Fresh Off the Boat Read Online Free

didn’t like were the pink mohawked punks who loitered around Market Street in full studded-leather-and-torn-T-shirt regalia. I was always a little afraid of them. I didn’t understand what they were calling me at first, but I soon learned it wasn’t very nice. They never failed to comment whenever I walked by—yelling out “FOB!” (fresh off the boat), which infuriated me since I had arrived in this country on a Boeing 747. I managed to hurry by without arousing their interest, however. Perhaps they were having an off day.
    “Anong nangyari sa iyo?” Dad asked, when I arrived at Arambullo Import Trading. He shook his head at me when he saw the Band-Aids on my hands and knees. “ Akala ko you were going to the game?”
    “ Wala , I fell. I missed the bus.” I shrugged, walking over togreet him with a kiss on the cheek.
    “You should be more careful!” he said. Dad always got angry as a way of expressing concern. When I was little, I was terrified whenever I hurt myself because Dad’s wrath was so much more frightening than the pain of any cuts or scrapes.
    I dropped my book bag on the floor, where Brittany was stretched out, coloring with crayons in a book. “Hi, Ate ,” she said, without looking up. My parents insisted Brittany call me “ate” the proper title for “big sister” as customary in Filipino families.
    “V, you know you can just call me V,” I whispered, since I was trying to discourage the habit.
    Dad’s office was just big enough to hold the three of us with all of his furniture. When you opened the door, it hit the guest chair. In the middle of the room was a big black metal desk with a battered old computer he had bought at a garage sale, a phone, and an ancient fax machine. It was so old it still used the shiny paper that spooled through in a continuous sheet that you had to rip off at the top. There was a filing cabinet wedged behind the desk on which Mom had placed a goldfish bowl with one lone goldfish. “For luck!” she said, explaining a Chinese superstition. A ceramic kitten with its paw sticking up stood guard on top of the minifridge. (“It’s supposed to bring in money! Japanese good luck charm!”) There was a pineapple-shaped ashtray and a pineapple-shaped coffee mug. (Hawaiians believed pineapplesbrought prosperity.) Mom believed in adopting as many superstitions as she could—you never know which one will work, she always said. My dad ran an import-export business, to bring Philippine products to American sellers and vice versa. So far, despite the numerous lucky charms, he’d had absolutely no luck.
    In Manila, my parents had owned one of the nicest restaurants in Makati, and my dad had been an investment banker who owned his own company, Arambullo Investments. He had the biggest office in the building on the top floor, with floor-to-ceiling windows and white shag carpeting. He had three secretaries: one to take calls, one to file, and another just to order Christmas gifts. The few times I’d visited my dad at his office, I was always amazed—everyone, from the bank tellers to the messengers to the receptionists and VP’s seemed to know who I was. “Mr. Arambullo’s kid, right?” “Oh, the daughter of the Big Boss!” Mom said that everyone at the office was scared of my dad, so I liked marching in, bursting in on his meetings or while he was on the phone or with a guest. Dad would shush me, but he would never ask me to leave. Instead, I would sit on one of the black leather couches next to the conference table and look out at the view or else admire the framed pictures of lions and waterfalls that I’d drawn which were his office’s sole decoration.
    “Can I go to Nordstrom?” I asked.
    “No, I’m done here,” Dad said, pulling out his briefcase. Heplaced a few file folders inside. “Bri-tta-ny, pack up na .”
    My sister nodded and started carefully putting away her things. Brittany is very particular about her stuff. We once had a huge fight when I