AN AMERICAN DREAM

Chapter 1 - Tiger Balm

I’ve read that teens have a deficient prefrontal cortex. Our brains are still developing and that makes us do stupid things. That’s my excuse. So, what’s Mom’s excuse.

In a matter of hours, Mom can be anyone. Her emotions change like the weather in the desert. One moment it’s flash floods drowning us in memories and next it’s sweltering heat exhausting me into submission. She oscillates from remembering that she loves me to hating me for ruining her life.

Mom. Spineless tyrant.

Repentant pimp. Pitiful.

Survivor. Helpless.

It’s been thirty minutes since Mom hit a new octave with her scream punctuated with a whack from her ringed hand. The cut on my face stopped bleeding, but my cheek throbs like the mouth of a suffocating fish. She’s now attacking the grout in the kitchen counter that won’t ever turn white, while I sit on our donated couch watching TV. I peek at the wadded dishrag I’ve held against my cheek.

On TV, CNN blasts more breaking news — another group of terrorists blew up a café. Targeted acts of violence. I scoff. Watching it keeps me from competing in the whose-life-sucks-more contest. It’s just life. Isn’t it?

Mom’s been both director and actor in our lifetime drama since Dad left us. Our story’s been stuck since then. It’s take number 3,650. Defeated by the grouts; Mom’s regained her voice. She’s born again. Om-ma to the rescue with her ever-ready trusty tin of Tiger Balm. 

It’s not enough time for me to have forgiven but as if on cue she comes to me.

Repentant Mom. “Odi-bo-ja,” Om-ma says to take a look at my face, and then sits next to me. We only speak Korean to each other. Om-ma gave up learning English before she even started.

I let go of my cheek and stare at the faded wall. I should protest, but I don’t. That gets old after so many times. It would be a lie if I said I didn’t care for her attention. Because I do. More than anything. Even after all the hurt.

She touches the cut. I cringe, but sit still. She palms my face, but doesn’t really see me. She’s thinking of my father.

“Whe ni A-ppa rul ggok dal-mut ni?” Om-ma asks.

I say nothing. The answer is always the same. I look like my A-ppa because I’m his child. I wish she’d stop loving him.

Mom puts her forefinger in the little golden tin of herbal ointment and swipes out a small dab. It smells like minty vinegar.

I stop thinking about Dad before my dammed tear ducts breach again. Instead, I imagine Mom in an infomercial. She’s conducting a performance of synchronized swimming with a dozen of my clones in a pool of liquid Tiger Balm. We dive, pirouette, and float out in a bubble like Glinda from the Wizard of Oz. Fully healed. Smile.

Om-ma mistakes the smirk on my face for something other than pity. “Your father was so handsome. Grace, you are like him.” She lifts my chin and smears the balm across my cheekbones. “You have his big eyes. It’s a gift. Do you know how many girls get plastic surgery to have eyes like yours?”

The sting from the Tiger Balm gives me a voice. “Om-ma, do you think being pretty ensures happiness? We should spend all of our money on plastic surgery if that’s the answer.”

Om-ma puts an arm around my shoulders and pulls me into her. “You know, Grace, I am really sorry.”

“Is that why you’re a born-again Christian? Always sorry.” I didn’t mean to say it, but it slipped out.

Om-ma takes her arm away and clasps her hands together. There are chips on her taupe-polished nails. Looking down, she says, “Grace.” I’m not sure if she’s calling me or praying. Darn. She’s doing it again. Pitiful Mom.

I need to leave the apartment. But, seeing her slumped posture, I can’t help it. I take her face into my hands. “Om-ma, being sorry hasn’t made a difference in our lives.”

“I am going to try harder,” Om-ma says.

I hate those words. “Oh, I know. I am going to try harder too. I am sorry for being disrespectful.” I let go of her face, sit next to her and put one arm around her, but turn my cheek away as she tries to touch my face again.

“Om-ma did not mean to hit you there,” she says, referring to herself in the third person as if hitting me anywhere else would’ve been fine. Om-ma takes my hand and examines my fingers, one finger at a time. She measures my hand against hers. Then, she gets to work, dabbing Tiger Balm on all my bruises. When she’s done, she says, “You know, I love you.” These words propel her through a time machine that resets everything. She kisses the side of my face.

“Yes,” I say in near silence.

“Promise me you’ll keep using the Tiger Balm. We don’t want a scar on your face.” She hands me the small tin. “Mr. Lee’s son fell in love with your picture.”

Useless Pimp. Just when I thought it was over, Mom’s added a forgotten scene to our script. “Why do you have to bring him up?” My words blister. “You’re marrying me off to a cripple. You should’ve killed me when you had the chance.” I catch her eyes. Wounded. Her lips part, but I press on. “Don’t say it. I don’t even want to know his name.”

I slap the tin to the floor, but she catches my hand and holds it. As she searches into my eyes, a scream from the teakettle in the kitchen breaks the silence, and I pull away and lock myself in the bathroom. “Arranged marriages don’t happen in America.” I don’t know if she hears me. The whistling stops. In the mirror, my cut’s open — deciding if it’ll weep or toughen up. I finger it gingerly and decide it needs liquid adhesive. I fish out a vial from my cosmetic bag and drip a drop onto the wound and hold it together.

“Have some tea. Speak with me,” Om-ma says when I step into the living room. “Where are you going?”

I leave without answering. It’s early evening. Outside, all around me, the dented-metal-link-fences and broken-window-buildings tease me. Even the cracks in the asphalt. My feet know where to go. Somewhere beautiful. Far away from home.

I have school tomorrow, but I don’t care. I’m at the bus stop. There’s a family waiting there with three young kids. Two of the older boys are running around, laughing, while the mother grabs the youngest boy’s face with both of her hands, and kisses him over and over. Giggles. More giggles. The boy catches me staring and I look away. The father sits without a concern, smoking his cigarette. I move to the side, away from the smoke.

Sons. My father wanted them too, and being a girl became my fault.

A bus arrives, but it’s not mine. The little boy waves to me through the bus window and flicks his tongue. I want to ignore him, but instead scrunch my face and stick out my tongue at him too. Why do I want to pinch his face and make him cry?

A few minutes later, I get on a bus going West. The bus is near empty, but filled with my reflections on the windows that judge me from every direction. The route tours through the various neighborhoods in Los Angeles. From downtown, we pass a Swap Meet, 99 Cents Store, and several liquor stores with iron bars on windows and signs that look like mismatched puzzle pieces that say “Llamada Centroamérica.” “Checks Cashed.” A bit further, the signs are in Korean and billboards say “EZ Baccarat” high above the streets in between churches that look like storefronts. Then there are stretches of nondescript office buildings before the first synagogue appears and trees begin to line the sidewalks. Sculptures and palm trees replace advertisement as museums appear. Then it gets fancier. Rodeo Drive in Beverly Hills. Cartier, CHANEL, Louis Vuitton, Prada. Wall after wall of spotless windows. Brazen. No worries from vandalism. Even the displays are works of art. No loud posters begging to buy. Just clean white lines.

The same bus moves through all these neighborhoods everyday as if it belongs. But, I don’t belong. Like TV, I watch through the bus window the world that passes me by — Beverly Hills, Century City, Brentwood, and Westwood.

The bus line ends at Santa Monica Beach. I get off and walk along the boardwalk. Waves lap the edges of the beach. It’s low tide. Sand stretches far into the black ocean at sunset. The glow lingers beyond the horizon, eager to leave me behind.

People stroll, enjoying the evening. Even the homeless are content lying on the green in the middle of the plaza. Groups of people walk and jog along the water’s edge. A family with a big yellow dog plays catch in the shallow waves. The parents splash and high five each other and the kids fuss over who gets to reward and scratch behind the dog’s ears. I wonder if my life would’ve been better as a dog.

My legs are tired after having walked to the end of the boardwalk and back. I sit on an empty stretch of the beach and gaze at the horizon. Korea is on the other side of the Pacific, and I ask the ocean the same question I’ve asked so many times in the past. “Does anyone miss me there?”

The question had been for my grandmother who died a while ago. Before, there was no answer. Now, I hear seagulls cackling on the beach. I can no longer ask this question. Mom and Mr. Lee have ruined even my solitude. The answer now is a yes — there is someone waiting for me, missing me before we’ve even met. Mr. Lee’s son, bound in a wheelchair, yearning for a wife. I feel sorry for him, but going back to Korea will jeopardize the only sacred memories I have of my childhood. I don’t need a reality check on it. I need them as they are because life can’t be hopeless.

I sit watching the waves surrender when the family with the yellow dog comes towards me. All this empty space and they choose to sit near me. It’s as if I had a sign over my head that said “Pick Me.” They’re laughing, enjoying the evening — ruining my self-pity session. God. How can I soak in the angst with so much laughing going on? I get up and walk back toward the less fortunate.

The homeless are settling down for the night underneath the giant Magnolia tree in the green. Looking at them, I know Mom’s right. I owe her. I’ve been her burden all of these years and all I can think about is leaving her. It’s time to go home. Pity session’s over. I take a deep breath. Reset.

It’s Sunday. I don’t want to miss tonight’s prime time TV. I run after a bus turning around to go East.

When I get off the bus, there’s a light breeze and I smell the fantasies the ones that can’t go home create. With their paper bags in hand, they loiter on side-streets. Some stand in clumps and others sit alone against the side of buildings like dead flies on a window ledge. I walk several blocks past the loners until I see a row of mismatched aging homes tucked away on a quiet street lost in the warehouse district. Our one-bedroom converted storage unit is home.

Mom’s already asleep when I enter the bedroom. She snores. There’s a collection of empty Bud Light cans on the floor next to her. I close the door and snuggle into the