Radiant (24 page)

Mary looked down at her solit
ary frock. "Well, Phos likes it—I mean Carter!" She quietly scolded herself for letting his name slip. "Carter likes it."

But Mom said,
"You've called him that before. Nick name or something?"

"Uh,
yeah," Mary said. "An inside physics joke."

"I see," Mom said. "You know, I could probably try and hide that scar with
concealer and foundation. Some eye shadow and lip gloss wouldn't hurt you either."

"Do I have to?" Mary asked.

Mom chuckled. "Come on. It'll be painless."

Mary
sat on the counter while Mom applied the makeup. "You really like him, don't you?" Mom asked.

"Yeah," Mary said. "I like him a lot
. But you don't."

"
Well, I don't want him to give my eulogy," Mom said.

Mary rolled her eyes. "More morbid humor?"

"I am what I am," Mom said. "Anyway, he hasn't done anything I don't approve of. Has he?"

Not c
ounting the possessing Carter part? Mary answered, "No."

"Then I don't have anything against him," Mom said.

Mary smiled. "I'm glad to hear you say that."

Mom smiled as well. "There. One cleverly hidden scar, if I say so myself."

Mary turned and looked in the mirror. The line near her collarbone was almost invisible. "That's awesome! How come we never thought to do this before?"

"You
used to not wear that dress," Mom said. "Turn around again so I can do your eyes. Then we need to go get Ba."

When they were ready, they grabbed a cab and headed to Agape. A nu
rse had Ba dressed and ready in the lobby. However, Ba seemed rather quiet. Mary hadn't seen her regularly for a while. In fact, she had seen less of Ba ever since she started spending time with Phos.

"Ba?" Mary asked. "Are you all right?"

"Oh yes. I'm fine," she said with a smile. But the smile faded as she looked away.

"She's been like that for the past couple days," the nurse said. "But she's had her medication on time as usual, so she should be good to go."

"We'll have her back no later than nine o'clock," Mom said. "Thanks for getting her ready."

The three of them
climbed into the cab and headed for the Maxwells' house. It was in a nice gated community. There was a guardhouse with an actual guard, and they had to tell him their names and why they were there before he would let them through. They drove through the winding neighborhood. The houses were huge and pretty, with great lawns. Mary had only seen houses like these on TV and in magazines.

The cab dropped them off in front of
a house with a tall roof and brown stonewalls. The black Aston sat underneath a stone archway between a silver Porsche and an odd-looking SUV that said "Range Rover" across the front of it.

When they rang the doorbell,
Mr. Romero answered. "Welcome!" The last time Mary had seen him was at the hospital. He was almost unrecognizable now that he was all smiles and cheer. "Come in, come in!"

He showed them through the
richly decorated house to the living room, where over a dozen people were talking and laughing. Mary saw Bruce, along with a few other adults she didn't recognize. George, Emma, and Julia from Agape were also there, having been brought by a grandchild or other relative. And Mary saw some kids from school.

"Mary!" Sienna
greeted as she and David made their way over to her.

"Hey guys," Mary said. "I didn't
know you were going to be here."

"We almost didn't come," David said. "But Sienna wanted to see the inside of Carter's house."

"Can you
believe
this place?" Sienna said. "There's a pool table upstairs and a game room with the biggest TV I've ever seen. And they have a pool and a half basketball court in the back!"

Mary
introduced Sienna and David to Mom and Ba. They chatted for about a minute before she felt a warmer than warm hand grasp hers.

"Good evening," Phos said. "Enjoying yourselves?"

"Better now," Mary said with a smile.

He turned to Sienna and David. "My apologies, but may
I steal Mary and her family away for a moment? I'd like them to meet my parents."

Phos took them
into a sitting room that had brilliant pieces of abstract art hanging on the walls. Ben was there, talking to a tall gentleman with graying hair and a slender woman with broad shoulders.

"Dad? Eva? This is Mary and her mother and grandmother
," Phos said.

Mr. Maxwell smiled. "A
pleasure to finally meet you, Mary. I can see now why Carter enjoys your company so much."

Mary blushed as she shook his hand.

Ben turned to shake Mom's hand. "It's great to finally meet you, Ms. Phan. Your daughter and grandmother come to my shop a lot."

The smile on Mom's face faltered for a moment. "You're Ben? From the art store?"

Mary was glad that Mom was finally meeting Ben. Maybe now she wouldn't think he was crazy or anything.

"I absolutely love his work," Carter's stepmom said. "Carter told us about the art show and the phoenix sculpture, and I thought such a p
iece would be wonderful to have."

"But he said it wasn't for sale
," Mr. Maxwell chuckled.

Ben smiled. "I'm afraid not.
That one has some personal significance."

"But you
could make more like it, can't you?" Carter's dad asked.

"Of course," Ben said.

"My company's opening offices in Dubai," Mr. Maxwell said. "What do you think about making a series of sculptures for them?"

Ben's eyes went as wide as saucers. "Seriously?"

Carter's dad laughed. "I'm always serious when it comes to money. But what am I doing? I'm sorry, Carter. I promised not to talk business tonight, didn't I?"

Phos laughed. "I think this is a good exception. Will you do it, Ben? I think it would be great
for others to see your work."

Ben looked back and forth between
Phos and Carter's dad. "Well, I…don't know."

"Why don't you think about it?"
Mr. Maxwell reached into his suit jacket and took out a crisp white business card. "And let me know what you decide."

"I will," Ben said as he took the card. "Thank you."

"Hey everyone." Raj poked his head into the room, smiling his Hollywood smile. "Food's hot and ready, so come get it!"

They followed him out back with the other guests, where an elegant buffet table stood
on the stone patio heaped with food from Spice. Everyone filled their plates and sat down at a beautifully dressed long table, with the adults gathering to one side and the kids gravitating to the other.

"I was a real troublemaker in
Korea," George said. Since it was a nice occasion, he had his teeth in. They looked really odd on him.

Julia rolled her eyes. "Here we go."

He ignored her and continued, "Got nearly court marshaled once for damaging gov'ment property."

"What did you do?" Mrs. Maxwell asked.

"Din' ya hear, woman?" he snapped. "I said I damaged gov'ment property! And people say
I'm
losin' my hearin'."

George's granddaughter, who had brought him, took his hand. "It's all right, gramps. You don't have
to yell."

"He was on leave," Emma chuckled. "And he got sunburned."

"
Damaged gov'ment property!
" George cried.

At the other end of the table, Sienna shoveled a spoonful of curry into her mouth.
"This is
so
good!"

Gita, Raj's younger si
ster, beamed. "I'm glad. It's a family recipe."

Raj looked at David. "
You okay, bro?"

David, red from ear to ear, gulped down a glassful of ice water. "It's a little hot for me," he wheezed.

"We brought milder stuff," Raj said.

"Yeah," Gita said.
"Did you try the yellow curry? That's pretty mild."

"That
was
the yellow curry," Sienna explained as her boyfriend took her cup of water and ate the ice from it.

Mary
looked over at Ba. She sat with her friends from Agape as they chatted. Normally, Ba interacted with them, but she just sat there looking off into the distance.

Mary went to sit next to her. "Ba?"

Ba looked at her. "Oh, hi Mary. Are you having fun?"

Mary nodded. "How about you? Did you get enough to eat?" She noticed that Ba's plate was
hardly touched.

"I did," she said. "I had a late snack this afternoon, so I'm not very hungry." Her eyes wondered off again, this time towards the pool.

"Carter's parents have a pretty neat place, huh?" Mary asked.

Ba looked at her again. "Oh yes. Very nice." She looked away again.

Mary stared at her for a moment. Then she took her hand. "Hey, Ba? We haven't gone shopping in a while. You wanna go tomorrow when I'm off from school?"

Ba's eyes met hers again. This time, her face lit up. "That would be wonderful!
We can look for more dresses for you, since you're starting to wear them more."

Mary smiled. "Sounds good."

"Excuse me," Phos said as he came over to them. "I'm so sorry to intrude, Mrs. Phan. But can Mary come with me for a minute? I won't keep her long."

"Of course," Ba said. "Go on. Have some fun."

Phos took Mary's hand. "Come on. I want to show you something."

She
walked with him into the house and up the stairs to Carter's bedroom. It was larger than Mary's living room and had a massive bathroom to the side. Posters of famous basketball players adorned the walls.

Phos opened the window.

"What are you doing?" Mary asked.

"In case
someone comes looking for us," he said. Then he took her in his arms and translated.

At that
instant, they were in the middle of the roof. It wasn't as easy to walk around like the apartment's flat roof, so Phos helped her up one of the pitches. They made sure that no one below could see them.

"Okay," she laughed. "
Now what?"

He smiled and gestured behind her. "
Look."

She turned. "Oh. Wow.
"

The Maxwell
s' house was situated on a large hill, and from the roof, Mary could see the city lights sprawled below. It looked like Christmas scattered on the ground. She could see the bridges and make out the buildings of downtown.

"It's like Paris," she
breathed. "I've lived here all my life and never knew it looked like this. It's beautiful."

"You don't
have to go far to be in an amazing place." Phos turned to her. "Mary, there was also something I wanted to tell you. Without anyone else hearing."

"What is it?"
she asked.

"Do you remember when you asked me if I
had experienced love?"

She nodded. "You said it didn't make sense to you."

"Yes. But I think I understand it now." He looked out at the city lights. "I believe it's not an emotion. It's so much more than simply showing affection. It also seems to require a lot of suffering."

Mary's hand went to her scar unconsciously
. "I can see that. But it's suffering for the sake of others."

He nodded.
"That's what I didn't understand before. Love is antithetical to human nature. Humans seek their own good. Their own survival. Their own glorification. But love seeks the good of the other, even to the detriment of the self. Even to the detriment of others." He turned to face Mary. "It's why I saved you that day. Even before taking over Carter's body and having his emotions. Maybe it's because I have watched you for so long. I don't know. But somehow, some way, I had fallen in love with y—"

Mary
kissed him, not letting him finish. He took her face in his warm hands and kissed her back. And again. And again, not letting her go after their three-second rule. Mary felt her mouth burning, but she didn't care.

It was
the voices just below them that finally made them stop. Quietly, they tiptoed to the edge of the roof and looked over to see Mom and Carter's parents talking away from the others.

"
When Marcos and Linda called us about that accident, we chartered the first plane straight out of Dubai," Mrs. Maxwell said. "We were wrecks the entire flight home."

"I can imagine," Mom said.

"But we were ecstatic when we landed and found Carter sitting up in bed and able to talk," Mr. Maxwell said. "I knew it would take some time for him to recover, so I actually cancelled my travel appointments for a month. But talk about a lightning quick recovery! I've never been one to believe in miracles. But I've changed my mind."