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  Mr. Wang tapped the table in front of his old woman. “Drop something tasty for me to eat, hmm?” he joked, referencing how he could only “chī” or “eat” a tile to form a run from the player before him, a.k.a. his wife.

  “Tiles are about as tasty as anything else around here,” Jing-Jing whispered to herself, but I heard and laughed. Her eyes widened in surprise, but then she joined in, loud and hearty.

  I winked at her and she graced me with a cheek-to-cheek smile.

  Mrs. Wang used her clear plastic tile holder to push her latest losing hand facedown on the table. “Okay, I’ve had enough. Andrew, you certainly are reckless, but I guess you know enough to use it to your advantage.”

  Jing-Jing pulled her face down in shock, then mouthed miracle to me as she tipped her head and thumb in her mother’s direction, exaggerating so her mother would see.

  Mrs. Wang swatted her daughter’s hand down. “I’m a very nice person,” she said gruffly, on purpose, before letting out a short, one-syllable “Ha!” Then, to my shock, she asked, “Are leftovers okay for dinner, Andrew?”

  She strode to the kitchen and I hurried after her, calling out, “Yes, of course! Let me come help.”

  Was my victory not limited to mahjong? Fifty mooncake points!

  Chloe

  Had Andrew just won my mother over a smidge, and through mahjong? How many mooncake points did that impossible feat equal?

  Dinner was a strange meal of Thanksgiving sides plus a turkey soup my mother had made from the otherwise useless bones. But the strangest part was how Andrew stole the show and became the center of the family.

  As he filled the otherwise silence with stories about playing basketball with his father, moon-gazing with his mother, and indulging in Sichuan food at the holidays—all fake, I presumed—my parents ate up his charm along with the leftovers.

  When he discussed his family’s deep involvement in their church and mentioned bringing me with him to Sunday services, my mother’s eyes bugged out of her head.

  “Why didn’t you tell me sooner?” she gushed. “Aiyah, what good news!”

  I couldn’t stop beaming as I dreamed of a life without the Kuo family sniffing around my twenty-four-karat vagina.

  After dinner, I started to wash the dishes, but Andrew approached me and said, “Go spend time with your parents; I got this.”

  He jumped in, grabbing a dirty fork and scrubbing it in the worst way possible—petting it with the sponge as though it were a timid dog.

  “How did they not teach you proper technique?” I asked in a joking tone. Wasn’t impressing parents with dish scrubbing, like, day two?

  He laughed, low and rumbly and sincere, as if it was just for me. “They did,” he whispered back. “Part three of orientation.” Then he continued flailing the sponge at the fork with exaggerated wrist waves. “But it’s just too easy to make you squirm,” he teased.

  I snapped the dish towel in his direction, spraying him with a few droplets. He yelped, dropped the fork, and grabbed the dish soap, aiming the nozzle at me.

  “Truce!” I yelled, throwing my hands up in surrender.

  He aimed toward the ceiling and squeezed, scattering a few bubbles in the air before putting the bottle down with a chuckle. “You don’t have anything to worry about; I would never.”

  “I would.” I made a sudden lunge for the dish soap.

  He flinched, and then when he saw I was just joking around, we both laughed.

  Without thinking, I poked him in his side. Genuinely. Flirting. His smile was wide as he started to lean toward me—maybe to poke me back?—but then everything changed in the same moment: the playfulness melted off his face, and his body recoiled. Then he cleared his throat and exited the kitchen, leaving a chilly trail behind him.

  What had I been thinking? We had a few fake moments and suddenly I was poking him for real even though I’d never poked anyone else before? Pathetic. Almost as pathetic as someone trying to flirt by poking.

  I cringed so much a tiny groan escaped my lips. Then I heard movement from the corner. When I turned, I saw that my mother was watching from the other doorway, arms crossed and a single eyebrow raised. Our eyes met and she ticked her chin in my direction, then left. I had no idea how to read that. Or how long she’d been standing there.

  Leaving the rest of the dishes unwashed, I returned to the dining room to join the after-dinner chrysanthemum tea. My parents were chatting easily with Andrew, and I slipped into my place at the table.

  But something had changed with him, with the poke, and it hadn’t reverted back yet. I laughed in the right places and smiled when Andrew grinned at me, but unlike before, the spaces between were now empty. My parents didn’t seem to notice, perhaps because the spaces with them were always empty and they couldn’t see the difference. Still, though, I worried they’d notice at some point. And besides, I had paid through the nose and gums—I deserved a better performance.

  I decided to talk to Andrew later, when my parents were asleep, to make sure we were still on the same page. And so he would know that the weird moment by the kitchen sink had just been part of my act, a clear failure, and to be forgotten. Forever.

  Drew CHAPTER 10

  LINE

  Later that night, lying in my makeshift bed, my face toward the cushions, I heard footsteps. They halted by the couch. Waiting, assessing. I tried to breathe as if I were asleep, but I sounded gaspy with a side of sleep apnea. Was it better or worse for her to know I was faking?

  When Jing-Jing had poked me, I’d had the urge to poke her back, which should not have been my first thought. Her parents hadn’t even been watching! And had they been (and I should have assumed as much, as per Rule 26—never drop character while the parents are under the same roof as you), I should have been thinking about how the Wangs’ Type C classification prescribed a hand graze or bright smile in return, not flirting with her as I would in front of Type A parents or, yikes, on a date.

  To be completely frank (and Drew), I might not have been in operative mode for a chunk of that last interaction (which, what the hell, had never been an issue before).

  Why did she throw me off my game? Why was it not about formulas and trained responses when she was around?

  Had her poke been real? Her expression had shifted from playful to embarrassed (maybe even ashamed?) when I’d brushed her off. But it didn’t matter what she’d been thinking or possibly feeling. That couldn’t happen. It was too messy. Which was why I had swung the other way and acted so cold.

  Rule 5 of the Rent for Your ’Rents Operative Handbook (a rule I had memorized but never thought twice about until today): Always know the line between the job and reality.

  The mission, her future, and my livelihood (and thus my artist dreams) were on the line, pun intended.

  Find the goddamn line, Drew, and dig it into the dirt until you never lose it again.

  I continued with the wheezes until she tiptoed away toward the kitchen. I counted sheep (one dressed in glow-in-the-dark pajamas, one in a giraffe onesie, and three sheep masquerading as a clump of cotton balls) until I truly fell asleep, no midnight mooncakes in my stomach.

  Chloe CHAPTER 11

  HOOK, LINE, SINKER

  November 28

  I accidentally slept in the next day, having stayed up too late wondering why Andrew had pretended to be asleep when I came downstairs around midnight. Had I done something worse than I’d realized and upset him? Was he scared I was into the fake him and was now distancing himself to set me straight? Had he… felt something for real too? I quickly convinced myself it was a hard no to that last one, given how unlikely it was.

  Also, did he really think he was fooling anyone with that laughable heavy breathing?

  When I padded to the kitchen early afternoon, only my mother was present, eating congee at the table. Honestly, I so dreaded time with why-don’t-you-wear-more-makeup Mǎmá Wang that I would have preferred it to be the “love you” guy from game theory sitting there.


  “Where’s Andrew?” I asked, sliding by her to put the electric kettle on for some green tea.

  “A few patients called with emergencies and Bǎbá decided to handle them with Andrew’s help so we could have some girl time.”

  My hand slipped and I missed plugging the kettle into the outlet. “What? No!”

  I hadn’t paid all this money for Andrew to sit around suctioning my dad’s pulpotomies. And if he was going to spend the day with anyone, it should have been my mom, not my dad, because turn Mǎmá Neck, and Head-of-the-Wangs Bǎbá would be swayed too, I’m just saying.

  My mother waved a hand at me. “Oh, stop worrying. It’s just a little male-bonding time.”

  “Yeah, and maybe they’ll hit up a strip club after.”

  My mother snort-laughed, and in my surprise I laughed with her.

  “You’ve always been my funny girl,” she said, her tone softer now.

  My nose and eyes burned. She was so awful with other people around that I often forgot she was sometimes different when it was just us—extra emphasis on the sometimes. Was she playing the part with company or with me?

  “So sometimes I’m funny, and other times those same jokes are disrespectful?”

  She swatted the air. “You’re disrespectful when you challenge me, joke or no joke. Why do you always have to do that? You know I just want the best for you.”

  “Yes, wanting the best for me with your great priorities, like how my future husband needs to have money and a double eyelid, which you’ve been telling me since I was, like, five.”

  “Andrew has both of those,” my mother said with a smile. “I can already picture your cute babies. With eyelid folds.”

  “Could you be more shallow if you tried?” And did you have to go from zero to sixty billion in one second? I’d been desperate for her to just accept him, and now we were already talking babies?

  My mother threw down her napkin. “Do you want your kids to be made fun of? To face more racism than they’re already going to? Having a fold in their eyelid will help them blend in a little more.”

  That was not what I’d been expecting. But why was I so surprised? Whenever I was ready to tell her off or stop caring, she always found a way to give me a piece of her. Was it manipulation or sincere? Did it matter? Because each time, I fucking bit the hook and sank myself. Sometimes I wondered whether things would be different if I had another person to lean on, or at least more friends, but that probably wouldn’t change much; she would always be my mother, and somehow that bond held more weight than anything else.

  My mother put down her spoon and joined me by the kitchen island, making my tea for me the way I hated: by taking already steeped-for-hours tea and adding lukewarm water to it. She was always scared of me burning my mouth and didn’t care that it was undrinkable.

  “Aren’t you the one who always tells me mouth tissue turns over in just a few days?” I asked softly. “Is burning your palate really all that bad?”

  “Is wanting your daughter to be most comfortable all that bad? I leave this on the counter when you’re home,” she told me, pointing to the bitter mother tea.

  I stopped resisting and, as usual, took the cup and thanked her.

  “You know, Jing-Jing,” she said, gesturing for me to join her at the table, which I did. “I’m starting to feel like I have nothing left to teach you. You stopped needing me so long ago. Mahjong felt like the last thing I could offer, but you don’t even need me for that.”

  Isn’t that a good thing? I couldn’t help wondering.

  She tapped her fingers on her own non-bitter cup of tea. “I kept thinking you and Andrew were still in the honeysweetie phase—or, no, I mean, you know what I mean—”

  “Honeymoon,” I said quietly, feeling bad even though she had asked.

  “Yes, honeymoon phase. It almost felt like an act until I saw you two yesterday at the sink. I don’t know what was going on, but it was the first time anything felt real. I was going to warn you that the honeymoon phase is too early to know what the future holds, but maybe you two are past it.”

  Well, shit. She was way more perceptive than I gave her credit for. My pits were starting to sweat thinking about how all of this could blow up in my face if she saw just a little too much. Honestly, I hadn’t thought about it before because I felt like my parents hardly noticed anything with me, but in reality, they just noticed what they wanted to, and the problem seemed to be that we deemed different things important. But if I shared my mother’s belief that incoming pimples were devastating and “priority number one,” then yeah, she was the most perceptive person in the world, noticing my undergrounders before I was even aware of them.

  “I know you’re smart, Jing-Jing. But you’ve barely had any boyfriends, so maybe I can teach you one last thing: All relationships have problems. It’s how you solve them that matters.” She laughed, one short exhale. “And I’ve had experience with that!”

  She clapped her hands twice. “Okay! Since the boys are away, hurry and eat so I can take you out for a facial and some new clothes!”

  My mind knew she was being generous, that it would be nice to do something together and that this was her way of showing me love, but I also couldn’t ignore that it was always her thing, it was usually about my appearance, and I was just so tired.

  “Can’t wait, Mǎmá.”

  Drew CHAPTER 12

  DR. HUANG

  Human mouths are frigging disgusting. This was most certainly not in my training. (I’d have to tell corporate to add a Don’t Upchuck after Contacting Human Fluids course.)

  “You okay, Fangli?” Jing-Jing’s dad asked through his mask.

  The middle-aged patient gave him a thumbs-up, unable to do more.

  I’m not okay! my brain screamed, but luckily my face mask covered a lot. It would also catch my vomit, right?

  In my year and a half at Rent for Your ’Rents, I had been covered in spit, yes (when Michelle’s mother yelled at me about the soaps and a spray accompanied every third consonant), had worn a mask, yes (at Grace’s house, because her nǎinai was a hundred and we all had to cover up so she wouldn’t get sick), but no, I’d never been covered in spit while wearing a mask that suddenly felt too thin. All while holding tools in a stranger’s mouth.

  “To the right, Andrew,” Jing-Jing’s father said sternly, and I tried not to look at the puddle of spit as I directed the thick white suction tube toward it.

  Shit, and I was supposed to be a promising medical student. This might be the closest I’d ever get to having my cover blown.

  Keep yourself together and the bile down! I yelled at myself. Fangli was the last patient today, but I hadn’t gotten better with experience. Somehow worse, it seemed.

  I tried to pretend Fangli’s mouth was just a canvas, and our goal was to create some art. Oh God, and now look, some blood—I mean, red paint—to use.

  “We hit pulp!” Mr. Wang declared triumphantly. “That means we’re into the part of the tooth that houses the nerve, so we’ll put medication in to alleviate poor Fangli’s pain, and we’ll do the root canal—”

  “Ooot cawnaw?” Fangli said, her mouth still open because of the bite block.

  He patted her assuredly and amended, “We’ll do the painless root canal on Monday. So this is actually the start of the root canal procedure, but because today’s just an emergency visit, we’ll stop here and use a temporary filling over the medication. Name of the game today is no pain, right, Fangli?”

  She nodded ever so slightly, which to me felt dangerous given how many power tools were in her mouth. Sheesh.

  Since the mask limited my reaction options, I tried to show with my eyes how fascinated and not gross I found all this gobbledygook.

  “You like art, Andrew?” Mr. Wang asked, mixing the medication on his tray.

  Ha. Life can be funny sometimes. “I suppose.”

  “Well, dentistry is like medicine, but it requires proficiency with art and your hands, even more so
than most doctors.” He cleared his throat. “But, er, of course your parents know that, being surgeons and all.”

  “Uh-huh.” I moved the suction around, trying to tell myself it was just water, perfectly normal and not bacteria-filled.

  Note to self: When possible, lean toward playing the future architect, computer scientist, lawyer, or CEO—any profession where it’s okay to look as nauseous as I feel in a medical setting.

  Thirty minutes and too many hand washes later (I hoped Mr. Wang wouldn’t notice how much less soap he had now), I threw my borrowed white coat into the hamper and took a seat in the Wang Dental Palace waiting room (I was not sitting in any of those disgusting operatories, even after I saw how much disinfectant was used).

  “Andrew?” I heard from down the hallway.

  Even though I wanted to call out What now? and stay where I was, I forced myself to get up and make my way to him. Instead of walking right in, I peeked around the door to his office, hoping it’d be quick. “Yes, Shǔshú?”

  He gestured to the chair in front of his desk as he swiveled away from his computer and toward me. I loped in and sat with my ankles crossed (relaxed but respectful). I sincerely hoped he couldn’t hear my beating heart from where he sat.

  “Andrew, I—” Then he cut himself off and started over. “Look, you’re a good kid. But Jing-Jing’s my only child. Her mother and I are very protective of her—her mother more so than me—and when it comes to Jing-Jing, I defer to my wife because she knows our daughter best.” Does she? “And look at what her nurturing has done so far! Jing-Jing is living up to her name!”

  He cleared his throat by coughing into his fist. “I don’t know what Jing-Jing’s told you about… other suitors, but you have to understand that we just know certain families well. And we haven’t met yours—hadn’t even met you until two days ago! I’m sure you’ve noticed I’m older than my wife”—I hadn’t, and Jing-Jing hadn’t mentioned it either—“and so for me, at this point in my life, I just want to make sure she’ll be okay.”