Girl Overboard (2 page)

If I sneak out into the January night, I’ll freeze. But flirting with frostbite is a small price to pay when I know with my eyes closed, for just a moment, I can pretend I’m free. Pretend I’m on top of a mountain. Who knows? I might even be able to trick myself into believing I’m about to ride with Age, the way we used to before the Accident.

As I push open the front doors, salvaged from some ancient monastery in China, I run right into the Fujimoro trio. Baba’s new hire, his pregnant wife, and daughter Lillian should be on meet-and-greet duty instead of me, their handshakes are so hearty-hello-nice-to-network-with-you.

“Good to see you, Syrah. Knee okay?” asks Mr. Fujimoro.

Knee okay, I nod; it’s my hand I’m worrying about. He’s pumping it up and down so vigorously, you’d think bonuses and stock options were going to spill out of my mouth.

“Good.” He thrusts a bottle of—you guessed it—my namesake wine toward me. “A memorable syrah for a memorable Syrah.”

“Thanks,” I murmur politely, taking the wine bottle, wishing once again that my name didn’t reek like a fermented grape. Honestly, if my parents had to name me for wine, why couldn’t it have been sassy, whip-’em-into-shape Shiraz, Australian for Syrah? Age says I should count my blessings. They could’ve named me Zinfandel. Or Gewürztraminer.

“You girls should catch up,” says Mrs. Fujimoro, one hand pushing back her blonde-by-salon hair, the other hand pushing Lillian toward me.

The problem is, we girls have nothing to say to each other. In the two months since Lillian transferred to my school, she’s already next in line to be editor-in-chief of our paper and has worked herself into Chelsea Dillinger’s Six-Pack clique. In short, Lillian is more Chengian than I am, right down to her figure that defies the need for any body shaper.

Deafening drumming, euphemistically known as Chinese music, pounds over this painful party chit chat. Without a backward glance, Lillian and her parents abandon me to watch the lion dancers pouncing around the living room to scare away bad luck from this Lunar New Year. As Bao-mu would say, this is a sign to grab my opportunity for escape. So I stumble-run outside, past the valets, as fast as I can in my heels, and head for the grounds.

The last time I felt this giddy with freedom, I was racing Age down the backcountry in Alpental a year ago. Not that either one of us would admit it to anyone aside from ourselves, but we’d been keeping score since the first snow over Halloween opened the season early. Bragging rights for being the fastest were on the line since we were tied, and that perfect morning, I had the lead.

“Watch and weep!” I yelled as I screamed past him, thinking life couldn’t possibly get any better than that moment. I knew that if I didn’t head straight for the base of the mountain, I’d lose for sure, but pillows of fresh snow were mounded everywhere, the kind that you hit on top and they bust open under your board. How could I resist? Even though it’d cost me precious seconds, I jumped, knees rising so high they could have substituted as my earmuffs. Just as I landed on the fluffiest pillow, Age spun around, shaking his head at me like he’d never seen a girl more crazy than I was.

In that split second, I flew around him, and as I soared down the mountain, swerving in and out of trees with Age chasing me, I remember thinking that life rolled out in front of us, one infinitely long and smooth welcome mat.

A sharp stab in my knee returns me to the Garden of Ethan, our version of the imperial summer estates in Suzhou, the Venice of China. Aside from the rustling of the bamboo around me, the garden is silent, as if it, too, is paying respects to the girl I used to be.

Then the drumming begins again, louder than before, which means that the lion dancers are leading the guests to the
tang,
the Hall of Expansive Dreams, where all of my parents’ formal entertaining takes place.

Expansive Dreams. That’s a laugh. I cross a bridge that arches over a manmade stream. My dreams have shrunk to the size of a snowflake now that everybody in the snowboarding industry has written me off as a selfish, spoiled dilettante who thought my trust fund entitled me to ride anywhere I wanted at Whistler, even in the off-limit, avalanche-prone backcountry.

No one has ever asked me why I went where I wasn’t supposed to go and ended up where I shouldn’t have been. No one reported about how the avalanche may have missed my body but iced over my heart. No one knows how the avalanche dog “found” me and ski patrol “rescued” me. But the Real Me, the fearless one? She’s still buried under an avalanche of one man’s making. I breathe in as deeply as my body shaper allows, refusing to be sucked down into the memory of Jared Johanson, snowboarding camp counselor who wanted me to be his free pass to paradise.

The sounds of Baba’s party, muffled conversations and clear laughter, cross the pond, almost camouflaging the crackle of interference on the garden path. Before I can duck into the shadows, Meghan, Mama’s favorite event planner, strides swiftly to me, announcing victoriously into her walkie-talkie: “Eaglet captured.” Without missing a beat, she nods her head toward the main hall. “Syrah, you’re late.”

J
ust as the lights
dim, I reach the family table, nestled inside the innermost circle of Baba’s premier business associates within the bigger pool of his wine-collecting aficionados, his corporate minions, and the Ethan-Wife Number One friends, all gray-haired enough to serve as my grandparents. I swear, Darth Vader is narrating a Hollywood homage to Baba’s life, large-screen movie, swelling music, and all.

While Darth extols Baba’s humble beginnings, starting with my great-grandfather who moved to
Gam Saan,
Gold Mountain, the Chinese name for America, Wayne makes a big deal of looking pointedly at his watch. “Nice of you to show up,” he says.

Give me a break,
I want to tell him. But it’s safer to ignore Wayne, so I slide next to Grace, who, naturally, keeps focused on the movie.

Another surge of music follows Darth’s words: “Like his grandfather before him who helped build America’s transcontinental railroad a hundred and fifty years ago, Ethan created Europe’s first transcontinental telecommunications superhighway.”

A small growl gets my attention. Grace’s dog is, as usual, perched on his lap of honor, only now he’s trying to wriggle out from under her heavy hand.

“Hey, Mochi,” I whisper.

The dog barks, sharp and high.

“It’s okay, Mr. Mochi,” coos Grace, soothing her little yippy dog with gentle strokes while glowering at me accusingly. I swear, that glorified rat gets more attention than a baby. While the movie credits roll, Wayne stands up in the still-darkened room, Grace following suit. She murmurs to Mochi, “Come on, sweetie, we’ve got a speech to make.”

On the dais, Wayne and Grace give off the same unmistakable vibe of success that Baba does. The Cheng power gene obviously skipped over me, or, more likely, ran out because so much success got concentrated in my half-siblings. Wayne is Mr. I-Graduated-Cum-Laude-from-Princeton. You can’t pick up a newspaper without reading about some new deal his venture capital company in San Francisco is brokering in Asia. And Grace’s hop, skip, and a jump from Princeton landed her in New York, where she found out she could brag and get paid for it. So now she’s the head of her own public relations agency.

Naturally, Wayne takes the microphone first, establishing himself as The Eldest Son, a chip off the gold block. “It’s hard to believe that my father is seventy tonight, when he’s got the energy of a man half his age. I’m sure all of you know what I’m talking about. His midnight phone calls. Three a.m. e-mails. And multi-tasking abilities.” Wayne waits a beat for the next photograph, this one of Baba sitting on an exercise ball in his office, instead of a chair. “The Ethan Cheng Way: why not work and work out at the same time?”

The businesspeople laugh appreciatively. I sweat profusely. I can’t remember a single word of my toast. Call me the ultimate case study for the should have, would have, could have chapter in Baba’s best-selling book,
The Ethan Cheng Way: From Rags to Richest.
I
should
have practiced my toast more. I
would
have if I hadn’t been dueling this dress. I
could
have been more prepared if I were a Cheng cookie cutter kid. But I’m not.

Brevity is not Wayne’s problem. His history lecture takes us back to the sixties, when Baba did research for Bell Labs, then moved to Hong Kong against the advice of his colleagues—“No one’s going to want to use a mobile phone”—to start his own wireless company. “Naturally,
my
mom’s family bankrolled that endeavor,” Wayne says, shooting a look at
my
mom, the beneficiary of that endeavor. “We should all be so lucky to look and act half his age. I suppose we all could if we had a beautiful Betty at our side, too.”

On the face of it, Wayne’s comment sounds innocent enough, but when he says,
“Mei-Mei”
—little sister—and hands the microphone to Grace, I see the look they exchange. The one that says,
Oooh, nice dig.

Grace’s speech is all “we” this and “we” that, making it clear with laughing glances at Wayne that the “we” she’s talking about is her and her big brother. “We” were the original beta testers for The Ethan Cheng Way. “We” were forced to be nothing less than excellent. “We” are such wonderful, accomplished, envy-worthy offspring.

I don’t know about the rest of the crowd, but I’m feeling a wee bit exhausted. Once upon a time, I thought being the offspring of Ethan Cheng guaranteed my place in paradise, too. Who knew that when I rang the bell at the New York Stock Exchange five years ago to start the trading of DiaComm, my life would change so much I’d give anything for a redo?

I’m not proud of it, but at first I gorged on everybody’s attention: “Who wants to see my new house, new yacht, new plane?” Age was the only friend from the pre-Initial Public Offering days who had the nerve to tell me I was bragging.

I should have listened.

My perfect starshine luster lasted three months. After Christmas break, everyone in fifth grade was comparing and contrasting their holiday haul, and I blurted out about my gift, a recording studio—just what every girl of ten wants, right? That’s when I overheard the derisive laughter and saw Age’s pitying told-you-so gaze and belatedly understood his warnings: my classmates didn’t like me; they liked my parents’ toys. So when Mama transferred me to Viewridge Prep, the best private school in Seattle, I vanished happily, not knowing that however much old and new money surrounded me, Age would be the one person who accepted me, no matter which side of the decimal point I was on.

Too soon, the audience applauds, and Baba nods approvingly at the Original Cheng Children. I stay seated until Mama’s meaningful look pierces me from across the table:
Don’t shame me.

On my approach to the dais, I realize that—oh, God—the crowd of two hundred people might as well have supersized into an audience of two thousand. Even though I want to cry now, even though my cheeks ache from grinning at these people, most of whom I don’t know, I smile like a good daughter, a good hostess, a good sport. After all, in my family, “face” is everything—how people perceive you, how you act in public. Who would have known that “saving face” would mean sacrificing the girl behind it?

Back at our table, the way Grace rolls her eyes at Wayne, she might as well gloat out loud, And she calls herself a Cheng? I knew Syrah couldn’t do it.

All around the tang, gazes drop faster than stock prices on a bad-news day. I clear my throat, the sound amplifying horribly in the hall, and spot a familiar army green jacket outside the far window. A red beanie waves at me from above everyone’s heads. Age.

Just like that, I remember how Age, my toasting muse, quoted Baba to me the other day. With more fervor than any true Ethan Cheng devotee, I cite that quote now: “As my dad wrote, ‘You cannot fail if you have good people at your side.’ There’s nothing more important in this world than friends. True friends.” As Mama makes her way up the stage to me, I look around the hall in my best confident Cheng impression. “Thanks to all of you, the good people at my father’s side.”

Applause echoes in the tang. Who cares if people are clapping because I’ve finally said something, or if they agree with what I’ve said? Next to me, Mama snakes her arm around my waist, and I notice that Wayne and Grace are smiling, too, like we’re one big happy Cheng clan. Holding two champagne glasses, Baba takes the stairs nimbly to the stage.

“Thank you, everyone,” Baba says. “As you may know, the Lunar New Year is the most important holiday in the Chinese year. Families unite to give thanks together. So Syrah is on the right track, but you’re more than friends. You’re family.” Baba contemplates his champagne glass. “The Year of the Dog is supposed to be one of frivolity and leisure, which is how I’m going to be enjoying my retirement.” He grins at the stunned crowd. “Happy New Year!”

Just like Wayne and Grace, and everyone else at this party, I gape at Baba. The only person who doesn’t look shocked is Mama. When Baba drops one arm around Mama’s shoulders and the other around mine, cold resentment settles on Wayne’s and Grace’s faces. Even as they lift their champagne flutes along with everyone else in the hall, I can feel the anger behind their stiff smiles as they stare at me and Mama, the two interlopers in their family. I could be three or ten or thirteen again, knowing then as I do now that I’ll never be able to break into their inner circle.

Age, standing in front of the window, gives me the thumbs-up sign. He inclines his head toward the garden before disappearing. Like I always do, I push away the hurt (The Ethan Cheng Way: focus on what you can change; change your focus from what you cannot). My inner circle is waiting outside.

B
ill!” says Baba, clasping
the hand of the one CEO whose face is in the news more than his own. This only goes to show that while Baba may consider everyone here tonight family, some relatives are more important than others.