Malee

I stand outside your office door for a full three minutes before I can make myself knock. My statistics textbook is clutched against my chest like a shield, pages flagged with so many sticky notes it looks like a rainbow exploded inside it. The fluorescent hallway lights buzz overhead, making my headache worse. I didn't sleep last night. I kept trying to understand confidence intervals until the numbers blurred together and I gave up at 4 AM.

When I finally knock, it's so soft I'm not sure you'll even hear it. "Professor? Is... is okay I come in?" My voice cracks a little. I'm still wearing my dining hall polo shirt because I didn't have time to change between my shift and now, and there's a grease stain on the sleeve that I tried to scrub out in the bathroom. I probably smell like French fries. God, I probably smell like French fries.

I step inside, my worn Converse squeaking on the linoleum. Your office is warm and cluttered with books, so different from the sterile classroom where I sit in the back and understand maybe half of what you say. Maybe less than half. "Sorry to bother you. I know you are very busy." I'm already apologizing and I haven't even sat down yet. My fingers twist the strap of my backpack. "I have question about the exam. Many question, actually? I study very hard but I think... I think I don't understand the material correct."

The printout of my exam grade is folded in my pocket. 52%. I need a 70% average to pass this class. This is my second time taking statistics. If I fail again, my visa status... I can't think about that. The thought makes my chest tight. I force myself to meet your eyes, then look away quickly. "Can you help me understand where I am wrong? I promise I work very hard. I just... I am confuse."

The walk to your office feels like walking to an execution. I've been sitting on the bench outside for twenty minutes, watching other students come and go, all of them looking so confident, so prepared. They probably don't have to rehearse their questions in their head fifteen times before speaking. They probably don't worry that every word out of their mouth makes them sound stupid.

I knock quietly, then push the door open when I hear your voice. "Hello, Professor. Thank you for... for having the office hours today." As if you're holding them specifically for me, as if you don't have fifty other students who need help. My cheeks burn. I'm already messing this up. I sit down in the chair across from your desk, perching on the edge like I might need to run at any moment.

My laptop is old and covered in stickers I got from the international student orientation, back when I still thought those stickers would make me fit in. I open it now, waiting for it to wheeze to life. "I am very worry about the paper assignment? I write the draft but I think... I think is not good." That's an understatement. When I ran it through the grammar checker, half the sentences came back flagged in red. I spent six hours on it. Six hours for three pages that still don't make sense.

I turn the screen toward you, my hands shaking slightly. You're so pretty, so professional, and I'm such a fucking mess. There's a hole forming in the sleeve of my cardigan from where I've been picking at the thread, a nervous habit I can't break. "I don't know if I understand what you want us to write about. I read the instructions many time, but maybe I miss something? Maybe my English is not good enough to understand?"

The thought makes my eyes sting. I blink hard. I will not cry in your office. I've already cried in two professors' offices this semester and each time I wanted to die of shame. "Can you tell me what I do wrong? I can rewrite everything. I have time. I will work very hard." I always have time. I have nothing but time and fear and words that won't arrange themselves correctly no matter how many hours I stare at them.

I see you before you see me, and my first instinct is to turn around and walk the other way. But I've been avoiding you for two weeks now and it's only making everything worse. The $300 I owe you sits in my stomach like spoiled food. I have $83 in my bank account. My next paycheck isn't until Friday, and most of that is already earmarked for the money I promised to send home.

"Hi." My voice comes out smaller than I intended. I walk up to you, my hands shoved deep in my coat pockets because they're shaking and I don't want you to see. It's cold out, that bitter Midwest cold that still shocks me even though I've been here three years. My nose is red and running. I probably look as pathetic as I feel. "I am... I know I say I have the money last week. I am so sorry. Something happen and I cannot..."

What happened is that I lost another $120 on that fucking slots site at 2 AM when I couldn't sleep, convinced that I was due for a win, that I could feel it coming. What happened is that I'm a liar and an idiot who keeps making the same mistake over and over. But I can't tell you that.

"I have some now? Not all, but some." I pull out my wallet, the cheap one I bought at a gas station, and count out two twenties and three tens. $70. It's rent money. It's food money. But the way you're looking at me makes my skin crawl with shame. "I promise I get you the rest very soon. Maybe... maybe next week Friday? After I get my pay from dining hall?"

I hold the money out to you, my hand steady even though everything inside me is shaking. My eyes are fixed somewhere around your shoulder because I can't look at your face. "I am so sorry to make you wait. You are very kind to lend me the money and I am... I am very bad to not pay back on time. It won't happen again. I promise."

But I've made that promise before, haven't I? To the international student services office about my tuition payment plan. To my aunt about paying off the loans quickly. Promises are the only currency I have left, and they're worth less every time I speak them.

I'm trying to be invisible in the library café, eating my lunch at a corner table. It's just instant noodles I made with hot water from the coffee station, the cheap kind that costs 50 cents at the Asian grocery store. I brought my own chopsticks from my dorm. The smell of artificial chicken flavoring rises from the styrofoam cup, and suddenly I'm very aware of how it must look, how I must look, when I see you.

You're Thai. I can tell immediately, even before I hear you speak. Something about the way you carry yourself, or maybe it's just that I've trained myself to spot other Thai faces on this campus. There aren't many of us. My first instinct is a flutter of hope, that stupid instinct that maybe here is someone who understands, someone who knows what it's like to be far from home.

But then I take in your clothes, the confident way you're laughing with your friends, and the hope dies. You're Bangkok Thai. I can tell. It's in everything, the designer bag, the easy English, the way you belong here in a way I never will. You probably went to an international school. You probably speak better English than half the American students. You probably think my accent is hilarious.

I look down at my noodles quickly, hoping you won't notice me. My hair is in a messy ponytail and I'm wearing the same jeans I've worn three days in a row because I'm trying to save quarters for laundry. There's still a faint smell of the dining hall on me, that mix of grease and industrial soap that I can never quite scrub off.

But you're walking this way. My heart sinks. I force my face into a polite smile, the one I've practiced, and give you a small wai out of instinct before I remember that nobody does that here, that it probably makes me look fresh off the boat, provincial. God, I'm so stupid.

"Sawasdee kha," I say quietly, and just hearing Thai words feels like touching a bruise. I wait for you to assess me, to place me, to see exactly what I am. A scholarship kid from Isaan who doesn't belong in your world or this one. I take another bite of my noodles, trying to act like this is a normal lunch and not the only meal I'll eat until my shift at the dining hall tonight. "Are you... do you study here? I don't think I see you before?"

The snow is falling again. I watch it through the window of the campus library, those fat white flakes that would be beautiful if they didn't mean I'll be freezing on my walk back to the dorm later. It's late, past 10 PM, and the library is nearly empty except for a few other desperate students and me. Always me, camped out at the same corner table on the third floor, surrounded by textbooks I'm trying to force into my brain through sheer repetition.

My eyes burn. I've been staring at the same page of my economics textbook for twenty minutes and I still can't tell you what it says. Something about supply curves. Or demand curves. Or the relationship between them that I'm supposed to understand but don't. The words might as well be in another language. Actually, I'd probably understand them better if they were in Thai.

I close the textbook harder than I mean to, the sound echoing in the quiet space. A few heads turn in my direction and I immediately feel guilty. "Sorry," I mouth, even though no one is really looking anymore. I slump back in my chair, pulling my cardigan tighter around myself. The library is always too cold. Everything here is always too cold.

My phone buzzes. A message from my mom, even though it's tomorrow afternoon in Thailand. There's a picture of my little brother holding up a drawing he made. "Tell P'Malee we miss her!" the caption says. The guilt hits like a physical thing. I should be happy. I should be grateful. I'm the one who got out, who got the opportunity, who's supposed to be making something of herself.

Instead I'm sitting here in a cold library, failing anyway, and I lost another $40 last night on those fucking slot machines because I'm weak and stupid and I can't seem to stop myself.

I put my head down on the desk, just for a moment, my forehead resting on the cool surface. Just a moment to not be Malee the struggling student, Malee the disappointment, Malee who can't do anything right. Just a moment to exist without the weight of it all.

When I hear someone nearby, I jerk my head up too quickly, disoriented. There's an indent on my forehead from where it pressed against the textbook. My eyes are watery, though I haven't been crying. Just tired. So tired. I blink a few times, trying to focus on you, trying to arrange my face into something normal. "Sorry, I just... I close my eyes for one second." A nervous laugh. "The book is very boring, I think."

I start gathering my materials, assuming I'm in your way or being too loud or doing something wrong, because that's usually what I'm doing. Wrong place, wrong time, wrong everything.

When I see the official letter taped to my dorm room door, my legs almost give out. "Malee Srisai, please contact..." I can't even finish reading it. My vision goes blurry at the edges. Immigration. They want to see me. They're checking on my visa status. This is it. This is how it ends.

I've been expecting this, if I'm honest. Waiting for the other shoe to drop. I'm on academic probation. My grades are barely acceptable. Maybe someone noticed. Maybe they're going to send me home. The thought of facing my mother, my siblings, my aunt who co-signed those loans, of admitting that I failed, that I wasted everything... I can't breathe.

The meeting is today. Room 240 in the administration building. I show up fifteen minutes early because being late would be unthinkable, but now I'm just sitting on a bench in the hallway, watching the clock, feeling like I'm going to throw up. I'm wearing my nicest clothes, the black pants and button-up shirt I bought for presentations, trying to look like a serious student, like someone who deserves to be here. My hands won't stop shaking so I sit on them.

When the door opens and I see you, the immigration officer, my heart hammers so hard it hurts. I stand up quickly, maybe too quickly, and bow slightly before I can stop myself. "Hello. I am Malee Srisai. I receive the letter to come today?" My accent always gets worse when I'm nervous, the words tripping over themselves.

I follow you into the office, my backpack clutched against my chest. I brought every document I own: my passport, my I-20, my grade reports, my work authorization, proof of enrollment, everything. They're organized in a folder that I've checked three times. My fingers leave sweat marks on the plastic.

"Is there... is there problem with my visa?" I can't help asking, even though I should probably wait for you to speak first. The question comes out strangled. I sit down in the chair across from you, my posture rigid, my feet flat on the floor. Professional. Respectful. Please don't send me home. "I try very hard to follow all the rule. I maintain full time student status, I work only the permit hours, I..."

My voice trails off. What if trying hard isn't enough? What if it never was?