Number One Chinese Restaurant

by Lillian Li

  “Sit here.” He gestured to the pink marble ledge bordering the bath.

  He cranked the taps, struggling with the handles, which had not been turned in who knew how many years. The bottom of the tub was fuzzy with dust, which the gushing water washed away. He tested the water temperature, wetting his hand every few seconds, first under the faucet and then, after he’d plugged up the tub drain, by dipping his fingers into the rising pool. Janine sat, legs crossed, and watched him work. Her hands were folded on her top knee.

  To pass time as the tub filled, Jimmy spoke of his grandmother, the one person his father had truly loved. His father had hated leaving his mother behind in China. He’d argued constantly with Uncle Pang about getting her a green card, one that the old woman, according to Jimmy’s mother, didn’t even want.

  Toward the end of her life, his grandmother had acquired a visa to come stay with Jimmy’s family for a month. Jimmy saw the washing, by accident, on the third night of her visit. On his way up to his bedroom, he’d heard a curious splashing on the first floor and looked through a crack in the guest room door.

  Jimmy knew his father led his grandmother to her guest room every night—Jimmy had assumed because the old woman was scared of their large house. But through the door, he’d seen his father’s back hunched over a plastic tub of steaming water. His grandmother sat in front of the tub, her slippers discarded on the carpet. His father was gently washing her feet. His cupped hands cascaded water over her pale, floating arches. Her eyes were closed in pleasure. Jimmy had stumbled back from the door, his insides squirming with unnamed emotion. The man had never touched Jimmy’s mother in front of the family except to nudge her out of the way. He used his hands to cuff Jimmy on the side of the head, and even Johnny got only a hard, stiff clap on the shoulder for his achievements. But for Jimmy’s grandmother, his father’s hands transformed into tender creatures. Jimmy had avoided that part of the house for the rest of her stay.

  “How beautiful,” Janine breathed, breaking into the end of his story. “Maybe one day my Eddie will treat me so well.”

  Jimmy pointed at her stockings. “Will you take those off?”

  Janine slowly shimmied her tights down to her knees, then folded the nylon down each calf. Her bare foot emerged, nails shining but unpolished. She kicked the stocking off her left foot. The wrinkled, fleshy hose looked at once normal and obscene.

  Jimmy reached out and cupped the backs of her calves, swinging her legs over the ledge of the tub and into the water, which had been turned opaque by froth and heat. “I should give you a kick in the face,” she said, but she rested her legs solidly in his hands. He liked the weight of her calves.

  He shut off the faucet when the water lapped against her ankles. Kneeling against the steps to the bath, he lifted one of her feet just barely out of the water.

  Her hands gripped the edge of the tub, framing her seat. “Don’t you dare look up my skirt.”

  She had pressed her knees together, but her fitted skirt offered a small, dark hole through which, if he peered at just the right angle, he might see. Jimmy dipped his head down and lifted his eyes up, smiling.

  Janine started to giggle—not laugh, giggle—and the harder she tried to stop, the harder her body shook. Her cheeks turned pink and a drop of sweat slipped down the side of her face. She looked as if she couldn’t believe she’d gotten herself into this mess. He copied the cupping–spilling motion he had caught his father using years ago. When he switched to her other foot, she quieted down. The only sounds were of water falling against more water and their even breaths.

  “This is nice,” she said, her voice faraway.

  Her mouth had relaxed, falling open a sliver. He wanted to slip his tongue into that space, to catch her bottom lip between his teeth. Would Janine let him kiss her if he tried? Would he forgive her for her desperation if she did? He didn’t know. But if she kissed him back while laughing that big, frightening laugh of hers? He would forgive her in a heartbeat. Because then he would know that she was submitting to this washing out of curiosity, out of daring. That she wasn’t just humiliating herself to sell a house.

  A series of muffled sounds came from downstairs.

  “What is that?” Janine whispered, upsetting the water as she plunked her feet onto the tub floor. “Is that your mother?”

  “It can’t be.” Jimmy refused to panic, as if by acting nonchalant he might will the noise to stop. The sounds grew louder.

  “Jimmy!” His mother was awake and howling his name. “Jimmy!”

  Jimmy and Janine whipped into action, jumping away from the tub, careful not to get the floor too wet. Janine grabbed her stockings and Jimmy pulled the bath’s plug.

  “I’ll lead her into the kitchen,” he whispered loudly. They hurried out of the bathroom. “Let yourself out and go home. I’ll get a cab.”

  “We’ll do lunch tomorrow,” she said. She slipped behind the bedroom door and he ran downstairs.

  His mother was at the bottom of the stairs. She looked crazed. Her hair was falling out of her pink rollers and she had a phone clutched to her chest.

  “Mom,” Jimmy started to say, moving her away from the foyer.

  He was frightened by her chattering teeth. How could his unannounced visit have upset her this badly? He dragged her into the kitchen.

  Before he could continue, his mother began to wail. Jimmy clutched her shoulders, so startled that he almost slapped her. He’d never heard her make this much noise before, and he felt sick as the sounds coming out of her grew louder. Her hands scratched at the sides of her face, clobbering the phone against her cheek.

  Then as suddenly as she started, she stopped. She regarded him curiously, as if wondering whether or not to share her news.

  “What is it, Mom?” he asked. “What’s wrong?”

  “Your restaurant’s on fire,” his mother announced, dropping the phone. “Someone burned it down to the ground.”

  9

  The first two decades of Jimmy’s life, he believed cooks didn’t talk in the kitchen. Waiters could shout, dishwashers could flirt with the duck carvers, but the cooks stood silent over their woks. They were like the old horses Jimmy had once seen on a duck farm in Long Island, with their sloped backs and long, motionless faces. They looked too miserable for words.

  He was a few months shy of twenty when he walked into Koi’s pristine lobby on the first day of his stage. He passed the indoor waterfall and rock garden, through the restaurant’s sunlit dining room. He assumed he was about to enter an equally soundless kitchen. The chef, a white man named Alfred, led the way.

  “I don’t usually let people stage who haven’t worked in a kitchen before.” The chef glanced down at the over-packed knife kit in Jimmy’s hands. “How many résumés did you fax me again?”

  “A lot,” Jimmy said. “Chef,” he added.

  “Sixty résumés. And not a single one with relevant work experience.” Chef Alfred knocked back a double shot of espresso. “But you have passion. That’s something you can’t teach.” He thought for a moment. “You can use a knife, though, yes?”

  Jimmy nodded. He’d been practicing on crates of onions filched from the Duck House, and he’d gone through so many that the amount of missing produce was driving his father crazy. Jimmy’s father had no idea who to blame, and when he wasn’t on the phone with the produce supplier, he was interrogating every person on staff, from the prep cooks to the little girl who poured water on the weekends. Served him right, the asshole. If Bobby hadn’t thrown him out of the Duck House for wanting to apprentice at Koi, Jimmy could have afforded to buy his own practice onions. The tips he’d saved had run out with his rent check, and stages didn’t pay. He felt too young for the knives he was holding. He was nineteen and had never been broke in his life.

  “Knife skills, we can teach,” the chef was saying. “But we’d rather not.”

  “Thank you for this opportunity,” Jimmy said. They approached the kitchen doors, and excitement replaced
his dread. Two months ago, after his mother insisted they go for her birthday, he’d eaten here for the first time. His world had split open, as neatly as an apricot. His father had not enjoyed the meal.

  Chef Alfred put his hand on the kitchen door and pushed his way in. “You’re free labor,” he said, before the sound of pans crashing together swallowed his words. The noise was sudden and explosive. Jimmy didn’t realize most of it was coming from a stereo in the back.

  “Shut that fucking death metal off, Ronny!” Chef Alfred screamed, his pale face growing mottled as he battled the volume of the music. “Or I’ll fucking gut you!”

  The kitchen was full of stout men with sleeve tattoos and wild, unfocused looks in their eyes, but to Jimmy’s surprise, Ronny turned out to look not unlike himself. Strolling to the stereo, Ronny turned the volume dial a scooch to the left, looking at the chef with what Jimmy’s father would’ve called a smack-me face.

  “Hurry it up.” Chef Alfred was tasting the stock. He rapped the spoon against the edge of the pot. Ronny held up a long finger and continued his slow turning.

  “I’m trying to find the perfect compromise, Chef.” He wrinkled his nose to push up his John Lennon glasses. “Not too quiet, not too loud, just right.”

  “I’ll shove that tape up your ass, how’s that for a compromise?”

  “I can’t work without my music,” Ronny said, his voice a playful whine, but he turned the volume dial from 10 to 6. The caterwauling of the Norwegian vocalist died to a medium yowl; he sounded as if he were coughing up phlegm now rather than blood.

  “That’s our fish cook, Ronny,” Chef Alfred said. “I don’t know why I haven’t cut him yet, but you’ll be helping out at his station.”

  “Chef, I got that eel.” Ronny came up to them with a plated terrine of unagi over toasted rice. The smell of mirin, sake, and sesame oil, the holy trinity of fragrance, hit Jimmy’s nose. His stomach grumbled, loud enough for both men to hear. He’d been living off onion sandwiches for a week.

  “Little dude is hungry!” Ronny clapped Jimmy on the shoulder.

  Chef Alfred carved a spoon through the tower and chewed. He began to hum softly. A dreamy look settled over his face and he leaned against a steel prep table.

  “That’s it.” He sucked the sauce off his teeth. “That’s why you’re still here.”

  “Butchered it myself,” Ronny said, then he turned to Jimmy. “Want a taste?”

  Jimmy grabbed the chef’s spoon and shoved half the terrine into his mouth before he realized his mistake. The two men looked at him with shocked faces.

  “Shit, that was for the rest of the kitchen,” Ronny said, looking at the plate.

  “We taste in the kitchen; we don’t eat,” Chef Alfred said.

  Jimmy knew he should be embarrassed, but the eel was buttery and sweet in his mouth, flaking against his tongue like snow, and the toasted rice cut through the softness with a nutty crunch. His stomach filled with warmth. He reached out for the plate again, before Ronny could pull it away, and plucked a crisp half-moon of cucumber to clear the unagi sauce off his tongue.

  “That was amazing,” he said, picking a sesame seed out of his teeth. “Like, one of the best things I’ve eaten in my entire life. Can you teach me how to make it?”

  “Where the fuck did you find this kid?” Ronny asked. “He just hoovered my dish.”

  “Reminds me of you,” a passing cook said, stockpot in his arms.

  “Yo, that’s racist!” Ronny called over his shoulder. Then he pushed the plate into Jimmy’s hands. “What’s your name?”

  “Jim—”

  “Gonna call you Hoover.” With that, Ronny brought Jimmy around the kitchen, introducing him to the other cooks and kitchen staff. Jimmy quickly learned that Ronny was the unofficial ambassador of the Koi crew, untethered by kitchen hierarchy. He not only knew everybody—prep cooks, line cooks, and pastry chefs alike—but had recently partied with, schemed with, or owed money to each person who shook Jimmy’s hand. He reminded Jimmy of a cruder, cooler version of his own brother.

  “This racist fucker is Key.” Ronny grabbed the white cook with the stockpot by the back of his neck. “He’s the saucier. Don’t ever let this man drive your car. And over here”—he fist-bumped a Hawaiian man with three skull rings on his hand—“is Lewis the grill man. You ever need a fake license, you call him. You still do passports, Lew?”

  Ronny finished the tour with the dishwashers, a trio of Hondurans who looked at the empty plate in Jimmy’s hands with open disgust.

  “They usually get a taste after the rest of the kitchen,” Ronny whispered, bringing Jimmy back to his station. “Look, we’ll get you back into everyone’s good graces.” He reached under his prep table and pulled out a big blue bucket. Something was thunking against the plastic. Jimmy looked down to see a swirl of freshwater eels, their gray-and-white bodies thick and tangled in the low water.

  “You ever butcher an eel before?” Ronny put on a blood-spotted fillet glove. He stuck his hand in the bucket and pulled out a wriggling eel by the head, its thin, muscular body almost the length of Jimmy’s arm. “I made this contraption myself.” He pointed to the wet board on his table, a screwdriver sticking out of the wood.

  “How do you butcher an eel?” Jimmy asked. A strange floating sensation clouded his head. He realized his hands were sweating.

  “Easy,” Ronny said. In one fluid motion, he slammed the eel onto the board and stuck the screwdriver through its head. He hammered the driver down with the flat of his knife, then stuck the blade below the gills, running it down the length of the eel until he’d butterflied it in half. Jimmy started breathing hard through his nose, black spots dancing in his vision. Ronny spread the eel open like a book, and as he was dragging the knife back down, peeling the translucent white flesh off the skin, Jimmy felt his eyes roll up in his head. With a strangled curse he went down hard.

  He came to when he felt someone’s clog push against his ribs. He rolled up into a seated position, clinging to the leg of the prep table while the blood rushed into his head. Blinking up at Ronny, he felt like crawling out of the kitchen and into the busy street.

  “You shit yourself?” Ronny asked, as if Jimmy were a toddler he didn’t particularly like. He scratched his nose with the side of his glove. “Look, why don’t you go gut those tomatoes?” His knife pointed to the stack of crates by the walk-in fridge. “Can you handle that?”

  Jimmy nodded, his face still clammy. He stood up on his own, Ronny having already turned back to his butcher board. He’d finished off four eels while Jimmy was passed out. The fillets were curled up like sausage casings, piled next to a stack of emptied skins. Jimmy slapped his cheeks and moved toward the tomatoes.

  “The tomatoes aren’t bleeding,” Ronny shouted after him. “It’s just juice.” He turned to the other cooks, cackling. “Yo, you see that, Lew? When’s the last time any of you fuckers passed out like that?”

  The cooks traded stories, the noise in the kitchen growing again; Jimmy sliced tomato after tomato. He was so mad at himself that he squeezed a few to bursting, and he hid those beneath the seeded guts he’d scraped from the others. With Chef Alfred no longer in the kitchen, Ronny turned his music back up, head-banging while he ripped his way through the rest of the eels. The flaps of his bandanna flew, wild; his glasses grew splattered with water and blood. Jimmy watched him from the corner of his eye, fighting the queasiness in his stomach. So this was what a real cook looked like, sounded like, moved like. If the cooks at the Duck House were workhorses, then Ronny and the rest of this kitchen were demon dogs, wrestling their prey and each other to the ground. Dogs with finesse hidden even in their most violent, butchering acts. Dogs who could fucking cook.

  Jimmy wondered where he might go to get his hands on some live eels.

  *

  It took Jimmy two months, working behind Ronny every single night, before the fish cook bothered to speak to him outside the instructions he barked during prep and service. Tha
t night, a packed Saturday service, Chef Alfred finally called Jimmy up to assist. He took the scallops while Ronny worked the fish, and together they built a rhythm that made Jimmy’s veins feel lit up beneath his skin. Every inch of him vibrated with fear, yet he did not come undone. Instead, with every passing hour, his movements grew sharper and faster. He couldn’t believe he had managed to harness this awful energy. He felt invincible, as if he’d managed to take the loose, liquid sand that made up the inexplicable world inside him and pack it until it ceased its shifting.

  At the tail end of the dinner rush, while craning his head to see Chef Alfred’s reaction to the scallops he’d just plated, Jimmy grabbed a hot sauté pan without a towel in hand. He yelped. Ronny, without turning to look, asked Lew, who was on the grill opposite, if he had some burn cream. The grill man grinned through the sweat dripping down his nose. The chateaubriand in his tongs spat hot oil.

  “Fuck burn cream,” Jimmy shot back, though his hand was so tender that the heat of the air made it sting. “Put that shit on your pussy. Fix that burning sensation when you pee.”

  He’d never spoken this loudly in the kitchen before. His first few weeks, he’d kept getting stepped on for standing too quietly. But he’d been absorbing the crack and cadence of the cooks’ bravado, their complicated insults and even more convoluted retorts. Jimmy waited, watching his scallops, to see if he’d hit his mark.

  “Hoover got you!” Lewis howled, leaning his shaved head back.

  “Who did Hoover get?” Key asked, on his way back from presenting the tea-egg appetizer to the chef.

  But Ronny gave only a thin smile and bent his head over his sea bass. His refusal to play along starved the oxygen from Jimmy’s little ember. Lewis went back to his grill. Key fired up a new miso glaze.

  After service ended, however, and Jimmy had finished cleaning up the fish station, Ronny waved him over to the restaurant bar.