“Wait. Stop.” Belle holds up a queenly hand, and I cease my babbling. Her eyes are dancing with barely contained excitement. “We need reinforcements for this.” She picks up her sparkle-encrusted phone and starts typing. Nak lifts his head, trying to look at the screen. “I am absolutely dying here, but I don’t want you to have to repeat yourself. You’re going to have to share this with everyone.”
“Who’s ‘everyone’?” I say, my voice tipping up with suspicion.
“Rory. Eliza.” Belle taps on the screen and nods to herself, satisfied. “Your two other best friends. We’re going to have a night out and help you with all these feelings you’re having.”
“Belle!” I grab for the phone, but she holds it just out of reach. Nak gives me a look like, Why did you even try? “Don’t bother them! I . . . I just wanted to talk about this quietly, it doesn’t have to be a whole production—”
“Rika-chan!” Belle shrieks. “Of course it’s a production. You never admit to having actual feelings, and I am not going to let that go without some measure of fanfare.” She grins at me and waves her phone in the air. “Anyway, I already sent the text.”
“Gah.” I slump back on the bed, defeated. “Fine.”
“Now we just have to wait for them to respond,” Belle says, her eyes narrowing at the screen. “But I don’t want to hear one more word until we’re all together—everyone should experience your epic telling of your emotions at the same time.”
“Fine,” I repeat, throwing up my hands. I try to suppress the tiny smile that’s tugging at the corners of my mouth again. When Belle gets like this, there’s no sense in arguing. But just this once, I’m kind of enjoying it.
We sit there in silence for a moment, her staring resolutely at her phone, waiting for a response. I clamp my lips together, determined not to spill any more of my story until it’s time.
After several minutes of this, she sets her phone down with a loud sigh and turns to me.
“They’re taking forever. Wanna go try on some of Ma Suzy’s old dresses while we wait?”
Belle manages to get everyone into Auntie Suzy’s vintage treasures before we leave the apartment. Then she herds us all out the door. We cross First and swan through the Japanese Village Plaza, our footsteps tapping lightly against the quaint brick path, lit by strings of glowing lanterns dancing overhead. When we pass by the Fire Tower—a tall, majestic column composed of interlocking scarlet-orange poles—I look up, letting myself sink into the magical feeling this neighborhood always gives me.
Belle teases me for still being in awe of the Fire Tower, which was rebuilt in steel after the original version was demolished by termites. It’s sometimes referred to as “Termite Tower”—not very majestic—and is also a prime spot for white guys to take photos with just-purchased samurai swords. But there’s just something about it I find beautiful, a sense of history housed in its rebuilt bones. Tonight, there’s not a termite or a faux samurai in sight, and the stars glitter around the tower’s peak, giving us a show.
Belle guides us through the plaza and over to Bae—an extremely hip soft serve spot that specializes in charcoal ice cream. “Pitch-black—just like Rika-chan’s heart,” Belle always jokes.
Once again, I marvel at her ability to bend people to her will and execute a plan so efficiently. She really is meant to be a queen.
“Okay!” Belle says, smacking a hand down on our table at Bae. “It’s time. Rika-chan is going to tell us all about her too-big feelings, and I, for one, have been waiting for this moment for seventeen years.”
“So since you were born?” Rory rolls her eyes. “That’s not possible. Anyway, Rika didn’t even exist when you were born.”
“A technicality,” Belle says, swooping an index finger through the air.
I smile and look at each of them in turn. Belle is swathed in a beautiful satin frock—this one emerald green, a stunning contrast against her creamy skin and midnight hair. Eliza, who doesn’t really do dresses, discovered a brightly patterned blazer with swirls of blue and yellow that looks incredibly sharp on her long, lean frame. And Rory, who is too tiny for any of Auntie Suzy’s grown-up clothes, simply grabbed a vibrant orange ruffled number and threw it around her shoulders like a cape. Belle managed to talk me into wearing a fitted silk sheath in the palest of pink. It’s not something I would have immediately chosen for myself, but I have to admit I like the way the silk feels brushing against my skin, the way the soft color contrasts dramatically with my brassy hair.
“You look pretty,” Belle cooed when I put it on. “But also like you could kill a man.”
I’ll take it.
Now we’re all gathered around one of the tiny tables at Bae, eating black ice cream in our fancy outfits. This place represents another one of Little Tokyo’s fascinating juxtapositions: unlike some of the more traditional, old-school spots, it’s super modern and hopelessly hip, all black walls with flashing neon mini-signs that seem to exist purely for Instagram photo ops. The ice cream is similarly photogenic, black swirled with a more unicorn-appropriate rainbow of colors and topped off with cascades of sprinkles and sugary cereal bits.
It’s also just so delicious. The special charcoal flavor of the day is pineapple, and I’m eating the pineapple-vanilla swirl, a perfect combination of tart fruit and soft sweetness. Those things that shouldn’t make sense together but just magically do.
Henry would love this.
“Stop stalling, Rika-chan, eating your ice cream all slow!” Belle yelps, slamming her hand against the table again. “Tell us about Hank—Henry—Chen. Tell us about all the stuff
