Amidst The Stars

New, For The Fourth Time

  The last time Vicente had been to Taoyuan Airport, he had been three years old.

  He remembered passing by stores packed with souvenirs — magnets, tote bags and purses galore. What was the clearest in his memory was his mother tugging a figure of the 101 Tower out of his hand and firmly placing it back on the shelf. "We'll see the actual tower soon," she'd said. It was as though that scene was a video forever downloaded in his mind.

  Now, just hours away from leaving the country, Vicente wanted so badly to run a second time to the souvenir stores and buy a little piece of Taipei to slip into his pocket. That way, he could pull it out whenever he felt nostalgic at Arlingdale and wanted to be reminded of his old (though also temporary) home.

  But he barely had any pocket money left for overpriced airport trinkets. Instead, he resorted to staring longingly at tourists strolling past him and out of the airport, speaking to each other rapidly in their native languages. He heard a young couple jabbering to each other in English, discussing just where to go for lunch, and shuddered. Even after two too-fast weeks of fervently working on his English, poring over textbooks that he could've been studying in his next year of school in Taipei, he was far from fluent.

  They dropped off their suitcases and watched them disappear on conveyor belts, before heading to immigration. When the immigration officer who looked over his identification documents asked for his name, Vicente replied, as loudly and clearly as he could, "my name is Huang Jia Lin."

  He still had that blunt Cantonese accent that simply refused to go away, and he was sure that he'd pronounced something incorrectly. But that didn't matter — it was probably going to be the last time he'd be speaking in Mandarin.

  As they left the booth, Vicente called out, "thank you, and have a good day!"

  It was definitely really childish, to shout out unnecessary things to strangers. But it felt good, too, to make the best of his last moments in Taipei. While his mother wasn't looking, Vicente ran over to a brochure stand and took a few booklets, stuffing them into his bag.

  Later on, as they were boarding the aeroplane, he saw Ling gazing around at the overhead carriers and seats, eyes wide with surprise. "Jia Lin," she clamoured, tugging on his shirt-sleeve, "where are we sitting? Do we have seats, or do we have to stand up?"

  Lifting up his ticket, Vicente pointed to his seat number. "See this number? That's where we're sitting. What does your ticket read?"

  Ling glanced at her ticket, then the 42B boldly printed on it. Without another word, she ran off to her seat. She plopped down quickly and looked around. "Look at all this stuff!" She unwrapped the blanket and threw it over her, peering excitedly at the pocket of magazines in front of her. "Do we get to take them away?"

  He took his seat next to Ling, placing his bag under his chair and buckling his seatbelt. "I don't think we can," he replied, "how about we ask Yao?"

  "Okay!" Ling clambered over him, stepping on her seat (and his hand) in the process, and shouted across the aisle, "Yao, can we take all this away?"

  A few people glared at her. Vicente, while nursing his bruised fingers, couldn't help laughing.

  Yao looked up from his brand-new cell phone and answered, in a far quieter voice, "I'm afraid not." He shifted the pillow behind his back. "But since our flight is fourteen hours long, we can enjoy them for a while."

  "Fourteen hours?" She looked out the window, stepping on her seat for the second time. "But how will we go to the bathroom? Or eat?"

  "People will bring us food later on," Vicente explained, "and if you need to go to the bathroom, Mother will take you there." He glanced over at his parents, two aisles away and deep in conversation. "Or, uh, Leon can."