"You'll miss me, will you?" Arin, leaning into Grace's seventh hug that day, nodded against her best friend's shoulder. She resisted the urge to choke up and instead answered through the huge lump in her throat.
"Every single day."
"Remember to text! We wanna hear every little detail of your time in America." Her other best friend Evan teased from behind the pair. He grinned as Grace reached around Arin and swatted at his arm. "Well, maybe not every little detail. We don't wanna hear anything about what weird propaganda they're brainwashing you with over there. Bleh. American politics."
Grace Zhang and Evan Choi were her best friends, her partners-of-crime, the breads to her butter and the breaths to her life—as she repeatedly told them twice a day, according to Grace. Evan had known Arin since they were both in diapers, their overbearing mothers forcing them to go on playdates with each other every time they wanted a break from their kids. Naturally, mayhem always ensued, and Evan and Arin would be mysteriously in the middle of it all with innocent grins plastered to their faces. (Their mothers stopped arranging playdates after that out of fear for their sanity. It didn't matter. They still found ways to meet up.)
Grace, on the other hand, was three years older than her. They had met at a math summer camp and immediately took a liking to the other. Grace was the savviest person Arin had ever met. She was also the one with the best fashion sense out of the three, and she often subjected the pair to makeovers and pelted them with pieces of (unwanted) fashion advice. Despite her initial protests, Arin was grateful that they'd accompanied her to the airport. She didn't know what she'd do without them.
"Our little Rin-rin's gonna come back all grown up and Americanized. Maybe with a handsome American boyfriend?" Grace teased, mirth sparkling in her eyes, which were starting to get suspiciously misty. She held Arin at arm's length, observing her outfit critically. "Well, maybe not with those shoes. And your shirt can use a bit of filling out. When are you going to start growing boobs—"
"Okay, stop stop stop." Arin complained. "Don't defile Evan's ears with whether I have boobs or not. And you're one to talk, Gracey. I've already heard the way you go on about that boyfriend of yours. Imagine if Evan had to put up with both of our boy-crazy yammering."
"I wouldn't mind, actually—" Evan piped up.
"Shut up, Evan," we chorused.
"Last call for Plane 212! "
Arin's eyes darted to the boarding pass. "I better go now—"
"Wait! I believe Evy here has something to give you." Grace nudged Evan in the side.
"What? Jesus, stop poking me, that hurts, Zhang—Oh!" His eyes lit up as he fished around in his pocket searching for something— "Found it!"
Dangling from his fingers was a glittering necklace. He dropped it into her hand. It was an intricate little thing: delicate silver chain, small shiny pendant. The design of it was rather elegant: looping metal cords encasing a glistening white crystal. The stone glinted as she fumbled with the necklace, the metal cool against her hand.
"Y-you shouldn't have," Arin breathed.
"Grace and I pitched in to buy it—think of it as a reminder that we're always there with you." He coughed embarrassedly, rubbing his neck. "The seller also said…erm…"
"Apparently there's a disk of lead on the inside that absorbs radiation," Grace drawled. "Don't want you to turn into the second Hulk, don't we? Load of bull, if you ask me. I only forced Evy to buy it with me because I thought was pretty."
"There's lead in this?" Arin's mouth fell open in horror. "Are you two trying to poison me?"
"Not on the outside, of course," Evan reassured her hastily. "It won't be directly in contact with your skin, and Zhang thinks the whole lead thing is a scam. You won't get lead poisoning from this…probably."
Arin was…not very reassured.
She eyed the necklace suspiciously, then sighed and clasped the necklace around her neck. "If I die from this, I'm haunting you two."
Grace snorted. "Have fun trying. Now shoo to your plane." She enveloped Arin in a final short hug, then stared expectantly at Evan. He quailed under her gaze and went to hug her as well.
"For the record, it was her idea and not mine." He whispered in her ear. She let out a short laugh and pulled away.
"See you in the winter break, Choi."
Arin shifted in her seat and tried to ignore the close proximity of the very grumpy, very white member of the male population seated next to her, eyeing her backpack suspiciously like she was hiding a bomb in there. She had nothing against white people, of course. It was the fact that he seemed to hold no regards for her personal space that irked her. Arin could smell cheap cologne coming off him, tinged with the hint of what vaguely smelled like alcohol. She blanched and groped for the armrest before realizing the seats had none equipped.
"Sir, would you mind moving to the side just for a bit?" She asked politely. At this point, she was going to asphyxiate before the plane took off.
The man was unresponsive. She tried again.
"Hallo, können Sie sich weiter weg bewegen, bitte?"
Nothing but an annoyed twitch in response. She sighed, knowing that the man was either pretending or just didn't give a damn. She gave it one last shot. "Не могли бы вы отойти от меня?"
A barely discernible grunt this time, but he still refused to move. His lip curled in contempt.
"您能稍微挪一下吗？"
It was apparently the last straw for the annoyed and very likely inebriated man. "I know how to speak English, you brat!" He snapped. "I just don't answer to the likes of you. Take a hint and scram!"
Ooh. Someone's got a temper.
"Excuse me?" She tilted her head to the side.
"It's bad enough I have to sit next to your kind—"
"Right. I'll leave." Arin said calmly, suppressing the urge to snipe at him or—god forbid—punch him in the face. There was really no point in exacerbating the argument. She racked her brain for a peaceful solution—and came up with a blank. Then she spotted the flight attendant. "When in doubt, tell a responsible adult." That was something every grownup—even the irresponsible ones—had told Arin at some point in her life. She shrugged. It couldn't hurt to try.
"Excuse me, ma'am!"
"Yes?" The flight attendant strode over to the pair, high heels clicking on the floor. She smiled somewhat condescendingly as she took note of Arin's age and appearance. "What can I do for you today?" She spoke extra slowly, as if Arin was a child that couldn't understand speech.
Arin smiled back, widening her eyes imploringly. Two could play that game. She deliberately pitched her voice an octave higher than usual. "I don't think this person next to me likes me very much. Can I find another place to sit or something? If I stay here," she lowered her voice, as if she was scared the man might hear her. (It was all an act, of course. The man was closer to her than the flight attendant was.) "I think he might…hit me."
The flight attendant gasped. "Sweetie, I understand you might be scared, but all the seats on this plane are fixed by your ticket. You'll have to pay extra if you want to upgrade to business class, but," she eyed Arin again. "I don't think that's an option for you, dear. Where are your parents?"
The man was either very drunk, very reckless or very stupid when he chose to jeer at her if front of the flight attendant. "Yeah, run off to your precious yellow parents, you little dog-eating whore—" Arin flinched as he shoved an offending finger in her face. The flight attendant, who seemed to finally realize the severity of the situation, opened her mouth in a wide O of shock. Her eyes widened and she quickly started muttering into her walkie-talkie, no doubt calling for reinforcements. "Right, I'm afraid we'll need you to come with us, Mr…?"
"Jamesson," the man muttered. Realization dawned on his face as his drunk self figured out what the flight attendant meant. "Whaddya' mean, come with you? Shouldn't this delinquent be the one to move?"
The flight attendant gazed uncertainly at Jamesson, whom Arin had already taken the liberty of dubbing as Jerkwad in her mind. It certainly suited him better than his original name. "Well, sir, we are required to take safety measures when passengers such as yourself turn violent—" Jerkwad thrashed in his seat, his entire body turning to face the attendant. The momentum of his overweight mass sent his flabby arms flailing randomly in the air. Unfortunately, the fat hand attached to one of said arms had managed to catch onto the nearest surface it could reach, which coincidentally happened to be Arin's face. The resounding SLAP it produced sent the entire cabin into deathly silence. There were some brief gasps of horror coming from the passengers nearby. One hand on her stinging cheek, Arin turned her head back from where it had been forcefully rotated by the slap to face the man, who did not look apologetic in the slightest.
"Sir, please remain calm—"
"I AM NOT LETTING THIS LITTLE BITCH FORCE ME OUT OF MY SEAT!" Jerkwad roared. The security guard had arrived in time to witness the whole fiasco and was physically restraining him, strapping him down to a nearby seat by the seatbelt. There was a whole lot of unnecessary force behind the movement that appeared to be originating from the flare of anger in the security guard's eyes. Apparently, no one liked grown men who slapped little girls for fun. Jerkwad had ceased struggling against the security guard's tender ministrations and turned his ire back on Arin.
"Dog-eater! Yellow vermin! You'll rot in hell for this, you fuckin' chink!"
The flight attendant asked her if she was alright. She really wasn't, but she thanked her all the same. The slap hadn't been entirely on purpose and didn't hurt a lot. Only her pride had suffered considerably from the blow. The shock hadn't subsided, but another emotion had started to take its place: anger. Red-hot coils of fury burned in the pit of her stomach.
What would Grace do in this situation?
Punch him, undoubtedly. Evan would do something similar. Unfortunately, that option wasn't available, (He really was too far away, and she doubted a girl of her size would do much damage to him) but it did spark some inspiration in Arin. She smiled grimly, the beginnings of a plan formulating in her head. Violence wasn't the answer, but humiliation would be as satisfactory. She had read one too many of those anecdotes online where a foreigner had automatically assumed someone of Chinese descent to know skills such as kung-fu and witchcraft. Most of them were purely for comedic relief, but she had a hunch that Jerkwad would fall for it.
"Unfortunately, we don't eat dogs. You'd be surprised to know what my kind do do, actually." She piped up, loud enough for Jamesson to hear. "For example, we curse vile men who insult children. My mama taught me this one. It does horrible things to the victim, of course." Jamesson's eyes bulged in anger—and a spark of fear that Arin didn't fail to catch. Vindictive glee filled her at the sight as she began tracing random Chinese characters in the air, chanting softly: "汉堡包，三明治，巧克力蛋糕，冰淇凌…"
("Hamburgers, sandwiches, chocolate cake, and ice cream…")
"What is this?" Jerkwad blustered, going white in the face. Some people nearby had caught on and were listening attentively, expressions of interest on their faces. A large portion of the people in the cabin had noticeably bristled when he had slapped Arin called her a slur. Now, they had a vested interest in witnessing him get his ass handed to him by the very girl he insulted. Even the flight attendant didn't try and stop her. Arin observed their reactions with muted giddiness.
"Don't you dare try your voodoo tricks on me, I've slapped you once, I'll do it again—"
"鸡蛋，鸭蛋，荷包蛋！" Arin bellowed, raising her voice above his. Her hand-waving was getting erratic, a sight which clearly alarmed the obese man.
("Eggs, duck eggs, and omelettes!")
"Why aren't you stopping her?!" The man's voice was a strangled whisper now as he jabbed a meaty finger at the flight attendant. "You! Waitress! Why aren't you shutting her up! She's a witch! She's going to kill us all!" The flight attendant, whom had shown signs of uncertainty at first, looked miffed at his treatment of her. She turned red and flounced away from him. (Yes, she actually flounced. Arin had never seen it before, and had to bite back laughter when it looked every bit as ridiculous as described in the books.) People were openly snickering at his discomfort by then. A third of the passengers understood Mandarin, and they explained to their neighbors what Arin was saying. No one told Jamesson. His rudeness and superstition had not done any favors with the already unsympathetic public, and now all they wanted to do was watch him squirm.
"JESUS! STOP! Stop, okay? I'm sorry!"
His face was now purple from his yelling. She had to stifle a giggle; all that blood rushing back and forth couldn't possibly have been good for him. She concluded her 'ritual' with with a triumphant flourish of her left hand: "小熊饼干!"
("Little Bear cookies!")
To her surprise, the cabin actually burst into applause. She was startled at first, but then her lips quirked into a small smile and she relaxed, basking in the glory of her victory. She even stood up for a small bow. Arin plopped back into her seat, radiating dark satisfaction. The flight attendant came back, wheeling a cart full of beverages. She skipped Jerkwad and made a beeline for her. "Coke or Sprite?"
"Sprite, please," Arin replied politely.
"Sprite it is," the flight attendant said with a smirk of her own. She winked at Arin and handed her a cup that—she noticed with a jolt—was noticeably larger than the rest. "Nice prank there you pulled." Arin accepted the cup gratefully. She glanced at Jamesson, who—despite the applause and the snickers—was too immersed in his own world of delusion to acknowledge that he had been tricked.
She took a large sip of the drink before hastily typing an incoherent text to Evan and pressed send before turning on airplane mode. Pointedly ignoring Jerkwad's glare, (He had finally figured it out) she popped her earbuds in and clicked on the first song she could find in her Spotify playlist.
The dulcet tones of We Are The Champions filled her head as the plane took off.
She landed unscathed, hooray.
Her stomach wasn't as lucky.
"I think I'm gonna regurgitate," she confided in the empty air next to her. It was weird, since she was relatively certain that she had slept through the duration of the flight, missing all of the nasty airplane food and therefore depriving her stomach of anything to upchuck. She chalked it up to airsickness. The flight attendant raised an eyebrow at her (definitively green) face. Arin managed a queasy smile and rippled her fingers in a small wave. She checked her phone. A conspicuous 4:55 glared back at her. Turning off airplane mode, she discovered 99+ unread messages. Thirty of them were from Grace, one was from Evan and the rest were in their shared group chat. She opted to check Evan's first.
Abirdissoarin: hrghsfghjktakignoff
Evenifiwerentawesome: hello to you too sunshine
She sent him back a crude gesture and a smiley face, just to annoy him.
"What is the purpose of your visit?"
"Sight-seeing." Arin replied blandly. Her knees trembled just from the effort of standing. She was afraid if she opened her mouth anymore she'd puke. Her airsickness seemed to be getting worse despite being on solid ground.
The lady at customs gave her a quizzical look.
"I study here. Scholarship to Midtown." She expanded. The slam of the stamp that followed sounded like Thor's avenging hammer pounding ruthlessly through her brain matter. "Your English is very good," the lady informed her.
Clutching at her head, Arin fought back another wave of nausea.
The suitcase was way too big for her as she lugged it through the airport. Her searching eyes raked through the small crowd assembled and spotted the sign: the words Arin Blake was scrawled on it in untidy letters. Her head swam just from reading it. The owner of the sign was a balding, middle-aged male in a suit. She squeezed her eyes shut. The sight alone was enough to bring another bout of vertigo to her overloaded brain. "Here," she managed to croak out. The man noticed her. His eyes lit up in recognition.
"You must be Miss Blake! It's a pleasure to meet you. The name's Toomes, but you can call me uncle Adrian if you want." He held out his hand for her to shake. Arin was dizzy with nausea, but she managed to grip it. Her insides squirmed violently. There's something other than queasiness, a sense of foreboding she couldn't quite put her finger on, but she managed to retain her manners despite her unease.
"Nice to meet you." She choked out in a strained voice.
"How was the plane ride?" He asked, then took one look at her face and chuckled. "Never mind, you don't need to talk." She must've been very green, as he mercifully did not comment or ask her any further questions. Arin gratefully followed him to his car and slumped in the backseat. Her mind, buzzing from the airsickness—she wasn't really sure if it was even airsickness at this point—was unresponsive to what was Toomes was saying, only catching snatches of speech here and there—
"—your father entrusted me to you as your legal guardian, and you'll be staying at mine for a while—"
The car turned sharply, throwing Arin against the window. She closed her eyes again despairingly.
By the time they eventually stopped at a building complex, she was ready to drop dead. Arin swayed dangerously in the elevator as Toomes pressed the button to the 22nd floor. They zoomed up, up into the sky at a dangerous speed, her vertigo getting worse than ever when they finally arrived. "We're here." Toomes announced as he threw the door open and ushered Arin in. "You can unpack upstairs. Bathroom's on the right, and there's a kitchen further in. I'll be visiting you once a week, and giving you your allowance from your father—"
"Where' you gonna live?" Arin slurred. She frowned. That was weird. She normally didn't speak like that. Maybe it was the sleepiness. But she had slept through a 15-hour flight….maybe she was sick. Even through the churning of her stomach, she could tell that something was very, very wrong. She stared without seeing at the thick layer of dust accumulated on the floor, the vacant living room devoid of furniture, and the grime on the walls. "There's no one living here.."
"Well, I do have other things to do…business trips, the such…I don't usually stay home."
"That's not it," she insisted, frowning. Her voice sounded dull, as if she was underwater. She remembered something her father had told her before she left, and she figured the problem out. "There's no one here. Dad told me you have a daughter…this isn't your home."
Toomes' expression was one of annoyance as he regarded her. "Ever the nosy brat, eh?" Arin froze as she heard the click of a gun. Cold metal pressed to her head, and all her sleepiness left her at once. He eyed her with contempt. "Looks like I should have told the flight attendant you a larger dose. Even drugged, you're incredibly meddlesome."
What? He had drugged her? How? She hadn't eaten any food on the plane, and the only thing she had ingested was the Sprite the attendant had given her, but all the passengers seemed to be fine, and they had drunk from the same bottles. Plus, the flight attendant had told her to choose between two beverages. How had she known she'd choose the Sprite? There was no way she'd drugged the entire cabin just so she could get to—then it hit her.
God, how could she be so stupid?
"You tampered with my cup," she groaned. How had she not been suspicious of the cup that had been so conspicuously different from the others? The flight attendant had been right to treat her like a brainless child; she certainly felt like one right now.
"Well, well, aren't you one smart cookie?" Toomes remarked. "Now, as much as I'm enjoying this little…conversation, my family will be wondering where I am. It really was nice meeting you, given the unfortunate circumstances, of course." Bile rise to her throat as the man twisted the gun brutally and removed it from her head.
"There never were bullets in this thing, by the way." He informed her smugly.
Arin's response was to puke on him.