
I shot him a telepathic thank you.
Dad directed his stony gaze back at me. "Really, Xiu Li?" That stung a bit. "As if I didn't have enough to deal with." Okay, now I was really wishing that I'd asked him what was wrong earlier. He wasn't finished with the guilt, though.
"I know you're all cool and delinquent and now, but this is a little too far."
Ouch. I looked at my feet, feeling awful, and I heard him ask, "So what will the consequences be?"
The next four words came like bombshells. "Three days of suspension." The woman sounded almost smug. I wanted to hit her with a ski pole.
"As for the outside consequences, you'll have to talk with her about that." Really? Did I need more punishment? I hadn't meant the ski prank to go this far in the first place...
"For starters, you're grounded," Dad told me.
Wow, what a great day.

Dad motioned for me to get up, and I did. Arjun looked at me and mouthed good luck. I wondered where his parent/s was/were. But now we were leaving. "Bye, Arjun!" I yelled backwards.

As we walked away from the school, I finally managed to ask Dad, "So. Um, if I'm grounded, what am I gonna do?"
I had been trying to imagine what I would do with three days of free time. I supposed I could try to go find Annalisa, although so far that search had been fruitless.
"You're coming to work for me." It wasn't a question. I was taken aback.
"What?" This was crazy. "What am I gonna do?"
"Drive a mail route." He wasn't looking at me.
I'm not sure if Dad remembered at that moment that I don't know how to drive. I've only been in a car a few times in my entire life, actually. I've spent my entire life in the city. And now he was expecting me to... drive a mail route? Wasn't that illegal? Was he just completely trolling? I couldn't tell.
"What? Why?"
"One of our guys is otherwise occupied," he said. What the hell did he mean by that? Was I allowed to ask?
"What do you mean?"
"He's on a spy mission." Oh. Of course. "DuBolaire runs the post office in the next town over and he may be blackmailing me."
Was this actually happening? I would've thought he was kidding if he hadn't looked so damn pissed.
"Oh. But... Dad, I don't even have a permit." I decided it was safest to let that one slide and backtrack to that particularly pressing issue.
He didn't answer me. I was sure he'd gone insane.

Eventually we got to the post office. The guy at the desk made a remark about troublemakers when we walked in. I wasn't sure if he meant Dad or me. Probably me. Dad walked right through the front room, though, so I followed him. He went out back to where all the mail trucks were.

"I want you to take Curt's mail route," he said.
I'd had enough. "Dad! I told you, I don't even have a permit yet, let alone a license!" Maybe he meant for me to push it in a shopping cart. I chuckled to myself at that.
"It doesn't matter. Right now, that's what I need you to do." I was astonished. Was he actually doing this? I guessed he was, but I didn't really want to believe it. I hadn't thought much about learning to drive, but I'd hardly assumed it would happen like this.
"Dad, that's--" He cut me off. "Xiu Li. It'll be okay." He sounded more sure than he looked. I certainly wasn't sure, though. "You'll be going really slowly." Oh. That made everything better.
He held out the keys. I glared at him and took them.

I walked over to the nearest truck, shaking my head. I didn't even know where I was going. I found a huge batch of letters in the back of the truck. I looked at the addresses on most of them and made a mental note of approximately where I was going. The nice part about walking all over the city was that I had a wonderful picture of where everything was. Wonderful. I had a route now. I just had to figure out how to operate this two-ton piece of industrial machinery.

I climbed into the seat with the wheel in front of it. It was weird. Wasn't it usually on the other side? I felt really ashamed for how little I knew about cars.
I put the keys in the ignition and turned them. The truck roared to life. Good!

I slammed the left pedal with my foot. Nothing happened. The other pedal made a lot of noise, though, so I figured that one was the gas. So the left was the brake, and the right was the gas. It wouldn't let me move, though.

It took me a few minutes of unsuccessful lurching before I found and disengaged the emergency brake and managed to put the truck into gear. I tried the gas again, and zoomed forward. I almost hit the side of the post office, but I slammed the brake. My nose dipped and I stopped on a dime. I felt sick. I was a swimmer. Why did I feel so nauseous on land? Ugh. But it had been twenty minutes and I hadn't even left the parking lot. I tried being more gentle with the gas, and executed a lap around the parking lot. In hindsight, I wish I'd stayed in the parking lot a little longer, but by that point I was feeling rushed to get out and do the route (rhyming!).

I pulled out into the street, trying to remember where my mental map was taking me. Just as I remembered, I realized I was going the wrong way. Brilliant. But I shan't bore you too much with the antics of my 19-point turn. Instead, I'll go for a more montagey type thing for my mail route, like I did awhile back with my work at Shoes & Etc. Wow... that was a really long time ago. But again, I digress.

My First Mail Route by Xiu Li Zheng

1. On the very first block of deliveries, one of the delivery boxes was glued shut. I pulled on it a few times, but it wouldn't budge. I wondered what kind of glue they'd used, and then (more logically) wondered why it was glued shut. A prank, perhaps? A frustrated backlash response to too much junk mail? But oh, no. There was actually a sign on the mailbox itself. It read "THEY'RE WATCHING US!" and had lots of conspiracy theories glued all over it. Probably with the same glue. Someone thought that the CIA was controlling the USPS and that they were somehow using the mail delivery service to intrude on their privacy. It is America, I guess, so people that stupid do have a right to put that kind of stupid sign on their mailboxes. I carefully set their two envelopes on top of their mailbox (thank God it wasn't windy) and proceeded.

2. I was getting less lurchy with my acceleration, and my heart rate had almost decreased to double my normal rate. I pulled to a stop in front of this one building, and when I went to fish out the letters for it, I noticed something really odd. They had fifteen letters. Actually, fifteen identical letters. Then I read the addresses and laughed out loud. They were all from the same return address, written in the same handwriting. The only difference between the letters was the spelling of the addressee's name. Rachel, Rachael, Raechal, Rachelle, Rochele, Rachele, Rachaele, Raquel, Rachal, Raychel, Lehcar, R@Ch3L, Rchl,  Rachyl, and, just for the hell of it, Radmilla. I couldn't even begin to imagine the purpose of this. I had many ideas, though, including (but not limited to): the sender thought you had to spell the person's name right for it to get there, they were trying to track down a one-night stand, or (this was my favorite) they were all different people with one really twisted mother.

3. While I was still pondering all of that, I had to get out for a while and go deliver to a bunch of shops I couldn't get to by driving. Actually, that was probably for the better. The letter delivery itself was extremely uneventful. However, when I came back, there was a hobo sleeping in my truck. Personally, I wouldn't have found a mail truck any more comfortable than any other outdoor location for napping. After shaking him gently awake, I politely suggested that he try the park, to which he griped something about all the first-class benches being taken. Nonetheless, he got out of the driver's seat, and I went on my way.

4. When I was about what I guessed was 2/3 of the way through my mail route, I realized that the needle was almost completely at 'E.' Dammit! I didn't have any money on me. So I pulled over into the parking lot. I tried calling Dad a couple times, but I didn't have any service. Oh. Or my phone. I think I'd left that at the post office. Yeah. That was an issue. Anyway, I scrounged around the truck and managed to find twenty dollars, which was really lucky. That was enough to get me the rest of the way through the mail route.

5. When I stopped at the last stop light on the way back to the post office, having delivered my entire supply of mail and feeling very proud of myself, I was greeted at the window by a weird-looking guy who was saying something. I did what you definitely shouldn't (being stupid and stuck in traffic) and rolled down the window. Thankfully, he wasn't trying to steal my mail truck.
"Do you want to buy my hat?"
Buy his hat? It was just a simple hat. A top hat, actually. Not even in good condition.
"No. Not really."
"But you'd look ravishing in it!" I was a bit scared. Again, thankfully (luck was on my side for once), the light turned green. I drove off, trying not to hit the Mad Hatter.
Did you see what I did there? It was pretty funny, wasn't it?

I pulled into the post office parking lot like a pro, and then discovered reverse was a little trickier. I may have slightly bumped one of the other trucks, but I don't want to talk about. If I had, hypothetically, then there would only be a tiny scratch anyway, which only looked like bird poop.

I waltzed into the post office, punch drunk on a new accomplishment, a feeling of maturity and badassitude, and the remainder of a few-hour adrenaline rush. No one noticed my swagger, though, because everyone was panicking.

I stopped in the doorway and observed everyone. There was one guy I didn't recognized. I was guessing that he was the spy guy from earlier. I wanted to walk up and be like, "Hey! Dude! I just drove your mail route!" But he was a little too close to my age, and that would've been awkward. I think. I don't talk to that many guys. Actually, I don't talk to any guys except Arjun.

That guy saw me, though, and while everyone else continued arguing and "discussing" heatedly, he filled me in on what was going on. Sure enough, that was Curt, whose mail route I had just completed.

He was actually pretty awkward himself. He thanked me for taking his route, and when I asked what all the debate was about, he stared at his feet for a few seconds before replying. "Your dad," he started. "Um. Your dad just got a call from the USPS. Yeah. And he has two days to come up with all the money necessary to pay off his debt, or the post office gets... shut down." A cloud of anger came over his face. "And DuBolaire wins."

I was in shock. That was not at all what I'd been expected. What a reality jolt. One minute I'd been so proud of learning to drive, and now my dad was about to lose his job? No, I shouldn't think like that. It would be okay. Wouldn't it? "Wait. I'm new to this. Wasn't there something about a spy mission?"
Curt smirked a little.
"Yeah. I went to go and spy on DuBolaire. He caught me."
I looked expectant.
"Enough said," he said.
I thought that was probably my cue to shut up, so I dropped the subject.

I joined the conversation, having now been initiated as an informed post office worker. The group was brainstorming, but I didn't really have any good ideas.
"What we should do," I said, "is rob a bank."
Nobody laughed. Nobody even acknowledged that I'd said anything. I shrunk a little back into my shell. But you know how it is with witty remarks. Sometimes you say one and it doesn't go well, so you just feel the urge to try again until it works.
"What if we all sold all our clothes and came in naked?"
I was invisible.
After a couple more stupid comments, my dad thought it was time for me to go home. I was pretty sure he was right.

So I grabbed my phone and left. "Bye, guys!"

Now what was I supposed to do? What I wanted to do was run to the Bahamas or something. Just get away. Take a vacation or some shit like that. But what did I do? I decided to stop by the clinic and see if Nova was there. I walked in and didn't see her, so I asked some random lady. Thankfully, she knew who I was talking about.
"Murphy! There's a girl here to see you!"
"I'm busy!"
"Not a patient!"
"Oh."
She came out of the room.
"Oh, hi, Xiu Li," she said, looking confused. "Is everything okay?"
"Do you have a minute to talk?"
She smiled. "I guess so. Am I now your counselor or something?"
"No. You're my I'm-grounded-and-my-dad-might-lose-his-job-and-life-sucks talking-to person."
"That was discreet," she told me.
"Eh." Suddenly I didn't feel like talking much. "So how are things here?"
"Well, my job is busy, but I like it," said Nova.
On a whim, I gave her a hug.
"I gotta go," I said, and left her with an even more baffled expression than the one she'd had on when I first showed up.

As I climbed the stairs in the apartment building, I felt myself wishing I did have a mom. Mostly because I'd gotten a taste, if ever so brief, of what I never had. Seen what I was missing. I didn't know if all moms would be as snarky or fun as Nova. But I wished I had a mom. A mom like her.

I finished off my day by watching some stupid show. It wasn't very interesting, so naturally, I watched the whole thing. I really have been watching a lot of TV lately. I didn't even notice when Dad came home.

When it finished, I refrained from continuing with the rest of the marathon that was apparently going on, and went to go to bed.

As I adjusted my pillow under my oily hair, I realized I hadn't thought about Annalisa much at all. Shamefully, the thought made me start crying into my pillow. I didn't want to forget someone so important to me. Not her.

An even more negative thought lingered as I dropped off to sleep. Had she forgotten me already, too?

part eight: rats put in lockers and dads' former flings / these are a few of my favorite things

After we finished talking with our new hired detective, I jogged quickly back over and up to the apartment, hoping that Dad wouldn't question too much where I'd been.
However, when I walked in, out of breath and sweaty, there was no one else there. So much for that.

I wondered where Dad was. I was a little concerned, since I hadn't heard anything, and I quickly dialed his number. But the call shut off after only one ring. Hm. I guessed that his phone was probably dead. That was my best bet, anyway, although I toyed with the idea of him having been chased by the police like I had been. It's funny, Dad always says I should call him and keep him updated on what's going on, and then he forgets to charge his phone and the entire point is moot. Moot. What a funny word.

So I made up my mind, and did the most obvious thing to do when home alone: make pasta! I put the water on to boil, put a little salt and oil into it, and was looking around for a lid when the door slammed in the front room. Through the door to the kitchen came my father.
"Dad!" I exclaimed excitedly. I was going to say something else, too, but I forgot it.
Some random gorgeous woman walked in behind him.

Let me stop and explain something, just so you understand my actions.

Dad doesn't... date. I don't mean that he just has a series of one-night stands, either. Dad's life has been entirely devoid of women for the entire time I'd known him. I didn't ever have a mom, or anyone I even thought of as a mom.
The first time I asked Dad about why my friends all had mommies and daddies and I didn't, he tried to explain it to me as best he could. He really did. "Well," he'd told me, "you weren't like other babies, Xiu Li. You didn't come out of your mama. Instead, you were all alone as a baby, and you needed a home. That's when I found you and decided you were the perfect little girl." He'd tweaked my nose, but I'd ignored him, since that was an awful lot to sink in. "So I don't have a mommy?"
"No," he said. I'd promptly burst into tears.

Although that was my initial reaction to learning that I was the adopted child of a bachelor, I moved through various stages of opinion on the matter. For a period of about two years, I convinced myself that I was secretly the Tsarina of Bratislava. It didn't matter that Bratislava didn't, and doesn't, have a tsarina. I was obviously given up by my real parents so that I could be safe from the evil people who wanted to kill me. Well, safe until I was old enough to fend for myself.
Sometimes I hated Dad for it, too. I wanted to be with my real parents, and I brought it up every time we fought in my preteen years.
"Go to your room!" he'd shout, to which I would sassily reply, "You're not my real dad!"
That argument didn't really work, obviously.

But through it all, I'd never had a mom. Never called anyone "mom." Never even really wanted a mom. I had a dad, and that was that. When I needed a bra, I asked my dad. When I started my period, my dad took me to buy pads and tampons. When I was feeling sad, my dad did the best he could to reassure me.
"Why didn't my real parents love me?!" I was thirteen.
"Xiu Li, maybe they did. Sometimes these things happen. Sometimes you have to give up people you love, to death, or to other people. But even if they didn't, does it matter? I love you, and Chinese or not, you're my little girl."
As I phased back into real life, I could almost see the ghost of Dad's face saying that to me over and over.

And here he was with some random woman. Have I mentioned Dad doesn't date? I've never seen him flirt with a woman. Actually, I rarely see him talk to women, unless you count me, and I'm not sure if I really count yet. I'm only fifteen, after all.
It's not that I thought Dad was gay, even. He just had never shown romantic interest in another human being at any point in the last decade and a half. I'd attributed it to his being an incurable dork. A male old maid.

The woman had stylish, curly hair. She had beautiful skin. Gorgeous eyes. I cringed slightly with envy. But I had finished looking at her. I was mad now.
"Dad!" I yelled. "Who the hell is in our apartment?"
It was actually a fairly clever test, since I could tell by his embarrassment that he did care about this person.
He muttered awkwardly, "Be nice, Xiu Li."

"Oh, that's great," I said. Be nice indeed. "Bring a girl home. You could've warned me." She didn't look like a prostitute, though, which eased my concerns a little. The woman looked like she felt a little awkward now, though, and I was somewhat oddly delighted to infuriate Dad.
"This is Nova," said Dad pointedly. "She was my high school girlfriend. You've actually met before."
I gave her a look. No, we hadn't. Dad had never even mentioned her name to me before. Was I just little when I knew her? Or was it like one of those memory things from Men in Black? I was so baffled. I hate when stuff like this happens.
It's kinda like when you're cooking and suddenly the instructions say "and then add half a cup of butter," and you're like, wtf! The ingredients didn't say butter! I don't have any butter! But it's like ADDBUTTER and you're like, screw you, cookbook! But the point remains that butter is in the recipe. And so was Nova.
"I don't believe you," I said out loud.
I didn't want to believe that my life has butter in it. Margarine was fine. Is that a weird metaphor? I guess Dad wasn't really margarine. Or Nova butter. I'll drop the comparison.

Dad had actually had a girlfriend. I was stunned. I internally laughed at myself for being so stunned.
I collapsed into the arm chair.
Feeling cutesy and obnoxious, I continued my streak of yelling. I didn't want Nova to like me. I wanted to make her leave.
"Like Supernova?" Perfect. Spike her name.
She looked slightly pained, but then she actually spoke to me.
"That's original," she said, but with a smile. She was being sarcastic. Oh, so two were playing this game.
It was time to drop the intercourse bomb. "If you're going to have sex with my dad," I informed her, grinning at the face my dad was probably making over my shoulder, "you'll have to go somewhere else."
That much was actually sort of true. I heard banging every morning. I definitely didn't need to hear it at night, and especially not the sexxy luuvvve funnn bouncy happy kind.
Nova didn't even flinch, though. "I'm thirty-three, little miss," she said, rocking the condescending nicknames, "and I'll fornicate wherever I please, thanks."
Snap! She was good.
I busied myself trying to think of a solid comeback to that, and Dad provided it for me.
"Nova's a doctor," he offered. "She's here looking for a job."
Laid out in front of me like a platter. "There's a lovely place called Isabella's Cafe down the street, although you may have trouble getting above minimum wage with those legs of yours."
I was bluffing; her legs were fabulous. In hindsight, I should've mentioned that they wanted nurses and not doctors.
"You seem to have quite a bit of knowledge about the establishment," said Nova smoothly, and the conversation was over.
"I got chased by the police once," I said.
"Did you, now? For underage prostitution?"
"Please, I'm a B cup." I smiled. "Actually, for assaulting a postmaster."
"You shouldn't take family issues to work."
"I didn't. If that guy was my family, you'd be able to tell, because I'd be considerably uglier."
"Oh well. Go back to that first part. Why did the police arrest you? Did they read you your Miranda rights?"
Nova was very quick-witted, I noticed. It was a bit hard to keep up with her.
As we chatted, Dad finished up the pasta that I'd been cooking, and we all ate.

Happily consuming calories, I found myself listening to a breakup story. Nova was single. She'd been engaged to a man who then cheated on her. I muttered "Bastard" under my breath, and Dad elbowed me and mouthed something about language. "Do tell," I said.
I eventually found myself talking about Annalisa and the happenings of today, what with Detective Alistair Oxley and all that. Poor Dad seemed to be on the other team here. Nova was like my cool aunt, except that that would've meant she and Dad were probably incestuous at some point.
I told Dad and Nova about my antique shop detective, and then decided to go to bed.
Nova wasn't half bad, I concluded. I wondered if she was staying. Very snarky woman. Annalisa would've loved her.

As I climbed into bed, I heard Dad's and Nova's voices from the kitchen.
I decided I still didn't want her to stay, despite our compatibility.

==========================

I was woken up the next morning not by an alarm, but by a text from Arjun with seven words.
We are the counterculture. Crash swim practice.
I texted him back, and we arranged to meet right outside the pool.

I hadn't been exactly sure what he'd meant by that, so I wondered curiously as I walked over there. When I arrived, Arjun was already standing behind a post near the pool. I walked up.
"So what do you mean, crash swim practice?"

He grinned. "First of all, Xiu Li, I've had an idea."
I nodded, prompting him.
"We are going to be the craziest pranksters ever."
Ordinarily this would've sounded lame, but I rolled with it due to my current social situations. It would be a nice distraction from looking for Annalisa.
"Okay," I said, somewhat excited. "And now?"
"We stand silently at the edge of the pool and stare at people," he said.
It turned out to be a stroke of brilliance.

The swim team showed up and started practicing, and Arjun and I were already stationed at one end of the pool or the other. We stared menacingly and blankly at the girls as they did their warmups. I could tell when Marianna became the first to notice our presence, because she jumped a bit, whispered something to the Shannons and Ruby, and then they all looked up too.

I tried forcefully not to laugh. Just stared. I tried to channel my anger into one magnificent death stare.

For the entirety of swim practice, the girls looked up, disturbed, every few seconds. They weren't doing so hot, either. The coach yelled at them, but when they told him what was going on, he came over to talk to me.
"Good morning," he said, in that falsely jovial tone of one who does not, in fact, hope you have a good morning.
"Hello," I said calmly. "Can I help you?"
"Yes. You can stop interfering with my girls' swim practice."
"Are you kicking me out?" I said. "Ooh, I'm scared. That's never happened before."
The coach turned a bit red. "Xiu Li, I don't regret my decision to kick you off this team. Now perhaps you should get out of here before I report you."
Arjun and I walked backwards out of the pool area, still staring at the swimmers until we were out of sight.

Once we were, we high fived. "I can't believe we just did that," I laughed.
Arjun hugged me. "Okay," I said. "We have got to get an agreement down about this relationship of ours."
And so it was. While we walked over to the school, we came to a consensus that hugging was the limit of our physical contact, and he decided that I had to help him pick up guys when we went out places.
I frowned. "That hardly seems fair. And you're not even out."
"Whatever," said Arjun.

We'd arrived at the school.
"Brainstorm pranks throughout the day," I said over the bell ringing.
And I sauntered into first period, eager to see Hana's face in response to our lovely little trick.
She didn't even look at me. I felt smug. Sort of.
So I doodled all the way through math class and idly paid attention to cosines and secants. But I also followed my own instructions, and brainstormed some.
I looked over at the back of Hana's head, where her blonde ponytail swung slightly.
That had to go.
But that was a little too mean, and I didn't want to do any pranks that I could get in serious trouble for. This was just for fun. We weren't trying to hurt anyone.

I took a deep breath and continued writing.

hamster in locker
soap random things on her car
spam email?
scavenger hunt leading to a dirty sock

I laughed to myself silently, and folded up the list to show Arjun later.
I listened for the rest of math about more trigonometry things. I realized that I was coasting somewhat. I hoped the detective guy would be able to find Annalisa.
But what if he couldn't?
I pushed the thought to the back of my mind.

In 2nd period chem, Arjun and I brainstormed broader pranks. These would involve more people, and could not be construed as a personal attack on anyone. The two main ideas we had were setting up a table for signing autographs during lunch and hanging a "Ski Area" sign over the teachers' lounge and letting the students do the work themselves.
We agreed that we could do both of those tomorrow in school. For the first time since I'd been kicked off the swim team, I felt happy in school. Looking forward to tomorrow and all that jazz.

Of my Hana pranks, Arjun really liked the hamster idea, and he promised to help me coordinate it after school. Our conversation was interrupted, though, by the teacher handing back our centrifuge lab.
An A. We high-fived.

In lit class, I oinked every seven minutes and held my nose a couple times. The teacher didn't notice, thank God, but Adelaide gave me quite a stank face.
I didn't care. I was having much more fun than any of them. Besides, it was funny to watch their reactions to my oinking. Some scooted away from me. One brave girl bleated ten minutes before the end of class. I gave her a thumbs-up, but she avoided my gaze.

At lunch, we assigned responsibilities. I had to figure out Hana McMurray's locker combination. Arjun had to scope out teachers' planning periods and look at what times would be best for hanging a SKI AREA poster.
I had World History after lunch, and we were actually doing work. I couldn't do much brainstorming, and since I was slightly late coming in from lunch, Hana had already gone to her locker.
When the bell rang after class, I tailed Hana discreetly down the hallway, and dropped a couple papers on the ground so that I could stand near her and watch at her locker. I felt incredibly stealthy. Hana took no notice of me as I acquired the necessary information.
6, 32, 20.

I don't usually talk about art class, but I will today, because it's relevant.
In the middle of art, I raised my hand and asked if I could go to the bathroom.
I did go to the bathroom, but I also put a small stick in the door of one of the less-known entrances to the school. That way, we knew we could get back in later to deliver a hamster.
Right as I arrived back in art class, my counselor called me in and told me I needed to switch to P.E. now, since I was no longer on the swim team.
Urgh.
As if that wasn't bad enough, my counselor decided to talk to me about absolutely nothing for the remaining hour of the school day.

After the last bell rang, Arjun and I met up outside. After a quick chat, it was decided that we would go get a snack, swing by the detective's shop, and then go to the pet shop.

"I propped the door open," I said as we walked off the school grounds. He grinned. "Marvelous. Did you get her locker combination?"
I smiled. "Maybe."
"Stop screwing around! Did you or didn't you?" He punched my shoulder.
"Yeah, I did. 6, 32, 20. Now shut up."

A short while later, we walked towards Jack's Jems, one chocolate bar apiece fuller and carrying a bag of chips. But when we actually arrived at the shop, it was closed. Shut tight. I hoped that was good news.
"Now what?" said Arjun.
"I mean, I suppose maybe he's out looking for her?"
Neither one of us knew.
After some discussion of how to react, we opted for leaving a note on the door.

Hi Mr. Detective-- (Very clever on my part)
We dropped by, but you weren't here... we'll probably stop by again soon, we just wanted to know if you've made any progress towards finding Annalisa!
I felt a little adrenaliney at the prospect of possibly finding her. Maybe he would show up with Annalisa, and when I turned around, she'd be there... ack, I was getting distracted again.
--Xiu Li and Arjun


Then we went into the pet shop. Good lord, it was noisy in there. After searching for hamsters in the smelly, noisy chaos for a few minutes, we asked the store owner. He seemed somewhat grumpy, (ha, I just accidentally typed "frumpy" and fixed it) but we did get one important piece of information: there were no hamsters at Alfonso's pet shop. "We do, however, have rats," he said.
We exchanged glances.
"That'll do," I said.
We picked out a beautiful white rat. I actually grew a little attached to it in the short time it took us to walk back to the school, but I knew that what with Persephone and Fuzzballe, there was absolutely no chance of keeping a rat. At least not alive. I felt a little nauseous at that last thought.

We also had bought it a nice little cage, and some food and water. We didn't want the poor little rat to die for the sake of a stupid prank. Arjun called me a softie for being so adamant about getting it food, but I held firm.

Then, it was ninja time.

We sauntered casually down the street and back behind the school building.
The door, thankfully, was ajar, just as I'd left it. We crept through the door and removed the prop.
Then we walked down the hallway as stealthily as one can without anything to hide behind. Like, seriously, that last part had me really frightened for most of the endeavor.

Arjun followed me as we navigated through the halls to Hana's locker. "Right here," I said. "The top one."
"What did you say the numbers were?" I had never heard anyone whisper so quietly, but a couple of teachers were still in the building, and we couldn't risk it.
I mouthed as clearly as I could. I even held my breath. "6. 32. 20."

It didn't open.
My heart skipped a beat. I didn't know what would happen if we got caught, but I knew it wouldn't be a positive consequence. Thankfully, Arjun opened it easily after the second try. We fed the rat, left it with plenty of food, and placed the cage gingerly in Hana's locker.

Then we ran as silently as we could out of the school.

We'd gotten no farther than the orphanage before we started laughing maniacally. It was even funnier because it had been so ridiculously silent inside the school, and now here we were bellowing and chuckling and snorting uproariously. I love the word uproariously. Say it out loud!

"What do we do now?" I asked Arjun, holding my sides from laughing so hard.
He couldn't breathe. I started laughing at him again, and it was another two minutes before he responded.
"I don't know," he said.
"We could go to my place and watch TV. My dad probably wouldn't mind."
Arjun nodded, and we continued laughing as we made our way back to Castle Apartments.
We ended up watching about two-thirds of some action movie-- I think it was Die Hard-- and then he got a phone call and had to go home.

Not fifteen minutes after Arjun left, though, there was a knock on the door. I wondered if he'd come back. Dad had a key. Unless he'd forgotten it; that was definitely plausible.

So, against all the instructions of anyone who's ever taught in elementary schools or been a parent, I opened the door. Nope. I'd been wrong on both counts. It was Nova. "Uh, hi," she said.
I decided to play up the awkwardness. I just stared at her menacingly.
"I have a job now," she said. I blinked. "Is your dad home?" I was succeeding in making her uncomfortable, but I felt that I did owe her a response.
"No, not yet."
I silently sent her vibes to come in. So she came into the apartment. She didn't say anything to me; I was dying of laughter on the inside imagining what her thoughts were. Especially since I'd been so wonderously bitchy the night before. Instead of speaking, she sat down and watched the last part of Die Hard with me.

Then she did talk. "So, Xiu Li."
"Yeah?"
"So, I need to find a place to stay. I can't stay here with your dad."
"No, you can't." I was vehement about this.
"Well, aren't you a little hospitable ray of sunshine," she said, and grinned at me. I smiled faintly back.
"Sorry," I said, "but frankly, that's kinda weird."
She nodded.
"And there's no point unless you're going to get back together with Dad. Is that what you want?"
There was a very long pause following that one. Nova sighed.
"Not really, I guess." I gave her an inquisitive look.
"After my ex-husband, though, he's so much better," she added thoughtfully. "Your dad's a great guy, Xiu Li."
I wasn't sure if I was supposed to agree with that or if I was being informed of something. I exercised my fifth amendment rights once more.
"But no. I don't love him anymore," she said. "And you're right."
I nodded again.
"Do me a favor," Nova said. "I don't want him to get the wrong idea. Tell him I came by, but don't say what I told you. Say I said thanks for helping me in finding a job, and hopefully we can stay in touch."
I gave her a look. "'Stay in touch?'"
"Okay, okay. And that maybe I'll see him around."
"Better," I said.
She smirked at me, and headed for the door.

Wow.
Suddenly, I didn't want her to go.
"Wait!" I'd never seen her look so baffled.
"Can you stay a couple minutes?"
Now she just looked curious. "Why?"
Then one of those perfect-timing moments happened, and my phone rang.
It was Dad, saying he was going to be late.
"That was Dad," I told her. "He's going to be late getting home because he took the bus to the next town over to talk to their post office."
"Okay, great," she said. "But why am I still here? Remind me?"
I couldn't believe myself.
"Could you tell me stories about you and Dad?" I stared at the ground. "It's just, I never knew you. And I'd kinda like to know."
"Has Renshu really not dated anyone since I left?" I shook my head. "This could be awkward, Xiu Li. I hope you know that."
I nodded. I was doing a lot of that. Then I thought of something.
"Don't tell me anything nasty! I just want to know what he was like."
"Well," she said, and thought for a long time. "For one, he was a lot crazier. Really outgoing. Somewhat irresponsible."
That got my attention.
"Like how?"
"Well," said Nova hesitantly, "once he took me out to this party, the week before his dad died."
The pauses seemed to be getting increasingly unpleasant.
"You do know about that, right?" she said, as if she wished she didn't have to ask.
Dad and I don't really have that many heart-to-hearts. We're close, but he tells me only what I specifically asked about. I knew both his parents had died when he was 18. That was all.
"Sorta," I said. She took that as a no, but didn't explain it very well.
"Well. Um, your grandpa died in a car wreck, that Renshu was in."
I didn't even get a chance to react before she continued.
"We threw a party in this park. The point of the party was to be... wasted without being wasted. It was a bit of a social experiment."
I thought of my current pranks and marveled a bit at my dad.
"He wanted to see how people reacted around us. What's funny is that I was convinced that everyone was drunk, even though I knew they weren't. One girl threw up repeatedly, even." I laughed. "Two boys kissed each other and regretted it later. Everyone was so... drunk... that we all kind of forgot we weren't. It was the most interesting psychology ever."
That actually was really interesting, but she hadn't finished talking yet.
"Well, the police showed up, since we were underage, and tried to arrest us." She was laughing now. "And then they brought out the breathalizers, and we were all sober." I giggled at that.
"God, you should've seen their faces," she said, and snorted.
I was laughing uproariously. There's my word again.
"And Dad?"
"His dad thought it was funny as hell," said Nova, "but his mom wasn't so amused."
She put on a weird voice, still laughing.
"THE LAW IS NOT TO BE TRIFLED WITH." We both sat there for a minute, still laughing.
"Well, you know that can be true, though," she said, more seriously.
I giggled.
"Dad should be home soon, though."
"Yeah. I should go."
Nova hugged me. "I almost wish I'd stayed to be your mom," she said. "Except really not. But you get me."
I smiled. "Yeah. Hopefully we can hang out in a noncreepy way."
We agreed that she was my aunt, and she left.
Dad came home about ten minutes later.

"Nova dropped by," I said nonchalantly. "She has a job, and she told me to thank you."
I was relieved to see that he didn't look completely heartbroken.
"Cool," he said.
He seemed completely exhausted.
I tried talking to him for a couple minutes, but eventually just told him to go to bed. I wanted to ask what was wrong, but I opted to wait on that, on a hunch.

I went to bed about an hour after that, after checking my email and Facebook and such.
As my mind made the descent into slumber, I grinned to no one in particular about the rat awaiting Hana.

part seven: my gay boyfriend helps me find Jane Patterson

I had a headache the moment I rolled out of bed in the morning. The noise from upstairs wasn't really helping, either. But I swear, it was louder in my room. So I dragged my sorry ass out of bed and flopped down on the couch. What, I asked myself, was I going to do today?

I vowed that I would continue daily on my quest to rescue Annalisa, and I could think of only one thing left to do: go to the orphanage and ask about her real name. Maybe Annalisa had tried to protect her new identity by sabotaging her old one? I was definitely grasping at straws, said one part of my brain. The stubborn part of my brain attacked it and told it to shut up. I had to try.

As I lay on the couch thinking about Annalisa and my headache (a 50-50 ratio), Dad came out of the room. He didn't say anything to me, so I didn't say anything to him. I just closed my eyes and listened to the dulcet tones of him getting ready for work. It made a nice duet with the metallic pipe noises.

The duet ended with the final chord of "doorslam," and I sat up groggily. I grabbed a quasishower and then walked over to school. Maybe it was the days lengthening that did it, but it felt really late. I was so used to getting up insanely early for swim practice, and even leaving later than usual, I still ended up sitting by myself outside the school for about forty minutes. I listened to music for the first thirty-four, until my iPod died, and then I sat there without saying anything.

At long last, the bell rang, and I walked into math and took my regular seat. Hana didn't even acknowledge me. I sat through math class, paying only moderate attention, and she never said a word to me. Apparently, the swim team had been a rather exclusive and bitchy clique. One that I was now out of. This was idiotic. So I took a nap.

I had a rather fascinating dream about Annalisa. In this dream, as she was dragged whimpering down the tunnel, I jumped out and sword-fought the police, stabbing them both through the heart. But then this weird Medusa effect happened, and they both grew two hearts where I'd stabbed the first one. Suddenly they were really compassionate, and let both of us go. We skipped off down the streets, which were orange, and--

The bell rang. I jumped and grabbed my books in one fell swoop, and sauntered out of the classroom just behind Hana, who swung her obnoxious ponytail in my face as I crossed the threshold into the hallway.

Thank God I had chem next. I walked into chem with an enormous smile, and my enthusiasm was matched only by Arjun's grin and loud exclamation, "Hey, Babs!"
I didn't think I really liked the nickname, but I rolled with it. As it turned out, we had a lab involving a centrifuge, and we worked as partners.
As I added the chemicals to our second test tube, he looked up and said conversationally, "So, what were you sick with, anyway?"
I froze. Did he know I wasn't sick? I didn't have any idea how to answer that. But now I'd paused too long. "Uh, chicken pox," I said less-than-confidently.
He shot me an impressively withering glance. Oops, crap...
"Nice scars, then, genius."
Shit. "On my back?" I offered. But he'd found me out already. I just smiled.
"Next time, try a plain "it was a virus." Anyway, so what was up?" he asked again. I answered a slightly different question than he asked.
"I'm on a mission," I told him, cryptically. But it was almost our turn for the centrifuge.
"Tell me at lunch?" said Arjun.
I nodded.

Lit was absolutely miserable. I was completely alone. It was like some awful sitcom, where I was the invisible girl in the corner while everyone else talked and laughed. I wanted to pinch myself, or wave my hands in front of someone's faces. Even the teacher ignored me. Once, about three-fourths of the way through class, a boy came up to me. I was actually excited that someone realized I existed, until he asked me for a pencil sharpener.

I was the first one out the classroom door when the bell rang. I would've swung my ponytail in Hana's face, but she had hung back to talk to Carrie and the Shannons.

Arjun actually wasn't at lunch. But I got a text as I sat down that said he had a project. I saved his number to my phone, and wondered how he'd gotten mine. A girl walked past my lunch table and told me that she didn't care what others said, she thought Arjun and I were positively adorable together. I never did figure out who she was. Isn't that the strangest thing? When people know you, like, obviously, and you really don't have the wildest clue as to who they are?

Apparently the world was convinced that Arjun was my boyfriend. I bet myself a snack that he had probably done that intentionally. I didn't really care, though. I was busy being interested in the strange nature of our sudden friendship. Instafriends. Just add being in the closet and being kicked out of cliques. Okay, that wasn't actually funny. Sorry.

After school, I walked outside and went to call Arjun to see if he was free. I was hoping that maybe I could tell him about my plot and maybe even drag him along to the orphanage. I really shouldn't have even been worried, though, because no sooner had I dialed the number than he appeared behind me and wrapped his arms around my waist.
"Arjun!"
He busted out laughing and let go of me. "People already think we're going out. Isn't this a bit far?"
But I kind of liked it. Was I that much of an attention whore? I definitely didn't like Arjun like that.
He just stood there and laughed. "We're going to the orphanage," I said.
He stopped laughing and looked puzzled. "Why?"
"I'll explain on the way."

I didn't give him the full spiel like I had to Dad and Dmitri. I wondered fleetingly what had happened to Dmitri, anyway. I would've liked to have thought he was my friend. But suddenly he was out of my life. Like Annalisa, but not. Anyway, so I told Arjun the general outline of things, and we got to the orphanage with that beautiful cinematic perfect timing of mine.

I walked up to the front desk. The lady looked like she didn't know what to make of us. Too young to be adopting. Too lacking-in-baby to be giving up. I answered her thoughts. "We're looking to check the orphanage records," I said. "Actually, to be precise, looking for a girl named Jane adopted in 2007-ish."

The woman fiddled with some paperwork and a computer for a few minutes. "Jane Patterson? That's the only Jane I have here."
Sure. Jane Patterson. "Yeah, that's her. Thanks."
"What? Oh... I mean, okay."
I thanked the lady for her time and we walked out.

"Want to get sodas?" I asked Arjun. I didn't have any homework, and I knew Dad would be really busy with his job anyway. So we did. We sat there, and he had a Coke, and I had a Fanta. Not that it matters for the story. I tried to make a joke about how he should have the Fanta because he's the fruity one, but he just glared at me.
I grinned.
"So, wait," he said, abruptly changing topics. "You know her as Annalisa, but her real name is Jane Patterson? Why'd she change it?"
"She had a new life. Wanted more glamour, I guess. At least, that's what she told me."
He nodded pensively. "What's she like?"
"Strong," I said. "Not specifically physically. But emotionally very strong. Realistic. Tall, with really long chocolatey hair, kinda wavylike." I paused and sipped my Fanta. "She's really a bitch at first, but then she opens up to you and she's wonderfully hilarious." Another pause. "The best friend I've ever had. No offense."
"None taken." He was smirking at me. "A bit of a hypocrite, aren't you?"
"What?" I was genuinely confused.
"Nothing, then," said Arjun, still smiling. "Um. I hate to be presumptuous--"
I shook my head. "Don't say it. Don't say anything."
"What?"
"I don't know."
There was a silence so thick that I could've karate-chopped it with my foot.
"What do we do now?" I said, changing the topic again for the umpteenth time.
"Have you asked the police?"
"Yep. Hold it-- but not about Jane Patterson."

We paid for our sodas and went back to the police station. "Hi," I said smoothly as we sauntered in like we knew what we were doing. "I'm looking to see if the police have a Jane Patterson on record."
Front Desk Man took forever to check, and then spoke.
"Jane Adamson," he said. "No Pattersons."

Another dead end. It was getting well into the afternoon by now. We sat on the curb and talked about random things. Birds. Sleepovers. Gossip. Bitchy swim girls.
Suddenly, Arjun leaped to his feet. "Babs. Let's go."
"Why? What? Where?"
"There's an antique shop near the pet store. I think the guy also claims to be a detective."
I was incredibly suspicious. Usually I'm not in the habit of hiring or talking to random detectives. Do they even have those? I mean, outside the FBI. But I thought a minute. I really had nothing to lose. Except possibly money.

So we walked over to Jack's Jems (hilariously sketchy name...) and into the store. There was a guy standing in there, presumably the salesperson/detective.
"Can I help you?" He seemed to be pretty nice. I was still a bit dubious about modern-day antique shop detectives. But I swallowed that.
"You're the detective?"
He was.
"I need you to help me. I've lost my best friend."
"Go on."
I started talking, and he pulled out a sheet of paper and started taking notes.
"Her real name is Jane Patterson. She was supposedly adopted at age 12, but really just went to live in secret tunnels under the city and changed her name to Annalisa. Tall, white, with chocolatey long hair."
That was the second time I'd used that today.
"My name is Xiu Li Zheng. I was living with her up until a few days ago, when she sacrificed herself to the police for me." I ignored Arjun's facial expressions and whatever he was mouthing at me.
He examined his notes.
"Please," I said, a little too desperately. "This is my last way, and I've told you everything I can. Please. I need you to find Annalisa."