She grew self-conscious all of a sudden, and her hands curled into fists. “I can walk.”
“We’re there.” He nodded toward the large white building with its four massive pillars and Sproul Hall engraved over the middle set of double doors. “The registrar’s office is in there. They should have a database of all the students who’ve gone here. I don’t know if they’ll give us the information you want, though.”
Staring up at the building, she nodded. “He walked up these same stairs.”
She wiggled her legs, and he let her down. She aimed a distracted smile at him before she hobbled up the stairs to the building. When they made it inside, she looked around with roaming eyes and parted lips.
He shoved his hands in his pockets and gave her space to explore. He didn’t really understand her fascination. It was just a building, and it wasn’t like her dad had left part of himself here. Well, if he had, that was nasty.
There wasn’t a line at the registrar’s, so they walked directly to the counter.
“Hi, how can I help you?” the guy asked through his enormous orange beard.
Esme hugged her purse to her chest, wet her lips, and glanced at Khai quickly before she said in rehearsed-sounding English, “My dad went to school here a long time ago. His name is Phil. Can you find him for me, please?”
So she could speak English. She just chose not to. With him. The guy looked at both of them over the tops of his purple plastic-rimmed glasses. “Are you serious?”
Esme nodded.
“You don’t know his last name?” the guy asked.
She swallowed, shook her head, and replied in English again, “No. All I know is Phil.”
Khai slowly turned his head so he could analyze her. She only knew her dad’s first name. That was surprising and . . . sad. This decreased her chances of finding him dramatically.
“There are probably thousands of Phils here. I’m a Phil.” The guy tapped his name badge where it said Philip Philipson.
Khai arched his eyebrows. The guy was about two hundred percent Phil, but his age and coloring were all off. “She has a picture.”
She hurried to pull it out of her purse and handed it over. “Twenty-four years ago.” She tried to smile, but her lips barely curved before she cleared her throat.
Philip Philipson offered Esme an apologetic smile. “I totally want to help you, but I’m not allowed to give you this information. I’m so sorry.”
“But he was here,” she insisted.
“I’m really so sorry. Maybe you should hire a private investigator,” Philip said.
She hugged the picture to her chest as her eyes went glossy, and Khai wanted to reach across the counter and shake an apology out of Phil. Before he could act, Esme pushed away from the counter and limped from the room.
He followed behind as she rushed out of the building, hobbled down the steps, and limped across the plaza to sit by the round water fountain. She dragged in deep breath after deep breath, but as far as he could tell, she wasn’t crying. She might as well have been, though. He didn’t see how it was that different from what she was doing.
A familiar sense of ineffectualness seized him. He never knew what to do when people were emotional like this, but he wanted to do something.
For lack of any better ideas, he sat down next to her and said, “My parents divorced when I was little. I know my dad, but we never see him.”
She turned to look at him. “Why not?” Back to Vietnamese again. What did it mean?
“He’s busy with his new family and lives in Santa Ana. He’s an accountant. Like me. Or maybe I’m like him. I don’t know.” He rubbed his neck. “Maybe
. . . it’s better that you don’t know your dad. You can imagine he’s better than mine.”
“That’s true.” A small smile touched her lips, but it faded quickly. “But I just—I just wanted to know, and if I go without seeing him, I’ll have wasted the trip here, and . . .” She swiped a sleeve over her eyes and tried to take more deep breaths, but then her face collapsed and her shoulders shook.
Fuck, she was crying for real now. Something much like panic gripped him. She couldn’t cry. She was supposed to be happy for the both of them because he didn’t know how.
He grabbed one of her hands. Hand-holding was good, right? But then she leaned toward him, and soon he was hugging her as she buried her face against his neck. The air rushed out of his lungs. She was in his arms, turning to him, trusting him, just like that time she’d had the nightmare.
It was terrifying. It was wonderful.