Page 27 of A Banh Mi for Two
“Hold on to you?” She shifts behind me, making my heart race faster. Placing her feet clumsily on the side of the motorbike, she tries angling herself so there’s space between us. I bite down a smile.
I lean back into her, closing that space, letting her know that it’s okay to touch me. “Yes, or you’ll fall off.”
Slowly, she inches her arm around my waist, holding on to me firmly.
For someone so bouncy and seemingly brave, she’s still shy—like me. “You can just grab my shirt, you know.”
“Oh.” Jolting, she starts to retract her hands.
“I’m teasing.” I hold on to her hands firmly. “This is nice, too.”
I turn into the busy traffic of Sài Gòn, joining the sea of motorbikes. We waddle through the crowd during peak rush hour, inching our way through the tide. I glance back at Vivi, a smile on her face as she takes in the city in front of her. The sun settles below the horizon, and kites once again take to the sky. The flying canvases makes me think of Ba, and grief grips me again. But it doesn’t feel like it usually does. Instead, I focus on Vivi’s warmth behind me, on her arms around my waist, and the loneliness doesn’t overwhelm me.
“Wow.” Vivi marvels at the kites.
I lean into her. “Do you want to go see the kites?”
“Yes.”
I weave through the crowd before turning into a narrow alleyway. Street food vendors selling bánh tráng, com t?m and chè mingle among passersby, feeding the people of Sài Gòn.
I can feel Vivi’s cheeks smiling against my back.
“Hang on,” I say.
Speeding up my motorbike, I swerve us deeper into the vast open field away from the blaring horns and toward the hum of cicadas. Vivi tightens her embrace. My heart is pounding so hard that it’s suffocating. As if on cue, five different paper kites spring from the ground up, riding the wind’s current and soaring right above our heads. I speed up again, chasing the kites around us as they dance gracefully across the red-and-orange canvas of the sky. The kites’ shades of blue, red, pink, and yellow bleed into the sunset’s hues, swirling into a palette that rivals that of traditional Vietnamese paintings. The wind playfully blows on our cheeks and the city’s humidity slips away. The earthy scent of the fields tickles my nose—the smell of sweet summer rain from the day before.
She tightens her arms around my waist, sending shivers up my spine. “Lan?”
“Yes?”
“Your Sài Gòn is beautiful.”
Chapter FourteenVIVI
Almost a day later, and the perfume of orchids still won’t leave my clothes, and every time I smell it, I think of Lan—of my arms around her waist, my face against her strong back, and my heart beating so fast I prayed she couldn’t hear it.
After making out with Mindy Kim four years ago at freshman year homecoming, I realized that kissing girls is one of the top ten reasons to be alive. I settled on the term bisexual, after years of wondering why my face heats up when a girl changes in front of me. Lan makes my heart skip like Mindy, but she also slows it down. I desperately want to see her again.
But does Lan even like girls?
Cindy pounds at my door. “Can you please tell Anh Huy to switch rooms? I missssss you.”
I think the C in her name stands for “codependency.” “I love you, but no, I don’t plan on causing trouble already. What if they email my mom?”
“You know she doesn’t check her emails.”
“She will be if she sees Vivi Hu?nh Is Expelled in the subject line.”
“They’re not going to expel you for switching roommates.” She laughs, and gets on my bed. “But, fine, I guess we’re going to have to do sleepovers for the entire semester.” She brought her pillows and blankets with her.
“You’re sleeping here again?” Nga groans from her bed that she’s currently sharing with five plushies. She has a sheet mask on, a routine she does every night.
“I know,” I second Nga’s whine. “You can’t be that scared of ghosts.”
“My room is creepy! It’s not my fault I got placed in the only single room and it’s cramped and tiny and practically haunted. I swear I heard someone talking the first night.”
“People would pay extra for a single,” I point out. “And it was probably just noise from the street.”
