The Bride Test (29 page)

He covered his face with the blanket. And breathed in her Esme scent. At first, he expected his nausea to worsen, but his muscles relaxed instead. Heaven, sweet heaven. If he shut his eyes, he could almost imagine she was here, wrapping her arms around him, and sleep dragged him to a place where he didn’t hurt anymore.

Thank fuck for the blanket. He was never washing it again.

K
hai woke at odd intervals throughout the night and the next day: 12:34
A.M
., 3:45
A.M
., 6:07
A.M
., 11:22
A.M
., and then 2:09
P.M
. That last time bothered him with its lack of logic, and he was scowling at his phone when Quan walked through the unlocked front door in jeans and an old black T-shirt.

Quan took in the shoes scattered on the ground, the opened windows, and Khai’s blanket-clad form on the couch and asked, “What’s going on? Did you burn a pizza in the oven or something? Why are you venting the place out?”

Khai sat up, but the blood rushed from his head from the sudden movement, and he slumped against the back of the couch. “The air felt funny.”

“You okay?”

He rubbed at his aching temples. “Shouldn’t you be in New York pitching for your B-round financing?”

Quan toed his shoes off and crossed the room to press a hand against Khai’s forehead. “I did the important stuff yesterday and rescheduled the rest. Was worried about you with the breakup and Andy’s death anniversary coming up.”

Khai pushed his brother’s hand away. “It’s just that flu that’s going around. Go back to New York. I’m
fine
.”

Shit,
death anniversary
. A cold sweat broke out over him, making his skin tingle as his heartbeat went erratic. He’d purposely blocked it from his mind because he hated those kinds of things, and this was the big one, the ten-year anniversary. There was going to be a ceremony, more monk chanting, and geysers of tears. His head throbbed on the verge of explosion.

“There
isn’t
a flu going around. It’s summertime.” Quan frowned and stuck his hand back on Khai’s forehead. “You don’t have a fever.”

“It’s in the pre-fever stages, then.” Khai mumbled the words because sound hurt now.

Quan sat down on the coffee table and searched his face like an astrologist reading the stars. When he shifted his position to get more comfortable, the water glass got in his way. He reached for it, but Khai stopped him.

“Don’t.”

Quan blinked and asked, “Why not?”

“I like it there.”

Quan stared at the water glass before fixing his eyes on Khai with a look of dawning understanding. “Holy shit, it’s
hers
, isn’t it? Do you know how cute that is?” Rubbing at his jaw, he added, “Also maybe a little emotionally unstable. You’re not being creepy, are you? Like stalking with binoculars and calling her at night to make sure she’s sleeping alone?”

“What? No.” But who the hell would she be sleeping with? If Quan meant another man, that was disturbing enough to warrant lengthy contemplation.

“Those weren’t suggestions,” Quan added. “Don’t do that.”

“I’m not being creepy,” Khai said in exasperation.

Quan nodded, and after a stilted moment, he dug his phone from his pocket and held it up like he was snapping a picture.

“What are you
doing
?” Khai asked.

“Sending a picture of your beard to Vy. You look kinda like Godfrey Gao right now.”

Khai rolled his eyes and scratched at his face. How long had it been since he’d shaved? He couldn’t remember. The past days were a mess of chaos in his mind.

“I’m not joking. Look at you,” Quan said, holding up his phone with the snapshot of Khai on it. As far as Khai was concerned, he looked less like a movie star and more like a drug addict, but what did he know?

Just then, message boxes from Vy flashed on the screen.

Oh momma.

Tell him to keep it.

Rawr.

Khai grimaced and rubbed at the back of his neck. “Not sure if I like my sister
rawr
ing at me.”

Quan laughed before his expression went serious. “Only Esme can, right?”

Khai thought that over for a few seconds before nodding once. Attraction, sex, lust, and wanting all orbited around one focal point for him. The focal point was Esme.

“I’ve been thinking about what you said at Michael’s wedding, about how you’re not in love, and I dunno. Maybe you’re not, but this ...” Quan motioned at the open windows, the cup collecting dust on the table, and Khai’s couch-ridden form before resting his elbows on his knees and leaning toward him. “This is you being sad, Khai.”

He frowned at his brother. What bullshit was this? “I’m not sad. I have the flu.”

Quan stretched his head from side to side until his neck audibly popped. “You know you’ve been like this before, right? It’s a predictable pattern with you.”

“Yes, I’ve had the flu before.”

“I’m talking about being heartbroken,” Quan said, his eyes delving into Khai’s in an uncomfortable way.

Khai’s body stiffened. “I’m not. I—”

“Do you remember when Mom and Dad separated when we were little?” Quan asked quietly.

“A little. They were together, and then one day they weren’t. It was fine.” He shrugged.

“Except you weren’t fine. You stopped talking, and you got so clumsy you had to stay home from school for two weeks.” An ironic smile touched Quan’s mouth. “I remember because there was no one to take care of you, so I had to stay home, too. I made us ramen in the microwave, and you were upset because there was no poached egg like when Mom cooks it.”

“I don’t remember any of that.” And what he did remember was neutral and colorless, flat. He’d been told to give his dad one last hug before he left town for good. He remembered hugging a person who used to be everything and feeling ... nothing.

“Maybe you were too young. How about ... after Andy’s funeral. Do you remember that?”

An irritated sensation scratched up Khai’s back, and he kicked his blanket off, suddenly needing to be free. He wanted to brush his teeth and shower, shut all the windows, and maybe put that cup in the dishwasher. Wait, no, he wasn’t ready to put the cup away yet. “Yeah, I remember. I was fine.” Too fine. “Can we not talk about this?”

“Why?”

“There’s no point. I wasn’t heartbroken then, and I’m not now.” Stone hearts didn’t break. They were too hard. “I’m like a Terminator with logic programming and no feelings.” He stretched his lips into a plastic smile.

Quan rolled his eyes. “What a load of shit. Are you going to say you don’t love at all? I
know
you love me.”

Khai tilted his head to the side. He’d never thought about that before.

“There is literally nothing you can say to make me believe you don’t,” Quan said with absolute confidence. “Go ahead. Try.”

“I hardly ever do things with you, and we don’t have a bunch of similar interests, and—”

“And you never forget my birthday, and you always share your food with me even when it’s your favorite, and I know anytime I need something, I can count on you, no matter what,” Quan finished.

“ Well ... yeah.” Those were hard rules in Khai’s universe.

“That’s brother love. We just don’t say it because we’re tough and shit, but yeah, I love you, too.” Quan punched him on the shoulder. “And why the fuck are you wearing a sweater in late July?”

Khai rubbed his shoulder. “I told you. I have the flu.”

“You don’t have the flu. This is how your heart breaks. It’s like you hurt too much for your brain to process, and then your body shuts down, too. You were a lot like this after Andy. Even down to the one sock.”

Khai looked at his feet and was surprised to see he only wore one sock. “Maybe it came off in my sleep.” He dug through the blanket, but it wasn’t there.

“Or you forgot it. After Andy, you were so out of it, we were all afraid you’d accidentally kill yourself by walking in front of a bus or forgetting to eat.”

Khai shook his head and scratched at his beard. “That doesn’t sound like me.”

Quan laughed. “No, it doesn’t. That’s why we were all so worried, and you seemed off ever since then. These past couple months are the happiest I’ve seen you in a long time, to be honest.”

Khai gritted his teeth. He hadn’t been
happy
. He’d been in an Esme high. There was a difference, though at the moment, his mind wasn’t clear enough to figure out what it was. Frustrated, he pulled off his one sock and tossed it on the floor. There, now he was symmetrical. But a lone sock lay on the floor, completely out of place.

Quan considered Khai for several long seconds before saying, “Are you ready for the death anniversary next weekend? Talking about him might help. You never do.”

Khai fixed his attention on the sock on the floor. “I did. At Sara’s wedding.”

Quan released a heavy exhalation. “Yeah, I heard about that. I should have been there with you.”

“It’s not your fault when I hurt people,” Khai said.

“It’s not yours, either.”

Khai shook his head at his brother’s insensible logic and focused on the sock again. He should pick it up, find its mate, and stick them in the laundry together. It was distinctly infuriating imagining his socks journeying through the house separately. They were designed to be together.

Unlike Khai. He was meant to be a lone sock. Lone socks had a place in this world, too. Not everyone had two feet.

“When’s the last time you ate?” Quan asked.

Khai lifted a shoulder. He couldn’t remember. “It’s okay. I’m not hungry.”

“Well, I am. You’re going to eat with me.” Quan got up and padded into the kitchen. The fridge opened, plates clattered, silverware clanked, and the microwave hummed and beeped. Soon, they were eating together on the couch as Quan flipped through TV channels until he found a program where ticker symbols scrolled along the bottom.

Khai hadn’t brushed his teeth, showered, or shaved, and he was fairly certain he was a psychopath, but sitting there with Quan, things seemed better. Eating with his brother and watching TV while sick felt familiar, and fuzzy memories flickered in his mind.

Maybe he really had been in this same position before, but as for the rest of it, the broken hearted stuff, he couldn’t bring himself to believe it.

E
arly the next week, when Angelika went to take the GED exam, Esme went, too. She didn’t need a GED and had no one to impress, and a high school diploma wasn’t going to help with her work. But the cost hadn’t been horrible, and she’d done all this studying. She told herself she did it to set an example for Jade.

But deep inside, she knew she did it for herself, too.

Unconsciously, she’d been studying for it this entire time.

Usually, she couldn’t do things because the opportunity wasn’t there, and the worry persisted that maybe she couldn’t because she just wasn’t good enough. Maybe all rich people were rich because they deserved it. Maybe she was poor because she, too, deserved it. But now the opportunity was right here, and she wanted to see.

What happened when you gave someone an opportunity?

Later that week, she still hadn’t figured out how to solve her visa problem, and the determined fire in her heart had banked. When she got her transcript in her email inbox, she opened it with resignation.

The contents put goose bumps on her head. She checked the name three times to make sure they hadn’t made a mistake and sent it to the wrong person, but no, the name was unmistakably Esmeralda Tran.

Under every category, it read:
PASS GED College Ready + Credit
. She’d achieved perfect scores across the board.

Did this mean she was smart?

It
did
. The proof was right here on her phone. Her heart burst with pride—in herself, for a change. Well, she wasn’t
very
smart. Just a little smart. Most people graduated from high school here. But that was more than she’d ever dared to dream of. This country girl had a high school diploma.

This was important. This meant something big. But her mind was too busy with this explosive happiness to grasp it all.

Her phone buzzed a few times, and when she looked at the screen, she saw she’d received text messages from Angelika.

I passed!

We’re celebrating at the boba shop by school.

Come!!!!!!!

Why not? She wanted to share her news, but it was the wrong time to call home, and talking to Khải was out.

She punched in a quick response, checked her spelling twice, and sent it.
Congratulations! See you there. :)

After she finished closing down the restaurant, she untied her apron from her waist, put it away, and waved good-bye to Cô Nga. It took three minutes to cross the street and walk to the bubble-tea shop, and when she stepped inside, the humidity wrapped around her like a blanket. Small flat-screen TVs were mounted on the walls by different groupings of tables. One played a Taiwanese drama. One played a football game. The one by the small group of Esme’s classmates played a golf game.

Esme waved at everyone, ordered and paid for a plain black tea with milk and pearls, and helped herself to the seat next to Angelika. The space across from her was taken by Miss Q, who was wearing jeans, a relaxed button-down shirt, and, of course, a scarf. Stylish as ever.