Kimchi & Calamari (4 page)

“S
top right there. Clarinets, start earlier—after the refrain,” Mrs. Athena, our pint-sized band director, called from behind the podium. She lifted her mug toward the woodwind section in between sips of coffee.

We were warming up with “You're a Grand Old Flag.” Mrs. Athena liked this tune a lot, I could tell. It's a peppy piece with cymbals crashing and trumpets blasting, but this morning it sounded sluggish, like funeral music.

“Where's that Uncle Sam spirit?” she asked. “Imagine it's the Fourth of July and you're marching down Main
Street, with thousands of patriotic folks cheering and waving little flags.”

This time the clarinets came in a half note too late. And then all three bassoonists gave a not-me face when Mrs. Athena asked whose instrument was blowing like a moose with indigestion.

“I wish they'd get their woodwind act together,” I whispered to Steve, who was slumped over the xylophone.

“No. No. No. The tempo is way off. Back to the first measure!” Mrs. Athena called, directing her words to the clarinets.

A collective groan came from the brass section and the percussion gang.

Steve tapped my head with the xylophone mallet. “I say we kidnap the woodwinds, tie them up with violin string, and hold them hostage in the custodian closet until school gets out.”

“And make them listen to recordings of their own music,” I added, grinning. People misjudge clarinet players as the true band kids because they're always walking around swinging their cases, but my ears have suffered the truth: most of them don't know a full note from a Post-it note.

We started over again. It still sounded bad. And again. Now it was badder than bad.

“Time out for an instrument check,” Mrs. Athena announced, and she began walking from chair to chair, examining each clarinet like a laboratory specimen. I glanced over at the trumpets. Nash stared back and directed a thumbs-down at the clarinets.

“Here, Joseph,” Jeff Henry whispered from the snare drum. “I saved some candy for you.” He had a Three Musketeers bar tucked discreetly by his side, but Steve saw it too.

Steve tuned in when he heard “candy.” “Got some for me?” he asked, almost drooling. Steve begs like a dog until he gets a piece of whatever you're eating. He actually looks like a Saint Bernard, with his square head and droopy eyes. A Saint Bernard with braces, that is.

I pulled my piece apart and handed half to him on the sly. Mrs. Athena was still looking at clarinets, and I didn't want to get caught breaking the No Food rule. I glanced over at the flutes.

“Pssst. Joseph.”

Robyn was whispering loudly from the flute section. She put her flute between her knees, grabbed her eyelids with her fingertips, and popped them inside out so she looked like Tweetie Bird. Her lashes were sticking straight up, and I could see the whites of her eyeballs.

Nothing unusual. Robyn and I always do juvenile
stuff to shock each other.

She was waiting for my comeback, so I stuck my drumsticks in my ears and started rocking back and forth while I crossed my eyes and stuck out my tongue. Robyn giggled, then covered her mouth to prevent a full-blown laugh attack.

“Aha, as I suspected, a cracked reed,” Mrs. Athena said to a sixth grader. She helped replace it, and we picked up where we left off. Surprise, surprise, we sounded cheery. And patriotic. And in sync. I could see the flags waving now.

“Finally!” Mrs. Athena called, jumping pogo stick–style. “Let's celebrate with a trip to the Caribbean.”

“Jamaican Farewell,” my favorite. Just tapping to that calypso beat works like a natural antidepressant for me. This sounds crazy, but it's true: I was born in Korea and my family is Italian, but I've got the soul of a reggae drummer.

Nash once told me I get this faraway look in my eyes when we play “Jamaican Farewell.” He said my shoulders move up and down to the beat, like I'm sitting on top of a mountain playing bongos for the gods.

He's right. When my drumsticks are tapping, I'm gone to Planet Harmony. Nothing else matters. Not Kelly, not my essay, nothing. It felt that way from the first time
I played rudiments in fourth grade. Drumming must be in my blood. Maybe my birth father is a drummer in Pusan.

“Hey, Joseph, check out the new kid,” Steve said. He pointed a mallet toward the flute section.

Talk about being distracted. I hadn't even noticed the unfamiliar face only a few seats down from Robyn.

The new kid had thick black glasses. He was squinting as he read his music, and he was wearing a pink sport shirt. Pink, with a collar, on a regular school day. I kept looking over at him in between full measure rests.

He was Korean. I just knew it. There was something about how his bangs spiked up like teeny black porcupine quills. Like mine.

 

Round and round my sisters spun.

“They don't give refunds if you puke,” I whispered that afternoon to Sophie and Gina, who were squeezed next to each other in the same stylist chair. Their knees were pulled up to their chests, lollipops were sticking out of their mouths, and they were grinning like they were on a roller coaster.

As soon as Mom walked over, Sophie stuck her foot down and stopped moving.

“Hi, honey. Didn't see you come in. Are you busy?” Mom asked me.

Translation: Time for a walk, Towel Boy.

Before I could answer, she handed me a bag of dirty towels and some money. “Here, get yourself something at Randazzo's on the way. But don't forget the towels. There's thirty-five in there.”

“I need some amaretti, Mommy. They're my favorite cookies. Can I go with Joseph?” Sophie asked.

“Me too.
Pleeease?
” Gina added.

“You both had a snack already. Study for your spelling quiz.” Mom pointed at their backpacks and covered her ears as the twins wailed.

“Want some biscotti?” I called to Aunt Foxy at her station.

“I'd love some, but I better pass. Gotta get more fiber in my diet.”

Nothing is private in a hair salon: constipation, cheating boyfriends, bad grades. Nothing.

After Randazzo's, I headed toward the Jiffy Wash Laundry. I was expecting the usual thirty-second chitchat with Mrs. Faddegan. I'd forgotten that she'd sold the business until I pulled open the door and nearly plowed into the new kid from band.

“Hey!” I said, surprised and a little embarrassed.

“Hey back,” he said with a laugh. He was holding a soda and a deck of cards.

He was at least two inches shorter than me and had a narrow face. But we both had the same nose: wide and smooth with a flat bridge. Koreans are a bridgeless bunch, which causes problems when you try to impress a girl. One minute you're talking, and the next you look down and your sunglasses fall off.

“I'm Joseph,” I said. “Joseph Calderaro. I saw you in band. I play drums.”

“I'm Yongsu Han. Mrs. Athena told me about you.”

“Don't believe everything she says. She just wants to keep me from joining chorus.”

He laughed. “Today was my first day. I'm in eighth grade. You?”

“Today was my hundred and fifty-ninth day of school, and you can bet I'm still counting,” I replied. “I'm in eighth grade too.”

I dropped the sack of towels on the counter, noticing the bag had a slight rip in the bottom.

“Uhmma!”
he called into the back room. Or something like that. No
Uhmma
came, though the mail carrier walked in and handed the new kid a stack of letters.

“You're Korean, too?” Yongsu asked.

“Sort of,” I said.

He pushed his glasses back on his nose. The way a geek would right before the bully pops him.

A woman walked out from the back room. Korean, of course, so I figured
Uhmma
meant “Mom.” Suddenly I felt out of place. Like how a Vulcan would feel at a Romulan festival in an old
Star Trek
episode. The Hans were
real
Koreans.

The new kid's mom held an armful of tangled wire hangers, which she threw in a plastic bin beside the cash register.

Then she spun around and noticed me. She lifted her eyebrows slightly, like she was suspicious, and grinned, showing big teeth. Not exactly buckteeth, like Mom says mine would be if she and Dad hadn't dropped three grand on my braces, but big like horse teeth, with a lot of gum.

“Ahn nyong ha seh yo?”
she said.

Both Yongsu and his mother stared at me.

I shrugged. “I don't know any Korean.”

The new kid said something in Korean, and his mom nodded. She started pulling wet towels out of the sack and counting them.

“There's thirty-five,” I said, remembering what Mom said.

But she counted anyway. So much for trust among Koreans.

“What's your family name?” Her accent sounded
much thicker than Yongsu's.

“Calderaro,” I said, speaking slowly. Up went her suspicious eyebrows. “The towels are from my mom's shop. She's a hairdresser.”

“You're missing one towel.”

I felt like she was accusing me.

“Maybe it fell.” I pointed to the floor on her side of the counter. She bent over and picked up a towel.

“Your mom Korean?” she asked as she reached for an order slip. Her eyes sparkled as she spoke, a little like Gina's when she's got a secret.

“No, she's Italian. My dad, too. But I'm Korean, which you probably figured out,” I said as my mouth started running away from my face.

Mrs. Han didn't understand.

“I'm adopted,” I explained.

Mrs. Han stared at me with icy eyes, but didn't say a word. It was as if she'd taken out a name tag, scribbled “fake Korean” on it, and stuck it to my T-shirt.

Then she muttered something quickly in Korean to her son. He picked up the towels and carried them to the back room. A bell jingled as another customer walked in.

“Phone number?” Mrs. Han asked, and I rattled off the number for Shear Impressions. She tore the yellow customer's copy from the order slip and handed it to me.

Mrs. Faddegan never used slips. She just billed Mom and Aunt Foxy once a month.

Mrs. Han quickly turned her attention to a man who'd just dropped a bunch of shirts on the counter.

No good-bye, no thank you from Uhmma.

I pushed hard on the door to get the heck outta there.

“Joseph, wait!”

“Whaddaya want?” I snapped with as much Jersey attitude as I could muster. The Hans could go back to doing laundry in Flushing, if that was even what they did there. Or better yet, Korea.

“You like to play war or poker?” The new kid was still holding the deck of cards.

The thought of playing cards in this sticky place was about as appealing as the stomach flu on Christmas morning.

“It's too hot in here.” I kept on walking.

He followed me outside. “We'll play behind the store. You like soda? We've got cans in the fridge, in the back room. Ginger ale, orange, root beer, whatever you like.”

I was about to say no again. Why should I spend time with this guy? But then again, my other options weren't so great: either walking the two miles home to get going on my social studies essay or hanging around Shear
Impressions for a couple of hours and listening to the hairdressers' gossip, since I knew Mom had back-to-back appointments until seven.

And root beer
was
my favorite.

“Okay,” I said. “What's your name again?”

He smiled. “Yongsu Han.”

 

The back of the building had two tiny windows that reminded me of portholes on a submarine. One was blocked by an air conditioner. The other had a ripped screen. Yongsu and I started playing war on the rusted metal picnic table, on a patch of brown grass beside the parking lot. I took a long swig of root beer. I'd never heard of this brand, but it sure was cold and bubbly.

I looked up and saw Mrs. Han staring from one of the windows. I could tell she was scowling. She wasn't discreet, the way Mom is when she peeks through the dining room curtain at our neighbor whose boyfriend drives a Harley and wears leather everything.

Obviously Mrs. Han thought I was a cheap Korean imitation, maybe even a troublemaker who needed watching. It hurt my ego, because most of my friends' parents make a big fuss over me, like I'm this funny, well-balanced influence on their kids. I thought about asking
Yongsu what was up with his mom, but he seemed so thrilled to have me around that I couldn't do it.

“Let's switch to blackjack,” I said. “I'll deal.”

I shuffled the deck while he got up and threw his soda can in the Dumpster. A breeze blew, and I smelled hamburgers from the diner across the street. My stomach growled.

“Hit me,” Yongsu said after I dealt his top card. I gave him another card. He had a ten of diamonds on top of a nine of clubs showing.

“I'm over.” He flipped his bottom card. Six of spades. The wind stirred and sent the card flying off the table. He bent down to grab it just as a white hatchback pulled up.

Yongsu ran over, and a Korean man got out of the car. Yongsu bowed, and the man nodded back. Must be his dad, I figured. They talked, and the man looked over and waved to me.

Clearly Yongsu inherited his friendly gene from his paternal side.

They walked to the rear entrance. Then Yongsu ran back and began shuffling the cards.

“Was that your
Uhppa
?” I said, remembering how he'd called his mom
Uhmma
.

“Apa,”
he corrected. “You say
‘Apoji'
when you're older.”

“So you speak perfect Korean?”

“I lived in Korea till I was seven. You know any Koreans here?”

“Not really.” Of course, I always notice other Asian kids. But in my school, if they're not in your classes, your neighborhood, or your after-school activities, they might as well live in Antarctica.