The Takedown Page 16

  Christmas.

  Since I want to go into politics, I’m obligated to say that I am definitely a spiritual person. But religious? Năinai was vaguely Buddhist. Dad and Mom were not so vaguely agnostic. For us, Christmas was about presents. Paid for with money I should have been saving for college. (And since I’d like to go into politics, I shall now redact the previous four sentences.)

  Christmas on the second anniversary of your grandma’s death, the day after you didn’t see Mac in any satisfying way and had a huge fight with Audra, and AnyLies is the first person to txt you Merry Christmas? A hundred times more depressing.

  Thank goodness for boy-Kyle.

  At six a.m., as he’d done since he could walk, he woke me up by bouncing on all fours on my bed.

  “What are you?” I asked, pulling my pillow over my head. “Five years old?”

  “Kyyyylieee, it’s Christmas.”

  Two minutes later he dragged me across the hall and we both bounced on Mom and Dad’s bed. Five minutes later we were all downstairs. Dad made coffee as Mom took our stockings down from the mantel. The whole present affair only took about ten minutes. I mean, it doesn’t take long to open envelopes of store credits and logins. After that it was breakfast, and naps, and me trying on the clothes my parents bought. Since Mom now pulled items directly from my InStitches cart, everything was literally exactly what I wanted. Still my crankiness persisted.

  Maybe it was everyone else’s good cheer. Maybe it was that we should have been getting ready to go to my grandma’s. And when we got to her Queens apartment we’d be greeted by a mountain of food she’d spent the last two days cooking. Hugging me around my waist, she’d scold me in Mandarin for being too skinny. Then she’d give me and Kyle our own plates heaped with food—soy-braised pork belly, those thinly sliced potatoes that brought good luck, homemade dumplings, and pieces of a steamed whole fish—and she’d shoo us from the room so she wouldn’t have to hear Dad complain about favoritism and how come he had to wait until dinner?

  But on the worst day of my life, exactly two Christmases ago, Năinai had passed away at New York Presbyterian in Queens. Since my mom’s parents had retired to the Languedoc shortly after Mom turned thirty, this effectively robbed us Chengs of all the family we didn’t have to FaceAlert to see and me of the one person in the world who I knew loved me unconditionally. Now, if we were creating new traditions, in a little while Dad would order Chinese takeout and we’d get six orders of shrimp toast instead of four.

  Ba. Hum. Bug.

  At noon, the doorbell rang. My first thought, unreasonably, was that it was my hater. But there on my stoop, squinting because the sun was right in his eyes, was Mac. He was holding a tiny box wrapped in the same kind of brown paper bag that a bodega sandwich came in.

  Just like that, my Christmas felt merry.

  Declining my offer to come inside, he said he didn’t want to take up my time, but you know, he knew we’d said no gifts, but it was Christmas and Saturday and he kinda, like, got me something. We sat on the stoop instead. With at least two feet of space between us, Mac inspected the cheek Ellie slapped. Beneath the cover-up I’d used to deflect Mom’s questions, it was slightly blue-greenish and sore.

  “Ouch,” he said. “I haven’t even gotten slapped before.”

  “Yeah, well, next time you see Ailey, tell her to thank Ellie for me. Yet another thing I can add to my résumé.”

  Mac rolled his eyes. “I don’t see Ailey. She had a math question.”

  “Macky.”

  One side of his mouth rose up. “And I, kinda like, knew it would make you muy jealous if I answered it right then.”

  “Thank you! See? I’m not crazy.”

  Mac laughed. “I don’t know about that. I mean, says la chica with a black eye.”

  I normally would have playfully pushed him, but now I kept my hands in my lap. I imagined an alternate universe where Mac had an arm around me and we were laughing, kissing. I imagined how easy it would be to cross into that universe. And how much I would prefer living in that world compared to this one. At least until Mac got bored.

  He cleared his throat. “So I’ve been thinking about the Virus.”

  I snorted. “That’s seasonal.”

  The Virus was the world’s new terror alert. And it had already happened to South Korea. One day, the Internet simply went away. Like someone ran a demagnetizing strip over the entire country. It took the South Koreans a month to get a bare-bones Internet back up and running after the blackout. During that time, chaos reigned. That was five years ago. Since then, most countries had channeled a lot of their military spending toward tech military branches. That’s where Sharma was headed after high school. She would have gone already, except the US military wasn’t like CB or Goog. It didn’t accept high school dropouts.

  “Why have you been thinking about the Virus?”

  “First, because that’s what it feels like not being normal with you.” Mac blinked a lot and looked away. “Second, I keep thinking if the Virus strikes, what will I be left with? Like will I have good people around me to be stuck in the dark with? I screwed up the other day when I asked you to be my girl. I’d been waiting for the right moment for a long time, waiting until after I proved myself. That was definitely not the right moment. I’m sorry.”

  “And I’m sorry if I hurt your feelings. Just…if you’ve really liked me for the past three years, why didn’t you act sooner? I mean, September was the first time we even spoke.”

  Even if he’d asked me out last year, that would have ruled out half a dozen other girls. We would have been dating for over a year. Which actually? Just didn’t seem possible.

  The twitch of his lips said, Isn’t it obvious?

  “Have you seen yourself walk Park Prep? With that high ponytail and that frowny pout. Intimidating doesn’t describe it. Every time I saw you, you acted like I was plague. I figured you were way out of my league. Plus, I was busy kissing, like, a lot of other girls.”

  Now I did shove his shoulder.

  “And then I cut class and saw you in that lunch line this fall and kinda, like, saw how you looked when you weren’t pretending to be scary and I had to go for it. I figured if I could get you to smile, I’d be aces. And you did smile.” The very act of remembering made his eyes light up. Then that glimmer went away. “But I think you’re right. If the Virus strikes, the best way to assure you’re in my top five lost contacts is probably by doing your friend thing. I won’t ask you out again. Está bien?”

  I swallowed hard. “Está bien.”

  “Friends?”

  “Siempre.”

  Mac turned my present over and over in his hands. When Mac was twelve, he gave himself a homemade tattoo on the soft flesh between his thumb and pointer finger on his left hand. He’d done it for a girl he liked, named Marrakesh. “Lucky we had the same first initial,” he laughed when he told me the story. Staring at that spot always made me proud we had the relationship we did. I mean, where was Marra now? But today, I suddenly got why Mac had asked me out right after he saw the Mr. E. vid. It was terrible imagining him attached to anyone else. I wanted to indelibly leave a mark on him. And not because we had a great friendship.

  “Nothing says gift time like awkward silence,” I said in my Mac accent.

  He groaned. I scooted closer, holding my hands out. He pulled my hat down over my eyes. When I fixed it, his gift was in my lap. I opened it quickly, fearing that at any second I was either going to cry or tackle him. We were back to being friends. I’d never felt more miserable.

  Inside the paper bag was a tiny jewelry box. Inside the tiny jewelry box was a pair of delicate woodlike earrings.

  “Are these 3-D printed?” I asked, holding one up.

  They were stunning.

  “Nope.” He smiled shyly. “They’re made by hand of natural materials. I bought them in person at the holiday market in the city.”

  “Macky.” I swallowed heavily. “I love them.”

  H
e looked down at his feet. “Yeah, well, I knew you would.”

  Patting me once on the arm, he stood up. I shielded my eyes against the sun so I could better see his expression when I said, “And all I got you was a preordered copy of KillCrush Eight. You can download it at midnight.”

  His eyes widened. He whooped loudly. Holding on to the porch rails, he swooped in to kiss me on the cheek. More out of surprise than anything else, I leaned away. Mac and I roughhoused so much, retreat was my go-to defense. Still, it stopped Mac cold. He pushed off the railing, his lips a flat unhappy line.

  “Good job, Rodriguez. I can’t even keep my word for one minute before I go pillaging again. Sorry, Kyla. Tell your family I said Happy Twenty-Five Percent Bump in the Economy Day.”

  “Tell yours I said Merry…”

  My mouth felt like it was filled with glue. There I was, the queen of debate, and I couldn’t think of a single example of anything Merry right at that moment. So I just shook my head and got up to go inside. When I got to the top of the steps, Mac was already gone.

  moi All I want for Christmas is for you to take down the video.

  It was close to midnight. My family was sprawled on the sofa. Mom was sleeping. Dad was on his Doc. Kyle was now on the sixth episode in a row of Cloaked Games. I’d just messaged Jessie for the nine thousandth time, asking her to talk, when moments later AnyLies responded.

  Can’t have it all. I’m sure you got everything else you wanted.

  moi Yeah, tho I kinda miss the years when I didn’t.

  Meaning?

  moi Meaning I guess I kinda miss the years when my mom got it wrong.

  Hmm. Because when your mom got it wrong, it at least meant she still knew you enough to guess what you might like?

  Yeah. That was it exactly. After days of feeling misunderstood by everyone who knew me best, somehow my hater kept getting it right.

  moi You’re pretty all right. If only you’d stop ruining my life.

  AnyLies and I aren’t friends, I quickly reminded myself. AnyLies understood what I was going through because she—I mean, let’s be honest, it had to be a girl—because she’d put me there. Maybe I was txting my hater in the hopes that she would take down my video, but why was my hater txting me back? I reminded myself of the sheets of paper with my name written on them a hundred different ways and I almost called it quits on the whole enterprise.

  But then AnyLies txted this:

  You know, you aren’t the only one.

  moi The only one what?

  The only one who’s been through this.

  moi This what?

  I waited. But that was it. The only one…who had grown apart from her mom? The only one…who was questioning every single relationship in her life? The only one…who hated the holidays? Missed her grandma? The only one who…

  I quickly sat up, crunching Kyle’s feet in the process.

  “No, that’s fine, girl-Kyle, I didn’t need to walk ever again anyway.”

  “Not like you do now,” I said as I did a quick search.

  I wasn’t sure how to word my question, but the Internet helped with that. There were enough results to make your mind spin, but none that seemed to match. I swiped further and further into the search. Then, as Kyle clicked next on the seventh episode in a row of Cloaked Games, twenty pages into my search, I found her—a Christmas miracle.

  Her name was Trina Davis. And, thanks to my hater, she was about to help me figure out who my hater was.

  The next day, when I woke, warm sunshine was filtering through my curtains. The house smelled of Sunday—organic bacon, chocolate chip pancakes, and coffee. I cheered when I swiped on my Doc. Christmas was finally over. Plus, I’d slept until eleven, which meant I was nearly late for my own party. After quickly responding to a string of CB messages that Trina had sent me after I went to sleep, I leapt out of bed.

  Twenty-five minutes later, the groggy versions of Fawn, Sharma, and Mac were in my living room, all decked out in their lazy weekend attire. Late last night, I’d invited them all over for an All Brains on Deck meeting. Now Mom brought in a huge pile of pancakes. Boy-Kyle passed out plates and in an effort to save room for dim sum brunch in a few hours, incredibly didn’t keep one for himself. My dad yawned. There was only one empty seat.

  Audra was a no-show.

  I’d expected it would take her a few days to cool down after our Christmas Eve fight over the B&P slut, but I hadn’t heard from her even once yesterday. And that was huge considering she’d come to my grandmother’s funeral two years ago. She knew Christmas wasn’t only tough on her nowadays.

  moi Urgent. You okay? Please confirm not dead in gutter.

  Since there was no worse feeling than not being able to reach someone, our code was that if we added Urgent to any message and you still had fingers on your hand, you MUST, caps and italics, respond. I could feel her gauging just how grudgey she felt like being. It took her a full two minutes to write back.

  audy Sorry can’t make your big show and tell. Busy. There in spirit.

  moi Busy with what?

  audy Schoolwork.

  moi Schoolwork?

  On the room screen, my Doc on share mode so it would sync with the hub, I pulled up the G-File account I’d discovered last night while searching student-teacher sex scandals. Unlike mine, which came up first, the one on-screen was 336 entries in. But that didn’t make it any less relevant.

  “Meet Trina Davis,” I said.

  No response. This was one sleepy audience. Kyle’s eyes flickered to Fawn. Poor guy. He was crushing hard on my Fawnie and she was years more experienced. Meanwhile, Fawn’s eyes were focused on the pancakes. Sharma was absorbed in her Doc. Mom sat on the arm of Dad’s chair and absently rubbed his neck. Across from them Mac put up the hood on his sweatshirt and yawned, “Who’s Trina Davis, amiga?”

  Ignoring the amiga descriptor, I said, “A girl who had an identical fake sex video made about her.”

  There. That woke everyone up.

  “Trina lives in Chicago. She’s a solid A-minus student. And two months ago, someone posted a video on their school’s faculty page of her and her young calc teacher having sex. Should I play it?”

  “No,” my dad said.

  “Yes,” everyone else said.

  Sharma was one step ahead. The file was already on our living room screen.

  The video had been filmed inside a car. The teacher propped his Doc up on the dash. Except in the beginning, when he hit record, you mostly could only see his back. Occasionally, Trina’s face surfaced over his shoulder. It was pretty clear that the teacher hadn’t said he was filming this. He’d acted as if he was just putting his Doc somewhere safe.

  “I called this All Brains on Deck meeting because I thought you guys could help spot the other similarities between me and Trina. Why were we targeted for these videos?”

  I’d asked AnyLies the exact same question right before I went to bed last night but hadn’t heard back.

  “How do you know they’re related at all?” Fawn asked. “This video looks real. I know coitus face when I see it.”

  As Kyle erupted in violent coughing, croaked that he needed water, and disappeared toward the kitchen, I shrugged. No way was I telling everyone that it was AnyLies who had led me to see the connection. Then I’d have to admit I was txting AnyLies, and I didn’t want to get chastised so early in the day.

  “That is exactly what everyone thought about my video. Trina and I CB messaged all last night. She adamantly denies it’s her. Even now, two months after her video dropped. She said the footage was taken from some video of her that her friends shot at the gym.”

  Sharma flicked more elements from her Doc at our home hub. On-screen, the gym video of Trina loaded next to the sex video. Trina was on one of those leg weight machines, pumping a SHT-ton of weight. The videos played simultaneously. Other than some high-quality masking, the footage was nearly identical.

  “See, Fawnie? Workout face. Not sex face.”

/>   “Oh yeah.” She squinted at the screen. “My bad.”

  “So why us?” I asked.

  Trina was suburban. Me, urban. She was a sports nut. I was a volunteer junkie. Trina’s guilty pleasure was the Colossus Sundae from someplace called Dirty Ice Cream. Mine was reading pop stars’ autobiographies.

  Please never repeat that.

  “You thinking Jessie again?” Sharma asked.

  I nodded, and quickly filled my parents in on the “human projects” Ellie had seen on Jessie’s Doc. This was quite a project all right. What was it she’d titled that one vid? “How the mighty shall Fall”? Was I only one level of a much more complex game?

  “Is it just me or does Trina kind of look like you?” Fawn asked.

  “You’re right,” Kyle rushed to say. “I think so too.”

  He was back, leaning in the doorway, crossing and then uncrossing his arms so his mini boy/man muscles bulged. Fawn glanced at him and hid her smile with a forkful of pancakes.

  “Aren’t the Rosenthals in Turkey?” Kyle asked. With Herculean effort he pulled his eyes away from Fawn and swiped at his Doc. “I go to school with Joseph. Yeah, look.”

  He flicked an image at our home hub and now we were all looking at three smiling Rosenthals (and one very unhappy one). They were out to dinner, sitting in a maroon leather corner booth with enough small plates in front of them to feed Fawn through the entirety of a My Friend, Ghost binge-watch. Joseph and his parents were leaning in for the photo, basking in the candlelit glow of their elegant dinner and clothes. Jessie sat on the outside, almost at the very edge, frowning at her Doc. Kyle put up another one. Three smiling Rosenthals were bundled up and posing in front of a mosque. Again Jessie was off to the side, arms wrapped around herself, cold, miserable, impatient.

  “So what? They’re on vacation. Turkey has the Internet.”

  “Yeah, but who stalks someone when they’re on vacation?”

  “Clearly miserable her.” I flung a hand at Jessie.