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Always be the first to arrive and the last to leave.I hear my mom’s calming voice and words of wisdom in my head. It’s quickly pushed to the side by a vision of the disappointed look on my father’s face. He doesn’t even need to say a word and I know I’ve messed up. My heart immediately starts beating faster.
I’ll need to walk places quicker. Be more direct in my communication, waste no time chitchatting. And when in doubt, stand straighter, lift my chin, and purse my lips with confidence. It’s my fake-it-till-you-make-it stance.
I’m top three in my graduating class, secretary of the student government, and a varsity tennis player. I have done everything to make sure I’d be considered outstanding. And now it’s time to show up for this internship.
Because there’s nothing special about where I come from. Nothing to set me apart from kids who have privilege and opportunity. I’ve got no name or bank balance to throw around and impress like other kids getting into the best schools. This internship is my one shot to get a step ahead, even if it’s a tiny one.
Terrified, sure. But capable, one hundred percent, I remind myself. And when all else fails, like I tell myself at least ten times a day, fake it till you make it.
And one day, I’ll eventually get to the place in my life where there’s a lot less faking it and a lot more making it.
I’m hoping this summer is exactly where that journey begins.
2
elijah
“Can you check again? Try Lee Yoo-Jin instead. Or maybe Yoo-Jin Lee.”
Maybe I should have taken my mom up on her offer to come with me. What made me think I could do this on my own?
I attempt to mirror my mom’s voice instead of my dad’s. Mom’s tone can, when she wants it to, be sweet and persuasive. Dad has never been sweet in his life. His way of speaking is condescending, insulting, scary as hell.
I don’t think that’s gonna work in my favor here.
I should have used a “please” and a “thank you” as well. Those words feel like the most foreign of English words I’ve ever learned. People don’t expect that from me. I am my father’s son in everyone’s eyes.
At least those who know our family.
I track the brows of the airline worker as they slowly furrow their way into a point in the middle of her forehead. Like skinny worms meeting for a kiss. She, clearly, does not know our family.
“You said your name was Elijah Ri...with aR.” She says the letterRlike it’s code for “fuck off.”
All I’ve ever wanted was for some space between me and my birth name. I even went as far as to go by “Ri” instead of “Lee” in my family name’s English form. All for it to now be the thing that will likely get me dragged away in handcuffs for identity theft or something.
“Yes, um, but that’s my English name. And you said I wasn’t listed on the flight. Here.” I reach over into the open pocket of my backpack and pull out my Korean passport. “This is my passport with my Korean name. Let me check my email and see if I have a confirmation number or something. My dad’s travel assistant made the reservation so she may have done so with my Korean information. Sorry.” I scan my email, a bead of sweat trickling down my back, and I’m too nervous to even look up at the disapproving expression on this stranger’s face. I drop the passport on the counter and try and find the email with my information on my phone.
I’m beginning to think Betty Sue Airline Worker thinks something fishy is going on. Just because I’m standing here wearing a long black trench coat, in June, in LA, with a black ball cap pulled low over my face and a black face mask on, handing over two forms of ID with different names on them...doesn’t make this suspicious, does it?
Shit.
Where is that email?
I should have just booked the flight myself. But my dad, always so certain I will fuck everything up, wouldn’t hear of it. And he for sure would have a field day if I miss this flight.
I’m nineteen years old and can’t do the most basic things on my own. I’m notallowedto do stuff for myself. We have people who work for us to do almost anything and everything we need. I don’t even wipe my own ass. We have a high-tech bidet for that, complete with warm air for drying.
Do not get me started on how irritated this makes me.
So here I stand, my future in the hands of an airline worker’s opinion on if my multiple identities are believable enough. Her whim will determine whether or not I get on that plane to New York and spend the summer bored to death in the Executive Training Program at my dad’s company.
I look down at my wallet and pull out my VVIP card. This usually works in Korea as auto-entry into just about anywhere. But I push it back into its spot. Somehow, I doubt it would work here. In fact, it will likely piss her off even more.
Maybe this is all a sign. Maybe my ancestors are smiling down on me and laughing behind my dad’s back.
I don’t know if I even want her to let me through or not, to be honest. Spending the summer working for a bunch of miserable executives at Haneul Corporation is not my idea of a good time. But at least no one will know I’m the CEO’s son and heir apparent to the company throne. I couldn’t stand having them kiss my ass while talking behind my back about how incompetent I am. I get that to my face from my dad on the regular. Thankfully, my mom and sister helped me convince him to let me work from the New York office instead of the headquarters in Seoul, where he’d be breathing down my neck the whole time.
“Your boarding pass,” Betty Sue says, holding out a slip of paper tucked in my passport.
