bitterdrive

The car ride was cold. The air conditioner was on too high; nipples stood out through my black organdie shirt. I was the only one in the car; this could have been prevented. Enough of my attention was devoted to the road—I did not hit the pregnant woman pushing a child in a stroller and carrying bunting bags of beach blankets and bottles that were tugged by two children. Her husband strutted proudly next to them, empty-handed. More of my attention was concentrated in the bitterness-the sour tingle-that results from my body's adverse reaction to the emotional hole in the center of my chest. My body is rush to fill this void with internal juices, which turn and tangle themselves, until the hole is initially imperceptible. As she crossed the road, I looked at my left arm expecting to see some manifestation of the bitterness; pustules, boils, perhaps, as it spread through my shoulder into my hand. It never spreads to the right.

On the green arrow I went again, to the chagrin of the Saab next to me that hesitated until the rooster assured himself his brood has crossed the street. As trees and cars Monet-ed past I thought of college feminism lectures, equality demonstrations, and bilums from Bouganville—I could hear, smell, and feel these better than the steering wheel or asphalt murmurs. A few moments later I parked, turned off the car, remained seated, waiting for the sunlight to absorb into the black leather. The heat rose quickly over the back of my head.

I got out of the car and walked to the beach-a small spot with no real beach, rather, a collection of rocks serving as a lake stop. I settled down on a rock, leaned back into the sun. My pocket vibrated; it was my dad, on schedule; I answered the phone. He said "hi" as if tired, cleared his throat, then apologized for our "difficulties in communication." He is perpetually doing this. I told him not to retract his statements made earlier—I told him I do not respect people who can't stand by their words, spoken in any condition. He was silent, then formulated a new thought, then told me what he always tells me after we've been fighting. It doesn't bear repeating when it happens, and doesn't bear repeating now. He hopes his apology will put happiness into the place where his words removed it, but the bitterness beat it to it.

I asked him what he wanted of me; he gave his rote Aftermath Response. I said "That's nice, bye bye." Silenced the phone. Smoked. Waited. Heard the waves breaking into the rocks, heard a small child behind me laughing as one of the Haitian men chased him around, threatening to tickle him in a French I rarely understand. Three seagulls flapped by, followed by four that coasted along, their white feathers flammable in the sun.

I got up and saw one large scoop of vanilla skin being splashed by a smaller scoop of chocolate skin. I could not hear them over the buzz of the jet ski driven by a man straddled by his girlfriend, monitoring buoys. Gravel powder mixed with sweat in between my toes. I did a loop around the building there, the one with the outdoor caf³ selling twenty-four dollar fried chicken presented in black plastic baskets.

The loop done, I sat down on a bench and vacantly accepted the junior high paper football sized sailboats on the horizon. Gum was wedged between some of the wooden slats. I checked my phone; three calls from home arrived and were ignored. No voice mail. The man on the adjacent bench watched me too intently-I got up to leave. He said, "can I ask you a question?" I'm sure you can, I thought.

Yes?
I've never been here before, see, this be my first time here. What beach is this? Berger.
But there's not much of a beach, it's all rocks.
So is Saint Tropez and the Cinque Terra... Well, there's a small patch of sand at the other end.
Can I ask you another question?
Exhale. Sure.
What nationality are you? I mean, I's just wondering, I'm not trying to be funny.
You're not?...

I gave him my answer as I always do, trying to hide my irritation.

Spanish?
No, Swedish.
Oh oh oh oh, so you're half Chinese and half Swedish.
Yes.
Well, if you were half Spanish, that would be OK, too.

He makes me drag up the recurring wonderment why people have to ask me where I'm from. One woman in Beijing asked me, loosely but accurately translated, "What the fuck is wrong with your face?" Other people invariably ask me "really?" after I tell them my name. This is because I have nothing better to do than to invent a name that could not possibly be mine. At bars, people ask me "what I am," then do a cursory glance downward wondering which part of the stereotype is true. It's a very exciting game. Maybe I'm being too harsh. Maybe it is the only exciting interesting thing about me. I have a scar on the side of my nose, though.

I walked away while he was in mid-sentence. He called me back, wanting to ask more questions. He didn't hurl out an insult at the end, so perhaps my abandoning was effective. At the crosswalk, I wondered if my parents thought of the questions I'd receive while in the midst of their wild crazy hot sex on the beaches of Bali, where they told me I was conceived.

I crossed the street and watched the man inside a black BMW 5 series. His legs were spread wide open with one foot thrown over the center console. Two young girls walked in front of me, scantily clad in fabric thick as doilies and large as napkins. This man leered at them, huffed and puffed trying to blow their napkins off, his wedding band twinkling in the sun. When he was done leering, he saw me; I laughed at him. He hates me; I'm sure he will tell his old fraternity members all about me. He doubt he wondered what my nationality is.

Beyond the moving napkins was a woman with feet pressed deeply into the confines of a shoe, the excess spilling out. An American gold anklet rang a solitary bell. She was followed by a black-and-white polka dotted woman with red shoes and a red handbag. She saw me and smiled; caught off guard, I smiled back. Her eyes shifted two millimeters to the left, onto me; she looked at me and said, "Um, not you" then lavishly launched a best friend conversation with the woman behind me.

Almost at my building, I saw the video store guy. He wasn't the one I wanted to see, not the stunningly gorgeous one. I walked past, into my building. In the lobby, a white man and Chinese woman got out of the elevator, holding hands. I wanted to tell them to move to Hawaii where their kids will not be bothered with conformist lug heads-or perhaps life in general-but channeled my activism into pressing six instead. It sufficed.

Out of the elevator, down my hall, loud voices streamed out of 609. My thighs clenched, raising my knee caps. DAD! SHUT UP! and a door slam and a neighbour I'd never seen before left his apartment and walked toward me, face pink, veins standing. I almost didn't hear the lame soundtrack and moaning and groaning of whatever was going on in 605. Before he could focus his anger on me to telepathically or sympathetically vent, I was home.