Becoming Who We Are Ch. 01

I drafted this novel about 20 years ago and recently unearthed and revised it in light of the renewed specter of anti-Asian hate in the United States. While one of its two main plots is a first-time romance, its other contains some dark themes, including racism, violence and suicide. So if you're hoping for a lighthearted sexy romp, this isn't the story you're looking for. If you came here because you like other stories I've written, thank you! I hope you'll like this one too. -- Van

Copyright © 2021 to the author.

**

As usual, Luke had overslept. His mother didn't try to hide her vexation with him as she shook him awake. As the boy stirred, a book slid off his bed and tumbled to the floor.

"Get up!" she said. "It's the first day of school and you don't want to be late."

Luke opened his eyes and blinked at the blurry face above him. He groped for his glasses on the nightstand and put them on. His mother's frown sharpened into focus.

"Huh?"

"First day of school," she repeated. "Get up. You're late."

It took him a moment to comprehend her words. When they sank in, he sat straight up and stared at his mother in panic.

"Ohmygod!" he said. "I forgot."

The lines between his mother's eyebrows deepened.

"Watch your language," she barked. "Now get up and take a shower and I'll fix you something to eat on your way to school."

She spun around on one tiny foot and stalked into the hallway.

"Such a lazy son," he heard her say as her heels clacked down the stairs. "Why did God give me such a lazy boy?"

Years ago, such words would have, and did, hurt the sensitive boy. He never meant to irritate his parents, but seemed to have a special talent for doing just that. At the family's restaurant in Queens, they had learned he had no skill at all with the cash register. He nearly sliced off a finger with a cleaver as a cook tried to teach him food prep. And last spring, the night before a gunman robbed his father of hundreds of dollars, he had dropped a tray on a family of five. He still cringed at the memory. The dishes had not broken, but the food had missed no one. His parents had had to replace the food, pay for their dry cleaning and apologize until the family left.

"He looks a little skinny to be hefting trays anyway," the man had said, trying to help. The remark had reminded his mother of the strong, coordinated son who had died.

"Go to the kitchen," she ordered as Luke bent forward to help dab the Kung Pao chicken from the woman's blouse.

For the rest of the night, he had washed dishes, the one task he did well. He had done nothing since but wash dishes and fill rice boxes for takeout, at least until his parents sold their thriving restaurant to start again, here in Pennsylvania.

Luke turned on the shower and clambered in, clipping one foot on the edge of the tub as he often did. He winced, then put aside his thoughts of pain and restaurant failure to consider the coming day.

Those thoughts held equally little pleasure. At his last school, Luke had not fit in with the other kids. All he wanted was peace and freedom to read his books and write his stories. From the first day, other kids had taunted, teased and punched him when they could. They soaked his precious books in the toilet. A couple had stolen his lunch money. Only when his younger brother stepped in did he get any respite, and that never lasted.

As water sluiced down his body, Luke wondered why he and Mark had turned out so differently. Like John, Mark had no trouble taking care of himself -- but then, Mark worked out and did martial arts, something Luke had tried exactly once and quit. He hated the kicks and punches, and couldn't bring himself to hit anyone else. Besides that, his weak right leg made him a target, something the other kids in the class had figured out within two minutes.

But underneath his muscles, Mark had an inner toughness too, just like John. No one dared to call him names. And although he was smart, earned good grades and played in the band, no one called him a geek and a loser.

Luke sighed. He would never be as good as his brothers -- the dead or the living.

He turned off the water, dried himself, and walked back to his room. He could hear his brother, sister and mother talking downstairs and that reminded him to hurry. He put on the first shirt and pants he found and slipped on socks and sneakers. He ran his fingers through his thick hair. It seemed damp, but it would dry on the way to school. When it came down to it, he didn't really care how it looked anyway.

He clomped down the stairs and stepped into the kitchen in time to see Mark and Mary carry their plates to the sink. Too late for breakfast, he thought wistfully. Then his mother turned and held out a thick sandwich wrapped in a paper towel.

"Don't be late," she warned him as he took it from her. Then she surprised him by standing on her toes to kiss his cheek. He couldn't remember the last time she had done that. She stood back and looked up at her eldest son.

"It's your senior year. You have an opportunity to start over this year. Nobody knows you. I want you to promise to try hard. Be diligent and make your father and me proud of you."

As he gaped at her, her face changed, just a little, and he saw in her eyes that she didn't expect this year to be any different either.

"I will," he said, trying to sound sincere. "I will."

**

Mary's middle school started later than the high school, so Mark and Luke left without her. Neither spoke as they strode down the sidewalk, Luke because the ham and bread in his mouth prevented speech and Mark because he normally said nothing if he had nothing to say. The people who saw them figured Mark for the older boy. His muscular body contrasted sharply with Luke's skinny, shorter frame. Mark walked with the easy confidence of an athlete, while Luke hunched his shoulders and stared at the ground, almost as if apologizing for his existence.

In the last couple of years, Mark had tried a few times to coach Luke on how to walk and stand so that bullies would not single him out as a target, but Luke seemed to slide naturally and inevitably into a slouch the second he left the house.

"People won't respect you if you hunch over like Igor in Frankenstein," Mark had said during their last such session. "You've got to look like someone not to mess with, and that means not wandering around in a daze all the time. You walk like a tourist, not a New Yorker. And you're too skinny. Why don't you work out with me and put some muscle on your bones? I could use a workout partner."

The thought of spending more than two seconds in a sweaty, smelly weight room had filled Luke with horror, and he had glanced down at his leg.

"Don't even start with me about that," Mark had snapped. "Three months of working out with me and it would be just as strong as the other one." He shook his head. "I just don't get it. Why do you want to look like a victim?"

"It shouldn't matter what I look like," Luke had argued. "People should respect my rights anyway."

Mark had shaken his head.

"You just don't get it. Sometimes you have to make people respect you. My teacher always says bullies look for weaker people to pick on because making someone else feel bad makes them feel better. Or they just want to take out their anger on someone who won't fight back. Remember that kid who used to beat you up on the playground?"

Luke had nodded. It had happened the year after John had died, and Luke had just returned to school after months of painful rehab, joining Mark's class at school and feeling like a failure. That boy, Mike Bartlett, had zeroed in on Luke and made his life a miserable hell until the bully had stopped showing up for school. No one ever heard what happened to Mike, but some of his classmates had whispered that the cops had come and arrested Mike's father for beating up the whole family, and the county had taken the kids and put them into foster homes. But even the memory of the humiliations he had endured at Mike's hands did not change Luke's mind.

"It shouldn't matter what I look like," he'd repeated, glancing down at his latest pick from the public library.

Each attempt Mark had made had ended like that, with Luke picking up a book and shutting out his brother and the world. He appreciated what Mark wanted to do for him, but Luke knew it would never work. He was destined to be a target.

Chewing the sandwich and wishing he had a drink, Luke thought about the book he had stayed up late reading the night before. During his Saturday trip to the library, he had stumbled across a series of fantasy novels that had completely hooked his imagination. Oblivious to the neat rowhouses and lush green park around him, Luke wondered what it would feel like to have a telepathic link to a powerful creature that loved only him, or to be able to leap on the back of a dragon and fly away from everything.

He came out of his daydream when Mark grabbed his arm. He blinked to find himself in front of White Rose High School. Despite the colorful banner welcoming the classes of 1992 through '95, the cinderblock and concrete building reminded him of a prison. He wondered idly if anyone ever escaped alive. He heard Mark say something and turned to him.

"Huh?"

Mark frowned.

"Come back to the planet with the rest of us," he said. "Now look. Mom's right. This is a chance to reinvent yourself. Nobody here knows anything about you. You have a chance to make friends and leave New York behind."

He paused.

"So don't blow it."

He turned and disappeared into the crowd of laughing, chattering students. Luke fought back a surge of panic. This was it. He lifted his head to see the school's front doors and the kids passing through them. He swallowed, then took a deep breath, unconsciously hunched his shoulders and took his first step into the unknown.

He immediately smacked into someone.

"Hey! Watch it," an unfriendly voice said. Luke turned his head and found himself the object of a cold glare. He shrank back.

"Sorry," he said faintly.

The tall husky blond boy added a sneer to his stare.

"Yeah, you are sorry." He gave Luke a once-over, as if it to memorize his face and form. Then he stepped away and lost himself in the sea of students.

Luke's heart pounded. He felt the blood rush to his face. He felt like a small bird that had narrowly escaped a cobra. Mark wouldn't have handled that blond, freckly ape that way, he thought miserably. Mark would have stood up for himself.

His eyes shining with tears, Luke hurried through the front doors, hoping nobody would look at his face. Already he felt the year was a hopeless cause.

**

As the other students swirled around her, Melina Taylor looked at the large block building before her and wondered why unfamiliar schools always seemed so cold. As an Army kid, she had attended more schools than she could count on one hand. No matter where her family went -- Texas, North Carolina, Germany, Alaska, Japan, Maryland and now Pennsylvania -- the schools all had the same forbidding look.

She listened to the other kids shouting hellos at friends they hadn't seen since June. Chatter about who had which class and who had broken up flowed around her. She clutched at her notebook. She hated this day, hated her alien status, hated her father for putting her through this every couple of years. It was so unfair. Other kids didn't have to leave their friends and start over at new schools practically every September.

She sighed and stepped forward, joining the river of kids pouring through the school's front doors.

Well, at least she'd had a chance to walk around the school this time, she thought, her sense of fairness asserting itself. She turned right and bumped into another kid. She muttered an apology. The boy shrugged. Both turned to walk up the stairs to homeroom.

She trudged through the double doors and looked up to the staircase landing. Yes! She saw the mural of a knight clutching a white rose and felt a tinge of triumph. Yesterday, after registering for classes, she'd taken a few minutes before her band tryout to do a trial run of how to get to her classes. She remembered the mural. She relaxed, just a bit.

Noise echoed in the stairwell. Above and below her, kids laughed and gossiped. She wished she could join them.

At the head of the stairs, she passed through another set of double doors and swung to her right. From the corner of her eye, Melina noticed the guy she'd bumped still behind her. He wasn't smiling or talking to anyone either. Maybe he had just moved here too.

Walking slowly, she scanned the numbers above the doors, searching for her homeroom. There it was -- two-seventeen. She snaked through the oncoming kids and into Mrs. Cowden's classroom, the boy right behind her.

"Good morning," the teacher said. Both teens walked to her desk. The woman looked up at Melina. "What's your name, please?"

"Melina Taylor."

"Taylor, Taylor," the woman said, sliding an index finger down a list of names on a computer printout. Near the middle, she stopped, picked up a pencil and made a check next to Melina's name. She glanced at the boy.

"And what's your name, please?"

"Mark Tang," he said, pronouncing it "tong."

"Tong," the teacher repeated, again running a slender finger down the list. She came to the final name and frowned. Mark saw her expression and spelled his name for her. The woman's face lightened as she checked off his name.

"Oh. Mark Tang."

"It looks like the drink, but it's pronounced like the forceps," he said, correcting her.

Mrs. Cowden laughed.

"Mark 'Forceps' Tang," she said, pronouncing it correctly this time.

The boy grinned back. Mrs. Cowden had a nice smile. He thought it made her look smart and friendly at the same time.

"Well," she said briskly, noting three more students walk in, "go ahead and take any seat for now. After I take roll, I'll assign seats alphabetically.

"In fact," she added, glancing again at the list, "it looks as though Mark will be sitting in front of you, Melina, unless someone with a last name between Tang and Taylor joins the class unexpectedly."

She directed her gaze at the students behind Mark and Melina, and they pivoted to face the students already seated.

At the back of the room sat a clump of kids -- two girls in cheerleader uniforms and three boys in football jerseys, all deep in conversation. Along the far wall sat a girl with braids, engrossed in a book. Kids staring outside filled the window seats. Melina saw a group of empty desks and set her notebook on one near the back of the room. If she had learned anything in all the schools she had attended, it was not to choose a seat too near the front. That looked eager, and therefore uncool.

Mark swung into the seat in front of her and turned to face her.

"Might as well get used to it," he said with a smile. "Are you new too?"

"Yeah. Where are you from?"

"New York. How about you?"

"Gaithersburg, Maryland. Outside of D.C., to the north," she added, noticing the blank look on his face. "We just got here last week."

"Lucky you. At least you got to spend the summer with your friends. We moved in June."

He softly drummed the fingers of his left hand on her desk. Melina noticed small muscles in his forearm, near the elbow, rippling rhythmically. Mark in no way matched the bulk and size of the football players behind them, but she had a feeling he spent plenty of time at the gym.

The bell rang. Mark turned around to face the teacher, giving the room a quick scan as he did. Seeing no other Asian faces, he sighed. Mark, he told himself, it's official: you're not in New York anymore. Meanwhile, Mrs. Cowden walked to the door and leaned out, craning her head to spot any stragglers. No one seemed headed in her room's direction, so she closed the door and walked to the front of the classroom, her full skirt swirling about her legs.

"Good morning. I am Mrs. Cowden, your homeroom teacher. I teach American history. Now, everyone get your things and come up to the front of the room. It's time for that timeless ritual of alphabetical seating I'm sure you all know and love by now."

The students picked up their notebooks and shuffled to the front of the room. The teacher returned to her desk and picked up a thick notebook.

"David Abbott."

As the students moved to their seats, Melina studied them with interest. The cheerleaders and football players didn't particularly interest her, but some of the other kids did. A stunning blonde stepped forward after Mrs. Cowden called out "Darcy Fitzwilliam," but only one of the other kids seemed to notice, a dark-haired girl who sniggered. Melina frowned. Normally you could count on a couple of boys to react to a girl that beautiful, but silence reigned as Darcy sat down quietly. Well, maybe she was new too.

Melina tuned out, knowing there was no point in listening until the teacher reached names beginning with "S." She wondered what her sister was doing at that moment in college. This would be her first morning of classes, too. Melina considered the last time she had seen Julie, in her dorm room, surrounded by boxes, looking for places to put things. Melina sighed. She'd be a freshman herself in only a couple of years. She tried to picture herself in a dorm room, but her imagination refused to cooperate, and her thoughts returned to Julie. She was probably showering after a run, or maybe eating breakfast, Melina decided.

"Ann Smith, take the first seat in the next row," Mrs. Cowden called, and Melina's attention returned to the classroom. One of the majorettes stepped forward to take a seat in the next-to-last row.

"Jasmine Smith." A pale, heavy girl took the seat behind Ann, who rolled her eyes at the two football players still waiting for a seat.

"David Steele." One player sauntered to the desk behind Jasmine.

"Bryan Steuben."

"Benjamin Strine."

"Mark Tang, take the first desk in the next row."

"Melina Taylor."

"Lakeesha Thompson."

"James Wilson, and I think that's everybody," Mrs. Cowden said, passing out cards for the students to fill in with their names, addresses, next of kin and hospital preferences, in case of emergency. All the kids were restless by the time they finished.

"Easily the most boring task of the year," Mrs. Cowden said she collected the cards. "American history is much more interesting."

Somebody groaned and Mrs. Cowden looked around, trying to identify the culprit. A sea of innocent faces stared back at her. She decided to ignore it and move on.

"Much more interesting," she repeated. "But we don't have to go into that now. For those of you who are new to White Rose High, I'll summarize how homeroom works. It's a fifteen-minute period at the start of each morning. I take roll and send someone to the office with the roll sheet to turn it in, as attendance taking has not yet entered the computer age here. On a normal day, this process takes about five minutes. Five minutes into homeroom, morning announcements are read over the public address system. With any luck, roll call and announcements take no longer than this period. Usually, we wind up with a few extra minutes, which you can use to study or frantically do homework you forgot the night before, or daydream, or even talk quietly."

A ripple of mutterings greeted the last point. Mrs. Cowden grinned.

"Yes, you can talk. Quietly. As long as you keep the decibels down, I'll allow it. If you start abusing the privilege, you lose it. Understand?"

Twenty-nine heads bobbed. A tone sounded for the public address system.

First-day announcements sounded pretty much the same everywhere, Melina thought. The welcome by the principal. Details of the first day's Pep Rally. Where to sign up for clubs and groups. Et cetera. The familiarity reassured her, even it was kind of dull.