Bitter Melon (26 page)

“I figured you would ask me about it once you heard from them,” Theresa says.

“But why wait?” I say. “Wouldn’t you want to share your good news with me?”

Theresa squirms under her jacket. “Sorry. I didn’t want to make you nervous.”

“Nervous about what?” I try to sound curious, but instead, I sound irritated.

Before Theresa can answer, we reach Nellie’s house. Nellie and Theresa part with Mom and me, and Mom and I continue to our apartment. As we get closer, the mail truck pulls away. Mom jogs to the mailbox. I jog after her. Mom fumbles through her purse for her keys and opens the gate. She rushes to our mailbox, wrenches it open, and pulls out some junk mail and a few envelopes. She sifts through the mail and finds what she is looking for. The legal-size envelope from Berkeley is skinny—not a good sign. My heart starts pounding. Mom climbs the stairs to our apartment and I follow.

Once inside, Mom sits down at the dining table and slices open the Berkeley envelope with her letter opener. With shaky fingers, she reads the letter. Her lower lip quivers. Her eyes register shock. Without seeing the letter, I already know what it says.

“How can this be?” Mom says. “Don’t they know about your speech wins? Didn’t they see you on the news?”

I don’t bother to remind her that I wasn’t featured on the mainstream news.

“Maybe … Maybe it’s a mistake,” Mom says. “Maybe they mixed you up with another applicant.”

Mom looks helpless as she fumbles for a way to understand. I look away, as if avoiding the sight of a naked person.

Then it occurs to me that maybe this isn’t so bad after all. If Berkeley is no longer an option, won’t that increase the chances that Mom will let me go to Scripps? When will I hear back from Scripps? I notice another envelope next to the Berkeley envelope. Could that be the letter from Scripps? It is skinny, just like the Berkeley letter. Maybe Ms. Taylor is wrong. Maybe I didn’t get in after all. I take a few steps to get a closer look.

Like a starved animal hoarding her food, Mom glares at me. “It’s Ms. Taylor’s fault,” she says. Her voice is almost a growl. “If she had kicked you out of her class, you would have taken calculus. If she hadn’t conned you into competing, you would have gone to Princeton Review and improved your SATs. See what happens when you trust other people besides me? You’re an idiot.”

My SAT score had improved by a hundred points. But because it wasn’t good enough to get me into Berkeley, to Mom, it was non-existent.

Mom slices open the envelope I was eyeing. Inside are a letter and a check. Mom’s eyes light up for a moment—until she reads the check.

“Damn them!” Mom says as she slams the check down onto the table. “Why would they be so stupid as to make it out to you? What kind of child has her own bank account?”

“What is it?” I ask, totally confused.

“It’s your check. From the Chinese American Association.”

“What’s wrong?” I ask.

“I can’t deposit it!”

“Why not?”

“Because your name is on it. Our bank account is in my name. They probably did it on purpose,” Mom hisses. “The longer it takes for us to deposit it, the more interest they can accumulate in their bank account. That’s probably why they waited this long to send it in the first place.” I wouldn’t have understood what she meant if Ms. Taylor hadn’t explained what interest is.

Mom buries her face in her hands. Her shoulders slump forward in a defeated posture.

Finally, Mom sighs with resignation. “You will attend State.” She is referring to San Francisco State University. “You didn’t get rejected from that school. They have a good journalism program. Ms. Costello said. Maybe after a year, you can transfer to Berkeley.”

My heart sinks. I already know from the finality in her voice that even if I am accepted by Scripps, she will not let me go.

In spite of my grim prospects, I check the mail every day after school for anything from Scripps. For five consecutive days, I receive nothing. I start to wonder if it got lost in the mail. Even a rejection would be better than this purgatory of not knowing.

The following Saturday, Mom drags me to the red fake-brick
bank on Clement Street to open a new bank account so she can deposit my check. Even though it’s supposed to be my account, Minnie, our teller, talks mostly to Mom. She even hands the checks and check register to Mom. The two act as though I’m not even there. When we get home, Mom doesn’t show me how to write a check or use the check register. She doesn’t teach me how to use the ATM card. Instead, she just places my checking account materials in her filing cabinet. She never mentions my account again.

The following Monday, after school, I make myself a cup of tea to stave my afternoon sleepiness so I can study. I remove my tea bag from my mug of over-steeped tea and throw it into the trash. It is then that I notice a big, thick envelope in the kitchen trash basket. I brush aside the cold, wet food scraps on top of it and pull it out. The envelope is heavy and stuffed full. It is greasy from food and wet from tea leaves.

It is from Scripps. Inside are my acceptance letter, which states that I have been awarded a scholarship, my registration form, and a course catalog.

Like a terrier smelling a rabbit, I dig farther into the trash and pull out several damp, stained, and smelly letters addressed to me. They are all from various scholarship organizations. About two-thirds of them inform me that I have been awarded money to attend Scripps.

All that worry over the last month for nothing. How did this end up in the trash?

I think back to the check I got from the Chinese American Association. Mom was angry that the check was in my name and not hers. To her, it was ploy on the CAA’s part to accrue more interest.

Interest is why it’s in the lender’s best interest to lend
, Ms. Taylor said. Suddenly, this statement sounds like it applies to my mother. Has every penny spent on me been nothing more than a loan, something I must pay back with interest? Has every selfless act been merely an act of self-interest?

I play back all the times Mom has scoffed at how I don’t understand the value of money. How could I understand if she never explained it to me?

Maybe she has withheld this knowledge from me on purpose. After all, I can’t be independent without my own money, so wouldn’t it be in her best interest to keep me ignorant about it? Along with keeping me dependent on her, it also gives her another excuse for criticizing me. That would explain why she was so angry about having to open an account for me. That would also explain why she neglected to teach me how to write a check or use an ATM card.

As the pieces of this mystery come together, a boiling anger erupts in my stomach. I can’t let Mom get away with this. I’m going to go to Scripps, with or without her approval. But how?

The reason I got to do speech in the first place was that I hid it from Mom. By the time she found out, it was too late for
her to wrench it away from me. Might the same tactic work for Scripps as well?

I decide not to fill out my registration form for State. If I am not enrolled, then Mom can’t make me go. If her choices are Scripps or nothing, maybe Scripps will look more attractive to her. I fill out my registration form for Scripps. It is then that I hit another obstacle.

The form says that I must include a check. What to do?

I dive into Mom’s file cabinet and ferret out the folder with my bank account materials. To my surprise, the checks have both my name and my mother’s name on them. Maybe it’s because I’m a minor. Unsure of how to write a check, I pull out a checking statement from Mom’s account, which has mini photocopies of the checks she has written. I follow that format as I fill in my check. With shaky hands, I clip it to my registration form and insert them both into the enclosed envelope. With a pounding heart, I walk it to the mailbox down the street. I hold my breath, hoping that Mom won’t find out until it is too late.

After discovering all my Scripps and scholarship materials in the trash, I have become much more diligent about checking our mail. It is a good thing too, because a week later, my first bank statement arrives. I open it and discover that, sure enough, the check I wrote has been listed and the money has been deducted from my account. I hide my statement in my backpack and blindly hope that Mom won’t notice its absence.

I have been invited to compete in the state championship. This is the first time a St. Elizabeth’s speaker has been invited to go. This year, it is being held at San Francisco State University, which is lucky for me, because I can take the bus there. Had it been held farther away, say in Los Angeles or San Diego, my mom probably wouldn’t have given me permission to go.

Two nights before the competition, after Mom has gone to bed, I review my most recent draft.

A wave of nausea passes through me. After everything I’ve been through with my mother, none of this rings true to me anymore. To speak it, to argue it, to win with it would be a lie. The room is dark except for the beam of light radiating from my small desk lamp. I look at my trophies and the framed articles on the wall. They form long, ghostly shadows.

Over the last several months, I have made small alterations to this speech to reflect the new truth. First I changed the part about going to UC Berkeley. Then I changed the part about becoming a doctor. These changes seemed cosmetic at the time. But now, as I read this speech again, I realize that with my words and actions, I was chipping away at the old speech word by word until the whole thing came tumbling down. I take out a pen and a new sheet of paper and construct my new speech.