“What? This is a joke, right? I … I don’t understand. This is impossible! I won the competition fair and square, and they pumped it up in the media. You were there. You saw it. They can’t do this to me, can they?” I accidentally dropped my shopping bag.
“Unfortunately, this is not a matter for negotiation. It’s a decision that has already been made. No one was going to tell you all this. They were just going to let you flounder in the dark until your agreement expired. I felt sorry for you, so I decided to call and fill you in. The deal is over. I’m sorry. It was good meeting you in Canada. I wish you all the best. Listen, I have to go. Take care.” She hung up before I could ask another question.
No way. She must be confused about something. I’m sure that this is just a misunderstanding. I had a hard time believing what I had heard. Fumbling through my wallet, I found Sam’s business card. I dialed his number in haste. I was so agitated that I dropped my phone twice before I successfully made the call. Answering machine? Got to be kidding me! I dialed again. Same? All right, I’ve had enough! This joke has gotta stop right now! Standing in the middle of the mall, I felt tears start to well up in my eyes.
I tried all the numbers on his business card: personal mobile phone, Taipei head office, Hong Kong head office. I couldn’t reach him. Different receptionists just kept sending me to his voicemail. I must have left a dozen messages. Sitting in front of my phone, I waited and waited. The phone was silent.
_______
Months went by. Every morning I woke up in total misery. I would sit still and stare at the preliminary contract. I simply could not face reality. Then Warner Music Taiwan announced the debut of a new hip-hop group, Machi, to all the major media outlets in Asia. This was the group that Linda had told me about. Their faces were plastered all over the front page of the Chinese newspaper my dad brought home. I immediately tore it into pieces. Whenever their music came on the radio, I’d turn it off right away. Every time someone picked one of their songs at a karaoke bar, I’d storm off to have a smoke to calm myself down. No matter where I went, they seemed to be following me. My dreams were shattered—and reshattered. Jealousy, anger, and feelings of betrayal gradually overwhelmed me. I lost to bands from LA, not once but twice. First, seeing a boy band and now a hip-hop group taking my rightful place was totally infuriating. To rub salt in my wounds, I had to constantly see them on all the Asian music channels.
Just in case that wasn’t enough grief to bear, all kinds of people kept calling me to ask about my music career news. They’d want to know when my album was coming out and where I would be touring and whether they could get backstage passes and this, and that, and anything-imaginable-that-would-result-in-further-humiliation. I had no idea how to answer. Why would the record label do that to me? Why would they launch me into the media stratosphere only to let me catastrophically slam back down to the Earth? Why bother awarding me a prize at all? From whatever angle I looked at it, it seemed completely senseless.
“Son,” my dad pleaded, “this is a testing from above. And when you come out of it, you’ll become stronger and wiser. Not everything will go your way. In fact there will always be things that won’t happen exactly the way you want. There’s no way to escape disappointment. But that’s okay. It’s just the cycle of life. You win some and you lose some. Don’t let these failures defeat you. You can get back up from where you fell, you know. This is not the end.” I got this speech in various forms day after day.
Dad’s words were extremely difficult to swallow at first, but as I chewed on them, I slowly understood the wisdom in them. There was really no point dwelling on the past, since I had absolutely no power to change the situation with Warner. I gradually concluded that I should turn this experience into an asset of experience and keep moving forward. At the very least, my talent had been recognized, not once but twice, by two major music companies. That had to mean something. I should have taken this as an encouragement. My only way to repay the unconditional support from my family was to get up, wipe off the dust, and try again. Right there and then, I swore to create my own promise of a brighter day—a promise to put my past behind me and to make it into the music business, no matter what the cost. I determined to prove to the world that I was worthy.
Chapter 3
Changes
“Baby, whatcha lookin’ at?” Amanda tried to catch my attention. She could see me occasionally craning as I tried to catch a glimpse of a stranger who was about a block ahead of us in the mall. She swung my arm playfully as we walked together—trying to get my attention—but she could see that I was clearly distracted.
“Nothing really … I think I just saw an old friend that I haven’t seen for a long time. Let me go say ‘Hi.’ Why don’t you wait for me back there at the food court? Grab us something to drink at the bubble-tea stand. You know what I want. I’ll meet you there in a minute, all right?”
I gave a quick look both ways as Amanda disappeared around a corner and dodged my way through the mall traffic to catch up to Cheri and a couple of her friends. When she saw me, her eyes lit up. “Hey, baby! What’re you doing here?” she asked. “You stalking me?” She cocked her head and squinted her eyes coyly at me.
“Yeah, totally! I’m watching you, so you’d better be good! Nah, I’m just here with another friend.” I leaned over and kissed her on the cheek. She smiled and looked me in the eye with a hint of suspicion. Man, she was pretty. Cheri introduced me to her friends, though I’m sure I had seen them before at a party or something.
“A ‘friend,’ eh? Better not be another girlfriend! You’re not allowed to mess around with other girls. You promised me that!” Cheri punched me gently square in the middle of my chest. I didn’t feel guilty, but I was a little nervous that I was going to get busted.
“Yeah, yeah, yeah … don’t worry. What are you doing here—just shopping?” I tried to change the topic.
“Yes, in fact, we are here to shop. Tanya and Brenda are helping me pick out something.”
“Well in that case, I better let you continue your mission. I need to get going too. Don’t stay out too late. See you tomorrow?”
“All right. Of course you’re gonna see me tomorrow! Call me before you go to bed. Love you!” She threw her arms around me and pressed her whole torso against mine. I could smell her hair and a gentle waft of perfume rising from her blouse. She really liked me—it was obvious. Over time, being a two-timing jerk was bothering me less and less. I was addicted to the feeling of finding someone new, and my conscience gradually faded behind the fog of my own desires.
I burned through girlfriend after girlfriend—I needed the rush of new feelings to keep me excited about life. Different types of girls attracted me in different ways. If they were taller than me or had money to flaunt, I didn’t let it intimidate me. All it represented was another challenge in a game that I was getting pretty good at—for a guy who used to be a geek, that is.
Some of my guy friends thought I was some kind of hero, but the truth of the matter is that maintaining the deception and constantly lying were completely exhausting. The exhilaration would keep me going for a while, but eventually I would long for a calmer and more honest reality. This I am certain of: a lot of this was overcompensation for my days as a social outcast. It was what you might call an “evil nerd syndrome”: high-school loser is suddenly popular and becomes a megalomaniac.
_______
I still remember my first impressions of Pinetree Secondary School in Coquitlam, BC, Canada. It was a beautifully built modern school surrounded by stands of West Coast fir trees and