Chapter 12 Mama Knows Best
Mama Knows Best
Yua’s been so busy with work and her apprenticeship that I haven’t heard from her in a few days.
My heart deflates every time I check my phone, hoping to see her name on my screen, only to stare at a wallpaper of my friends back in DC.
And even though I keep telling myself that she’s too busy to respond, I still can’t seem to shake her from my mind.
All I want to know is how she’s feeling, what she’s doing, and when I’m going to see her again.
But all I can do is stay busy and try not to let those thoughts distract me from what I came here for.
I’m filling the void Yua left behind by video calling Ma. It’s late at night for me and early morning for her. Ma is heating up a bowl of leftover beef noodle soup while I sew the final details of my yukata.
Finally, Ma sits by the coffee table with the soup steaming her face.
I’ve been in Tokyo for almost three weeks now, and already, the deep chestnut furniture in my own living room looks foreign to me.
It seems like she’s rearranged the shelves while I’ve been away.
At least Ma hasn’t killed our money tree yet.
It’s still sitting on the windowsill behind her.
From my angle, it kind of resembles a leafy green parrot resting on her shoulder.
“I’ve never seen you sew something so colorful before,” Ma notes, blowing into her bowl. “I’m proud of you for trying something new.”
A blush brightens my cheeks. Ugh—thanks for bringing back my red undertones, Ma.
For real, though, I’m glad she’s proud of me. She worked hard to get me here.
“Thanks, but this is only an assignment,” I say over the hum of my sewing machine. “I technically haven’t started on the essay portion of my application yet.”
“No, I’m talking about those designs you sent me pictures of.
What made you want to venture away from only using black and lace?
” Ma asks. She sips her broth, and I vicariously experience the warmth of beef noodle soup sliding into my own stomach.
Man, I miss her cooking. “I haven’t forgotten your rant about how textures are what makes a black dress pop.
And remember that time you stayed up until three in the morning so you could bid on a single yard of black ribbon? That’s commitment.”
The sewing machine vibrates as I stitch the yukata’s obi together. The belt of a yukata is the easiest part—at least it is on this simple design. But I can’t lose focus and risk sewing off the line I’ve pinned together.
“I still love black and lace,” I say, feeding the inside-out fabric through the foot of my sewing machine. “It’s just that…someone inspired me to branch out.”
I don’t need to look at my phone to see how stiff Ma is. “Who?”
My lips coil into a smile against my will. It was only a matter of time before I told Ma about my date with Yua. I lift my foot off the sewing machine pedal, and with that, the room falls into silence. “Actually, Ma, I have something to tell you.”
Ma stops with the bowl of soup halfway to her lips, eyes wide. “What happened?”
I know how Ma’s going to react. It might be best to lower the volume on my phone before I speak, so I do exactly that. Once my phone is resting on my desk again, I finally take a deep breath and say, “I met someone who inspires me. In fact, she took me on my first date and—”
Even with the volume set to the lowest level, Ma’s scream-cry-giggle noise blows out the speakers.
She drops her bowl of soup onto the coffee table, and the broth sloshes over.
She leaps into the air and twirls around.
Her words are a mix of Mandarin and English, but I can’t make sense of either because my phone’s speakers are rattling so much it’s shaking my desk.
Yeah. That’s about what I expected.
Ma snatches up the phone. She’s pacing now, and there’s a sheen of sweat on her hairline. “Who is she? Did you kiss? Are you in love?”
I recoil until my head tucks into my shoulders like a turtle. Like Ma, I know I’ve fallen into infatuation quickly. Too quickly. And I don’t know why. The romantic in me wants to sail away into the horizon. But the realist in me knows that there is no horizon. There’s only more and more ocean.
“No,” I finally say. Because it would be impossible to be in love with someone I’ve only gone on one date with.
Ma freezes, and for a moment, I imagine it’s because my Wi-Fi buffered. There’s something in the way her jaw goes slack that makes me feel like I told her I need a root canal.
“You’re my daughter. How can you not be in love? We love love.”
I chuckle to myself before telling Ma all about the way Yua and I clicked from our first conversation.
I share how fascinated I was by the fact that someone with such an honorable family name could wear tattoos, which are frowned upon, like a badge of pride.
And that the more I understand her, the more inspired I become.
I end my recap with my date at Chidorigafuchi Park.
Because after experiencing the world through Yua’s gaze, how can I not keep filling my own with color?
By the time I’ve told her everything, Ma’s shaking in her seat like a dog wagging her tail.
“It sure sounds like you’re in love,” Ma says with a silly grin.
I roll my eyes and finish the final stitches of my yukata’s obi. “Ma, I’m not in love with someone I just met.”
Ma waves a hand at me. “You’re being too illogical about this.”
I’m pretty sure she means logical, but I catch her drift.
Ma grins, and I have a feeling she’s going to quote some lyrics from an eighties goth-rock ballad to emphasize how deeply I’ve fallen for Yua.
“You and I are lovers of love, but we experience it differently,” Ma continues, cheeks plump like apples when she smiles. “You look at love like a puzzle. I look at it like a choice. You get to decide when you’re in love, and no one can tell you otherwise.”
My head cocks to the side. I get to decide when I’m in love.
I’ve never thought of it that way. For the most part, I’ve filled my head with love through lyrics to different Neck Lace songs.
Love is a dagger—a work of art that can defend or destroy.
Love is a rose that needs nourishing, but when left to die, it’s still beautiful in a new way.
Love is the full moon on a cloudless night, the only sure thing in the darkness.
But love has always been something else. Anything other than mine.
“So, tell me.” Ma’s smiling so hard that her skin is as red as an apple, too. “What do you decide?”
I swallow hard. There’s no wrong answer here.
I’m the author of my romance, and I get to decide how I feel.
For some reason—I already know. Love is unconditional.
It doesn’t end when the summer does. It doesn’t stay in Tokyo while I go back to Washington, DC.
And those are some very real conditions that my relationship with Yua comes with.
“No.” My head wins again. “I’m not in love, but I think I’m in like.”
Ma recoils as if I’ve squirted her with a water gun. “What do you mean, in like? Is this another one of the slangs you kids use these days?”
I chuckle. Slang is too mainstream, and like Yua, I refuse to conform. But I get what Ma’s saying.
“No, being in like means that you—you know—like someone. You want to be with them, but you aren’t ready for that commitment yet,” I say, ignoring the way my stomach knots.
“Or, well, that’s what it means to me, anyway.
I like Yua. More than I thought I could like someone, actually.
But I can’t commit to her because I’m going to college in New York, and she’s training to be a tattoo artist here. ”
Ma gapes at me for a long moment. She doesn’t even blink. Just when I’m about to check the Wi-Fi connection, she speaks. “Do you feel this way…because of me?”
“Wha— No!” I sputter the response like a reflex, even though I know it’s true. “Why would this have anything to do with you?”
Ma glances out the kitchen window—at least, I imagine that’s what she’s doing. She’s paced so much that she’s not in the living room anymore. “Do you think my relationships are shallow?”
I roll my eyes in exasperation. “You know that’s not what I mean.”
Ma blinks as if waiting for me to explain.
But nothing comes to mind. If this isn’t what I mean, then what am I trying to say?
I love my ma. There’s no way I’d tell her she’s going about love in all the wrong ways.
Who am I to tell Ma what her definition of love is?
She said so herself—we experience love differently.
And yet…I wonder. Because of Ma’s dating habits, she’s seen guy after guy.
No boyfriend lasts more than a few weeks.
A couple months at most. So then…was my father just another one of those whirlwind love affairs?
Did he mean anything real to my mother? Did she mean anything to him?
And what does that mean for me—someone born from what she considers love but I, truthfully, think of as lust?
My stomach knots like I’m hungry and nauseous at the same time. “Are you happily dating—um—sorry, I can’t remember the name of your current boyfriend?”
“Philip.”
“Right.” I’ve forgotten his name by the time I sound out the t. “Are you happy with…him?”
Ma shrugs nonchalantly as if I’ve just asked her what she thinks about grilled cheese sandwiches. “I don’t know. I guess I’ve never really thought about what I want out of a relationship. I’ve always thought about making the other person happy. And when they stop being happy, I leave.”
Ma crosses back into the living room, where she takes a seat by the coffee table once more. Steam no longer rises from the soup, but she stares at it like it’ll give her all the answers to an AP Trigonometry exam.
“What about you?” Ma asks, changing the subject. “Are you happy dating Yua?”