'Oh.' Mike was silent for a while, thinking about what could be worse.
'You know what I have to do now?' she said.
'You have to hit every hospital in the metropolitan area looking for white-Chinese combination babies.'
'Tristate area. The whole world, if I have to. Mike, I don't think I believe in mixed.' That's what she'd come to tell him. She flushed some more.
'Mixed marriages, mixed love affairs, mixed drinks, what?' Suddenly he was angry.
'You know what I mean,' she said softly.
'I know that's the prejudice that keeps all the wars going,' he said evenly. 'But sometimes you don't choose who you're going to fall for.' He gave her a look to calm her down, but she wasn't buying.
'Don't give me that. It's not prejudice. I lost a friend. I lost my parents, everything,' she cried.
'What are you talking about, you lost your parents? Are you nuts?'
'My mother's giving me the silent treatment. I went
home, no one's there. I call, no one answers the phone. Ever had your mother boycott you?' she asked.
'No, mine wouldn't know how. What's her beef?'
'You are.' April put her hand to her mouth and closed her eyes. 'I can't take it.'
Mike sat up. He'd never seen that expression on her face before. 'You going to cave for your freaking parents? That's
'I'm not making this up, Mike. She's wiping me out.'
'Nah, she wouldn't do that.'
'Yes, she would. She'd cut off her only daughter for face.'
Face! You couldn't fight Chinese and their crazy concept of face. Mike chewed nervously on his mustache. '
give me a hug. I'll help you with this. You want something to drink? Huh, how about a beer? You want to eat something? How about dinner?'
She shook her head again. 'Sorry to throw off your sex schedule.'
'Oh, don't do that.' What was this? What was in her head here? Suddenly he needed a beer. He got up a little self-consciously and padded into the kitchen. In the refrigerator, he found a six-pack of Dos Equis. He came back with the tops popped on two and handed her one. She put hers on the floor without taking even a sip.
Mike swallowed some beer. 'You want me to talk to your parents?'
'What can you tell them, that your intentions of ruining their precious Han daughter are honorable?'
'I could tell them we love each other and want to get married sometime within the millennium.' Mike handed her back the baby picture.
'That's dishonorable. It would bring on World War Three.'
'You told me World War Three has already started.'
'It has.'
'If they're boycotting you, how do you know something else isn't going on?'
'Like what?'
Mike shrugged. The Woos had a complicated variety of relationships with people they called sister-cousins, old uncles, young uncles, aunts, grandfathers, and grandmothers they weren't even related to but who nonetheless had the power of family members to one-up and torture them. Could be some crisis had come up with one of these nonrelative relatives.
'I have a feeling they'll get over it,
Why don't you ask me to dinner?'
'I can't do that, Mike. They're not at home. They're not speaking to me.'
Most people were glad to get a little relief from their parents. But the silence seemed to unsettle April more than was absolutely necessary. He felt bad for her. 'So leave them a note. Let me spend a little time with them. Trust me on this. They'll get used to me.'
'Oh, they'll never get used to you. They're going to make me pay. You're costing me.' A ghost of a smile played on her lips.
The sun was going to come out. 'And the lost friend? Who might that be?' he teased.
'You. Chicks and guys can work together—I guess—but once you turn the corner into the other thing, God, it's babies and marriage and—nothing but trouble.' She shook her head. 'I hate this.'
She loved it, but he wasn't going to argue. 'You want to hear about my case?' he asked.
'Sure.'
'Guess who was the last person to see Schlomo alive?'
'A queer. A transvestite.'
He jumped away from her in shock. 'Oh come on, who told you?'
She laughed suddenly. 'No one told me. I was kidding. A transvestite, really?'
'He/she. Could be he castrated him for a souvenir, but it's hard to buy.' Mike finished the beer and rolled the empty can around in his hands thoughtfully. 'I'm looking for missing sex organs and you're looking for a missing baby. Your parents aren't speaking to you, and you're scared to death about race, sex, and friendship, in that order. Phew, this is a heavy week.'
'Jesus. Somebody took his
? You didn't tell me that.'
'Yes, I did. You weren't listening.'
'You didn't tell me,' she insisted.
He tickled her. 'You weren't listening.'
'Well, maybe they'll turn up. Look. I've got to go.' She gathered herself together.
.' Mike lobbed his empty beer can into a wastebasket across the room.
'What about you?' She finished the beer and put the can down on the floor.
'I've got to go, too.' He stretched. 'Anything else on your mind? I mean, other than breaking up.'
She hesitated, then gave him a sly smile. 'You want a last fling?'
He threw his hands up in the air. 'Oh, no. You'll have to beg me now.'
'I don't beg.'
'Okay, then strip for me.' He sat back with a grin.
She rolled her eyes.
'Go ahead. Otherwise, we'll just end it now. Clean break. That's it.'
'All right.
Turn off the lights. I'll strip.' 'I'm not turning off the lights.'
'Fine, I'll do it.' April got up and unzipped her skirt. It fell to the uncarpeted floor. She unbuttoned her blouse, took it off slowly, and tossed it away from her. Then she gave him a shy smile and stopped.
Good enough for a beginner. He held out his arms. '
CHAPTER 22
J
ason finished his patient day, had dinner with his wife, Emma, then returned to Roosevelt Hospital late in the evening. April had left instructions with the nurses and the officer on duty to let him into Heather's room, so he had no difficulty gaining access. After talking to her nurse, he went in to see her, pulled up a chair, and sat close to the bed. She was in the same position on the bed and looked much as she had earlier in the day. He took her hand and squeezed it.
'Hi, Heather. It's Dr. Frank. The nurses tell me you're beginning to come around.'
