Confucius Jane (7 page)

“Guess,” Sutton said, wanting to keep her on her toes.

The bridge of Jane's nose wrinkled in thought. It was cute. Damn it. “I'm going to say … cardiologist. Maybe even a heart surgeon.”

Sutton rolled her eyes at the clear flirtation. “The heart is a relatively simple muscle. It doesn't interest me. I'm a neuroscientist.”

“Impressive. What's your favorite part of the brain?”

“My favorite part of the brain?” Sutton was absolutely sure no one had ever asked that before. Colleagues always wanted to know what her specialty was, and the rest of the population tended to feel intimidated. “What kind of question is that?”

“A relatively simple one.” Jane winked.

“Let me think about it and get back to you.” Sutton sounded absurd to her own ears. The brain was a highly evolved and complex organ that habitually eluded human understanding, and Jane wanted her to choose a “favorite” part?

As they continued down the street, she noticed the sun glinting off portable steel barricades that had been erected along the sidewalk. She glanced up at the sign and realized that this was Canal Street—one of the main thoroughfares that bisected downtown Manhattan. Some people had already staked out places along the barricades, while others milled about, browsing through the shops.

A traffic cop waved them to cross the street, and Jane led her down one more block before pointing at a sign that read Dragon Land Bakery. “Here we are.” When she held open the door, Sutton felt a quick rush of pleasure.

The bakery smelled of sugar and cream, and Sutton's mouth began to water in a Pavlovian response. To her left, several tables and chairs had been set up near the floor-to-ceiling window looking out onto Baxter Street. To her right, neatly organized rows of pastries filled a large, heated display case. A middle-aged woman dressed in a red apron stood before the case and took orders, plucking out each pastry with a clean piece of waxed paper. She smiled and waved at Jane, calling out the New Year greeting across the room.

“Do you trust me?” Jane asked once she'd returned the sentiment.

Sutton blinked at the audacity of the sudden question. “I only just learned your last name two minutes ago.”

“Go on instinct. What does your gut tell you?”

“That I trust you just enough to let you order breakfast.”

“That'll do for now.” Jane's eyes were sparkling. “Would you mind finding us a place to sit?”

After wiping off the table in the far corner with a napkin, Sutton watched as Jane conversed with the woman operating the register. She wondered which language they were speaking, and whether Jane, with her lithe build, was an athlete—a swimmer, perhaps. When Jane turned toward her and raised one eyebrow, Sutton mentally cursed herself. She'd been caught staring. Just fantastic. She smiled briefly in response before turning to casually glance out the window, as though she'd been about to do that all along. Right.

A few moments later, Jane slid a tray onto their table. It held two round, golden buns with sugar sprinkled on top and two plastic cups filled with what almost looked like a milkshake, except that the liquid was thinner in consistency.

“Pineapple bread and bubble tea,” Jane said proudly, as though she'd made them herself. “If you don't like them, I'll be happy to get you something else.”

“It looks great,” Sutton said, not having to stretch the truth at all. She broke off a small piece of the bun and raised it to her mouth, inhaling the delicate scent before taking a bite. The outside was flaky, almost like a pie crust, while the inside was spongy and sweet. When she caught Jane looking at her with an almost puppyish eagerness, she smiled around the mouthful.

“Delicious,” she said once she'd swallowed. “But it doesn't taste like pineapple at all.”

“It's called pineapple bread because of its shape and color. See what you think of the tea.”

Sutton put her lips to the straw and pulled gently. The tea was mild and sweet, but her head jerked up as she felt something round and rather squishy roll across her tongue. Reflexively, she spat it out—so hard that it flew several feet before landing on the floor and rolling into the corner. Horrified by both the sensation and her reaction, Sutton grabbed her cup. Peering through the translucent plastic, she noticed, for the first time, several small dark globes clustered at the bottom.

“What—” She looked to Jane in alarm. “There are balls! In my tea!”

Jane looked as startled as she felt. “Oh, jeez. I'm so sorry. I thought you must have had bubble tea before. Those are tapioca pearls.”

Sutton could feel her heated cheeks trying to match the hue of her sweater. “They're normal?”

Jane gave a tentative nod. “They're even pretty good.” She started to reach across the table but then apparently thought better of it and drew back her hand. “I'm really sorry I didn't warn you.”

Sutton was mortified. She wanted to disappear into the floor. Or better yet—hit the “undo” button on the last five minutes of her life. But since neither of those options was possible, she was either going to have to beat a hasty retreat from the bakery and never see Jane again, or swallow her pride. And some tapioca pearls.

“I'll try anything once.” After a deep breath, she took another pull from the straw. This time, she bit down gently on the pearl, closing her eyes to focus on the flavor. It was, in fact, a very mild tapioca, and it complemented the tea perfectly. She opened her eyes to the sight of Jane regarding her intently, and for a moment, the rest of the bakery seemed to fade into the background.

“What's the verdict?”

“I like it.”

Jane did a little fist pump. “All right.” Her expression turned sly. “So tell me—do you carry a license for that concealed weapon?”

“You mean my tongue?”

When Jane's eyes grew hazy, Sutton knew she had won this round. The victory was heady, as was Jane's responsiveness.
Not date,
her conscience supplied helpfully.

Visibly trying to pull herself together, Jane took a long sip of her own tea. “Let me guess,” she said, her voice deeper than it had been a minute ago, and slightly hoarse. “You have an older brother who roped you into spitting contests.”

Sutton shook her head. “I'm an only child.”

“Ah, so it's a natural gift.”

Ten different suggestive replies popped into Sutton's head, but she forced herself to ignore them. “What about you—are there more besides you and Min?”

“I'm an only child as well. Minetta is my cousin.”

Sutton could have sworn the name was familiar. “Minetta? Isn't that—”

“—the name of a street in the West Village.” Jane grinned. “My uncle John is a thematic sort of person. My other three cousins are named Hester, Carmine, and Cornelia. It's okay—you can laugh.”

“What made him choose street names?” Sutton said, glad Jane wouldn't be offended by her amusement.

“It's pretty common for a Chinese family to pick names for their children that are related in some way. He, my mom, and their siblings all have Chinese names from a famous poem.”

As she spoke, she broke off another piece of the pineapple bread, and Sutton's gaze was drawn to her hands. Jane's fingers were slender and moved with an unexpected grace. Feeling her mouth go dry, Sutton quickly took another sip of tea.

“I have a theory about the street names in particular, though,” Jane was saying. “I think they're sort of aspirational. Every one of those streets is outside of Chinatown, though none are very far away.”

“You think they're symbolic? Of him wanting what, exactly?” Sutton tried to work through the logic. “Something beyond this neighborhood? Why would that be the case?”

Jane shrugged. “This place is pretty insular. It has its own languages, its own rules, its own customs. And for women especially, those customs can still be limiting. Maybe he wanted them to have … more.”

Sutton sat back and thought about that. Chinese culture was a blind spot for her—she didn't know much beyond what she liked to order at Chinese-American restaurants uptown. “Interesting,” she said, not wanting to admit her naïveté. “And regardless, they're beautiful and distinctive names.”

“As is ‘Sutton.'”

“Also a street in Manhattan.” At the moment, Sutton didn't want to divulge the fact that her own name came not from the Upper East Side thoroughfare, but from the old New York family whose scion had developed the entire neighborhood. “There's a Jane Street, too, isn't there?”

“There is. But I was named for my great-grandmother on my father's side.” Jane turned to look over her shoulder. “Looks like the crowds are getting thicker. Shall we go find a good place to stand?”

They left the bakery and turned into the sea of people, almost all of whom were wearing red. As they slowly made their way through the masses, Sutton tried to soak in the sights. Streamers and banners hung across the streets, punctuated by store awnings. Most of the conversations around her were completely unintelligible. Had it not been for the occasional sign written in English, she might have suspected she'd been magically transported to Beijing.

After a few blocks, Jane pointed to an unclaimed spot along the barricades. “How about there?”

Sutton nodded and did her best to unobtrusively squeeze into the space between a family of four with two small children and a pack of adolescent girls who were popping foreign-looking candies into their mouths while pointing and laughing at those around them. But no one seemed to mind being crowded or jostled, and when the mother to her right smiled and said, “Happy New Year,” Sutton felt brave enough to respond in Chinese.

“Nice job,” Jane murmured. “You have a good ear for the tones.”

“Perfect pitch,” Sutton explained. They were pressed close together, and she felt the sudden urge to pull Jane's arm around her waist. What was wrong with her today? Was she hormonal? How could she feel this much chemistry with someone she'd spent less than an hour with?

“You'd probably have an easier time than most with learning Chinese, then.”

“Not me. I'm awful at languages.” Sutton flashed back to how she'd barely squeaked by with B's in the two semesters of Spanish she'd taken to fulfill her college language requirement. Her brain was a steel trap for scientific facts and formulae, but a sieve when it came to verb conjugations. No matter how many tutoring sessions and study groups she had attended, she'd never been able to achieve anything more than the most basic competence.

Beside her, Jane had struck up a conversation with the woman and her husband. The fluid cadence of their unfamiliar words put Sutton in mind of a stream bubbling over rocks. When Jane laughed, Sutton wished she could share in the joke. Finally, Jane turned back to her, eyes gleaming in clear amusement, and lowered her head to speak into Sutton's ear.

“They said we look very happy together, and wished us joy and prosperity in the coming year. They also think I'm a guy.”

Sutton clapped one hand over her mouth to contain her surprised laughter. “What? You don't look like one at all.”

“It happens sometimes. It's my short hair. And my clothes.”

“But your face—” Sutton managed to stop herself before she blurted out something about Jane's elegant cheekbones and beautiful eyes.

“My face?”

“Is not mannish in the slightest.” Sutton silently prided herself on her quick recovery.

“A lot of people don't look too closely. They see a few external signs and immediately make assumptions.”

Sutton wanted to ask whether that bothered her, but she thought it might be too personal a question. “So, were you raised speaking Chinese?” she asked instead.

“No, my parents always spoke English at home.”

“Where did you grow up?”

“Nowhere. Or maybe everywhere. My father works for the State Department, and I've never lived anywhere longer than three years.”

Sutton was intrigued. “Where were you born?”

“Right here, while my dad was finishing up his Master's degree. When I was one, we moved to D.C. A year later, we were in Hong Kong.”

“And then?”

Jane flipped her hands over and began counting on her fingers. “Thailand, Italy, Sweden, Egypt, South Africa, and Portugal. Then I came back here for college, and they went to Russia. Now they're in Brazil.”

“Amazing.” Sutton could only imagine what such a nomadic life must have felt like. To be completely uprooted every few years to an entirely new place with a different language and set of customs must have been so disruptive. And yet Jane didn't seem bitter at all. “Were you resentful of having to move so often?”

“You'd think that would happen, but it didn't for me.” Jane's gaze grew distant as she smiled at some memory. “My parents always made each move feel like a great adventure.” She homed back in on Sutton. “Did your family ever relocate?”

“Only once.” Compared to Jane, Sutton felt decidedly uncosmopolitan. Annual family trips to Europe and the Caribbean couldn't compare with her experiences. “A whole two blocks away.”

“Where in the city?”

“The Upper East Side.” Feeling suddenly self-conscious about her privileged and sheltered upbringing, Sutton was relieved to hear noise coming down the street. “Is that the parade?”

Jane listened for a moment. “It sure is. Get ready to hear a lot of cymbal clashing today.”

“Oh? Why is that?”

“Loud noises frighten away the demons.”

Sutton searched Jane's face for any hint of facetiousness, but she looked serious. “The demons. I see.”

“I don't believe in them, either,” Jane stage-whispered. “I won't tell if you don't.”

“Your secret's safe with me.”

Sutton rested both hands on the barricade and focused on the oncoming procession. Sure enough, the parade was led by two men dressed in flowing, black-and-red jackets and pants, their cymbals glinting in the midday sun. Behind them danced two black-and-red lions, their massive, vaguely leonine heads bobbing up and down in synchrony. As one, their mouths snapped open to reveal red tongues and white-painted teeth. They shook their heads before charging at the barricades in a show of ferocity. The younger spectators squealed in delight.