A Quiet Neighbor (28 page)

I took a seat at the kitchen table, with legs
dangling from the plastic chair, directly across from my dad’s burning glare.
For what seemed like an eternity, no one spoke.
Umma
rose to prepare
ginseng tea, probably to distract herself from
Appa’s
bad temperament
and the punishment that would ensue.

My parents didn’t have great communication
skills.
Appa
made a decision and
Umma
followed.
Umma
was
in charge of the household and the child-rearing, but if I stepped out of line
Appa
would step in. He didn’t have to confer with
Umma
first—his house, his
rules.
Umma
was not very twentieth-century-woman-of-the-world. She was
probably in the dark as much as I was, maybe more.

I fidgeted in my seat; the silence was killing
me. Peering up at his ashen face, the realization that
Appa
found out
sunk in. I cringed at the thought and wondered how much he knew.

Shame welled in his dark eyes and I reddened
with the memory of Brett. What did Brett’s father say to
Appa
? More
importantly, what did Brett tell his father?

Without explaining,
Appa
removed an
unmarked envelope from his coat pocket and slid it across the table until it
barely touched my drumming fingers. The manila envelope was fat and lumpy.

I was so confused.
Appa brought me a gift?

I looked up, perplexed. In
Appa’s
face
was neither emotion nor answer. His face remained unmarked and rigid. His
workman’s hands were hidden beneath the table. I gulped, visualizing those
hands clenched and knuckles white, maybe even drawing half-moons of blood where
the nails dug in, his dry coarse skin splitting open from the strain like a
seam ripping from a worn coat, stitch by stitch.

Curiosity overcame me so I unclasped the flimsy
metal tabs and opened the flap. Agape, I stared at the stack of crisp hundred
dollar bills still hidden in the folds of the yellow-orange paper. The smell
was overpowering. I immediately closed the flap without a second glance. At
first I was worried that the envelope contained incriminating photos, but it
was worse. With shaking fingers I placed the envelope back on the table and
slid it forward.

Stumbling over my words, I struggled for
answers. “Why…where…what’s all this money for?”

“What?”
Umma
turned from her aimless
kitchen chores—the tea poured and served—and swept the envelope off the table.
Choked gasps cluttered her throat as she viewed the contents. Speaking in rapid
Korean, she grilled
Appa
for answers. He dismissed her with the raise of
a hand while never taking his eyes off me.

Glaring at my shaking hands he spoke, his voice
cold and callous. “You are not my daughter. I see you but you are not my Kylie.
Who are you?” His dark eyes washed over me in one final disgusted sweep before
he pushed up from the chair. Brushing off
Umma’s
wild grasps for an
explanation, he walked heavy-footed toward his room. Without turning around he
paused and said, “The money’s yours. Use it for college or throw it away. Do
what you want. You are no longer my daughter.” The door to his bedroom closed.
He didn’t even wait for a response.

My heart dropped from my chest.
Appa
washed his hands of me. He didn’t even ask for my side of the story. He already
cast his vote. I was done. Scratched from the family records and left to my own
devices.
Appa
never forgot nor did he forgive easily. If he was ever to
forgive me, it would be on his terms, not mine.

Since I didn’t know what
Appa
was told,
I was led to believe it was the worst possible scenario; that his eleven-year-old
daughter initiated sex with a seventeen-year-old boy and got paid for it. Even
if
Appa
was told the truth, that I peeled my clothes off for a man who
wasn’t my husband, I would have been disowned. I don’t even know why I did it.
I didn’t plan on having sex with Brett…oh, that just sounds so disgusting. I
just wanted him to notice me. I wanted him to like me.

What I ended up doing was not only shameful but
dishonoring to my family’s name. Disgracing my family was the worst sin
imaginable and I would have to live with that for the rest of my life, as would
my family.

But why did
Appa
accept money from Gary
Ficks? That I couldn’t understand. My family would never make this scandal
public. We had too much pride to spread ill-words or embarrassing stories. I
could understand that Gary might have thought his son had a hand in the whole
thing and didn’t want word to spread, ruining his son’s reputation as well as
the Ficks’ name. But
Appa
could have just convinced him in words that
neither I nor anyone in the family would ever say anything about the incident
and would rather pretend it never happened. Why didn’t
Appa
tell Gary
that?

A clean slate; that’s all I wanted. I’m sure that’s
all anyone wants. So why couldn’t we do that? Pretend it never happened.

I felt defeated. The only reason I could come
up with was that
Appa
believed him.

The next few weeks of summer break were
difficult and uncomfortably quiet. I kept to myself, mostly with my head stuck
in a book (working through the Nancy Drew series), cleaning my already spotless
room, or lying in bed with my eyes wide open. I was no longer summoned to the
restaurant for chores. My parents barely said one word or looked my way. It was
as if I had died that hot June day and I just hadn’t crossed over yet. Hell
didn’t even want me.

The phones remained quiet. Leila never called,
nor did any of my other friends, whom I was mainly friends with because of
Leila. And the person I most wanted to hear from—Brett—never called. Then, when
I assumed my life was already at the bottom of the barrel, everything plummeted
from worse to worst.

Or so I thought.

One day before I started seventh grade,
Umma
rushed into my room and plopped a large suitcase on top of my ruffled
bedspread. The suitcase was well worn and scratched along the bottom and sides.
Since my family never went on trips, I figured
Umma
got the suitcase
from a garage sale at church. It smelled like tobacco, ginseng, and potpourri.

“Ky,”
Umma
whispered, “Hurry up and pack
your things.”

“What?
Umma
, why? Where are we going?”

“No question,” she hissed, nervously looking
behind her, “just pack your things. I’ll be back later.”
Umma
left the
room as swiftly as she entered, and I was left alone with the smelly suitcase.

That afternoon
Appa
left the apartment
to play
Hwatu
, a Korean card game, with a bunch of his friends. Thirty
minutes after his departure,
Umma
returned to my room, grabbed ahold of
my hand and the stuffed suitcase, and pulled me out the door.

A taxi cab was idling in front of the house.
The man in the driver’s seat popped open the trunk and waited for us to enter.
Umma
plopped the suitcase into the empty trunk and pushed me into the back seat.

The seats smelled stale and musty. The driver
had dark skin and hairy arms. There was a tiny photo of a dark woman holding a
baby clipped to the faded sun visor, probably his wife and son. Nervous, I
fiddled with my skirt as I looked out the window.

We drove for a while. Staring at the passing
trees, cars, and houses made me sleepy, so I closed my eyes and rested my head
on
Umma’s
bony shoulder. When the taxi jerked me awake we were parked in
front of the Amtrak train station.

I followed
Umma
, bleary eyed, through
the train terminal. Every now and then, I caught a whiff of the suitcase.

The two-hour train ride was taxing. I spent
most of the time dozing off, using
Umma’s
shoulder as a pillow. I must
have dozed off a hundred times without ever finding sleep. When we arrived in San
Diego, I followed
Umma
into another taxi cab. This time, when the taxi
pulled into a fairly new mobile home complex, I knew where we were and why we
had come.

“Hurry up, Ky.”
Umma
motioned for me to
follow and keep up.

The prefabricated home was one story with white
aluminum panels set along a rectangular frame. A row of similar homes lined the
driveway and were individualized with colorful awnings, potted plants, and
patriotic flags. The home I was staring at was one I’d seen before in photos
attached to holiday greeting cards. The place looked exactly as it did in the
photos: built-in porch, faded blue awning, and plastic blue shutters. A rusty
mailbox, once painted blue, was staked in front of a white picket fence that surrounded
a small plot of grass. On the side were faded white curlicue letters that read,
Whimplestein
. A
bed of yellow and orange sunflowers sprouted bountifully by the porch, sparking
a bit of warmth to the otherwise cool color scheme. The gate leading to the
house was unlocked and cracked ajar, as if the Whimplestein’s were expecting company.

The front door opened and an elderly Korean
woman appeared. The grayish, thinning mat of curls covering the woman’s flat
head matched the wrinkles and saggy, tanned skin that cinched and hung around
her face. Her skin felt doughy when the lady hugged me. She smelled like bark
and herbs. Her pudgy fingers squeezed my cheeks with shocking strength. Her
tea-stained teeth gleamed and her eyes sparkled from behind folds of skin as
she drew me in with a wide smile. When the lady spoke, it was with an accent similar
to
Umma’s
. I understood little of the conversation and peered curiously
from the curb.

Then a tall Caucasian man appeared from the
open door and walked steadily toward me with a large smile. His bushy white
eyebrows and white carpeted arms moved in unison as he knelt and reached out to
envelop me in a loving embrace. His arms were warm and smelled like cough
drops. The scent made me wrinkle my nose. What was it with old people and their
scents?

“Come on in, Ky. It’s so great to have you come
live with us,” he bellowed in warm and soothing tones.

I knew this was coming and still I was stunned.
I turned to
Umma
who suddenly fell silent. “
Umma
? What does he
mean…live with us?” At that point I noticed that the taxi we arrived in had not
left, but was still idling at the curb. What was the taxi waiting for?

Umma
suddenly grabbed both of my
hands and knelt before me. Tears were streaming down her face, overcome in
sadness and sorrow. “Ky, this is where you’ll live now. You’ll be living with
Halmoni
and Bill while you finish school. You remember
Halmoni
. She lived with
us until you were three.”

I slowly shook my head from side to side. No, I
didn’t know this old woman and man with whom I was supposed to live. I searched
Umma
’s face for answers and found none. “But, wh—what about you and
Appa
?
Where are you guys going?”

“I’ll go back home.
Appa
’s really mad
right now. You can’t stay there. Bad rumors…” she squeezed her eyes shut for a
moment and then opened them, her eyes red. “A change of scenery will be good.
Trust me.”
Umma
forced a tight smile, squeezed me and kissed my cheeks,
leaving behind red smudges from her lipstick.

Brushing away the tears that started to drip
down my neck, I said goodbye to
Umma
, whom I wouldn’t see again until
years later when Gramps got sick and
Halmoni
had passed. How was I to
know that being sent to live with my grandparents was going to be the best
thing my parents could have done? At the time, all I could think was that my
parents abandoned me. They were ashamed and humiliated of me and I was a huge
disappointment.

At that moment I felt worthless.

Chapter
Twenty-Three:

Friday,
June 29, 2012

10:38
P.M.

DRINKING WAS CERTAINLY NOT AN ADMIRABLE TRAIT
for a
lady as beautiful as Tess. Knowing this, and the fact she was losing the battle
with gravity, the elasticity of her skin and the natural luster of her hair,
she spitefully poured herself shot after shot of vodka within the solitude of
her bedroom walls.

When the vodka was tapped, she decided to
upgrade to a bottle of Glenlivet 18 she received awhile back from one of her
clients as a thank you gift. She kept that one hidden in her closet for just
such an occasion, in the oversized pocket of her seldom-used ski jacket.

Already horribly drunk with her taste-buds
burned, she pulled down hanger after hanger from the wardrobe bar until she
could fish out the bottle. She greedily popped the cork and took two huge slugs
from the bottle, unable to taste anything or realize how much she was spilling
down her front. Staggering back, she tripped and tottered over the clothes that
littered the carpet and barely made it to the bed before collapsing in a
stupor.

Her life seemed to be crumbling upon her in one
fell swoop, unraveling at the seams. Her daughter dead, murdered. Suspect,
husband. Did he do it? She wasn’t sure. Lover, gone. Broke up at the first sign
of trouble. Drunk, alone, and lost. She didn’t even have the strength to feel
sorry for herself. All she wanted was to feel nothing at all. She took another
swig of single malt, and with watery eyes set the bottle on the nightstand.

That day was a blur. She overslept and was
nursing a hangover. Brett was passed out on the bed and she was trying to
inhale a cup of coffee so she could figure out the best way to apologize to him
when he woke up. The sneaking around with Jim was beginning to lose its luster.
She got swept up in the thrill of the chase and affection. Jim was a
charismatic guy with all the confidence Brett was lacking. She believed that
she deserved the affair. That she was a woman who shouldn’t be denied the
attention that she craved. That lie was starting to get to her, especially
after the blow up with Loral and then with Brett.

It was midmorning when the detectives knocked
on her door and close to noon when they left. Once the detectives finished
invading Tess and her distressed family with questions and accusations, she
escaped to her office to be surrounded by the safe, the familiar, the manageable.
She wasn’t ready to fully face the gravity of the news she was just given. She
needed an escape.

“Loral is probably just at Mike’s house,” she
told herself as she drove to the office, “or at the park writing in that
goddamn notebook of hers that she’s never able to part with.”

She added to the mantra as she parked in her
usual spot and walked into the office: “It’s all going to blow over. A simple
misunderstanding, that’s all this whole thing is. Yep, a simple
misunderstanding.” She almost had herself convinced by the time she sat down at
her desk, when she stopped to notice the picture of her and Loral when Loral
was six. They were at Sea World. She was wearing pink knee-length pleated
shorts and a long striped shirt with a teddy bear on it. They had just been
splashed by Shamu. Even then, she had that damn journal tucked beneath her arm,
the other arm craning around Tess’s white tennis shorts, her head resting
against Tess’s hip.

At this, Tess remembered the way Loral’s eyes
lit up when she unwrapped her first journal at age five. From that day forward,
Loral could scarcely be seen without a journal and a pen on her. That journal
opened the door for Loral, gave her an outlet for a layer of emotions that Tess
herself never learned to handle without the aid of alcohol.

“She was really something, that kid,” Tess
thought as she stroked the glass frame, realizing this was the first time she
used the past tense in relation to her daughter. Tears began to well in her
eyes and she grabbed her hair with both hands in frustration. She spoke to the
empty room, more loudly now:

“How can it be that I can only conjure up a
handful of happy memories with Loral?” She began counting off the memories by
prying a finger backward for each one. “The time when she was born, the time
when she first wrapped her tiny arms around my neck and whispered ‘I love you,’
the time when she opened her first journal and started frantically writing in
it, and the time when Tory and Bella were born. The rest is just memories of us
fighting and yelling and unhappy. What kind of mother am I?”

Shaking, she quickly removed a cold water
bottle from the mini fridge she kept below her desk, and forced herself to
swallow. The water felt cool against her parched throat. Although water helped,
it wasn’t doing the trick for her nerves. She craved something stronger,
something more potent, something that burned away grief.

No.
She shook the need to drink
and instead decided to bury herself in work. That was why she came here in the
first place, right? She unwisely started by making her client callbacks. Her
voice sounded dead and foreign as she spoke in the empty room. It wasn’t filled
with her usual fluty tones; the tickle of sweet laughter and icy precision her
clients knew and loved. More than once a client had to interrupt and ask what
was wrong. More than once the caller would suddenly cut the conversation short,
blaming another meeting or a sudden visitor. More than once she felt like
bursting into tears or resorting to a drink. She resisted the drink, mainly
because she wasn’t sure if she’d have to answer some unexpected follow-up
questions with the nosy detectives regarding her daughter’s murder. So instead
of turning to alcohol as a means of an escape, she called Jim.

Jim would know what to do, she thought. He
would have the answers. She just needed something to erase the pain. Like an
addict, she dialed his number. When she was sent directly to his voice mailbox
on the first ring—which never happened since he always picked up—she knew the
affair was over. Just like that. Over.

She broke. Anger, sadness, and confusion flooded
her veins, boiling her blood. Her protective shield of confidence shattered,
exposing an ugly weakness she spent years protecting. With her emotions
discombobulated, she grew frantic.

Without thinking, she grabbed her purse and
angrily swiped the few tears trickling down her face. She decided to pay Jim a
visit. If you wanted answers, you needed to seek them out for yourself—up close
and personal.

The visit was short, dramatic and heated.

His office was pristine and lavish as always,
but there was an underlying sense of unwelcome in the air. The dolled up
receptionist was prissy and arrogant, clipping the end of each syllable as if
the words were dull and in need of a manicure. “Mr. Kings. Bee. Is. Busy.”

“I know. That’s why I came in person.”

“Sorry you made the trip, but like I said—”

“Listen, Bitch, either you tell Mr. Kingsbee
that Ms. Holmes is here to see him or you let me pass. I
know
where his
office is dear and I don’t need your services or permission to find it.”

Looking up at Tess through a fan of thickened
lashes, Candy pursed her painted lips and said, “I’ll let him know that a Mrs.
Holmes is here to see him.”

“Thanks,” she said with an icy sneer. “At least
you’re not as dumb as you look.” Color flushed her cheeks as a fire erupted in
her belly. By now, her throat screamed for a drink, but she pushed back the
need when she saw Jim’s tentative smile come floating down the hall.

“Tess!” Jim exclaimed. He lifted his arms as if
to say
it’s been a long time
and
what a pleasant, but unexpected
surprise
. “Please, step into my office.”

Tess glowered. “How kind of you to make the
time.”

“For you, my dear, no problem at all. Candy,
please hold my calls.”

“Sure thing Mr. Kingsbee.” Tess noticed Candy’s
flirtatious purr and sneered.

Jim quickly led Tess within the thick walls of
his soundproofed office, sealed the door, and sat at the edge of his enormous
mahogany desk, unclipping the Bluetooth from his ear. Clasping his hands
together and forcing a wide, phony smile he said, “So, what can I do for you?”

Keeping her voice low and snipped, she said,
“Why aren’t you answering my calls?”

He laughed. “I’m a busy man, Tess. You know
that.”

“What I know is that in the past few months,
when you weren’t banging me between the hotel sheets, you answered every call I
made. Except, that is, for today. And I want to know the reason. Actually, I
demand to know.”

“Tess,” he smiled patronizingly, “what can I
say, I’ve moved on.” The last words dripped out slow as honey. He shrugged and
let out a little, incredulous gasp of a laugh. “You didn’t think we were
serious, did you? I was under the impression that you just wanted a little fun.
Besides, you are still married and the mother of two girls and I—”

“Two?”

“Hmm?”

“You said two girls. I have three.”

“Oh…right. Sure you do. What I meant to say is
if I’d known you were the clingy type, I wouldn’t have even tried. Really Tess,
I’m kind of disappointed. You knew I wasn’t looking for anything serious. And
even if I were, I wouldn’t want to add complications in my life. And to be
frank, well…after last time with that call from your husband, you are a
liability I just don’t need.”

An eerie calm settled over her flushed face.
Taking a minute to settle the burn that had colored her voice up to this point,
she took a deep breath. When she finally spoke, her voice was lower, almost
inaudible. “Fine,” she said through clenched teeth. “I figure you’ve already
seen the news. The San Diego Homicide Unit is trying to look for my daughter’s
killer. Cops are poking their noses around, asking questions. Looking for clues
and pretty much anything that might
hint
at a clue.”

“What are you getting at?” An icy drop of fear
trickled down the center of his back. Amused at his discomfort, she smiled
thinly, noticing the sudden trepidation in his icy blue eyes.

She shrugged. Turning toward the door she gazed
past her shoulder and said, “Like you said, it was only fun, nothing serious,
so why should you worry?”

“Tess? What shouldn’t I worry about?” Nervous
panic rose in his voice. “What are you planning to tell them? Think, Tess.
Think about your kids.”

Turning the knob she said icily, “Oh, you mean
my
two
kids?” and closed the door behind her. Shaken but unbowed, she
walked down the Kingsbee-celebrity corridor with her head held high and her
hands clenched to her sides, fighting the urge to tear the pictures off the
walls.

Without acknowledging the seething redhead, she
walked straight through the large revolving doors and out into the baked air of
the parking lot.

She made a beeline toward her BMW, choosing to
tramp through a row of carefully manicured Japanese boxwood and daylilies
rather than follow the curvaceous footpath bordering the parking lot. Fumbling
with her keys, she unlocked the door and slipped inside. Sinking into the
leather seat, she closed her eyes and punched the steering wheel for effect.
The outside world seemed to fade away now that she was enveloped by the
soundproof bubble of her luxury sedan. The remote silence coaxed down her bravado,
blandishing fresh tears from her eyes.

Looking back on the day, she wondered:
how
could I be so stupid?

Feeling pathetic, she opened the glove
compartment, pulled out the hidden pint of Smirnoff, and took a desperate swig.
The burning heat rushed down the back of her tongue, licking her esophagus and
stomach lining with intoxicating flame.
How stupid am I to get involved with
another man? Why was I so easily seduced?
If it weren’t for her alcoholism
and her insatiable need to be desired, she might have noticed Loral’s subtle
cries for help. But weren’t all teenagers moody, always griping about
something? And what could she have done to stop her daughter’s killer? She had
no control over the mental defects crowding this world. Come to think if it,
what more could she have ever done to help Loral, really?

She tossed the bottle onto the passenger’s seat
and turned the ignition. The bubble of silence collapsed, giving way to an engine’s
purr, an unobtrusive seatbelt reminder—
ding-ding-ding
—a thin gurgle and
swish of vodka in glass, all blending with the roar of the tires as she threw
the sedan into drive and headed home.

Although she wasn’t directly responsible for
her daughter’s death, she could not deny her contribution to her daughter’s ill
state of mind in the days prior. All those days—and so many others before—she
danced about, worried only about her own adulterous cravings, turning a blind
eye to her daughter’s obvious inner turmoil. And Loral knew about the affair.
With all she had to process just being a teenage girl, there was her mother,
throwing kerosene to the fire.