#ReadWithMC (opens in new tab)-Welcome to Marie Claire's virtual book club. It is a pleasure to meet you, and for the month of January we will be reading "Fiona and Jane" (opens in a new tab) by Jean Cheng Ho (January 4). The novel is about a friendship between two Taiwanese-American women that develops over a period of 20 years. Read an excerpt from the novel and learn how to join our virtual book club here (opens in new tab). (The year we turned 16, Fiona decided it was time to learn to drink. We drove to a swap meet in Norwalk and shelled out $50 each to buy fake IDs at the passport photo, fax, and color copy stalls. The store was run by a Gujarati family, and the girl we paid for had graduated from our high school a few years earlier. When she handed over her finished ID, we knew immediately that we had been scammed. It was a flimsy laminate, no better than a Blockbuster membership card, with a photo of our unsmiling faces glued onto a rectangle of white paper, with California Identification Card typed at the top and our names and birthdays written underneath. I was too embarrassed to ask for my money back. Still, I wanted to give it a try. So I called Wong. He said he knew of a place, and the three of us set out one Saturday night in a Shamu, a hatchback named by Fiona after SeaWorld's killer whales.

The freeway glowed with stop-and-go brake lights. The speeds were something like 10, 12, and 15 miles per hour. It was 7:30 in the evening, the sky was a washed-out indigo color, and the dingy gray ripples hung low. There was no doubt that Sham was a whoopee, but she was ours. She was Fiona's. In other words, she was also mine. We were best friends. [Wong leaned forward from the back seat. 'We're lucky we don't have cards in this place,' he said. 'You guys are idiots, if you think you can go anywhere with such a chummy ID.'

Wong told her the name of the exit off Route 5 in Garden Grove. He called us "Sulzip."

"Trust me," Wong said. 'It's going to work out. Stay calm. You hear that, Jane?"

"Shut up," I said." Chill out..."

"Behind there..."

I looked.

I looked through the windshield to where Wong was pointing.

Fiona swerved into the strip mall parking lot. She hesitated." Right ahead."

Between a brightly lit 24-hour donut store and a dry cleaners with pleated metal shutters down at night was an unmarked store with a row of large windows. The glass was tinted black and completely obscured the inside. In one of the darkened windows, a neon sign with something written in Hangul script glowed red.

Before stepping out of the sham, I exchanged a light glance with Fiona. I could see the excitement in her eyes and she was trying to hide it.

We followed behind Wong and sat down in a booth. The place was nothing like the bar we had seen on TV. First of all, it was not what one would call a bar, nor was there a bartender standing behind a long counter lined with stools. There were tables, chairs, and booths just like in a restaurant, but the lights were dimmed. The air smelled of fried oil, garlic, and chemicals like chlorine and citrus. The walls were covered with newspaper cartoons and glossy magazine advertisements, with English and Korean written on them in black Sharpie. [As the waiter approached, Wong spoke it all. His voice sounded different in Korean. It sounded somewhat harder, like a stone hitting a stone. The waiter did not smile, but tilted his head toward Fiona and me. His name tag, pinned to his black button-down shirt, read. There was a raised pink scar from his left ear to his chin, where a thin layer of short black hair had grown. I noticed Fiona looking at him. When Wong answered, the waiter nodded and backed away. [What did he say? I asked. [Wong said.

"Shall I show you my ID?" said Wong. [Wong shook his head and laughed; a minute later a waiter appeared with a tall pitcher of beer and three mugs on a tray. We fell into a tense silence as he placed everything on the table. As soon as he walked away, Fiona and I looked at each other and burst out laughing.

Wong poured beer into three glasses. I almost gagged at my first taste of beer. I sipped slowly, trying to get used to the bitter taste. When I finished half the glasses, my head was dizzy and my face warm. [Wong said. Wong said." This is good."

A loud burp escaped Fiona's throat and she put her hand over her mouth.

"I don't know how I feel," she replied honestly." Is this drunk?" "Am I drunk?" Wong poured water into my glass.

"Wong, I love you," Fiona said. He moaned. 'No, really,' she said seriously. 'I love you,' she turned to me. 'And Jane, I love you too. I love you the most."

"This turns into the happiest ass I've ever seen," Wong said, "and I've never seen you so happy." What about you?"

Fiona said from across the table. "Are you okay?

"I love you too," I said.

Wong said. 'One of those melancholy drunks.

"What? I said. 'No, it's not.

"There are two types," Wong said knowingly. 'You don't start crying.'

"Waiter," said Fiona. 'He's kinda cute.'

"Him." Wong said."

Fiona, Wong, and I have been friends since second grade. We went to middle school and high school together, until Wong got thrown out last year when we were in second grade. He was already on probation for skipping school, fighting, and all that. Then one day last April, a big Samoan football player decided to punk Wong for no reason.

Wong looked like the kind of guy who would call bullies out like flies on dog shit. I was a little surprised, because he was wearing a Boys II Men-inspired cable-knit sweater, a preppy button-down shirt, and cuffed chinos. Everyone else was wearing white tube socks, Adidas slides, size 40 waist jeans, and XXL Fruit of the Loom t-shirts. People called him "Pretty Boy" or "Richie Rich."

Fetu showed up at lunchtime and said he heard Wong bad-mouthing his girlfriend. Not only did Wong suffer the humiliation of getting his ass whipped in front of everyone on the quad, but our evil vice principal decided it was the final blow to Wong's indiscipline and expelled him (nothing happened to Fetu, who was a "lil' bitch"). Wong was sent to continuation school with drug addicts, pregnant women, and gangsters. It was his last hurrah before dropping out, juvenile detention, or deportation.

But Wong was not the player everyone thought he was. He was not the spoiled son-of-a-bitch with a father who owned a chain of liquor stores, gas stations, and SAT cram schools. There were other Koreans like that. But Wong wore only fancy clothes. The security guards at the mall were always too busy policing the black kids to notice the skinny Asians taking advantage of the five-finger discounts. For years, he used a fake address and attended school in a better district than his zip code district.

Most of the boys he met at school were Neanderthals with acne and soaked in cool water cologne. Wong was not like them. He was different. I felt safe with him. Fiona and I never confessed to him to his face, but Wong was convenient for us.

From "Fiona and Jane" by Jean Chen Ho, published by Viking, an imprint of Penguin Publishing Group, a division of Penguin Random House LLC.Copyright (c) 2022 by Jean Chen Ho.