Holding Pattern by Jenny Xie

Author:Jenny Xie [Xie, Jenny]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Penguin Publishing Group
Published: 2023-06-20T00:00:00+00:00

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• • •

My mother and I spent the day on the couch. She scanned the classifieds for jobs while I flipped through a fantasy novel, absorbing nothing. When it got dark, she didn’t pour herself a glass of wine, though I could hear her thinking about it.

It was Saturday, and I had missed call time for the musical; by this time, I should have been in costume and finishing with my warm-ups, alternating between lion face and lemon face. I hadn’t expected to be missed, but an hour before showtime, Andrew rapped at the door. He stood on the landing in all black, the uniform for stage crew members.

“Hey,” he said. “I said I’d come fetch you. Mr. Baker’s pissed.”

“Really? I didn’t think he’d notice.” I was elated to see Andrew. I couldn’t believe he was here, after the state he’d seen Marissa and me in.

“Of course he would. You’re essential up there!”

“I am not.”

“Okay, you’re strategically placed in front of Jacqueline, who has no idea what she’s doing.”

I laughed.

“Who is that?” My mother approached, stopping a few feet behind me.

“Mom, this is my friend Andrew.”

She was too far away for a handshake, so Andrew rubbed his chest with one hand and then raised it in a wave. “Hi, Mrs. Cheng. Nice to meet you.” He gave no indication that he’d seen her careening on all fours, and I felt a burst of relief and appreciation. No one knew what to say. Andrew broke the silence with: “Well, if you’re coming, you got to come now.”

“Ni yao chu nali ah?”

“I’m supposed to perform tonight,” I explained.

“What! You not tell me,” she said in English, for Andrew’s benefit.

“My brother’s waiting in the car,” he said.

I scrambled to collect my things and then hastened down the stairwell. Andrew brushed my lower back with his palm and said under his breath, “Everything okay?”

I nodded, thrilling under his touch. There was such care in it, and tenderness. No boy had touched me there before. An echo of pleasure ricocheted around my body.

“Stop!” I looked behind me and saw my mother coming down the walkway. “So stupid, you not tell me about play! All you practicing for nothing.”

“You don’t have to come,” I said.

She swatted away the suggestion and opened the car door.

Andrew’s brother, Mike, had the radio tuned to a brash pop-punk song. As we pulled away from the apartment and Andrew pumped his fist in the air, I let out a laugh that sounded carefree but soured as it died. A great loneliness had broken for my mother and me, but I couldn’t see what would come to take its place. I couldn’t know that my mother would get a job at the perfume bar and quit drinking in tottering spurts over the next decade. Or that Andrew and I would kiss and squirm in the very back seat that I now kneaded with my palms. All I knew with certainty was that by the end of the night, I would

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