through my mouth, trying not to be ill.
I didnât want to throw up in public, where people could see, strangers, the girls who worked in the grocery, the men who worked in the video store, the who-knows-who potential customers in the parking lot.
Something cold and wet nudged the side of my arm, and I jumped.
One of the checkers from the grocery was holding a cold can of 7Up in her hand. âYou okay?â
I nodded.
âTake it. Donât work too hard,â she said with a smile, and went back inside.
I mouthed, âThanks,â as though she could still see me, and opened the soda. The pop! and hiss, so familiar, made me feel better. Sometimes the smallest acts of kindness made me melt.
I took a sip of the soda. It was too sweet against my teeth, but it was like the treasured cans of pop we used to share when I was a kid. When we first came to America, the Church Ladies never gave us soda pop in the bags of groceries they brought. And food stamps didnât let us get brand names either. If Ma bought us a soda, we had to share it. I didnât even like the taste at first, but Iâd seen kids on TV drinking Coca-Cola and Pepsi and 7Up, smiling and strong and running and popular and happy, and I wanted to be just like them. I wanted to give the world a Coke, too. I wanted to take the Pepsi Challenge. I liked the pretty green cans of Sprite with the fancy lettering I couldnât read yet, not like the ugly type on the generic soda we could afford.
We used to blindfold ourselves, using an undershirt that Sourdi tied around our heads, take sips from the same can of soda, and say, âItâs Coke!â or âItâs Pepsi!â Sourdi would make a buzzer sound or a âding!â like a bell, depending on her mood, to signal if we were correct or wrong.
Then Sam would exclaim, âI canât believe I like Pepsi better!â and slap his forehead just like the man in the commercial, and weâd laugh and laugh.
Sitting on the curb in front of the grocery, facing the donut shop, I drank the whole can of 7Up that the girl had given me. It still tasted like a luxury.
Then I went back to work.
Nobody was working in the donut shop when I returned. I peeked into the kitchen and spotted Anita and Uncle conferring by the mixers. I was going to tell them that I was back and that Iâd man the register, but something about the furtive way they huddled together made me hesitant to interrupt.
âI havenât seen you look this down in a while,â Anita was saying. âIs it Nea?â
My heart stopped. Then started up with a jerk.
âShe looks just like Sopheam . . . When they were the same age,â Uncleâs voice sounded strangled, stretched too taut. âI see her and I remember everything.â
âDoes she know?â
âWe donât talk about these things.â
Then the bell on the door rang behind me, like a really big cat bell signaling the arrival of a customer, and I quickly shut the swinging door to the kitchen and jumped behind the counter, hoping Uncle and Anita hadnât realized Iâd been spying on them, and wouldnât know that Iâd heard them and that I knew Uncle was sorry Iâd come.
PART THREE
You do not fear the thorny plant (underfoot), yet you fear the tiger (far away)
.
âtraditional Cambodian proverb
CHAPTER 7
The Sisters Who Turned into Birds
Ma used to tell me a folktale, the story of the three sisters who turned into birds. We must have been living in the refugee camp, where it was safe to tell stories again. Under the Khmer Rouge, stories were forbidden, language was dangerous, and we had to be quiet all the time. I loved Maâs stories, but I was hungry, I kept interrupting, I didnât let her finish.
Once there were three little girls who were living alone with their widowed mother when she remarried to a wealthy gangster from the city
.
âWhat kind of food do they eat
I didnât want to throw up in public, where people could see, strangers, the girls who worked in the grocery, the men who worked in the video store, the who-knows-who potential customers in the parking lot.
Something cold and wet nudged the side of my arm, and I jumped.
One of the checkers from the grocery was holding a cold can of 7Up in her hand. âYou okay?â
I nodded.
âTake it. Donât work too hard,â she said with a smile, and went back inside.
I mouthed, âThanks,â as though she could still see me, and opened the soda. The pop! and hiss, so familiar, made me feel better. Sometimes the smallest acts of kindness made me melt.
I took a sip of the soda. It was too sweet against my teeth, but it was like the treasured cans of pop we used to share when I was a kid. When we first came to America, the Church Ladies never gave us soda pop in the bags of groceries they brought. And food stamps didnât let us get brand names either. If Ma bought us a soda, we had to share it. I didnât even like the taste at first, but Iâd seen kids on TV drinking Coca-Cola and Pepsi and 7Up, smiling and strong and running and popular and happy, and I wanted to be just like them. I wanted to give the world a Coke, too. I wanted to take the Pepsi Challenge. I liked the pretty green cans of Sprite with the fancy lettering I couldnât read yet, not like the ugly type on the generic soda we could afford.
We used to blindfold ourselves, using an undershirt that Sourdi tied around our heads, take sips from the same can of soda, and say, âItâs Coke!â or âItâs Pepsi!â Sourdi would make a buzzer sound or a âding!â like a bell, depending on her mood, to signal if we were correct or wrong.
Then Sam would exclaim, âI canât believe I like Pepsi better!â and slap his forehead just like the man in the commercial, and weâd laugh and laugh.
Sitting on the curb in front of the grocery, facing the donut shop, I drank the whole can of 7Up that the girl had given me. It still tasted like a luxury.
Then I went back to work.
Nobody was working in the donut shop when I returned. I peeked into the kitchen and spotted Anita and Uncle conferring by the mixers. I was going to tell them that I was back and that Iâd man the register, but something about the furtive way they huddled together made me hesitant to interrupt.
âI havenât seen you look this down in a while,â Anita was saying. âIs it Nea?â
My heart stopped. Then started up with a jerk.
âShe looks just like Sopheam . . . When they were the same age,â Uncleâs voice sounded strangled, stretched too taut. âI see her and I remember everything.â
âDoes she know?â
âWe donât talk about these things.â
Then the bell on the door rang behind me, like a really big cat bell signaling the arrival of a customer, and I quickly shut the swinging door to the kitchen and jumped behind the counter, hoping Uncle and Anita hadnât realized Iâd been spying on them, and wouldnât know that Iâd heard them and that I knew Uncle was sorry Iâd come.
PART THREE
You do not fear the thorny plant (underfoot), yet you fear the tiger (far away)
.
âtraditional Cambodian proverb
CHAPTER 7
The Sisters Who Turned into Birds
Ma used to tell me a folktale, the story of the three sisters who turned into birds. We must have been living in the refugee camp, where it was safe to tell stories again. Under the Khmer Rouge, stories were forbidden, language was dangerous, and we had to be quiet all the time. I loved Maâs stories, but I was hungry, I kept interrupting, I didnât let her finish.
Once there were three little girls who were living alone with their widowed mother when she remarried to a wealthy gangster from the city
.
âWhat kind of food do they eat
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