I Am Not Jessica Chen(47)
Second to who? I’m about to ask, when I realize the obvious answer. Second to Jessica.
“No, I disagree,” Leela says. “At least being second means you get good grades, and you get more opportunities. I feel like it’s much more depressing to be average.”
“That’s like one of Cathy’s friends,” Celine says. “I kid you not, I completely forgot this girl was even sitting behind me until I was paired with her for a group project. . . .”
We ride for miles like this, with Leela and Celine comparing notes on who’s smarter and who’s more suitable and who’s lacking in this department but not that one, and I feel my skin begin to prickle uncomfortably. Surely, at some point, they must have had a similar conversation about me. And then I realize I no longer have to guess. I can find out for myself.
I breathe in. Speak up before I can back out. “What about my cousin Jenna?”
“Your cousin?” Celine’s brows furrow, like she’s struggling to place a memory from years ago. “Oh right. Jenna.”
So at least they still remember me. They still know I exist. I don’t know whether to be relieved or disappointed. Not until Celine sighs and says—
“You’re not going to tell her this, are you? I mean, I know you won’t. But she’s always struck me as, like, the kind of person who’s really hardworking. Just really, ridiculously hardworking in order to make up for her lack of natural talent. We can’t blame her for that, though. At least she’s self-aware—”
“Celine. Don’t be so mean,” Leela chides her, but she doesn’t seem to disagree either.
And my stomach is falling, my blood is freezing, my lungs are failing me. Still, I persist, like someone standing on a twisted ankle, testing the extent of the damage. “Is that . . . really a bad thing?”
“Hey, being hardworking isn’t anything to be ashamed of,” Celine says, adjusting the reins with one hand. “But just hard work isn’t going to get you very far, either. Look at all the famous athletes and screenwriters and singer-songwriters and scholars. All the people who’ve left an actual mark on the world. That writer we were learning about in literature the other day. She wrote her first award-winning bestseller when she was, what, sixteen years old? She showed promise when she was, like, ten. And she said that she barely even practiced, all she did was read a lot. For people like that, do we think they worked hard or were born as prodigies?”
It’s not an actual question.
I already know the answer, anyway. I’ve known it this whole time.
“But your family already has you, Jessica.” Celine flashes me a smile that’s probably meant to be flattering, meant to make me feel better. I feel like I want to throw up. “One prodigy is enough. You work hard and you’re talented and everyone knows you’ll be successful. If Jenna ever needs anything, she can always ask you for it.”
Leela nudges her horse forward just to shove Celine’s shoulder. “You think everyone would leech off their relatives the way you do?”
Celine grins. “It’s called being resourceful. And very soon, I’ll be the most successful one in my family—I’m very certain of that. They’ll all be leeching off me.” Then she glances back at me again, her brows rising and disappearing under her helmet. “But why do you even care about your cousin? She’s kind of just . . . there.”
The funny thing about time is that part of it is always at a standstill, frozen in the back of your mind, waiting to resurface at any given second. Because just those few words and I’m ten years old again, watching the other kids play together at recess, all of them laughing so loud it hurts my eardrums. I’m fumbling for the basketball in gym class because despite my best efforts I can’t get it right, and I can see the eye rolls from the sidelines, I can hear the soft snickers when I trip over my feet, my face flushing, eyes burning. I’m walking through the mall with my family and half of the girls in the year are gathered there and I almost go up to them to say hi until I realize that I wasn’t invited. I’m trying to smile through my mortification when the teacher lets everyone choose their own study groups and all my classmates are leaning over their desks, reaching for each other, making plans already, and I’m the only one left. I’m shrinking myself down, down, down, as small as physically possible when the teacher forces me to join the group of best friends in the back, like the unwanted product in a clearance sale. I’m pretending I can’t hear when one of them whispers, “God, not her,” but maybe the whole point is that I can hear them.
It was a little better when Aaron joined. The classes became bearable. I could hope to let myself hope. I tided myself over from day to day with the promise of catching his eye in the hallways.
It wasn’t enough, though.
I needed to find a solution. So I started observing my classmates, desperate to find that mysterious, decisive quality that separated them from me. The thing that I was lacking, that made it so I was always picked last, left out, laughed at.
And I came to the eventual conclusion that they were all good at something. Celine was beautiful and witty and intimidating and a humanities genius. Leela was incredibly well-rounded across all her subjects and creative and could carry any conversation with anyone. Even Cathy Liu, who’d always looked up to Jessica, was respected in her own right for her grades.