Page 31 of Taipei Story

“Okay.” He waited, hands in his pockets.

“Downstairs,” I said. “I think we’d better use English.”

“Um, okay.”

We walked outside the building, just under the awning where we could stand in the shade. We didn’t move to cross the street. I didn’t know whether we were stalling because of me or JC. But we obviously weren’t walking to lunch together.

JC stretched his arms over his head. “So what’s up?”

This irked me. He knew what this was about—he was making me spell it out.

“So there’s this weird rumor going around.”

“Yeah?”

“About what people think happened in Beitou.” I folded my arms against my chest. “Sexually?”

“Ah,” he said.

“And I know I wasn’t going around telling people about it.”

“Ah,” JC said again. “I mean.”

The doors to the lobby kept opening, and our classmates kept walking by. The lunchtime rush had begun. Several people glanced our way. We stepped toward a shaded corner and lowered our voices. “And people have been staring at me all day, and I think the whole program knows, so you see why I might be upset.”

JC hemmed and hawed for a bit, tapping his fingers against his elbows. At last he said, “Look. I didn’t tell people what we did, exactly—”

“So it just came from nowhere? This highly specific detail about a blow job in the hotel bath?”

JC reddened. “So maybe I told a few people. Just Skipper, honestly. But it’s not my fault if Skipper’s gone and spread it around—”

“But what about me?”

“What do you mean?”

“What do you think it does to me to be the girl who gave you a blow job in a hot tub?” My voice hitched. “I mean, this is a pretty small program, so what consequences does that create for me socially, do you think?”

He looked surprised at this—genuinely, innocently surprised. “Well, that’s kind of regressive.”

“What?”

“I mean, that’s classic slut-shaming? We’re adults, who cares what we did?”

Was I losing my mind? How had this become my fault? “But I didn’t even blow you!”

“Well, it was a close thing.”

“Oh my God—”

“Listen, Lily.” JC had his hands up in the most condescending gesture—as if I were a raging bull, and I had to be tamed. Whoa, Nelly. “I think the vibes aren’t—I mean, between you and me, they’re just not there. Anyways, I’m not looking for a committed relationship this summer. I hope you’re not too disappointed.”

“I don’t want to be in a committed relationship with you!”

“Okay, so what are we fighting about, then?”

The way he said this—the way he drawled out the “okay,” the way he actually backed away, as if I were about to charge—felt worse than a slap.

Some part of me still thought we had ended on good terms—that our Beitou adventure, awkward as it was, would have become a funny story between friends. Now I saw there was a certain generosity of friendship that simply was not there, and perhaps never had been. JC did not actually like me. He did not care about me at all; in this moment, I was just a problem he wished would go away.