“It’s so unfair. It’s not like she paid to be here,” Audrey adds. “We all have to pay for her.”
Wow. And here I thought we were all equals.
I fume as I walk over to Rosa’s after training. I can’t believe what my teammates said; I thought we were a group of principled individuals. That’s what I loved about debating: we may come from different worlds, but we believe in the same things—justice, ethics, equality. Evidently they’re just a bunch of words to score points from judges. They don’t really mean it.
The door to Budget Maids bangs against the wall as I push it open.
“Dani, where have you been? You’re late!” Rosa scolds me as she snaps her fingers, chop chop. “Get your uniform on.”
I glance at Ming, who already has hers on. Her cut-off denim shorts peek out from underneath it. Rosa makes us wear these ridiculous black-and-white maid uniforms that have Budget Maid on them, complete with hat and surgical mask, like some sort of half Pilgrim, half nurse. She says they make us look professional.
“I don’t get it,” I say, reaching for mine in my locker and putting it on. “Why does the client care what we wear as long as we get the job done?”
“How many times do I have to explain it to you?” Rosa asks, cutting the air with her hands. “It’s not just about getting the job done. It’s about brand building.”
I roll my eyes. Rosa’s been taking e-MBA classes. That’s where she gets terms like that from, which she likes to throw around to remind us she’s not just a boss, she’s a CEO.
She hands me and Ming our next address, one I don’t recognize. My mom and I have this rule—if it’s a new address, I don’t go. Someone else can go and clean it for the first time, just in case there’s something dodgy with the client. But maybe it’s okay. I glance over at my mom’s sweater hanging by her locker. Ming will be there with me, and besides, I really need the money, especially if I’m going to Snider. Round-trip tickets to Boston cost $500, and that’s just for the flight, that’s not even including a hotel. Every dollar counts.
Ming stuffs the address in her pocket. Her parents aren’t here to tell her where she can and cannot clean. I don’t even think they know about her part-time maid job. She nods to Rosa and says, “Okay.”
I help Ming with the cleaning supplies, and we head to the truck. Rosa’s husband, Eduardo, drives us. As we shuttle over to the address in North Hills, where the houses are twice as expensive and the people twice as likely to accuse us of stealing, I fidget in my seat, looking over at Ming. I want to tell her what Heather and those jerks said at debate, but she has her eyes firmly glued to her window.
We arrive in North Hills and make our way up the winding driveway to the impressive Mediterranean mansion perched above. With its lush lawn and wraparound balcony overlooking sprawling views of Los Angeles, it’s got to be worth at least two to three million dollars. Property prices have been going through the roof lately. Ming points to a jade statue of a dragon near the doorstep, muttering, “Crazy-rich Asians.”
“Gotta love them!” Eduardo says, beaming. He and Rosa are big fans, both of the movie and of the people, who buy up houses in North Hills and hire Budget Maids to keep them clean. He teases Ming, “Those are your people!”
Ming shakes her head as she lugs the cleaning supplies out of the car. “Not my people. We crazy poor Asians,” she says, pointing a thumb to her chest.
I get out of the car and smooth out my maid’s outfit. Together we walk over to the house. Eduardo waits until we’ve found the key under the mat before backing out the car.
“Call me when you’re nearly done,” he hollers as we open the front door.
Once we’re inside, Ming and I drop our cleaning supplies on the floor. I take off my surgical mask. We look up at the forty-foot ceilings in the living room.
“Holy shit, it’s like a museum,” I say.
A single crystal chandelier hangs from the center of the ceiling, made even more dramatic by the gigantic mirrors along the walls and the white marble floors.
“Or a concert hall,” Ming adds.
She lifts her hands up and pretends to play the violin, humming the melody. I smile and go into the kitchen to get us some sodas. There are a couple of dirty dishes piled in a corner and some pizza boxes on the floor. That’s it. This will be a cinch to clean.
Light floods in through the French doors. I stand for a while, taking a moment to look out at the pool as I sip my soda, trying to imagine what it would be like to live in a place like this.
Ming’s testing the cleaning sprays against the mirrored coffee table when I get back to the living room. I notice she’s wearing a new thin leather hair band. I wonder if she made it herself. It looks good on her. I hand her a soda and kneel down beside her. I’m about to tell her what happened at training when she turns and drops her own news.
“So yesterday my host dad was walking around the kitchen in his underwear, again. And he reaches in there and he readjusts.” Ming puts down her soda and gets up and demonstrates, reaching for her crotch.
“Ew,” I say.
“And then he takes the same hand and hands me my plate.”
The look on Ming’s face is so priceless, I start laughing, even though it’s not funny. Ming’s host dad is a middle-aged out-of-work truck driver named Kevin Malone who has a drinking problem, two little kids he can barely support, and no business watching over teenage girls. But he somehow discovered that hosting foreign students was an easy way to make money, and, as luck would have it, Ming got assigned to him, mostly because he was cheap. The school only gives her $600 a month for her housing stipend.
“Can you get another host family?” I ask her. “Or tell him to put some clothes on?”
She takes a sip of her soda and shakes her head. “The other host families, they’re all too expensive,” she says. She’s afraid of upsetting the school if she asks for more money.
I can relate. I’ve thought many times of asking Mrs. Mandalay, our headmistress, if the school will cover my debate travel, but I’ve never been able to do it. Every time I’ve opened my mouth, I’ve promptly closed it and ran over to Rosa instead to ask for more addresses.
“It’s not like my parents can help.” Ming sighs. She doesn’t talk much about her parents. I know they’re not like the parents of the other Chinese kids at our school who drive around in Porsches and Teslas armed with their parents’ American Express black cards.
“You want me to talk to your host dad?” I ask. I’d love to straighten him out!
But Ming shakes her head. “It’s okay. It is his house, and I guess he has the right to wear—”
A noise from upstairs cuts her off. What the . . . ? Is someone home? Ming and I walk quickly up the marble staircase to the bedrooms. We follow the sound to the master, where we push open the door and walk in on two people having sex. The guy, not much older than us, peers at me and Ming as a topless girl sits on top of him. An amused look crosses his face as he looks at us.
“Wanna join in?” he asks.
Three
Claire
My mother and I wait outside my Chinese teacher’s office. The Shanghai traffic hums from the window. My mother shakes her head as she stares at my pitiful Chinese essay exam in her hand. I can feel her disappointment—her anxiety—with every labored breath she takes.