Sali and The Five Kingdoms Read online

  “Grandma, I think I just got offered a job!”

  “That’s wonderful!” She hugged me and turned to Grandpa. “Isn’t that wonderful, George?”

  “Sure is.” Grandpa took his turn, hugged me, and teased, “Does this mean you can finally pay rent?”

  By now the crowd had grown substantially, and as it did, the noise level increased. I started feeling strange. I could hear distinct conversations coming at me all at once. I started getting a headache. It came without warning. One moment I was fine, the next it felt like my head was about to explode. Grandma was overprotective as heck, but she was also a worrier. I didn’t want to tell her that I was feeling worse and worse. My vision was being affected. I was seeing spots, and things were blurry. Finally, I let out a scream. “Ow!”

  “Sali? What is it?” said Grandma with an undertone of substantial concern. “Are you OK?”

  I put both hands to my temples. “I have a nasty headache all of sudden,” I said, holding on to her and Grandpa for support. Grandma hastily gestured for Grandpa to fetch the car.

  3

  The Eyes Are Useless

  It was ten minutes to ten, and I was rushing to leave the house. I grabbed the car keys from the kitchen counter. I took my gloves and rushed to the car. I put the car in reverse and hit the gas. As I looked back for possible obstacles behind me, my eyes caught the empty back seat.

  “Argh!” I exclaimed in frustration. I put the car back in park, jumped out, and ran up the stairs, strides at a time, to my bedroom. Seconds later I was back in the car with my workout bag.

  When it comes to dealing with hardship, there are three categories of people. There are those who shut down and retreat into themselves. They must be thinking that if the world is that cruel and only deals us sadness, disappointment, and despair, staying away from it means we can’t get hurt.

  On the other hand, there are those who take the hardship head on and deal with their feelings, take the time they need, and allow themselves to feel the full force of whatever misery comes their way.

  Finally, there are those who look to the future and move on.

  I was in this third category. I coped with hardship by keeping myself occupied. When Mom disappeared, I did just that. I joined a hockey team in my local community. I had quickly found out that I lacked the patience to gear up, get on the ice, and chase after a puck. So I had tried softball. That, too, wasn’t my thing. The sport felt too structured and too restrictive for me. I had nearly given up trying any other activities when Grandpa suggested that I try something more physical. That’s when I signed up for a trial run of tae kwon do. After an initial trial, I quickly took a liking to the sport. The group classes gave me a sense of belonging without having to be dependent on anyone but myself, and my own performance. The levels of knowledge, the many skills, and the ten belts one could reach gave me something to look forward to. Subconsciously I must have been attracted to the sport because it provided a channel for me to release all the guilt and frustration I had accumulated since Mom’s disappearance—the drawback to moving forward and not dealing with the pain. I could spend an hour punching, kicking, screaming, sweating, and on occasion even get bruised and bleed without anyone judging me.

  But after years of practicing the art of tae kwon do, I found that it had a hidden benefit. It taught me to control my emotions, but most of all, it taught me to be in harmony with my own body, my self-confidence.

  I finally arrived at a small strip mall where a converted storefront served as the dojang—our training room. The training facility did not look like much. The sign above the door read “TKD School of Martial Arts.” Some of the letters were missing, while others had faded and were illegible. The smell of baked dough from the deli next door filled the air.

  The interior of the dojang was as bare as its facade. The facility had the bare minimum: an open training room with blue gym mats, a unisex bathroom that doubled as a locker room, and some punching bags off to one corner of the main room. On the entire length of the back wall, a quote by the founder was featured prominently in black paint. It read “‘The eyes are useless when the mind is blind.’ Grandmaster Lee.”

  I walked into the dojang and headed straight to the locker room, where I dropped my bag off. After a few minutes of stretches, Grandmaster Kramer stepped up to the mat in front of the class. “Bring it in, everyone,” he said. “We are going to get started.”

  There were about a dozen students in the class, lined up in three rows of four. I was in the front row, facing Grandmaster Kramer. He put his feet apart, meticulously placed his fists on either side of his waist with his palms facing up, then lowered his center of gravity to strike a perfect horse stance. He scanned the room, looking to each of us to mirror his pose. His eyes landed on me. He quickly looked at my form and nodded in satisfaction. With a stern voice, he cued for us to start. He punched the air with his right hand while counting in Korean.

  “One …”

  He retracted his right hand back to its starting position and proceeded.

  “Two …”

  His fists were alternating between their starting position and punching the air in front of him. The class mirrored his every move in unison. A guttural chant emanated from the class and echoed off the walls. Under his critical eyes, I was determined to give it my all. I tightened my stomach, flexed my forearms, and pictured an imaginary adversary coming toward me. He was dangerous. If he touched me, it was game over. So I had to punch and punch, relentlessly. I focused on saying the numbers, my head clear of all thoughts. I could feel droplets of sweat forming on my forehead. Each time I punched the air, the large sleeves of my uniform trapped the air and caused an oddly satisfying and emboldening thud.

  Grandmaster Kramer was moving between the ranks, correcting our stances.

  “Don’t lean forward; keep your spine straight!” he told a student.

  “Your stance is weak! You need to lower your center of gravity more, much more!” he said to another student. To prove his point, he firmly pushed on the student’s shoulder, and he immediately crumbled to the padded floor like a tree under a category five hurricane.

  The grandmaster finally issued a command in Korean to get us to stop. Across the room, everyone caught their breath; some of the newer students were bent over and breathing heavily. He divided the room into two groups with equal numbers of students on either side. He pointed at me and gestured for me to move forward. He turned in the opposite direction and pointed at another student from the other group, who also stepped forward.

  I was now face-to-face with Scott, a heavyset man in his thirties, twice my size.

  Grandmaster Kramer took a couple of steps back and pointed to the center of the mat. Scott and I simultaneously bowed to Grandmaster Kramer then to each other. The grandmaster stepped off the mat and with one swift hand movement, ordered the start of the sparring session.

  I put my guard up, moving about the mat, my eyes fixated on my opponent. Scott emulated me and ran toward me without hesitation. He faked a punch as if to see if I would flinch. I pulled my head back. Suddenly Scott lunged forward and executed a double blow that knocked me backward. Grandmaster Kramer stepped in and pointed his stretched-out arm in the direction of my opponent. Scott got the point.

  I got back on my feet and in the center of the mat. I quickly evaluated my opponent. He is big and aggressive, I thought. He favors his right foot; that’s why he has the left side of his body facing me. As we moved about the room, I continued to study my opponent. His left knee is bent forward, and his left arm is way too high in a parry position. He is giving me a false opening. If I attack, he will counter with another double strike. He is overconfident. I can use that to my advantage, I concluded. I know just what to do!

  I moved forward slowly. Scott smirked, probably thinking that I had taken the bait, that I was going to strike under his arm. I went for it. I purposely moved my arm forward and simultaneously took a step with my right foot. Just as I had suspected,
he attacked with a double strike. I executed the second part of my maneuver. I dropped to my knees while turning counterclockwise with my left leg extended, leading with the heel and firmly anchoring myself against the mat. The whole thing only took a fraction of a second. His punches went high and missed. My heel made contact with his left foot and bam! Swept off his feet, he hit the mat, hard. I sprung back to my stance, waiting for him to get up.

  Scott got up. He looks pissed. Good! I thought. He is going to get even more aggressive now; that’s his style. I watched his posture. He shifted his weight onto his back leg and pulled his right fist way past his waist. He is going for power. This is it! I thought as I readied myself.

  Grandmaster Kramer gave the final signal; whoever took the point would win the sparring round. Scott rushed toward me in full force. I have to time this right … Wait for the hit. Don’t move. Not yet. Wait for it … Now!

  Scott extended his arms in my direction; it was a power hit. The moment he flinched and moved toward me, my heart started beating faster. My eyes focused precisely on where I wanted to make contact with him. I shifted my foot and positioned my body slightly to the side. A strange sensation came over me: I felt faster and more agile than ever. I stepped into the hit but moved my upper body slightly left so that his fist would miss me. At the same time, I turned my back while locking his extended forearm. I pivoted half a turn, holding his forearm firmly. My back was resting against his. I elbowed him mid-spine, taking care not to hurt him, much. The round was over; I got the second point.

  “Well done, Sali,” said the grandmaster. “Way to use your opponent’s strength against him.”

  He also gave some advice to Scott. “Control your emotions, attack carefully, and don’t underestimate your opponent.” He pointed to the quote on the wall. “The eyes are useless …” He stopped and waited for Scott to complete the saying.

  “… when the mind is blind, got it!”

  I bowed to Scott one final time then to Grandmaster Kramer and left the mat.

  The practice had ended. I sat on the floor with my back against the wall and took a sip of water. Grandmaster Kramer sat next to me.

  “You know,” he said, “in some parts of the world, people with heterochromia are said to have foresight.”

  Surprised, I responded quickly. “What? How did you …?”

  “I’ve known since the day you started here.”

  Grandmaster Kramer had somehow noticed that my eyes had different colors: one was green and the other brown. A condition known as heterochromia iridis. Something I preferred to keep under wraps. When I was younger, the different colors of my eyes attracted unwanted attention from my classmates, friends, and even strangers. Some were even a bit weirded out by it. So I decided to wear contact lenses so that people wouldn’t notice it. During my sparring with Scott, one of my contacts must have fallen out.

  I must have looked concerned and puzzled.

  “Don’t worry. I won’t tell,” he said with a reassuring grin. “You know,” he continued, “there are many celebrities with the same gift.” He named them. “Jayne Seymour. Kiefer Sutherland. Mila Kunis …”

  “You know Mila Kunis!” I interrupted.

  “Hey. Even tae kwon do masters need entertainment.”

  The sun had reached its peak when my tae kwon do class finally ended. I made my way through the parking lot to get to my car.

  A short distance away from the car, I noticed a man standing near the driver-side door with his back toward me. From a distance, it looked like the man was touching the hood of the car. As I got within about a hundred feet, he turned and saw me coming. The man hastily walked toward the mall and quickly vanished.

  He must have been putting one of those car wash coupons on the windshield, I thought. What a waste of trees that is!

  I got to the car and lifted the windshield wiper to reveal a small white envelope. Carefully I unfolded the enclosed note and read the message. I looked up and looked around for the man I had just seen standing by the car. I threw my bag on the passenger seat, slammed the door shut, and ran toward the area of the mall where I had last seen the man. He was gone.

  I got back to my car, sat down, and looked at the note and reread it.

  I KNOW WHAT HAPPENED TO YOUR MOTHER.

  SOLOS PIZZA. 8 P.M. COME ALONE.

  At first I didn’t know what to think. “What the heck is going on here?” I asked, perplexed. The more I thought about what just happened, the more upset I got. Who is this man? Why would he do something like this? Did he know Mom? Why now? After all these years? Why now, the heck now!

  I tried to rationalize the situation. Clearly, this man is up to something. Let’s assume for a second that he knows what happened to Mom. That would mean that he either knew Mom personally or someone told him what happened. On the other hand, could he have read it in the local paper? If that’s the case, what a sick thing to do! I mean, who would do something this hurtful? What would be the fricking point of that?

  On the drive home, I couldn’t contain the strong feelings brewing in my head. The more I tried to rationalize things, the more confused and upset I got. A myriad of emotions and feelings ran through my body. Memories of Mom, long thought forgotten, came up from the abyss of recollection like a silent film projected on the canvas of a drive-through theater. It made me feel sad and vulnerable. Near tears, I thought about calling Dad but hated the idea of getting any support, even emotional, from him.

  “He is probably sipping tea on the terrace of some pub in London,” I begrudgingly uttered under my breath.

  4

  Mystery Man

  Time is the strangest of things. When it counts down toward uncertain events where circumstances are beyond our control, we dread it. It affects us physically and emotionally in ways that one would not expect. Nothing else matters. Things that we normally don’t pay attention to in the daily grind come into focus, and everything else seems to fade away. The world around us simply ceases to exist. Time slows.

  “You’ve been watching the clock for the past hour. Is everything OK?” asked Grandpa, who was resting in the living-room recliner, reading a newspaper.

  “Yeah, I’m OK,” I responded.

  But truthfully, I was concerned and couldn’t stop thinking about my encounter with the man at the mall. Who the heck is he? I pondered. “Well, I am about to find out!” I said under my breath with conviction before running upstairs to my room to get changed.

  If this guy has nefarious plans, I better be prepared. I slid the closet door and looked at the tightly packed rack of clothes hanging on a wooden rod bowed at its center by the weight of my outfits. I have got to get this fixed! I thought, sifting through the clothes. I pulled a pair of nylon pants and threw them on the bed. Then I grabbed a sturdy long-sleeved polyester shirt to go with it. My goal was simple: wear clothes that would not restrict my movements should I have to defend myself or run. I threw the clothes on and walked up to the mirror affixed to the closet door. I struck a pose, punched and kicked the air a few times, and smiled at my reflection, satisfied with my choice of attire.

  I ran back downstairs, put on running shoes, and announced from the front door, “Grandma, I’m going to run an errand. I will be back soon!”

  “OK. Don’t stay out too late,” yelled back Grandma.

  I sat in the driver seat of the car, hands on the wheel at ten and two. I stayed in that position for a moment, contemplating what I was about to do. “Meet with some creepy dude who left a creepy note at a creepy mall,” I humorized. “Nice Sali! You do know that this is how Dateline stories start out!” I could hear the archetypically deep voice of Keith Morrison announcing the start of the show: “An energetic and bright young woman with a promising life … a mysterious note … and the man who would end it all …”

  I let out a long sigh and sat back in the chair. I dug out the note and read it one more time. It suddenly dawned on me that the note was vague. While it told me where to go, it did not exactly give me
an address.

  SOLOS PIZZA. 8 P.M. COME ALONE.

  Well. A girl’s gotta do what a girl’s gotta do, I thought, with an utter and renewed sense of determination. I put the note on the passenger-side seat and looked to my wrist. I tapped the screen of my portable device. The screen, the size of a small watch, lit up. I spoke into it. “Alex?”

  A monotonous robotic voice responded. “Yes, Sali. How may I help?”

  “What is the nearest Solos Pizza location?”

  “The nearest Solos Pizza is two point three miles away. Shall I start navigation?” the voice asked.

  “No. Project it.”

  Upon issuing that command, my wristwatch projected a larger version of the map right before my eyes, in midair. A small green car icon marked the location of my car. Further along the virtual topographical map, at the end of the winding route, was a red icon of a restaurant. My eyes stopped on the estimated time of arrival: six minutes.

  “Alex, how many Solos Pizza locations are there nearby?”

  “There are two other locations within a fifty-mile radius.”

  I brought my hand to my lips, pensive. I put the tip of my thumb and ring finger on the virtual map and brought my fingers closer together until they touched; the map immediately adjusted and scaled up, covering a broader area. On the scaled-up map, I saw that the other two locations were not in the city. Naturally, my observations raised further concerns. How is it that this man knew where to find me when I was away from home? He also knew that there was a Solos Pizza near my house. This realization should have deterred me, but I wanted to find Mom. If there was even the slightest chance that he knew where Mom was, it was well worth the risk.

  The store was at the center of a busy mall bustling with activity, even at this time of night. I didn’t park right away. Instead, I circled around a couple of times, strategically looking for any suspicious vehicles or individuals.