Read Hello Kitty Must Die Online

Authors: Angela S. Choi

Hello Kitty Must Die (6 page)

BOOK: Hello Kitty Must Die
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SO WHAT HAPPENED TO
you after St. Sebastian’s?” I asked him after we parked.

Sean began pulling out a shotgun. Clay pigeon shooting over Lake Merritt. This early in the morning, I should have guessed. Sean had been an excellent marksman with his slingshot when he was a kid. He took out a rat’s eye once at his house with a single shot.

“Well, juvie for one. Lucky for me Stephanie didn’t die, so they let me out when I turned eighteen. Changed my name. Fast tracked college and medical school in Puerto Rico. Surgery residency. Blah, blah. Here I am.”

“Holy crap. I am in the presence of greatness.”

“Thank you, thank you. And you became a liayer?” Sean smiled as we walked toward the lake.

“Please. No lawyer jokes. I’ve heard them all. But yes, college, law school, then husband hunting.”

“Well, your father will have that covered for you. No worries.”

“God. I’ve been trying to tell him for ages that I don’t date Asian guys.”

“Why not? Penises too small? It’s not like you’re a sex maniac. Hell, I doubt you even have a libido.”

“What? Why would you say that?”

“If you had a raging libido, your first time wouldn’t have been with a dildo dipped in Lidocaine at the fine age of twenty-eight. You would be out dressed like a slut in some bar, trying to catch yourself a man. Any man. If you were a lesbian, you’d be doing the same thing, but in a lesbian bar. But instead, you are spending the day with yours truly, bitching about your arranged date tomorrow night.”

Sean hit the nail on the head. He had a special talent for that sort of thing.

IN THE SEVENTH GRADE
, Sean and I decided to dress up as Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence for Halloween. That year, the Sisters had angered the Catholic Church with some raucous public paddling. The Church got mad because the Sisters had been enjoying it.

The nuns at St. Sebastian’s denounced the Sisters as handmaidens of the Devil himself. Abominations against God. They were here with the sole purpose of hurting Jesus.

So Sean got us two nun outfits and some cheap makeup from Walgreens. He took one look at me and said, “Christ, Fi. You look like a real nun. Sister Maria’s going to love you.”

Of course, he was right.

When Sister Maria saw me, she said, “How adorable! Fiona wants to be a nun. Isn’t she sweet? You’ve made Jesus very happy. But not that much eyeshadow, dear.”

I didn’t realize then that I was Hello Kitty in a habit. Being yellow and having a vagina meant I couldn’t pull off the Sister of Perpetual Indulgence outfit. Being Hello Kitty sucked.

When Sister Maria saw Sean, she called his mother and sent him home.

White boys had all the fun.

AND SEAN WAS RIGHT
again now.

Even though I never told Sean about Grandmother or Eddie Martin. Or about Uncle Yuen.

When I was seven, my parents dragged me on a fourteen hour flight back to China to visit some of my cousins. At their house, boys were allowed first dibs on all dishes at mealtimes. Girls had to wait until they took all the chicken drumsticks, wings, all the good parts. So of course, I grabbed my fork (because my Chinese cousins assumed I didn’t know how to use chopsticks, being American and all) and nabbed a prime piece of chicken in protest.

I got sent out to the open yard for my audacity even though it was raining. That’s what happens when Hello Kitty refuses to play according to the rules. She gets sent out in the rain. Blackballed, ostracized, shunned, punished.

Uncle Yuen paid me a visit out there. He was what people called a funny uncle. Not because he was full of laughs, but because he tried to tickle me in all the bad places. Alone, out in the rain, vulnerable. Hello Kitty was a sitting target until a flock of roosting pigeons suddenly took off from the roof and distracted him.

I had left the lunch table so suddenly that I didn’t realize I had taken my fork with me. I stabbed his hand with it. His tickling days were over.

That’s why I love birds. I really owed them one.


I THINK YOU MIGHT BE
onto something, Sean. I don’t like touching people. The feel of another’s bone and flesh reminds me too much of my own mortality. Creepy.” And of my funny uncle in China.

“Yeah, that might be an issue with dating someone, Fi.”

“No shit. I’m a loner. Doomed forever to wander the moors alone.”

“Not necessarily. You could marry this Asian boy.”

“I told you, Sean. I don’t date Asian guys.”

“Oh yeah, why?”

“Two reasons. One called Theo. The other, Keith.” I kept the other reasons to myself.

Sean waved to a man in a thick blue jacket, who looked up as we walked over. He had been loading the traps with clay pigeons. Seeing us, he straightened up and held out his hand. “Nice to see you again, Sean.”

Sean shook his hand. “Max, this is my friend, Fiona. We’re going to do a little shooting today. Over there.”

“Nice to meet you, Fiona. Okay. Let me know when you guys are ready.”

We wandered a little ways further and stopped as Sean loaded his shotgun. “PULL!” He bellowed.

A clay pigeon shot into the air.

Sean aimed and fired. Crack.

The orange target shattered.

“Nice, Sean.”

“Thank you. So, what are you waiting for, Fi? Dish. I know you’re dying to. Theo. Keith.”

Even when we were in the sixth grade, I always had the sneaking suspicion that Sean could read minds. Although his uncanny ability had impressed me, it had also frightened me. It was like having Counselor Deanna Troi for a best friend.

“Theo. High school boyfriend for a week. Korean guy.”

“Boyfriend for a week? Wow, a long, serious relationship, I see. Your dad must have been thrilled.”

“My dad didn’t know. Anyway, Theo’s parents were both doctors. Well-educated. Wealthy, but country bumpkins at heart. Lived up in a four-story house near where Robin Williams used to live in the Pacific Heights. His father regularly beat his mother to a pulp, causing the neighbors to call the police. He thought wife-beating was his birthright because he had a yellow penis.”

“I hope you convinced him otherwise.”

“Nah, left that to some other lucky woman. Hence, a week.”

“I see, and Keith?”

“Oh no. I’m not done with Theo. He also had this thing where his little toe kept falling off.”

Sean snorted. “PULL!”

Crack.

“His little toe kept falling off?”

“That’s what he told me. Said he had to keep going to the hospital to get it re-attached.”

“Did you ever see this, Fi?”

“No, why would I want to?”

“Then please tell me you didn’t buy his bullcrap.”

“Nah, I’d figured that he was fibbing. Sounded too incredible.”

“Yeah, I’ll say.”

“He also had a mentally ill grandmother who regularly ate her own shit.”

Sean lowered his shotgun and stared at me.

“Did you just say that she ate her own shit?”

“Yup, and not only that, she believed that her fecal matter was so nutritious she slipped some into the family dinner when they weren’t looking. They had to lock her in her room while they cooked. Not joking.”

Sean stared at me with wide eyes. I noticed how very beautiful they were.

“Christ, Fi. Tell me you never ate dinner at his house.”

“What are you, crazy? Meatloaf with a taste of grandma for dinner and watch his dad beat his mother for entertainment afterwards? No thank you.”

“When you put it that way, makes me think you missed out on some serious family entertainment at his house.”

“God, thanks to Theo, I didn’t date another Asian guy until Keith last year.”

“Ah, Keith. Please tell me he didn’t eat his own shit.”

“No, worse. He ate his cats’ crap.”

“Fi, you’ve got to be kidding me. You are one weirdo magnet. Where did you meet this guy?”

“Tell me about it. Keith. Chinese. Met him in salsa class. By the way, worst music in the world. Does nothing but give me migraines.”

“Me too. I’d rather bang my head on some cymbals. But wait, your dad let you go salsa dancing?”

“Of course, guys all around.”

“Got it. Go on.”

“Keith fancied himself an architect. Ninety-nine percent ego, one percent questionable talent.”

Sean laughed. “Harsh, aren’t you?”

“But true. Thought he was the next Le Corbusier. My ass. Everything Keith designed looked like a matchbox that would roast people in the summer and freeze them in the winter. But what he lacked in talent and ability, he made up for in ego.”

“That’s it? You know, Fi, score on the loser scale is usually inversely proportional to penis size.”

I threw my head back and laughed loudly. God bless Sean.

“You might be right. Keith was a major loser. He believed he was special because he thought of himself as a hippie. Because he was not ‘mainstream.’ What a retard.”

“Awww, gross, Fi. I hate hippies. Nothing special about surviving on rabbit food and not showering. Doesn’t make you special, just stupid and disgusting.”

“Oh my God, no shit. He had to eat all organic food. We’re not just talking tomatoes here. From bread to cookies to rice to the onions he put into his stir fry. And you know what I noticed? If organic food is so damn good for you, why did all the people who shop at those organic markets look so bad? They all looked wrinkled and dirty. My God, the chemicals must be doing something good for us.”

“Hippies. What did you expect? Well, at least he cooked.”

“I wished he didn’t. He was such a loser. He got fired from a proper architectural firm because he couldn’t play well enough with others. So he decided to start his own firm in the back room of his apartment. He didn’t make enough money to feed himself properly because he insisted on eating organic everything. So he starved half the time and wanted me to do the same. That and every time he made dinner, we both got diarrhea. And I finally found out why. He was a big believer in composting...”

“PULL!”

Crack.

I watched as the shattered pieces fell into the lake.

“Oh no, I’m not sure that I want to hear the rest of this story.”

“Too bad. I’ve already started. Composting. Good idea in theory, not in practice. It just stinks and you have to be really careful or you’ll just contaminate your food and poison yourself. Well, you’ll never believe where he kept his compost heap.”

“Where?”

“In the bottom shelf of his fridge, next to uncovered food.”

“Aw, Gawd. Disgusting. No wonder you guys had the shits. How long were you with this loser?”

“I’m so embarrassed. Four months, four months too long.”

“Four months and you didn’t sleep with him?”

“Nope.”

“See? No libido.”

“Whatever. I wasted enough life on him.”

“Why? Because you liked him or because you were hoping to land a husband to please your dad?”

“Honestly, I have no idea. I wanted to shove cat shit into his mouth every time he said ‘organic.’”

“What did your dad think of Keith?”

“Nothing. I didn’t tell him anything.”

“Let me guess, lots of all-nighters at the office?”

I laughed. Sean was sharp as ever.

“So you said Frank Gehry wannabe ate cat shit?”

BOOK: Hello Kitty Must Die
4.38Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads

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