This Is How We Fly Read online

  Also by Anna Meriano

  Love Sugar Magic: A Dash of Trouble

  Love Sugar Magic: A Sprinkle of Spirits

  Love Sugar Magic: A Mixture of Mischief

  PHILOMEL BOOKS

  An imprint of Penguin Random House LLC, New York

  First published in the United States of America by Philomel,

  an imprint of Penguin Random House LLC, 2020.

  Copyright © 2020 by Anna Meriano.

  Penguin supports copyright. Copyright fuels creativity, encourages diverse voices, promotes free speech, and creates a vibrant culture. Thank you for buying an authorized edition of this book and for complying with copyright laws by not reproducing, scanning, or distributing any part of it in any form without permission. You are supporting writers and allowing Penguin to continue to publish books for every reader.

  Philomel Books is a registered trademark of Penguin Random House LLC.

  Visit us online at penguinrandomhouse.com.

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available.

  Ebook ISBN 9780593116883

  Edited by Kelsey Murphy.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  pid_prh_5.6.1_c0_r0

  For Sophie Bonifaz Pérez, Brandi Cannon, Mollie Lensing, and all the quidkids

  CONTENTS

  Cover

  Also by Anna Meriano

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Epilogue

  Acknowledgments

  About Quidditch

  Get Involved

  About the Author

  1

  Xiumiao takes one look at me standing in her doorway in my graduation dress that I hate, jaw clenched to hold back tears, and says, “What if we just don’t go?”

  Connie’s car has already disappeared around the corner, so it’s safe to wipe my watering eyes. “Won’t your parents be disappointed?”

  “Oh, they definitely weren’t coming.” Xiumiao rolls her eyes. “I told them it was next week, after we leave town. I didn’t want all the fuss.”

  And without another word she spins me 180 degrees and tows me toward the strip mall at the end of her block. I guess we’re officially skipping graduation.

  Xiumiao strips off her hoodie and offers it to me to cover up the dress before we enter Tea Corner, which marks maybe the fourth time I’ve seen her without it all semester (the other three being choir performances). The hoodie is a mark of her true dedication to the street urchin aesthetic even in ninety-degree heat.

  Our wardrobe swap leaves her in a tight tank top and me in a short swishy skirt under my hoodie, and the unusually feminine looks don’t escape Counter Guy. We don’t know his name, but we’ve watched him grow from the confused first-ever white employee at the boba shop to a competent Counter Guy.

  “Hey, y’all look nice today,” Counter Guy says. Not in a creepy way, but my face turns red—this is why I normally dress like I just rolled out of bed and also might be a troll.

  “Thanks, but we’re miserable,” Xiumiao says. “One taro and one jasmine green tea, no milk. Both with tapioca, please.”

  She pays, and we sit on cute but uncomfortable armchairs in the back. Nubby canvas scratches the backs of my knees as I try to settle without flashing the world. Xiumiao hands me my cup, not even teasing me for my nondairy preference like she usually does. I slurp until the lump in my throat gets a little smaller.

  “So . . .” Xiumiao’s not exactly asking anything. She didn’t ask questions when I texted twenty minutes before graduation looking for a ride, either. She just told me to come over.

  “They completely bailed,” I tell her. “Dad got tied up at work last minute, as usual, and Connie thought it would be boring.” I knew my stepmom didn’t want to go to my graduation, but I guess I didn’t think she’d really blow it off.

  “It is going to be boring,” Xiumiao says. “It’s the school’s last-ditch attempt to bore us to death before we escape their clutches.”

  “I know,” I sigh. “But I wanted to go.”

  “We still can,” Xiumiao offers.

  I shake my head. It’s not like I care so much about sitting on folding chairs in the gym for two hours. “I don’t know, maybe I just wanted to go because Connie didn’t.”

  “You need to learn to fly under the radar.” Xiumiao shakes her head. “Just do whatever your parents want, and then let the resentment eat you up until you’re dead inside. It’s a perfect system.”

  I snort. “Yep, you’ve got it all figured out.”

  Xiumiao’s parents are nice, and they love her and all. It’s just that they have strong opinions about her singing in the church choir and getting good grades, and they would probably prefer if she grew up to be straight and got married to a dude and had straight babies, which is probably not the way things are going to play out.

  Not that Xiumiao’s talked about it with them, so they’re really just Schrödinger’s homophobes. But she doesn’t want to open that box, which is valid.

  “We can tell Melissa to record it so you don’t miss the boredom,” Xiumiao says.

  I sip my tea. “Nah, that’s okay. Besides, she abandoned us. Best friend status revoked.”

  “That’s not at all what happened, Ellen. You just have abandonment issues.”

  “Wow, sounds like you’re abandoning me to side with Melissa. Best friend status revoked.”

  Xiumiao snorts. “Well, if you don’t want to watch the valedictorian speech on a two-inch screen, do you want to go back to my house and watch Rent? You can borrow shorts.”

  There is something to be said for a friend who’s known you so long that they understand what you need even when you don’t. I follow Xiumiao into the morning heat. Maybe this was the perfect way to end high school after all.

  * * *

  • • •

  Of course, Mrs. Li wants an explanation, and she kind of wants to feed me.

  “I didn’t know you were coming,” she exclaims, “and don’t tell me you’re drinking all that sugar for breakfast! And you look so pretty! What’s the occasion?”

  I think the law of the suburbs says that your friends’ parents have to love you, but Xiumiao’s parents have always gone above and beyond ever since Mrs. Li met Dad crying outside the pre-K classroom door and decided to take the struggling single parent under her wing. I used to carpool with them to and from kiddie sports and choir events and occasionally to their Chinese Baptist church in one of their not-so-subtle gambits to save me from my heathen Cathol icism.

  Xiumiao is quick to cut the conversation off. “No, Ma, she ate before.” Untrue. “She just came from a funeral.” Super untrue, and also out of nowhere even if my dress is black. Then Xiumiao invents an (untrue) scholarship essay contest we have to work on, and we retreat to the library, which is the kind of room you have when you’re an only child in a five-bedroom house.

  “We’re using your Netflix,” Xiumiao warns, handing me her dad’s tablet with the login screen open.

  “Really? You watch every other musical movie on their account. At this point it’s probably more suspicious that you haven’t watched the gay one.”

  Xiumiao glares.

  “Sorry. You can always use my Netflix to watch gay things.”

  She raises a very worrisome eyebrow.

  We settle onto the couch, sipping tea and scrolling our phones and humming along to the movie we have mostly memorized, until Xiumiao says, “You know it’s just a ceremony. Your diploma comes in the mail either way.”

  “No, I know. It was more about Connie and Dad showing up for me.” Xiumiao nods. “And, like, closure.”

  “Wow, no, super can’t relate. Case closed. Burn it all down.”

  My phone dings in my hand, notifying me that Xiumiao is also on Tumblr and liking my posts while we talk, which is either tragic or extreme best friend goals.

  “You don’t want to celebrate before Melissa and I leave town?” I ask. “Soon you’ll be stuck here missing our faces.”

  Xiumiao is making her parents’ dreams come true by staying in Houston for college, while Melissa goes off to the rural wasteland (by which I mean medium-sized college town) where Texas A&M is located, and I’ll be in Austin at the University of Texas. Xiumiao and I have been in the same classes since pre-K, and with Melissa since sixth grade—it’s weird that soon we’ll be in totally different cities/rural wastelands.

  “I think I’ll remember what your face looks like.” Xiumiao gulps tapioca, totally unconcerned. “And anyway, I’ve been thinking . . . as far as she’s concerned . . .”

  I put my phone down, because whenever Xiumiao stops using Melissa’s name it means we’re entering the secret romance zone, where Melissa is not our best friend that we speak to and about normally, but instead the object of Xiumiao’s long and painful crush on a straight girl.

  “Yeah?”

  Xiumiao loses some of her nonchalance, stabbing her straw up and down in her cup. “I’ve been thinking that I need to get a little space.”

  “Oh? That might be good.” Especially since Melissa’s been dating her current boyfriend for a while now. “You’ve got that vacation coming up, right?”

  “That’s, like, a week. I’m talking about actual physical, mental, emotional space. A total disconnect. High school is over, and it’s time to move on.”

  “But,” I stammer, surprised by the sharp edge in Xiumiao’s voice. “You’re not going to stop hanging out with us?”

  Xiumiao’s face falls, but I can’t figure out why. She hides it quickly with an eye roll. “That’s kind of exactly what I’m trying to say.”

  “But . . . she’ll notice.” Xiumiao’s biggest fear in life, after her parents learning anything about her, is Melissa learning about her crush. And it’s probably not cool of me to use that against her, but I feel a tiny bit panicked. We’re about to be forced to get space. Why does she want to speed it along?

  Xiumiao shrugs. “I’ll be really busy this summer,” she says. “Shadowing at the hospital, church stuff, camp. And we’re all going to be getting ready for college anyway.”

  If by “getting ready for college” she means “desperately clinging to friends who are basically family before circumstances beyond our control separate us,” then yes, totally, we’re on the same page here.

  But we’re not. Is she really ready to just move on?

  “So am I supposed to lie about hanging out with you, or what?”

  Xiumiao frowns and opens her mouth like she’s going to respond, but instead she just sips her tea. The silence stretches a little too long. “Like I said, I’m going to be busy.”

  Wow. So maybe it’s not just Melissa who Xiumiao wants to move on from. She goes back to her phone while angry New Yorkers sing about capitalism. Usually comfortable silence is our jam, but right now it feels ominous.

  I suck up the last of my tea, leaving a lonely pile of gloopy tapioca. My summer plan was to spend all my time at Xiumiao’s and Melissa’s houses, avoiding Connie to avoid fighting. Is Melissa thinking the same thing Xiumiao is? Does everyone expect us to stop being friends now that high school is over?

  While I pick at the hem of my borrowed T-shirt and watch a found family grow closer through adversity on-screen, my phone buzzes. Melissa is tagging me in photos of empty graduation seats with sad-face emojis. Where are my friends? the caption reads.

  I text her, My family is the worst, so Xiumiao and I ditched. Have fun.

  Ugh, sorry, tell me about it later? And thanks, it’s actually really boring, Melissa responds.

  I smile, about to tell Xiumiao that she was right. But maybe she doesn’t want to hear anything about Melissa, or graduation.

  Anyway, happy official start of summer! Melissa texts. You’re definitely coming to quidditch practice with me and Chris this week, right?

  I text back ellipses, which seems nicer than “I thought you were joking about that” or “Seriously?”

  Melissa’s boyfriend Chris plays quidditch. Yeah, that quidditch. Melissa really wants to check out the real-life version of the Harry Potter game, but she’s already in marching band, so joining a nerdy outdoor activity isn’t as much of a stretch for her. It’s been a long time since I’ve willingly participated in any team sports.

  You have to! Melissa texts. Quickly followed by, It’s our bonding activity for the summer! She sends an assortment of sports-ball emojis, plus a wizard in a pointy hat, making my phone ding with each text. I snort.

  “What?” Xiumiao leans to see my screen, probably expecting a meme.

  I tilt the screen. “Nothing,” I say. “It’s just from . . . Nothing.”

  Xiumiao nods. “Thanks,” she says. “You can tell Nothing to enjoy graduation. But, uh, actually don’t say it from me.” Then she turns back to her phone with a determined nod.

  She’s really going through with this. The tapioca rolls like marbles in my stomach.

  I’m not one hundred percent sure how I feel about going to the park to pretend to cast spells, but I know that I don’t want to disconnect from everything this summer, and Melissa must not want to, either.

  Fine. I’ll try it.

  It’s not a solution to my fears about life after summer, but at least it’s something to do with my friend.

  But, I mean, how are we supposed to fly?

  * * *

  • • •

  When the movie ends, Connie starts texting. Her texts come rapid-fire, always too impatient to wait for a response.

  Where are you? she asks first. Your father wants to have a celebration dinner. This perks me up momentarily, until the next ding: We need to clean and decorate the kitchen. And finally, The ceremony should be over by now.

  I tell her that I went to Xiumiao’s.

  Well, you should head back soon. Ding. I can pick you up on my way back from the mall. Ding. You don’t want to overstay your welcome.

  I pause the credits. “I have to go. Connie.”

  “Boo.” Xiumiao nods. “Good luck. See you . . . whenever.”

  I change out of the borrowed clothes and drop them in Xiumiao’s lap as Connie texts me that she’s pulling up.

  “Uh, bye,” I say. It feels wrong—we usually have a relationship that supersedes small talk and greetings in favor of just walking in and out and ignoring each other—but the way she hesitated, I’m not sure if Xiumiao intends this to be the last time we ever hang out or what. “Have a good vacation, I guess.” Have a good summer? Have a good life?

  “Sure, yeah.”

  I’ve never been broken up with, but I feel like maybe this is a taste of that when I put my (annoying) heels on and walk out the door, a weird pit in my stomach. I climb into Connie’s car, relieved when she starts talking about the new curtains she’s considering without asking anything about graduation.

  That’s it for high school. And other than a summer of trying to fly under the radar with Connie, and I guess playing quidditch with Melissa, I have no idea what comes next.

  2

  “Thanks,” I say, holding back my building eye roll, “but I’m not even that hungry.”

  It’s six o’clock and Dad still hasn’t made it home from work, so we’re starting graduation dinner without him.

  Connie draws a deep breath in her trademarked reverse sigh, pulling Styrofoam out of the brown paper bag from Tortillas a Go-Go. “Try a fish taco.”

  “Vegan,” I remind my stepmom for the twelve thousandth time since last semester.

  “That’s why I got fish.” Connie grabs my empty plate and heaps it (aggressively) with piles of rice and beans and guacamole. Mexican food—sorry, Tex-Mex, which is nothing like real Mexican according to Connie—was one of the hardest things to give up, and watching the glazed blue ceramic plate disappear under globs of sour cream makes my traitorous mouth water. Theoretically there are plenty of vegan tacos I could be eating, but the problem is that most of them are in the cool parts of Houston and none of them are my family’s favorite takeout choice. Being Mexican American and vegan (well, Mexican American on my dead mom’s side and white Irish American on my dad’s side, which is basically the Tex-Mex of heritage) is not easy.

  “Fish isn’t vegan.” My stepsister Yasmín plunks into the seat across the table. She must’ve been messing around in the mirror again, because her normally neat ponytail has been attacked by a swarm of sparkly plastic butterfly clips. “It’s pescatarian. You’re not a pescatarian again, are you?”