I feel validated in that approach right now as I wrack my brain to remember exactly how much Kimiko knows about Helen. She knows things about Helen that even Helen doesn’t know. It’s a recipe for disaster. One tiny slipup, and everything will fall apart.
“So how do you know Joey?” Helen asks.
“Oh, Joey and I gowayback,” Kimiko says vaguely.
“You’re from San Diego?”
“San Diego? Me? God, no. I’m from the city,” Kimiko responds, sounding truly appalled at the thought. When her declaration is greeted by a blank stare, she clarifies, “New York City. Manhattan. Upper East Side,” and I want to laugh because Kimiko isexactlythe type of New Yorker who would refer to New York as “the city” even when she’s on the West Coast.
“Oh, likeGossip Girl.” Helen lights up.
“ExactlylikeGossip Girl,” Kimiko confirms with a wink.
“Right, so, then…” Helen trails off, still searching for an explanation.
“We’re in a book club together,” Kimiko says with a shrug, which Helen accepts as a good enough explanation. She doesn’t know I would literally never join a book club.
“I love malls. Don’t you justlovemalls? So nostalgic.” Kimiko changes the subject, marveling at our surroundings. “What store are you hitting next?”
“We were actually leaving to play mini-golf. Do you want to join us?” Helen offers.
Before I can protest and say we’re goingon Thursday, Kimiko exclaims, “Mini-golf?How kitschy—Iloveit. I need to run home and change. I have just the outfit. Text me the addy.”
She leaves. Resigned, I call Alex to tell him the plan, and we go back to campus to pick him up.
Before I know it, the three of us are walking through the doors of Sherman Oaks Castle Park, a “family amusement center” with batting cages, arcade games, and multiple mini-golf courses. It’s where most of my mini-golf dates took place.
As soon as we enter, I’m pulled back to childhood by the scent of buttered popcorn and churros, the beeps and chimes of arcade games, the slamming of air-hockey pucks, the eager screeching of kids running around.
Alex leans in toward me and murmurs, “I bet I could beat you at foosball,” and I wonder why the hell my eighteen-year-old hormones decide to interpret that sexually.
We exit out the back of the arcade and arrive at the miniature-golf courses, where Kimiko waits for us. The just-the-outfit she ran home to change into is a pastel-blue golf dress with a pleated skirt. She spots us, scoops up the four golf clubs leaning against the table next to her, and heads in our direction. I meet her halfway and take two of them.
“I paid and got us clubs and score sheets. They were very adamant about us staying on whatever course we choose rather than jumping around. The courses get harder going from right to left—or maybe it’s left to right, I’m not really sure. Oops.”
I’ve been here enough times that I should know, but the answer eludes me.
“Yeah, I’m not sure. Wanna just do the left one?”
“Works for me,” Kimiko says with a shrug.
I turn to Alex and Helen for confirmation and find Alex glancing from me to Kimiko and back expectantly. Oh, right—
“Alex, this is Kimiko. Kimiko, this is—”
“Well, well—if it isn’t Alex Aquino,” Kimiko says dramatically, sounding not unlike aScooby-Doovillain.
“Don’t say his name like that,” I mutter, struggling to conceal my laugh.
Alex’s smile barely dims as he holds out his hand for her to shake. “I see my reputation precedes me.”
“Boy,doesit,” Kimiko says, her voice filled with innuendo that, if you didn’t know Alex’s future, might imply that I’ve overshared about our sex life.
Somehow, I think that’s her intention.
“Kimiko,” I protest. Alex and Helen don’t know her, and I think they should be eased in.
“What class do you two know each other from again?” Alex asks.
