“And everyone projects all kinds of things onto you,” Henry says, nodding in recognition. “You’re a mongrel—a mistake. You’re a watered-down diet version of something else.”
“Like a fraction,” I say. “A thing to be claimed only if the community deems you worthy.”
I flash back to Belle and me in second grade, her screaming “She’s half!” at the teacher who didn’t believe we were related. She’d been trying to stand up for me. But something about that had still cut deep—as if I could never be a whole version of anything.
“Yeah,” Henry says. “Or you’re a great savior, here to unite two worlds in peace.”
“Like Aquaman,” I say.
He lets out a surprised laugh—and this time, he totally snorts. “Hey—Aquaman was tight.”
I don’t know what it is about that that makes me start laughing. Maybe it’s the way he says it, with so much sincerity and gusto. Maybe it’s the fact that he’s grinning at me while lit by a neon pickle wearing a bow. Maybe it’s . . . oh, I don’t know.
But I do laugh. Long and hard. And he’s right there with me, snorting all the way.
“I just want to be able to exist as myself, you know?” Henry says, as we’re catching our breaths. “Not a savior, not a tool, not a mystery to be solved. Not someone who has to be described using fractions.”
“Just a whole you,” I murmur.
“Yeah,” he says, smiling. “I really hope you get to meet Grace tomorrow. I think you could talk to her. About all this. She’s really empathetic?”
I nod, picking up another taco and nibbling at the corner. I don’t want to interrupt, hoping against hope that he’ll keep going, tell me more.
“She . . .” He meets my eyes, his brow furrowing. Wow. I don’t think I’ve seen Henry Chen’s smooth brow furrow, ever. I didn’t know it was even capable of such things. “She talked to me about the panic attack stuff,” he finally says. “Had her therapist refer me to someone. That’s what she’s been helping me with. She has an anxiety disorder—she’s talked about it a lot in interviews—and she helped me understand that that isn’t, like, a shameful thing. That I don’t have to shove it down and pretend I’m okay. Which is what my parents would prefer.”
He snags the last bit of sticky rice, his more confident expression sliding into place. I’m beginning to understand that that’s the expression he puts on when he’s getting truly uncomfortable, when he’s done talking about something. So I don’t push it.
It hits me that I’ve just talked quite a bit to this near stranger about things I never share. I should be feeling weird about that, uncomfortable. And yet, talking to Henry about all this stuff feels like the most natural thing in the world.
“I hope you get to meet her,” he says again, shoveling the sticky rice into his mouth.
I give him a tentative smile. “Me too.”
Something I don’t want to put a name to has taken up residence in my chest—a tiny light, a flutter of hope. A little fairy thing that’s about as far from the nure-onna’s vengeance-loving ways as you can get.
I can actually see myself meeting Grace in front of one of these old zoo rock formations. Her embracing me. Both of us teary. It must be said that the whole thing—finding this scrap of a photo behind an old library tile, the mysterious inscription directing us to a legendary LA location, the potential reunion—feels . . . well, like a fairy tale.
With a happy ending.
Wait, am I starting to believe in happy endings now?
Belle will never let me live this down.
Once upon a time, there lived a handsome . . . no, cute. No, adorable prince. (Ugh, did I really just use the word “adorable”?) He was gifted with an enchanted smile and the magic of dance and used his charms to entertain everyone in the land. But his dancing feet masked so many more magical abilities that were far less appreciated—a genuine empathy and a goofy laugh and the talent for eating multiple delicious spicy foods all in one sitting.
Not to mention the magical ability to totally distract the nure-onna from her very important mission.
What was I talking about again?
TEN
“Rika . . . Rika-chan! My hair’s on fire and you’re the only one who can put it out!”
“That’s nice . . . wait, what?” I whirl around to see Belle cocking a quizzical eyebrow at me. I’m standing atop a small stepladder in the cramped kitchen of Katsu That. I’ve been counting down the minutes—the seconds—until five p.m., when I can finally leave and set out on my quest to the old Griffith Park Zoo. Henry is supposed to meet me outside the restaurant, incognito baseball cap firmly in place. After the library debacle from the day before, we’re determined to be discreet.
I’ve been distracted all shift, my brain whirling around what this rendezvous might hold. In just a couple short days, Grace Kimura has grown into an epic figure in my mind, an exiled queen unfairly cast out from her kingdom. Or maybe she’s more like a fairy godmother who will wave her glittery magic wand and make me whole.
Ugh. Did I really just think that? My fantasies are getting so flowery. The nure-onna does not do bibbidi-bobbidi-boos.
The nure-onna also does not do whatever my brain is doing with Henry Chen. I can’t explain it, but in the midst of me spinning various scenarios about my impending Grace reunion, he keeps popping
