“That’s not true at all,” I answered quickly. “Even if I weren’t in the picture, it wouldn’t change how she felt about you.” I wished there were a way to fully show him that, but I couldn’t tell him the truth of how I knew Jing-Jing’s counterfactual (which was really her factual).

“You need to break up with her,” Hongbo declared like the spoiled, privileged ass he was, so used to demanding things of others, even strangers. A diaspora version of Little Emperor syndrome at its finest.

“Do I get a say in this?” a voice said from behind us. A voice that made my knees a little weak.

I turned to watch Jing-Jing approach, her steps confident and an exasperated but take-no-shit look on her face.

Chloe

“Why do you even care this much? Is it just about the money?” I asked Hongbo. An image of him begging his mother for three thousand dollars popped into my head. “Are your parents threatening to cut you off if I don’t marry you or something?”

He scoffed, a spit-spraying pfft. “You think they would do that? Even your vagina isn’t shriveled enough for that.”

Andrew’s fists clenched, but he let me lead.

“Well, if it’s not the money, then what? You clearly don’t have feelings for me.”

Hongbo cringed. “Ew. No shit.”

“We’re missing something,” I said, half thinking out loud, half to Andrew. Definitely not to Hongbo, but he responded anyway.

“Maybe if you’d gone to Stanford like me, you’d have figured it out.”

I snapped my fingers. “You must have done something! And it must’ve been really horrible, even for you.”

Hongbo wore his usual smug expression, but I saw the hint of panic in the lines around his eyes. So I kept ruminating, because if he and his parents were hiding something, maybe we could use it against them once we figured out what it was. “Well, given that you wanted me for my reputation—” I started, but before I could finish, he turned to leave.

Time for drastic measures. Even if I guessed it, he wouldn’t admit it, so I had to change tactics. And what was Hongbo’s biggest downfall? His behemoth, blown-out-of-proportion ego.