PENNY.
It was the big day. Penny considered feeling sad. It was supposed to be bittersweet, wasn’t it? Leaving home and going off to college was A Thing. She blinked for moisture—no dice. Along the lines of having a sneeze you can’t find or an itch that lives too deep under the skin, college felt surreal, conceptually out of reach. Even the application process felt like it was happening to someone else. It was unimaginable that there would be any consequences to filling out the forms and writing the essay. She applied to only one place—the University of Texas at Austin—and got in. By law. Everyone in the top ten percent of their Texas high school did.
Penny’s new phone chimed next to her on the bed. It was Mark.
Good luck baby!
Text me when you get there!
Penny rolled onto her back and smiled. She considered what to write back. The screen beneath her thumbs was so shiny. God, her phone was beautiful. Rose gold, in a black rubber case that read, Whatever, Whatever, Whatever, it was easily nicer than anything she’d ever owned. She wiped down a smudge with her T-shirt. It was way too pretty to be desecrated with nudes. Especially with a 2436-by-1125-pixel resolution at 458ppi. Penny sent a generic smile emoji back.
She went downstairs. While Penny’s walls were bare, every other surface in Celeste’s home, much like her car or her desk at work, was covered with keepsakes.
According to Penny, her mom wasn’t very mom-like, much less Asian-mom-like. It wasn’t solely that she dressed like a fashion blogger and was younger than other moms. Celeste didn’t monitor Penny’s homework or insist on piano lessons. Okay, so maybe Penny’s idea of an Asian mom came from the movies, but she hadn’t grown up with a lot of Asians in her life. Let alone Koreans specifically. Penny had a Korean name and it was bogus. It was “Penny”—not even Penelope—spelled out phonetically in Korean characters so it didn’t actually mean anything.
When she was three they’d visited her grandparents in Seoul, but she’d been too little to remember anything and they’d never gone back. Celeste did, however, dedicate a Korean corner in her home. An altar of sorts. It included a miniature Korean flag and a framed poster of the 1988 Olympics with the cartoon tiger mascot. There was also a small laminated picture of the pop star Rain in a white suit from years before he went into the military for mandatory service. The first time Penny’s friend Angie came over, she asked her if it was a photo of her brother.
Elsewhere in the house there were snow globes galore, Eiffel Towers of varying sizes and framed pictures of World-Famous Art—two renditions of Van Gogh’s Starry Night (one on a tea towel), Monet’s water lilies, and several of Degas’s blurry ballerinas. Penny called the whole lot “fridge magnet art.” Stuff you’d seen enough times that you could imagine the factory workers in China rolling their eyes about having to keep churning it out.
The only memento Penny prized was a framed picture of her parents. She’d carefully wrapped it in a T-shirt and stowed it in her backpack to bring to school. It was the only photo she had of them, possibly the only one in existence, and Penny treasured it. It was the source of 50 percent of the material in her “dad” dossier. Other information included:
1. Penny’s mom and dad had met, of all places, in a bowling alley on dates with other people.
2. Her dad had a cute butt (Celeste’s words) because he played baseball in high school.
3. They were inseparable. Until, of course, they weren’t.
4. He was Korean too!
5. His name was Daniel Lee and as far as Penny knew he lived in Oregon or Oklahoma. It could have been Ohio. In any case, it started with an O.
6. In those three states combined there were 315 Daniel Lees. Some were probably white. Or perhaps black.
In the picture, Penny’s parents are at the beach at Port Aransas. They’re kids. Celeste hasn’t visibly changed over the years (Asian don’t raisin) except her face was rounder then, fuller in the cheeks and lips. They’re sitting on a black and yellow Batman beach towel. Daniel Lee has a straw cowboy hat perched on his head but no shirt. Celeste’s wearing a trucker hat that says PORN STAR, a bright red bikini, legs crisscrossed, and she’s grinning behind huge white sunglasses while holding an ICEE. Celeste swears the ICEE must have been a pregnancy craving since blue raspberry usually makes her gag. To Penny, it’s cosmically unfair that her mom’s tummy can be that flat while she’s pregnant, but then it’s hardly fair that her dark-eyed father would skip town two months before Penny was born either.
“He was the funniest guy I’d ever met,” Celeste said when Penny unwrapped the parcel on her eighth birthday. “He asked the best questions.” Penny had been asking a lot of questions for a genealogy assignment. She wanted to know everything (mostly as it related to her)—whether he asked about Penny, if he had another family with brothers and sisters for her to play with, when she could see him. But Penny could tell Celeste hated talking about him. She became withdrawn and went to her room with a headache. So Penny shoved the questions to the back of her brain and never brought him up again. The photo, she kept in a drawer.
Downstairs, Celeste was sniffling in the kitchen, as she’d been when Penny went to bed. Penny suspected a performative aspect to her mom’s crying. Comparable to YouTubers sobbing during heavily edited confessional vlogs, Celeste bawled lustily during the semifinals of reality singing competitions and any movie involving animals. Penny would rather eat a pound of hair than reveal her true emotions. Not to mention how Penny wasn’t sure she’d be able to stop once she got going.
“Mom?”
Celeste glanced up from the wadded tissues in her hands. Her eyes were puffy as if she actually had been crying all night.
“Hi, baby.” She smiled before crumpling again. “Can I please come with you? I could buy you lunch. Help you decorate?”
“I can buy my own lunch,” Penny said. “Plus, you’d have to trail me in your car and drive all the way back by yourself. I’d have to get back in my car and follow you to make sure you got home safe. A vicious cycle.”
Celeste swallowed. “You know, I didn’t know it would hurt this bad?” She seemed genuinely surprised. Celeste’s narrow shoulders quivered like an agitated Chihuahua. Penny sighed and hugged her. She was going to miss her.
Oh, shit. Am I going to cry?
She squeezed her eyes tighter for any reciprocal condensation.
Nope.
“Well, I’m proud of you,” Celeste said, pulling away and smiling bravely.
Penny peered down at her. Celeste seemed small. Feeble really. And damp. In the afternoon light, in jeans and a faded T-shirt that read SLAY HUNTY, Celeste resembled an incoming freshman as much as Penny did.
It was sad that things had gotten so bad between them. When Penny was in grade school, they’d been thick as thieves. Back when the greatest excitement Penny could imagine was having a Starbucks salted caramel mocha for breakfast, Penny thought she was so lucky to have her mom as her best friend. She could stay up late, wear makeup, borrow her mom’s clothes, and dye her hair any color of the rainbow—life was a riot—a never-ending slumber party. In middle school Penny started to see things differently. She no longer texted her mother a thousand times a day for outfit approval or advice. Celeste and Penny became a study in contrasts. Celeste was proud of her well-mannered, studious daughter, teaching her how to forge her name on letters from school and getting Penny her own credit card for “fashion emergencies.” Celeste encouraged Penny to get her hardship driver’s license at fifteen, not because they needed her to but because Celeste thought it would bolster Penny’s popularity to drive her friends around. The harder Celeste tried, the more Penny pulled away. If anything, Penny resented that Celeste had decided somewhere along the way that her daughter could parent herself.
Penny walked to the driveway with her mom trailing her. She turned for a one-armed hug. Imagining herself as part of an animal control unit lassoing a python in a studio apartment, she held Celeste’s gaze with her own the whole time. Then—with no sudden movements—she deftly popped the car door open with her free hand and slid in.
Seat belt fastened, Penny eased out of the driveway and into freedom. Part of her dreaded going to college alone. In the Instagram Stories version, her dad would haul her boxed-up belongings in a big truck. They’d argue about what to play on the way there and he’d give up the aux cord, since he’d miss her so much. As he left, he’d get choked up, handing her fifty dollars while mumbling something about making good time, and Penny would know deep in her heart how much he loved her.
“I love you, baby!” wailed Celeste, jolting Penny from her thoughts.
Penny rolled down her window. “I love you too, Mommy. I’ll call you later. I promise.”
This time Penny did feel a pang. Her nose got that stinging, chlorine feeling you get right when you’re about to cry. She checked her rearview to see her already small mom getting smaller, waving big.
• • •
An hour and a half later, Penny pulled into the curved driveway at Kincaid.
“Jesus,” she whispered, clutching her steering wheel to gaze up at the building. Kincaid was among the oldest dorms at UT, and it was hideous. Penny wondered if you could feel the ugliness from the inside. Boasting eight floors painted in alternating blue and salmon layers, it resembled a Miami hotel from the 1970s more than a dorm. Eighty units of eyesore that were the tackiest part of the campus skyline. The lurid hues reminded Penny of kicky animal-print scrubs favored by pediatric oncologists. It was the upbeatness that made the whole thing depressing.
Throngs of anxious parents and freshmen huddled around SUVs carting enormous plastic bins, laundry baskets, and floor lamps. Just as Penny rolled down her window to scope the scene, a freckly brunette stuck her face into her car until they were nose-to-nose. Her eyes were bulbous, glinting with a helpfulness that bordered on menacing.
“Name?” yawped the girl. Penny smelled Fritos on her breath.
“Lee,” she supplied. “Penelope.”
“Hmm . . . Lee?” She drew her finger down her clipboard and then tapped it. “Ah,” she said triumphantly. “There you are, sweetie.”
Ugh. Sweetie. This chick was nineteen tops.
The girl’s eyes flickered over Penny’s red lipstick. Penny had found it with a note to “smile more!” in her backpack pocket. Celeste had a habit of tucking cosmetics or clipped-out articles about the effects of positive thinking among Penny’s things. Sneak-attack gifts that felt like criticism.
“Sweetie?” Penny sang back. “Can you back up a smidge? You’re practically inside of my face with your face?” She said it exactly how she imagined the girl would, with everything going up in a question.
There was no way Little Miss Texas Corn Chip was going to “sweetie” her into submission.
The girl swiftly withdrew her head.
“Oh my God?” she chirped, bleached teeth gleaming. “So many of the parents literally can’t hear me? I’ve been yelling for hours?” The girl inspected Penny’s lipstick again. “Wait. I’m obsessed with how matte that is. What is it?”
“Isn’t it fabulous?” Penny enthused, reaching for the tube in her bag. “Too Thot to Trot?” she read off the sticker on the bottom. Christ, she felt as if saying makeup names out loud set women’s rights back several decades.
“Ugh! I knew it! I love Staxx lip kits? You know T-T-T-T’s sold out everywhere, right? Why are the good reds always quickstrike?”
“Ugh, right?!” exclaimed Penny, who had no idea what she was talking about. “It’s the worst?” The girl rolled her eyes theatrically in agreement.
“Okay, so you’re in 4F,” she said, drumming her shellacked nails on her clipboard. “Elevators are toward the back. And you can unload anywhere you can see a blue sign. Buuuuuuuut . . .”
She placed a purple laminated pass on her dash. “This buys you parking for the rest of the day. Just return it to the front desk when you’re done.”
“Thank you?” said Penny brightly. “You’re a lifesaver?”
The girl beamed. “I know?”
Penny’s face strained from the false cheer. It was frankly impressive that Celeste’s addiction to trendy makeup and some doofus imprinting on her like a baby farm animal could land her parking privileges. More yakking and some thigh-slapping laughter at dad-jokes scored Penny a hand truck from her neighbor down the hall. Rules for friendliness were a racket. In no time, college Penny would be as adored as Celeste. Granted, she’d have to get a lobotomy to keep it up, but maybe the exchange rate was worth it.
When Penny swung her door open, she noticed the following: Her room smelled of Febreze with a top note of musty carpet. It was discouragingly small to be shared with another person. Plus, it was already inhabited by a dark-haired girl sitting on the bed by the window. A girl who was not her roommate. Penny and Jude Lange had Skyped twice over the summer, and this chick with indoor sunglasses and a wide-brim Coachella hat was not her. The girl neglected to glance up from her phone.
“Hello?” Penny began lugging her stuff in.
The girl silently continued typing.
Penny cleared her throat.
Finally, the girl removed her oversized bedazzled sunglasses to get a glimpse of Penny. She had famous-people eyebrows and wore a tan suede vest with foot-long tassels.
“Where’s Jude?” the girl asked in a manner that suggested Penny worked there.
“Uh, I don’t know.”
The girl rolled her eyes and returned to her phone.
Penny glared and once again wished her hostility could incinerate people.
Possible responses to a possible home invader who was possibly a maniac and possibly has a switchblade under her hat:
1. Fight her.
2. Start screaming and pull your own hair to signal that you’re even crazier and not to be trifled with.
3. Introduce yourself and find out more information.
4. Ignore her.
Unsurprisingly, Penny chose the path of least resistance. She grabbed her toiletry bag out of her suitcase and made a beeline for the bathroom. It was the size of a closet. You could’ve washed your hair while sitting on the toilet by leaning into the shower stall. Penny placed her bag on the toilet tank, figured it was perilously close to potential pee splash-back and set it on the side of the sink.
From another stash bag, she pulled out a roll of toilet paper, a microbe-free shower curtain, a toothbrush holder that didn’t have a well on the bottom where water could collect, a brand-new shower mat, and towels. Penny arranged everything exactly the way that made sense. TP was hung in the correct direction (“over” obviously; “under” was for murderers).
When she was done, she marched back out and went for option three. “Penelope Lee, Penny,” she said, extending her hand to the girl.
The girl stood up and considered Penny’s paw with distaste until Penny was forced to lower it. Penny’s eyeline was to her boob (option one would not have been cute). “Mallory Sloane Kidder,” she said, still typing on her phone. “Though I’m in the process of changing my name to Mallory Sloane. Professionally.”
Mallory had symmetrically winged eyeliner, thick hips, and pointy metallic nails. Penny didn’t know what “professionally” implied.
“Actor,” Mallory Sloane (formerly Kidder) said briskly. She sat back down and crossed her legs. Her nails tap-danced furiously as she texted. “I’ve done off-off-off-Broadway.”
Penny wondered about the jurisdiction of off-off-off-Broadway. It probably had nothing to do with actual Broadway in New York. With enough imagination, hyphens, and prepositions, the corner of East César Chávez and Chicon could probably qualify as off-Broadway.
“Uh, rad,” Penny said.
Mallory held up a finger to indicate for her to wait.
“It’s Jude,” she said, typing into her phone. “Your roommate.”
“Cool.”
“She’s my best friend, you know.”
Tappedy, tappedy tap.
“Since we were six.”
Penny rolled her eyes. Quickly so she wouldn’t get her ass beat by this giant.
“Is everything okay?”
Mallory held up her finger again. Penny wondered how much force it would require to break it in three places.
“She wants us to meet her at a coffee shop on the Drag.”
There had to be some rule against moving to a second location with a stranger. For all Penny knew, her new roommate and this obnoxious broad could be “best friends” from a fetish message board that specialized in cutting up Asian girls for hot dogs. It was all so typical. Penny was at college ten minutes and she was already the third wheel.
“Let’s go.” Mallory set about collecting her things and then looked at a dawdling Penny as if she were stupid.
“Look, they have donuts.”
Penny grabbed her backpack.
Mallory Sloane Kidder might have been an asshole, but her argument was airtight.