That Math Girl (Chapter 12)

*Disclaimer*: This is a work of fiction. Some events may be based on real life, but some events are made up.

     “Um, how are we going to get blue vegetables? I mean, don’t they just grow in Japan?” I asked. Ling-Ling and my new aunt puzzled over this for a while. Then, Ling-Ling walked over to Great-Uncle-Harry. She whispered to him and he quickly walked away. Ling-Ling gave me a wink. What was that all about and why did Ling Ling wink at me? 

After a few minutes, Great-Uncle-Harry came back. He was holding a huge packet of seeds. The seeds were like tiny balls. They were as blue as the wide-open sky without a single cloud. They were also super cute! “Here. Just plant these in the winter or when it’s really really cold. It’s best if you plant them in a mix of snow and potting soil, and if you don’t have snow you can use ice cubes,” Ling-Ling said because her husband was still quietly in hysterics. 

Isabella suddenly came over, “Why was Uncle Harry moaning about taxes? Aren’t you guys really rich? I mean, if you can produce this many bathrooms and showers, shouldn’t you be able to easily pay your taxes?” Isabella flushed a little and quickly said, “Oops, sorry. I guess I shouldn’t have asked this, I’m still getting used to…, well, talking. Sorry, if you think I’m rude.” It seemed like she was going to run away, but she stayed put. 

“Oh it’s okay, I’m glad you're opening up,” Ling-Ling said encouragingly. “You see, Harry loved Damien very much. He always looked up to Damien when he was young and still does. He was so disappointed when Damien decided to become a farmer. He thought that Damien should have become a businessman like their Uncle. Harry thought that Damien would earn a lot of money. He probably could have.” Ling Ling paused to catch her breath.

“Your uncle Harry didn’t have that much money.” Ling Ling continued. “But, your uncle Derek had a small fortune from one of his great aunts and he looked up to Harry as a superhero. For some reason Derek really, I mean really likes the superheroes in comics, almost like an obsession. Anyways, They decided to use the fortune to impress Damien, Derek’s father. At the time though, they didn’t know that. They didn’t even know that Harry was Derek’s uncle. Then they made this,” Ling-Ling said, pointing at the house surrounding her and spinning around like a little girl. 

She then blushed and said, “Oops, sorry. I just love to dance.” Isabella and I both stared at each other as if to say, “Why in the world would she like to dance? That is my least favorite subject and I would want to avoid dancing at all times.” Then we waited a few minutes for Ling Ling to continue after she drank some Hot Chocolate.

“Now about the taxes. As you probably know, houses have taxes for water and other stuff. Like servants. Then, there were all those bugs, special snacks, wood carving, all of that stuff. We didn’t have that much time. We wanted to have 50 servants, well my ol’ husband Harry wanted to have 50 servants, I wasn’t much into it, but, well he’s my husband, so you know, I agreed. But we didn’t have time to get all of them. By the time Damien called to say that your guyses flight had finished, Harry had only hired 47 servants. Derek, Xiaohua, and Mingmei agreed to be servants for a while, though they weren’t paid because, after all, it was Derek’s money. We probably shouldn’t have made them servants, because Mingmei kept complaining about it, but yeah, you know. You should put some blame on me, to, though, cause’ I agreed to that crazy plan of Harry’s, I should have tried to stop him. I even told everyone loud and clear that I wasn’t going to pretend half of the time to be a servant and the other half of the time to be your hostess.”

“I’m so sorry, I’m sorry, about, about, about everything. I just wanted to arrive. You know how plane rides stress Austin out and he makes those sounds, I was just so happy when we got off and I didn’t know that you wanted more time. We could have gone to the popular Japanese restaurant that Harry loves to talk about. I’m just so sorry about that,” Ye Ye said tearfully, wiping a stray tear from his eye. Obviously, Ye Ye was probably going to stay for a while, talking about why he’s so sorry.

Ye Ye always intervenes at important times to say sorry, and right now it was the worst time to apologize, I was learning so much! I rolled my eyes, saying, “Whatever. It’s okay.” Isabella quickly nodded in agreement, and Ye Ye sniffled a little. “Sorry, I need to go,” he whispered quietly, already shuffling out the room. Phew! I thought he was going to stay forever. 

“Anyways, let’s excuse that, we had originally planned to bring a big bus like The Lee Family Bus you have back home, but we didn’t have enough money and time to rent one for a month. Then, when I had to go to the grocery store, that was an accident too. I had to get some food because I had forgotten to get so much food. Oh boy, it was one of Harry’s crazy ideas, no offense to my dear and old husband. Well, at least you solved the Nabal problem. I actually didn’t really like him. He wasn’t that polite and he always tried to get me to sign contracts that were in Korean, although I’m not trying to express offense for Korea, my mom was actually half Korean, and half Japanese,” Ling-Ling explained. Then she crouched down next to Isabella and me, and whispered, “Don’t tell anyone because for some odd reason, probably about business, Harry doesn’t like Koreans that much.” We both nodded, pretending to seal our mouths with an invisible key. 

“You see, I knew some of the languages since one of my best friends is fluent in Korean. Her parents were missionaries there. Anyways, he wanted me to sign these contracts that made me do horrible things for him. He shouted, but I stood firm. Okay, is that good enough for you?” Ling Ling added, as if she hadn’t said anything about Korea, and being a descendant of a Korean woman. Isabella nodded, obviously really surprised that Ling-Ling had said so much. I was surprised too, but I needed to learn more about these blue vegetable seeds. 

“Okay, that’s wonderful. So, how deep do the holes for the seeds have to be?” I asked. Ling Ling told me all I needed. I wrote it down on the Lists app. It was supposed to be a digital shopping list, but since Covid-19, people have used it to write down things to remember for later. That’s what I was using it for. 

After our huge day, we all went to bed, happy that the case was solved. Mingmei slept on the bottom, I slept on the top, and Isabella slept in the middle of the bunk bed. (This was the latest design, and for some reason, it made Isabella normal colored. Before that, she was still pink, but to be polite nobody ever mentioned it. (Not even Uncle Harry.)) I slept soundly until morning. 

It was 6:20. "Hi guys!", I said. Nobody answered. After a few minutes, Mingmei and Isabella looked up from their game of Speed. Speed was a game that used cards. Like its name, it was really fast and usually, you can finish a game in a few minutes. They were just starting to play a game of Dogs. You used the same cards and also went really fast. 

            "Hi, Clara. You slept in. Well, anyway, you know how Ava's making a lot of snoring sounds through these paper-thin walls?", Mingmei asked. She pointed to the paper-thin walls. Isabella and I nodded and laughed. "Maybe, we should go wake her up." We all shared secretive smiles and laughed again. We quietly tiptoed out the door and in Ava's door. We could hear Ava's loud snore. 

            "Hong-Xiu! Hong-Xiu! Hong-Xiu!", Ava snored, loudly. Isabella and I giggled a little, but Mingmei put her finger to her lips to quiet us down. Mingmei quickly grabbed Ava’s alarm clock and motioned for us to walk out. Quietly, we tiptoed out and walked back to our room. There, Mingmei started to explain her plan. 

“Okay, okay. I’ll tell you my plan, but next time don’t laugh. I know you laugh a lot for no reason, but, really Clara, you might as well wake Ava up and tell her that we heard her snoring. She did tell me that she was touchy in that area. Anyways, I’ll set her alarm clock to 6:25, since it’s 6:23 and then we all hide in her closet. When her alarm rings, we yell ‘Boo!’ and then we all run away. Got it?” Isabella and I both nodded. 

I quickly pressed a few buttons and then we all snuck back. After a minute and 2 seconds, the clock rang, Ding, Ding, Ding, and we yelled, “Boo! Boo!”, then we all snuck away. Unfortunately, Mingmei wasn’t fast enough and Ava sent her AirPods after her. “Help”, Mingmei yelled, while the AirPod robot chased her around the room, but there was nothing we could do. Ava had blocked the door and if we came in, Ava would know that we had helped Mingmei and that would make it even worse than the situation already was. Finally, after a few minutes, we surrendered to Ava and her AirPods and we all went to go get some breakfast, laughing about our hilarious encounter with the AirPod Robot. 

"Hi, Clara, Isabella, Mingmei, and Ava. I heard some weird noises", Ye Ye said frowning and then smiled,  nodding at all 4 of his granddaughters. "I have a big surprise for everybody. Meet everyone in the living room at 7:00 am. It's 6:30 now." Ye Ye smiled and his brown eyes twinkled. We all nodded and went over to the buffet. We had 10 minutes to eat breakfast. I tried eating some American food first. Even though we lived in America, we rarely ate American food because Nai Nai always cooks Chinese food. Even the only bakery and store are Chinese food and supplies. 

After we ate breakfast, we headed to the living room. Everybody was already there, except for Hayden, though Malachi and Austin had literally just come on. “All, right, guys, I have a big surprise as you all know. We are going to go visit my mother, your great-grandma,” he said, with a smile. “Oh, Ava, you can probably stay here with Ling Ling and Harry if you want, but other than that, all you need to know is that we will be going the day after tomorrow and it’ll be very humid, so bring summer clothes.” Everybody nodded. It was so exciting. We had never ever been to Taiwan, that was where Ye Ye’s mom lived. I couldn’t wait to go! 

Come back later to read more of "That Math Girl" and don't forget to check out the rest of my blog!!!!