“Let’s go in,” Matt said.

“Oh no, we can’t buy anything,” Ma said.

“No harm in looking,” I said because I knew how much she wanted to enter, and Matt and I ushered her in through the double doors.

A burst of air-conditioning met us. It felt like heaven. There were enough customers wandering around, examining instruments and looking at musical scores, that Ma started to relax. Some were seated at the pianos, testing them out. I longed for this clean and carpeted life. Ma was as wide-eyed as a young girl. She started leafing through a stack of scores by Mozart, completely absorbed.

Matt and I walked around by ourselves.

“I didn’t know your ma liked music so much,” Matt said.

“She was a music teacher.” I paused. “Back home. What about your parents? What do they care about?”

“My ma’s so busy, just taking care of Park. And my pa’s gone. So I have to look after everybody.”

I smiled. Matt always took his responsibilities so seriously. But this was the first I’d ever heard about his father.

“You mean he’s passed away?”

Matt nodded without meeting my eyes, then said, “Where’s your ma?”

I turned around to look for Ma and found her lingering by a grand piano. I cocked my head in her direction, and Matt and I crossed over to her.

“This is a handsome instrument, isn’t it?” Ma said, flipping through the sheet music that someone had left on the piano. “It must sound lovely.”

“Try it out,” Matt said. “You’re allowed to push a few keys.”

“Oh no,” Ma said.

“Please.” I caught her eye. I desperately wanted her to play for Matt, to show him that we were more than what we seemed to be at the factory.

Slowly, Ma sat down. “Your pa used to love this piece,” she said, and ran her fingers up and down the keyboard in a series of runs before she started playing Chopin’s Nocturne in A-flat.

Matt’s mouth was slack.

I closed my eyes, listening and remembering how it had been when we had our own piano in our apartment, how Ma’s delicate fingers had moved so gracefully over the keyboard. She played the beginning and then stopped. By then, we had attracted the attention of a salesman, despite our simple clothes.

“Madam plays beautifully,” he said. “The piano has a wonderful tone, doesn’t it?”

I wondered how I could turn him away politely, but Matt spoke first.

“Yeah,” Matt said in English. “Thanks, but we’re just looking.”

For once, someone had taken the burden off me.

We wandered around the Tay Um See Arena, looking at the skyscrapers.

“Oh my, I have to look up three times before I can see the top,” Ma said, laughing as she peered up at one particularly high building.

“I can span it with my hands,” Matt said, stepping back and pretending to measure it.

That reminded me of something I didn’t want to bring up, but I needed to know.

“What’s going to happen to Mr. Pak?” I asked Matt. Since he lived in Chinatown and knew a lot of people from the factory, he heard most of the gossip.

“He won’t be coming back to the factory. His skin was badly burned and his wife thinks the work is too dangerous.”

“What will happen to him, then?”

“She works for that jewelry factory on Centre and Canal, so I bet he’ll do that with her when he heals.”

“What is that?”

“Making bead bracelets and other costume jewelry. You can bring all your work home, but it pays even worse than our factory. And you need to have very fast hands.”

I looked at Ma. Could this be a way to get out of the clothing factory?

She shook her head. “Remember how cold it gets at home, ah-Kim?”

I nodded. In our unheated apartment, we would never be able to string beads with a needle and thread.

Finally, we went to see the Liberty Goddess. Ma had tried to pay for Matt’s subway tokens but he’d been too quick for her.

“Now, we’re not going to actually get off at the Liberty Goddess,” Matt said. “That boat costs too much. What we’ll do is to take the Staten Island Ferry, which is only twenty-five cents, and you get an even better view.”

“Perfect,” Ma said.

We climbed aboard the large yellow ferry, which reminded me of the ferries in Kowloon Harbor, and Matt led us up to the top deck. Ma said it was so windy there that she had to go back downstairs to sit down.

It was wonderful, standing against the railing with Matt by my side, the cool wind blowing the heat away. The ocean stretched out before us.

“We’re going to get a first-rate look soon,” Matt said, and he left to go downstairs to get Ma. I marveled at how he could be tough yet considerate.

I held my breath when we finally got a good view of the Liberty Goddess. She was so close and so magnificent. Ma and Matt were right next to me. Ma squeezed my hand.

“How long we’ve dreamed of this,” she said.

“We’re here,” I said. “We’re really in America.”

Matt was looking thoughtful. “Doesn’t she remind you of Kuan Yin?”

We nodded.

Later, when Ma and I were finally back in our apartment, she said to me, “I was wrong about that Wu boy. He’s more than handsome, he’s got a human heart too.” She meant he had compassion and depth.

I didn’t answer but I hid my face in my pillow, thinking about Matt.

Ninth grade marked the transition to high school. Most of us had been there for seventh and eighth grade but some new students entered in ninth, and the school year began with placement tests in math and science to determine which level classes we should be in. The other students, especially the better and more competitive ones, were nervous about the tests because spots in the accelerated science and math program were limited and coveted. Although the tests were supposed to be a simple evaluation of our abilities, many kids had tutors to help them do some extra studying on their own. There was a rumor that some colleges accepted only students who had gotten into the accelerated program.

After the dusty, physical work of the factory, the scientific world created a clear and logical paradise where I could feel safe. Just for pleasure, I had started reading library books about subjects we’d touched upon in school: amino acids, mitosis, prokaryotes, DNA forensics, karyotyping, monohybrid crosses, endothermic reactions. And mathematics was the only language I truly understood. It was pure, orderly and predictable. It gave me great satisfaction to work on mathematical puzzles and forget about my real life at the apartment and factory. So I might have been the only student who actually looked forward to the placement tests and enjoyed taking them.

When I received my scores, they seemed impossibly high, even to me. I was overjoyed. However, after a few weeks in the accelerated science and math program, Dr. Copeland, the director of the science and math department, called me into her office. My heart thudded in my throat. I didn’t have good memories of that place.

“Kimberly, I am concerned by your performance in your classes,” she said.

My breath seemed to lodge in my throat. What could be wrong this time? I’d been getting close to perfect scores on every test so far. As an extra credit assignment in Biology, I’d devised a lab activity my teacher had raved about: using dehydrated juice to identify solutes, solvents, solution, concentration, and to simulate enzyme activity. “Is there a problem with my grades?”

“To tell you the truth, you’re doing a bit too well.” Dr. Copeland stared at me with narrowed eyes to gauge my reaction.

Now I understood. She hadn’t forgotten that incident with Tammy last year. With the fear clogging my throat, it was hard to get the words out. “I’m not a cheat.”

“I hope not. All of your teachers seemed to be convinced of your intelligence, and I do want to believe them. However, no student your age has ever gotten the results you got on those placement tests. And you are doing extremely well in your classes, while your middle school grades were less consistent. You may or may not know this, but tests have been stolen in the past.” Her face was filled with suspicion. She leaned in closer to me. When she finally spoke, her voice was so low I could barely hear her. “I was a pretty bright student too, as smart as they come, and I couldn’t have learned as quickly and as well as you claim to be doing. If you prove me wrong, I’ll be glad-glad to have such a brilliant young girl in science-but, well… you understand why we need to be sure of this, I think. You will be taking a new combined placement exam, an oral one, conducted by the entire science and math faculty. Each teacher will contribute his or her own questions.”