Let's Dance
Okies so here's a little tale I wrote. I'm not going to spoil the theme or setting, so those of you that want a flash bang boom know everything in the first word story, go somewhere else: this is theme and character, not kaboom.
Let's Dance
Anna had been sitting in the passenger seat of Mai's tuner import, the name of which she never cared to remember. She'd been listening to the engine whine for well over too long and getting close to what the hell. The sweltering August heat, magnified in reflection by both the side-mirror and passenger window, burned into her shoulder as she fidgeted with the AC.
"Where are you taking me?"
Mai just glanced through her too-cute-to-be-called-glasses, flipped her black ponytail to someplace other than where it was and returned her gaze to the road, smiling.
“Nowhere in particular.” Then, as an afterthought and with a small smile, “Someplace special.”
Anna made a strange mumbling noise as she ran her palms down the side of her face in frustration. The two had been driving since before daybreak yet the ambient temperature had already reached the boiling point of Anna's patience. She pursed her lips and glared sideways through squinted eyes.
“Nowhere in particular isn't someplace special, nor is someplace special nowhere in particular. Unless, of course, this someplace special just happens to be in a city called nowhere in the land of Particular.” Anna was rocking her head back and forth, long blond hair following in some strange form of dumb-blond joke. Her hands followed the gestures until the hair needed moving. “And since I don't think there's a country called Particular in the world, that isn't a possibility.”
Mai covered her mouth with one hand, giggling, as she chose an off-ramp that signaled her exit from the harsh California highway system and granted her blue Celica unrestricted passage to a smooth, dark asphalt river running between banks of beautiful green grass. She returned her hand to the wheel as she signaled a turn.
“I promised I wouldn't tell anyone, but I guess I can trust you.”
Anna slid downwards in her seat.
“You guess you can trust your best friend? Who did you promise, anyway? Is this some sort of secret Chinese kung fu meeting or something?” Anna paused before throwing on an old Chinese-movie accent, “Oh no the kung fu masta might find out!”
Mai slapped Anna before pulling into a nearly full parking lot.
“I promised myself, but, you see...of course I can trust you! Maybe the fact I was driving kept my attention just enough to say one thing the wrong way?”
Anna grumbled an apology as she looked out the window at the parked cars and other people who looked as shocked and confused to be here as she was.
“And I'm Vietnamese, you twit!”
This time Anna gave Mai a playful tap on the shoulder.
“It don't matter, you're about as Asian as a piña colada.”
The two giggled as Mai shrugged acceptance. Her car was the only Asian thing about her, aside from her looks. She found an open parking space and turned hard right into it. Anna glanced up at the large banner as she closed the car door.
"So how long has this been going on and when were you planning on telling me about it?”
Mai shrugged sheepishly and smiled at her best friend before opening the trunk, pulling out a backpack and dropping it to the ground. She adjusted her glasses and retied her ponytail, anxiously watching each passerby. She wore a white tank with spaghetti-straps and short blue shorts meant for ease of movement, though her boyfriend often suggested it was meant to accent her rear.
“Seriously, Mai?” Anna was still laughing to herself over the huge revelation, the secret Mai couldn't share. “The Table Tennis Regional Championships? You...play ping pong?”
Mai adjusted the straps of her backpack and put it on, then readjusted it. She gave Anna a half-smile before pointing casually at the banner that seemed to state exactly that.
“Nah, I just come to watch all those asses move back and forth.” She pulled a paddle out of her backpack with a mischievous grin. “I bring these for the naughty ones.”
The two started walking toward the entrance; Mai returned the paddle to her backpack but still nervously looking around while Anna found it hard not to laugh.
“Oh Asian, Asian, who hits balls, who's the naughtiest ping pong player of them all?”
Mai had stopped walking just outside the entrance. Her smile faded as her face turned a cherry color. When she spoke, it was with bitter resentment, and admiration.
“Xiaoling Yu.”
Mai looked sideways at Anna and gave her a knowing nod.
“She's Chinese.”
Anna raised an eyebrow at Mai's change of attitude.
“She's the naughtiest? Are you certain?”
Mai nodded curtly as she moved so others could enter the convention center. Anna followed Mai's stare to Xiaoling Yu. The people around seemed to fade and she could only see what could've been the epitome of thousands of years of Chinese genetic evolution. It must have all come down to this: the long hair, black as hatred and straight as love, reflected the morning light in a way that seemed to illuminate the area around her; the brown eyes as darkly haunting as the inevitable calm before the worst of storms, those...
“Anna!” Mai nudged her friend out of the trance.
“I wish I was lesbian,” Anna replied in a forced whisper.
Mai rolled her eyes and tugged at her friend's shoulder, the redness in her face fading but her blank stare had turned to a scowl.
“You are! And what's up with you anyway, you're supposed to be my best friend and wish for me to win!”
Anna smiled nervously as Xiaoling walked closer.
“I need one of your paddles.”
“Oh, gosh, Anna, it sounds like you're already in love with the girl,” Mai exclaimed as she pushed Anna slightly. “And she's my arch nemesis!”
Anna's eyes were fixated on the nearing ping pong superstar, or so she guessed. To say throngs of adoring fans were crowding around her might be an overstatement, but it was ping pong after all. Anna decided that three or four children wanting an autograph and the ever-present stares of two stiff-looking parents was enough to make her the next rising star of Asian American sports.
"Nah, I don't love her. But she's, you know, good where it counts."
Mai's arms tightened as her hands slowly formed a fist.
“And what do you mean by where it counts?”
Anna noticed her friend's anger and smiled sheepishly.
“She has uh, a good backhand?” ...and a good back end, yum!
Mai crossed her arms and glared at her friend as Xiaoling stopped to talk with two strapping fellows in suit and tie. Scouts, no doubt. I'll show them...I'll show her... A sneer crossed her upper lip.
“She's sixteen years old,” Mai offered to Anna mindlessly. “She's been training since she was born, literally, I've seen pictures of her birth.”
“Geez, over dramatic, much?”
Mai ignored the comment and continued in a monotone narrative.
“She's won everything she's entered, even last year's Miss Ping Pong pageant. I'm just as good as her but the ref's are on her side. I won't win by just being better, I have to be superior in every way. This is what it's all come down to. Today. This event.”
Xiaoling shook hands with the two gentlemen and continued her walk as the girls remained still. Xiaoling gave Mai a quick glance and a sly grin; she spoke in an accent so thick it was like mocking the people who mock the bad movies.
“I am happy to beating you again, Mai.”
Xiaoling entered the convention center with her parents. What was once lust in Anna turned to rage as she took a step towards the door before Mai grabbed her arm.
“She'll get what's coming,” Mai offered with a hint of a smile, as if she'd just remembered something long forgotten. The two linked arms and followed Mai inside.
Homemade signs hung from the bleachers as people sat in patches throughout the main hall as the younger divisions were already playing their final rounds. The loud clicking of ball against paddle slowly gave way to the murmurs of anticipation when Xiaoling and Mai entered. Despite the many competitors each would face, they would only play one game that mattered and it only took a couple of hours to get there.
“Xiaoling, for sure,” one onlooker offered to his girlfriend.
“Really?” she replied, smirking in response to her boyfriend's obsession. “I think it will be Mai.”
“Nah,” a random stranger piped in, “Mai can't handle 'Ling's curves.”
The boyfriend's ears piqued and his eyes raised towards the stranger with a short nod.
“I think I agree.” He grinned. “Not many can.”
The girlfriend slapped him. Then, to spite her boyfriend, she cupped her hands over her mouth and shouted.
“Go Mai!”
Mai glanced up from the bronze-colored folding chair in her corner of the 'final match' court. The girlfriend pumped the air with her fist and shouted again, causing Mai to blush a little and smile. Xiaoling glared at both the girlfriend and Mai indignantly.
“Xiaoling! Yeah!” Now the boyfriend shouted. Xiaoling grinned widely, as fake as her applied accent, and waving her hand to the crowd that now began to chant both names. Xiaoling took special care to note where the scouts had seated, offering a respectfully obvious bow to each.
Mai and Xiaoling extended their hand for the traditional handshake as high school and college journalists were capturing this once in a lifetime calm-before-the-storm that had been long-brewing between the two up and coming ping pong greats.
“Good luck.” Xiaoling spoke just loudly enough so that those nearby could hear it, even if others could guess by watching her lips move. Mai nodded and smiled but before she was able to reply, Xiaoling pulled her close and whispered in the forced east-Asian accent, “good luck een duh foo-chuh with no peeng-pong."
Mai's eyes burned but she put on her own fake smile as the two released. Paddles in hand, they walked to their respective sides of the table: the match began. The cheers from the crowd had diminished and the loudest noises would soon be the friction between floor and shoe; paddle and ball; ball and table.
Xiaoling held first serve. She bent near to the table, paddle in her right hand behind her back, ball held delicately in her left. Her eyes raised ever so slightly, as if glaring at Mai, then a sly grin spread across her face. Her hands moved swiftly, dropping the ball with one and moving the other with frightening speed and precision. Mai jumped to her right but it was too late. The ball bounced off the tip of the paddle and bounced dejectedly somewhere unimportant. The crowd let out various exasperations of amazement. Xaoling winked at Mai and let her single word drag out.
“Ace.”
Mai turned from the table and took a step from the regulatory play area. Scratching the side of her head she returned to the table and spun her paddle while Xiaoling readied herself for another serve. The crowd quieted once again as Xiaoling began her movements. Mai tried to anticipate the angle, swinging desperately to her lower left, wincing as the ball stung her right shoulder. The distinctive voice of another thickly faked Chinese accent, that of Xiaoling's mother, boasted from the crowed:
"Helpful hint: Wait until you sober before try that again."
Scattered murmurs sprouted around the room before Xiaoling's father stood, took off his glasses and pointed at Mai in agitation.
“Go back to Korea, Nei!”
Mai's heart was beating rapidly, how was she to win against multiple opponents? She stopped walking and faced the onlookers.
“I am Vietnamese,” she shouted in a perfectly American voice. She scanned the crowd for the man standing. “And Tên tôi là Mai!”
The murmurs grew louder until a security member hushed the crowd. Xiaoling held the ball between her fingers as Mai approached the table, closed her eyes and took a deep breath. When she opened them, Xiaoling's arms began to move. Mai responded with a quicker movement in response, giving the ball an awkward spin that sent it sideways after hitting Xiaoling's side of the table. Xiaoling lunged, missing the ball but injecting herself with the corner of the table. She stood back, examining her stomach and withdrawing a hand with a hint of scarlet: just a scratch. Her mother shouted in anger at the missed point.
"Sixteen years, gone to hell." She shook her fist. “What training was for if not win?”
Xiaoling glared at Mai who responded with a knowing smile.
“First blood, drawn by the defender. Yuenan will be victorious.”
Xiaoling stepped back as her native language had been used in a threat against her.
“You don't speak Chinese,” she sputtered, not even bothering to fake her accent.
“But I can beat one,” Mai retorted quickly and with a nod, then smiled. “Let's dance.”
Author's Note Redux: Boyfriend met Xiaoling and had an affair. Girlfriend broke up with Boyfriend. Xiaoling was deported; her family was here illegally. Mai still loves to dance.
Poll
Let's Dance
Anna had been sitting in the passenger seat of Mai's tuner import, the name of which she never cared to remember. She'd been listening to the engine whine for well over too long and getting close to what the hell. The sweltering August heat, magnified in reflection by both the side-mirror and passenger window, burned into her shoulder as she fidgeted with the AC.
"Where are you taking me?"
Mai just glanced through her too-cute-to-be-called-glasses, flipped her black ponytail to someplace other than where it was and returned her gaze to the road, smiling.
“Nowhere in particular.” Then, as an afterthought and with a small smile, “Someplace special.”
Anna made a strange mumbling noise as she ran her palms down the side of her face in frustration. The two had been driving since before daybreak yet the ambient temperature had already reached the boiling point of Anna's patience. She pursed her lips and glared sideways through squinted eyes.
“Nowhere in particular isn't someplace special, nor is someplace special nowhere in particular. Unless, of course, this someplace special just happens to be in a city called nowhere in the land of Particular.” Anna was rocking her head back and forth, long blond hair following in some strange form of dumb-blond joke. Her hands followed the gestures until the hair needed moving. “And since I don't think there's a country called Particular in the world, that isn't a possibility.”
Mai covered her mouth with one hand, giggling, as she chose an off-ramp that signaled her exit from the harsh California highway system and granted her blue Celica unrestricted passage to a smooth, dark asphalt river running between banks of beautiful green grass. She returned her hand to the wheel as she signaled a turn.
“I promised I wouldn't tell anyone, but I guess I can trust you.”
Anna slid downwards in her seat.
“You guess you can trust your best friend? Who did you promise, anyway? Is this some sort of secret Chinese kung fu meeting or something?” Anna paused before throwing on an old Chinese-movie accent, “Oh no the kung fu masta might find out!”
Mai slapped Anna before pulling into a nearly full parking lot.
“I promised myself, but, you see...of course I can trust you! Maybe the fact I was driving kept my attention just enough to say one thing the wrong way?”
Anna grumbled an apology as she looked out the window at the parked cars and other people who looked as shocked and confused to be here as she was.
“And I'm Vietnamese, you twit!”
This time Anna gave Mai a playful tap on the shoulder.
“It don't matter, you're about as Asian as a piña colada.”
The two giggled as Mai shrugged acceptance. Her car was the only Asian thing about her, aside from her looks. She found an open parking space and turned hard right into it. Anna glanced up at the large banner as she closed the car door.
"So how long has this been going on and when were you planning on telling me about it?”
Mai shrugged sheepishly and smiled at her best friend before opening the trunk, pulling out a backpack and dropping it to the ground. She adjusted her glasses and retied her ponytail, anxiously watching each passerby. She wore a white tank with spaghetti-straps and short blue shorts meant for ease of movement, though her boyfriend often suggested it was meant to accent her rear.
“Seriously, Mai?” Anna was still laughing to herself over the huge revelation, the secret Mai couldn't share. “The Table Tennis Regional Championships? You...play ping pong?”
Mai adjusted the straps of her backpack and put it on, then readjusted it. She gave Anna a half-smile before pointing casually at the banner that seemed to state exactly that.
“Nah, I just come to watch all those asses move back and forth.” She pulled a paddle out of her backpack with a mischievous grin. “I bring these for the naughty ones.”
The two started walking toward the entrance; Mai returned the paddle to her backpack but still nervously looking around while Anna found it hard not to laugh.
“Oh Asian, Asian, who hits balls, who's the naughtiest ping pong player of them all?”
Mai had stopped walking just outside the entrance. Her smile faded as her face turned a cherry color. When she spoke, it was with bitter resentment, and admiration.
“Xiaoling Yu.”
Mai looked sideways at Anna and gave her a knowing nod.
“She's Chinese.”
Anna raised an eyebrow at Mai's change of attitude.
“She's the naughtiest? Are you certain?”
Mai nodded curtly as she moved so others could enter the convention center. Anna followed Mai's stare to Xiaoling Yu. The people around seemed to fade and she could only see what could've been the epitome of thousands of years of Chinese genetic evolution. It must have all come down to this: the long hair, black as hatred and straight as love, reflected the morning light in a way that seemed to illuminate the area around her; the brown eyes as darkly haunting as the inevitable calm before the worst of storms, those...
“Anna!” Mai nudged her friend out of the trance.
“I wish I was lesbian,” Anna replied in a forced whisper.
Mai rolled her eyes and tugged at her friend's shoulder, the redness in her face fading but her blank stare had turned to a scowl.
“You are! And what's up with you anyway, you're supposed to be my best friend and wish for me to win!”
Anna smiled nervously as Xiaoling walked closer.
“I need one of your paddles.”
“Oh, gosh, Anna, it sounds like you're already in love with the girl,” Mai exclaimed as she pushed Anna slightly. “And she's my arch nemesis!”
Anna's eyes were fixated on the nearing ping pong superstar, or so she guessed. To say throngs of adoring fans were crowding around her might be an overstatement, but it was ping pong after all. Anna decided that three or four children wanting an autograph and the ever-present stares of two stiff-looking parents was enough to make her the next rising star of Asian American sports.
"Nah, I don't love her. But she's, you know, good where it counts."
Mai's arms tightened as her hands slowly formed a fist.
“And what do you mean by where it counts?”
Anna noticed her friend's anger and smiled sheepishly.
“She has uh, a good backhand?” ...and a good back end, yum!
Mai crossed her arms and glared at her friend as Xiaoling stopped to talk with two strapping fellows in suit and tie. Scouts, no doubt. I'll show them...I'll show her... A sneer crossed her upper lip.
“She's sixteen years old,” Mai offered to Anna mindlessly. “She's been training since she was born, literally, I've seen pictures of her birth.”
“Geez, over dramatic, much?”
Mai ignored the comment and continued in a monotone narrative.
“She's won everything she's entered, even last year's Miss Ping Pong pageant. I'm just as good as her but the ref's are on her side. I won't win by just being better, I have to be superior in every way. This is what it's all come down to. Today. This event.”
Xiaoling shook hands with the two gentlemen and continued her walk as the girls remained still. Xiaoling gave Mai a quick glance and a sly grin; she spoke in an accent so thick it was like mocking the people who mock the bad movies.
“I am happy to beating you again, Mai.”
Xiaoling entered the convention center with her parents. What was once lust in Anna turned to rage as she took a step towards the door before Mai grabbed her arm.
“She'll get what's coming,” Mai offered with a hint of a smile, as if she'd just remembered something long forgotten. The two linked arms and followed Mai inside.
Homemade signs hung from the bleachers as people sat in patches throughout the main hall as the younger divisions were already playing their final rounds. The loud clicking of ball against paddle slowly gave way to the murmurs of anticipation when Xiaoling and Mai entered. Despite the many competitors each would face, they would only play one game that mattered and it only took a couple of hours to get there.
“Xiaoling, for sure,” one onlooker offered to his girlfriend.
“Really?” she replied, smirking in response to her boyfriend's obsession. “I think it will be Mai.”
“Nah,” a random stranger piped in, “Mai can't handle 'Ling's curves.”
The boyfriend's ears piqued and his eyes raised towards the stranger with a short nod.
“I think I agree.” He grinned. “Not many can.”
The girlfriend slapped him. Then, to spite her boyfriend, she cupped her hands over her mouth and shouted.
“Go Mai!”
Mai glanced up from the bronze-colored folding chair in her corner of the 'final match' court. The girlfriend pumped the air with her fist and shouted again, causing Mai to blush a little and smile. Xiaoling glared at both the girlfriend and Mai indignantly.
“Xiaoling! Yeah!” Now the boyfriend shouted. Xiaoling grinned widely, as fake as her applied accent, and waving her hand to the crowd that now began to chant both names. Xiaoling took special care to note where the scouts had seated, offering a respectfully obvious bow to each.
Mai and Xiaoling extended their hand for the traditional handshake as high school and college journalists were capturing this once in a lifetime calm-before-the-storm that had been long-brewing between the two up and coming ping pong greats.
“Good luck.” Xiaoling spoke just loudly enough so that those nearby could hear it, even if others could guess by watching her lips move. Mai nodded and smiled but before she was able to reply, Xiaoling pulled her close and whispered in the forced east-Asian accent, “good luck een duh foo-chuh with no peeng-pong."
Mai's eyes burned but she put on her own fake smile as the two released. Paddles in hand, they walked to their respective sides of the table: the match began. The cheers from the crowd had diminished and the loudest noises would soon be the friction between floor and shoe; paddle and ball; ball and table.
Xiaoling held first serve. She bent near to the table, paddle in her right hand behind her back, ball held delicately in her left. Her eyes raised ever so slightly, as if glaring at Mai, then a sly grin spread across her face. Her hands moved swiftly, dropping the ball with one and moving the other with frightening speed and precision. Mai jumped to her right but it was too late. The ball bounced off the tip of the paddle and bounced dejectedly somewhere unimportant. The crowd let out various exasperations of amazement. Xaoling winked at Mai and let her single word drag out.
“Ace.”
Mai turned from the table and took a step from the regulatory play area. Scratching the side of her head she returned to the table and spun her paddle while Xiaoling readied herself for another serve. The crowd quieted once again as Xiaoling began her movements. Mai tried to anticipate the angle, swinging desperately to her lower left, wincing as the ball stung her right shoulder. The distinctive voice of another thickly faked Chinese accent, that of Xiaoling's mother, boasted from the crowed:
"Helpful hint: Wait until you sober before try that again."
Scattered murmurs sprouted around the room before Xiaoling's father stood, took off his glasses and pointed at Mai in agitation.
“Go back to Korea, Nei!”
Mai's heart was beating rapidly, how was she to win against multiple opponents? She stopped walking and faced the onlookers.
“I am Vietnamese,” she shouted in a perfectly American voice. She scanned the crowd for the man standing. “And Tên tôi là Mai!”
The murmurs grew louder until a security member hushed the crowd. Xiaoling held the ball between her fingers as Mai approached the table, closed her eyes and took a deep breath. When she opened them, Xiaoling's arms began to move. Mai responded with a quicker movement in response, giving the ball an awkward spin that sent it sideways after hitting Xiaoling's side of the table. Xiaoling lunged, missing the ball but injecting herself with the corner of the table. She stood back, examining her stomach and withdrawing a hand with a hint of scarlet: just a scratch. Her mother shouted in anger at the missed point.
"Sixteen years, gone to hell." She shook her fist. “What training was for if not win?”
Xiaoling glared at Mai who responded with a knowing smile.
“First blood, drawn by the defender. Yuenan will be victorious.”
Xiaoling stepped back as her native language had been used in a threat against her.
“You don't speak Chinese,” she sputtered, not even bothering to fake her accent.
“But I can beat one,” Mai retorted quickly and with a nod, then smiled. “Let's dance.”
Author's Note Redux: Boyfriend met Xiaoling and had an affair. Girlfriend broke up with Boyfriend. Xiaoling was deported; her family was here illegally. Mai still loves to dance.
Poll