Face Time (28 page)

“Unless you don’t want to talk via FaceTime anymore? I kind of thought we were together, no? Am I not understanding this?”

He stares at me blankly, and my insides grow cold. “I.. I… uh,” Lee stutters, looking down and blinking his eyes.

“Shit, Lee. What the hell happened between now and like two hours ago when you told me you loved me?” I sit up on the bed, angry at him and myself.
 
How could I have read this wrong? “Um, I should keep packing. You’re only here for another day or two, right? I need to be out by Monday. My mom said she’d sell the place this summer but I want to be gone by the time she comes back.” I throw the covers off and get up.

“Wait, Laura. Stop.” He lunges forward and grabs my arm. “How much Korean do you really know?”

A puff of frustration exits my lungs as I try to pull away from his grip. “Lee, for fuck’s sake, I know the barest minimum.”

Laughing, he releases my arm and comes around the bed to me. “No wonder. You’re coming to live with me, Laura. Don’t even think about moving to New Orleans or I’ll be crushed.”

“What? This is the first I’m hearing of this.”

“Because I’m dumb and said it in Korean. My brain is truly bilingual, Laura. You asked me to speak to you in Korean, but I remember it in English.” He sighs and takes my face in his hands. “You understood the ‘I love you’ and didn’t hear all the other things I said before that. I want you to live with me. Travel the world with me. Let’s make a life together and see where it takes us.”

“Lee, are you sure?” My voice is unsteady, and my brain is disbelieving. This is the first time a man has ever been so forward and forthright about what he wanted from me. Even Rene never got this far.

“I’m positive. Let’s spend time together, lots of time. Together. Not separated by seven thousand miles and two devices we use to talk to each other. That’s frustrating on so many levels. I don’t want to do that again.”

I throw my arms around his neck and hug him tight to me. “I’d love that, Lee. Love it. It’s been ages since I traveled, and I want to get on a plane and just be gone. With you. I even renewed my passport last year in the hopes I could travel again.” I pull back away from him. “There’s only one problem. I don’t have a ton of money in the bank. I may have enough to last me a little while, but I won’t be able to afford all the extras.”

He smirks at me. “How much money do you have?”

“Thirty-six thousand dollars? Like I said, it’s a lot but then not really if I’m going to be traveling with you.”

“Sit down, Laura.” He points to the end of the bed, and he sits next to me. “Baby, I have…” He thinks for a moment. “I have more than ten times what you have in the bank, in savings, and that doesn’t count what I have in stocks, bonds…” He waves his hand in a circle and rolls his eyes. Shit. I have landed myself a wealthy boyfriend, and I didn’t know it. “I want you to keep your money unless you really need to spend it. You have no idea how well my firm pays me.”

“No, I don’t think I do, Lee. Did you pay off your student loans?”

He nods at me, and I pull back, inhaling sharply. Berkeley law school was not cheap. “That’s amazing, Lee, but I would feel weird about taking your money. I’m an independent woman. All of that sugar daddy talk was just for fun.”

Lee takes both of my hands in his. “Please don’t feel weird about it, Laura. There’s nothing I would rather spend my money on than having you with me.” He is literally begging me, and I have a moment where I think about my mother. She never worked a day in her life. She was a housewife and spent my father’s money, and now she’s met a new husband and will spend his money too. I can’t be like her the rest of my life.

“Okay, Lee. On one condition.”

“What is it, Laura? Give it to me straight.” His mouth twists, and I want to slap him for being all sarcastic when I want to be serious.

“That I get a job in Seoul. I can travel with you eighty percent of the time, but I need to do my own thing.”

He smiles. “Sure. I’ll help you out as best I can. Get a job teaching English. Or become a private personal trainer. Or get your certificate in yoga instruction. I can think of a million things you could do…” His voice wanders off and he smiles again. “I just had the best idea, but it’ll have to wait.”

“What?” I ask, intrigued by his sudden change.

“Nope. It’ll be a surprise.” He stands and pulls me up. “Now, let’s shower and go out to dinner.”

“Shower together?” I ask, hopefully. I step towards him and pull on his shirt playfully.

“Mmmm. You’re full of good ideas today, Laura.”

I’m determined to take advantage of every opportunity for sex with Laura while we can, so sex in the shower is a definite winner. Soon, I’ll be off to Japan and working long hours again, and, even though, she’ll be with me, I don’t know how much private time we’ll have. While Laura is blow drying her hair in the bathroom, I put on my boxers and open her refrigerator for a drink. Near the back, I find a neglected can of Coke which is what I need right now — sugar and caffeine. Laura has worn me out, in a good way, but I could use a whole night of sleep. The jet lag is going to kick in by the time we’re done with dinner.

I’m standing in the kitchen chugging down the Coke when the tinkling metallic sound of keys rattling in the doorway echoes in the hallway. Who is this? The top lock clicks, the door opens, and Laura’s mother walks in with a rolling suitcase behind her.

“Laura?” she calls out and then stops, her eyes wide. “Who are you?”

“Lee Park. We’ve met. On FaceTime. I’m dating your daughter.” I can only imagine what she thinks of me half-naked in her kitchen, but she’s not supposed to be here.

“What are you doing here?” She crosses her arms over her chest and narrows her eyes at me.

“I came to be with Laura. She said you didn’t invite her to your wedding.” I jab the sword of truth in to her heart, but she doesn’t even flinch.

“I didn’t, and there was no wedding. Richard and I are done. He wanted me to sign a pre-nup.”

“He sounds like a smart man.” Her eyes widen, but I’m possessed with anger and not stopping. “You know, Laura gave up her life to come back and help you out when you needed her, and you haven’t been very grateful to her.”

“She hasn’t been a very grateful daughter with all the whoring around Asia she did and the
abortion
she got. It reflected poorly on me and her father.”

Wow, Laura wasn’t kidding about her mother. She dropped that bomb on me so readily, my head is spinning from the brashness of it all. On one hand, I’d like to tell her to fuck off, but that doesn’t make the best of impressions. My immediate back-up plan is not any better, but it will have to do.

The hair dryer isn’t blasting in the bathroom anymore, and Laura is standing in the doorway in her robe, all the color from her face absent.

“Well, if only Laura had a loving and caring mother to help her out when she needed it.” I walk towards Laura’s mother and take the keys from her hand. “Laura, which ones are for the apartment?” I hand them to Laura, and her mother turns around slowly, knowing she’s been caught by her daughter. Laura pulls the two apartment keys from the chain and hands them back to me.

“The apartment is ours till Monday. When you come back, Laura and I will be gone.” I hand the keys to her mother and gently turn her. She walks away easily, probably wanting to run from my scrutiny, and if she stays any longer, I’m going to let her have it. I have put more powerful people than her in their place.

“Laura, darling,” her mother starts, her voice saccharine, “where are you going?”

“She’s coming with me,” I interrupt. I selfishly don’t want Laura’s mother to know anything. She doesn’t care about Laura, but Laura holds out hope that her mother still cares about her. “I’ll have Laura send you a postcard.”

I open the door for her.

“Where should I go? This is technically my home, you know.”

“Go to Aunt Sally’s,” Laura says, her hand on her hip. “I’ll drop all the keys in the mailbox when I leave.”

Once her mother is in the hallway, I close the door on her displeased face and lock the deadbolt.

“Lee,” Laura whispers. “You didn’t have to do that.”

“I know.” I shrug my shoulders and smile at her, and she smiles back.

“It was super smooth. If I had tried it, she would have pulled some guilt trip like she always does.”

“Well, it’s a good thing I’m here then.”

She shakes her head in disbelief and laughs. “Let’s go out and celebrate. And you better put some clothes on or we’re not going anywhere.”

(>’o’)> ♥ <(‘o’<)

Dad, Laura, and I are watching a Mariner’s game at the park, drinking beer, and laughing. The crowd around us is talking and happy, enjoying a rare sunny and beautiful day in Seattle. A round of applause breaks out as a batter steps up to home plate, and the pitcher cranks back his arm.

“I’m glad we all got to do this together,” Laura says touching my father’s arm, and he smiles at her from under his dark blue baseball cap. “I’ve never been to a baseball game. Are you having fun Lee?” She leans over, her gaze directed down at seven-year-old me. I’m not drinking a beer. I have a soda in one hand and popcorn in the other. A few drops of rain land on me, little circles darkening my jeans, and when I look up, the sky has clouded over, thunder rumbling across the grass. I’m alone, in a downpour…

Bzzt. Bzzt. Bzzt.

Bzzt. Bzzt. Bzzt…

I open my eyes and take a moment to figure out where the hell I am. I’m not in Seoul, not in Mumbai. Laura’s warm body stirs next to me, and I sigh in relief. I’m in Laura’s bed in New York. We had a long and lovely dinner together, her friends Justin and Nicole showed up for drinks, and we talked until eleven when I was so tired I thought I would fall over and die. We came back to her place and passed out without even having sex. I regret that. I roll over and slip my hand over her body to rouse her, but my phone buzzes on the nightstand next to me.

That’s why I’m awake. I grab the phone, and my mother’s name is on the screen.

“Hi, Mom. Is everything okay?” I sit up quietly in bed, but Laura wakes and pushes herself up. My mother never calls me. Only my father calls, and she chimes in if she feels like it. Our relationship has always been like that.
“Oh, hi, Lee. Let me get your father…”

“Lee, son, I call with bad news.” Her voice is shaking. No. My mother’s voice doesn’t shake. “Dad died of a heart attack earlier today. There was nothing that could be done. He passed away in his car sitting at the golf club.”

“I’m sorry, what? Dad? No,” I whisper. I glance around Laura’s room, hoping this is all a dream. She must hear the urgency in my voice because she reaches over and flips on the light. The clock next to the bed reads 2:13am.

A crackling erupts over the line, and I pull the phone away so as not to deafen myself. I still don’t understand.
 

“Lee? Lee? It’s Jin. We need you to come back to Seattle. Can you get a flight home today?”

“I... Uhhhh…” I rub my face with my free hand and pinch the bridge of my nose. I may still be drunk. This may be a hallucination. “What? Dad’s not dead. He just retired.”

Jin sighs on the other end. “Lee,” he yells into the phone, and I jump startling Laura. “I’m sorry to have to call you like this. Dad loved you. He’d want you to be here for the funeral.”

“I’ll call you back.” I don’t even say goodbye. I just hang up, and I look at my phone again to make sure the call was real.

It was.

“Lee? What’s wrong?” Laura asks, slipping on a pair of glasses.

“My dad is dead?” My dad is not dead. I don’t believe it. I pick up the phone and call back. “Is this a joke? Because it’s not funny. Not at all.”

Jin sighs again. “No, Lee. He died in his car sometime during the day. He went to play a round of golf and was found some hours later when he never arrived. The doctors said it was quick. They’ll do an autopsy, but he’ll be released to us in two days for cremation.”

“Okay, okay. I’ll get on the first flight I can in the morning.”

“You sound like you were sleeping, Lee? Isn’t it the middle of the day in Seoul?”

“I’m not in Seoul. I’m in New York with my girlfriend. Dad didn’t tell you? I just talked to him.” Just made plans with him for the summer and told him I’d introduce him to Laura. This can’t be happening.

“No, he didn’t. We’ll see you tomorrow. Call me when you get in.”

“Okay.”
 

The phone call ends, and my life dissolves to a simulacrum of grainy black and white detachment.

“Thanks for the first class flight, Lee. That was nice. I’ve never flown first class before.” I look over at him driving the car from the airport and try not to cry.

“You’re welcome. I never fly anything but first class anymore. It’s the deal through work. If I’m going spend all my time traveling, they better make it easy on me. I booked us in a beautiful hotel downtown. You’ll love it.”
 

I try to smile at Lee but my lips only jerk upward for a second. Even though, his words are positive, he’s sad and distant. We had just made it through all my past drama, kicked my mother back out of the apartment, and he had met some of my friends before this happened. He doesn’t deserve this. He deserves peace and easiness. He deserved a stress-free week in New York. I wanted him to meet Theresa. I wanted to spend a few days with him, walking the city, eating out and talking, making love at every available opportunity. Why can’t we catch a break?

Lee’s shoulders are up around his neck and his eyes are red. We never went back to sleep after his brother called. He helped me pack the last of my things in my apartment, stack all the boxes by the wall in the living room, and then he showered while I packed my bag before our flight. I’m not sure if he slept on the plane. I fell asleep an hour after take-off with my hand in his, but when I woke up he was in the same position he was before, staring into space with a drink in his hand. We’ve both been through hell these last few days. I’ll try my best to ease some of his suffering.