Number One Chinese Restaurant

by Lillian Li

  “I’ll let Christine know about the guest room.” Johnny brushed off his knees and hefted himself up out of the chair. He bent to drop his cigar in the ashtray. “She’ll want to change the sheets and whatnot.”

  “I don’t need that.”

  “She can’t relax until she’s played the perfect host.” Johnny headed for the door.

  “I’m just family!” Jimmy shouted at his brother’s retreating back.

  “Exactly,” came his answer, already muffled by the growing distance.

  Jimmy was left alone with his sputtering cigar. The house kept him company, its strange whistling ventilation, the grumble of the humidor, the muted thuds of footsteps a story above. They were familiar, the sounds his old house might have made, and this made them all the more haunting. If only he could have silence. But what was silence without peace?

  21

  Ah-Jack woke up for work in a recently emptied bed. he rolled onto his back and rubbed his belly. He’d finally taken Nan to bed. His first new woman in fifty years. His body was like a forgotten object finally turned on. Colors seemed brighter. Sounds clearer. Even his rotten morning breath tasted sweet. Had Michelle felt this way too? Had she buzzed all over with energy? Or had she been hit by an awful, crushing guilt? Hers more awful because her betrayal came first.

  He clapped his hands above his head, as if killing a mosquito, and got up. No bad thoughts allowed after such a magical night. The room itself held no evidence of their fun. They’d gotten re-dressed after the act, and he’d fallen asleep almost immediately. Everything was where it should have been. No clothes were draped over chairs; no lamps had been knocked over. Well, he was an old man. Anything more rollicking might have sent him to the hospital.

  Only Pat was downstairs in the kitchen, drinking a Coke and watching a frozen scallion pancake make circles in the microwave. Nan was nowhere to be seen. Ah-Jack fought the impulse to climb back up the stairs and wait for the boy to leave. The past few days, Pat had rarely been home. His presence now felt like an intrusion.

  “Good morning,” Ah-Jack said, striding into the room. Pat stank of stale cigarette smoke and sweat. “All right there? You didn’t come home last night.”

  “Surprised you noticed,” Pat said.

  “Of course I noticed. Your mom has been worried sick.” A small lie, but Pat perked up. Ah-Jack felt the same strain of guilt that had nearly overwhelmed him in bed.

  “I told her where I’d be,” Pat said.

  “Even so, she’d prefer you be at home with her.”

  “I’d prefer you be in your own home too.” Pat’s hangover softened the bite in his comment, but Ah-Jack still felt the teeth. He’d seen the boy when he was only a day old in the hospital, had watched him grow up, and now, seventeen years later, the young man hated him on sight.

  As if his hangover made him sensitive even to the hurt feelings of a man he couldn’t stand, Pat relaxed his stance. “About last night.” He glanced down at Ah-Jack’s bandaged arm. “I’m sorry. I was stressed.”

  “Stressed”—what was that word? Americans used it all the time, and Ah-Jack always translated the word in his head to “pressure,” which made more sense. They were all under a lot of pressure with their new jobs and new living arrangements. Happy as these changes had made him, the weight of the newness was crushing. He couldn’t imagine how Pat must feel, the painful imprints the pressure must have left on his reluctant form. He forgave Nan’s son then. He’d been angry with the boy all this time, he realized, and as his anger left him, his spirit ballooned up.

  “I barely remember last night,” he said. “Doctor gave me very good pain meds.”

  “Cool,” Pat said. The timer beeped and he opened the microwave, grabbing the thin pancake with his hands. He juggled the hot disc between his palms before dropping it onto the kitchen table.

  Ah-Jack picked up the pancake with his fingers. The skin on his hands was like steel. Though that hadn’t been a problem with Nan last night; his fingertips could still feel certain kinds of heat. Wicked thoughts to be having in front of her son!

  “Decades of practice,” he crowed. “Should be cool enough for you to handle now.”

  “Keep it.” Pat backed away from the pancake.

  “You’ll feel better if you eat.” Ah-Jack took a big bite. A limp piece of scallion squeaked between his teeth. “Get that sour taste out of your mouth.”

  “I’m fine.” Pat crushed his Coke can between his hands and tossed it in the trash. “My mom said to tell you she’s running errands. She’ll be back to drive you to work.”

  “What a busy woman.” Ah-Jack’s smile bumped up against the curve of the pancake. Pat noticed.

  “She’s probably getting us ready for our California trip.” Pat burped into his hand, then fanned it away from his face. “We’re leaving pretty soon.”

  “California?” Ah-Jack stopped chewing his mouthful. “To visit your father?”

  “Not quite.” A rare smile spread across Pat’s face. Ah-Jack wanted to slap it away.

  “My dad wants us to move in with him,” Pat said.

  “That’s not going to happen.” Ah-Jack sank into a seat. The words Nan had spoken in frustration last night—“What’s even keeping me here?”—came back to him. “Your mom has a life here. She’s not planning on leaving.”

  “Go and ask her, then,” Pat said, louder than either of them expected. “That’s her pulling in.” He grabbed his work blazer off the back of his chair and slipped his cell phone and wallet into his pockets. “My ride’s here.”

  He headed toward the back door to avoid Nan, whose key was clinking its way into the front-door lock. Ah-Jack wanted to grab Pat by the shoulder and drag him back into the kitchen. He was tired of feeling like the messenger between mother and son. But Pat was too quick, and besides, Ah-Jack knew his idea was a fantasy. If a man as unobservant as he could see the ways Nan and Pat reached for and missed each other, then there was something more selective behind their blindness.

  He hurried over to the door, anticipating shopping bags, but Nan held no trace of the errands she’d run. He went to embrace her. She stopped him by snatching the pancake out of his hand.

  “You shouldn’t be eating white flour,” she said. “That’s a restricted food.” She held the pale, floppy pancake between her thumb and pointer and shook it. “It’s not even cooked right. Did you microwave this? You lazy man.”

  She gave him back the pancake and moved into the kitchen. She grabbed the package from the freezer and turned on the stove. While she waited for the wok to heat, he came up behind her and kissed her on the back of her head. He inhaled the still-sleepy musk of her hair.

  “I had a wonderful time last night,” he said.

  “I know,” she said, face hidden. “You already told me.”

  “I wanted to tell you again. In fact, I think I’ll tell you every half hour today.”

  “Since when have you followed a schedule?” She threw a pancake onto the pan. Her sass was a little shaky. She hadn’t been this shy around him in decades.

  “My body is like a clock!” He knocked on his chest to get her to laugh.

  “The only regular thing about you is when you go to the bathroom.”

  “You were such a lady last night. Now you’re bringing up my shitting habits?”

  She flipped the scallion pancake with one hand and slapped at his leg with her other. He danced out of reach, enjoying his nimbleness, which reminded him of the secret games of tag he used to play with the Duck House busboys during service.

  “Maybe this job kept me young,” he mused when she handed him his pancake on a flat wooden spoon. He tried to pick it up with his fingers but quickly dropped it onto a plate when the golden dough singed his fingertips. Good thing Pat wasn’t around to see. Nan passed him a pair of chopsticks, then went back to stand by the stove.

  “You kept yourself young.” She had a strange note in her voice. “You kept me young too.”

  “You’re still you
ng. But I will take all the credit, thank you!”

  “You’re an amazing, amazing man,” she said. From the way she spoke, she should have been wrapped up in his arms. Instead, she stayed, stubbornly, all the way across the kitchen from him. He found the moment strange but also precious, as if they were separated by a gulf and had to holler their sweet nothings at each other.

  “You’re the amazing one,” he said. The scallion pancake was crispy and flaky. An oniony fragrance lifted off the plate. The alchemy of this woman! “This delicious pancake is only a fraction of how delicious you are.”

  She laughed and crossed her arms, a sight so familiar that his chest fluttered. Thirty years ago, he’d looked down from his ladder to see this same pose. Had he known from the start that he cared deeply for her? Or had he kept such an idea out of his own reach until Michelle finally set him free? He’d certainly guessed that Nan had had a harmless crush on him at the beginning. He’d been flattered and, he could be honest now, invigorated by her attention. But as the years passed, their friendship had deepened, until it became its own category, impossible to compare and therefore impossible really to understand. Stepping outside his marriage, never a true possibility, no longer seemed relevant. Their relationship existed outside the worlds he’d always known. His love for Nan was his outer space. He finished his last mouthful of pancake. Good food from a good woman could certainly make him blossom.

  “We’re going to be late for work,” the good woman said, clearing the table.

  All that poetry and fragrance had completely distracted him from asking about California! This was the problem with indescribable relationships. They had no limits but also no rules, no boundaries. The only thing holding them together was the strangeness and majesty of their love. Was this enough? He opened his mouth, then closed it again. He didn’t want to know. He used to think that he wanted the answers to all his questions, but his recent experience with Michelle had made him reconsider. He’d survived her honesty, but Nan had been the real shield, not his less-than-tough skin. If Nan was leaving him—he had to believe not because she wanted to but because she had to—then he didn’t want to know. He would take his last days in ignorance. The only knowledge he ached for now was not if she would go but how to make her stay.

  “Actually,” he said, getting a sudden, dazzling idea, “let me deal with the plates. You’ve been working hard enough and I just remembered something I have to do. I’ll take my car today.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Yes, you go. I’ll see you at the restaurant.” He pecked her on the mouth. “Don’t miss me too much.”

  Once he heard the front door shut and her car drive away, he ran up to the bedroom and nabbed one of Nan’s rings. He studied the ring he’d grabbed—a cheap yellow thing that looked suspiciously like an old wedding band—but only for a moment.

  Then he was out the door, his unbuttoned sleeves flapping. The August morning contained the glitter and heat of a baking rock, but Ah-Jack sucked in the roasted air as if it were a refreshing drink. He plucked a flower from the edge of a neighbor’s yard and stuck it behind his ear. Nan was right; he did know how to stay young. He got into his car and peeled out, heading toward the strip mall he passed every time he drove from his place to Nan’s.

  The jewelry store he’d thought he’d seen in the strip turned out to be a pawnshop. A used pool table sat in the center of the long, narrow room. Antique swords and electric guitars hung on the wall. Luckily, the store had a good selection of engagement rings.

  “What size?” the man behind the counter asked. He was potbellied, over-cologned, and wore a stained white button-down tucked into black slacks, not unlike the uniform Ah-Jack was also wearing. Bending their heads over the glass counter, they must have looked like two monkeys in tuxedos.

  Ah-Jack took out Nan’s ring and gave it to the man. The man took out a series of finger-like cones and slid the ring onto one.

  “An eight.” He gave the ring back while grabbing a case from the bottom of the counter. “We’ve got several. Usually from mature marriages. Fingers get thicker the older you get.”

  “She have thick finger, all right,” Ah-Jack said. “Maybe more thick than mine.”

  “You can get yourself a nice ring too. We have men’s engagement rings. And wedding rings. Might as well get the entire collection; save you a trip in the future.”

  Ah-Jack fingered Nan’s old wedding band. “Just ring for her. She can say no.”

  “To a sharp-looking man like yourself? I think you’ve got this one in the bag.”

  “I know her thirty years.”

  The man whistled through the gap in his teeth. “Jesus. My wife made me buy a ring after five.”

  “She is patient.” Ah-Jack looked through the selection of rings, hoping that one might jump out at him. “What is good?”

  “Who knows? They’re just rocks to me.”

  “I like this one.” Ah-Jack pointed to a square-cut ring that had a modest but bright diamond. He could see it glittering in the dome of the security mirror.

  “It’s a beauty,” the man agreed. “A real steal at $2,399.”

  Ah-Jack balked at the price, but he’d heard that a ring should cost even more than that, something like one month’s salary. Nan deserved a nice ring. He would not have waited thirty years to end up with himself. He patted around his blazer for his wallet.

  “You take Visa?”

  *

  The ring and its box didn’t weigh more than a bundle of tips after a busy night, but Ah-Jack felt every gram acutely. He sweated through his shirt on the car ride to the Georgetown Waterfront. He didn’t usually get nervous, but he had no idea what to expect. He hadn’t proposed to Michelle. They were married in a community square, no rings, no party. Would Nan expect him to get down on one knee? What if he couldn’t stand back up! Forcing himself to focus, he managed to parallel park without clipping the cars sandwiching him.

  Walking toward the restaurant, Ah-Jack took quick looks around. Had any of the people on the street noticed the extra weight in his pocket? He realized that he wanted someone to ask him what he was carrying around. He wanted to share the news of this day, a day when everything would change and yet also stay the same. He was going to make his indefinable relationship official. He was going to guarantee that Nan would stay by his side until the day he died.

  He slapped his cheeks lightly to get the morbid thought out. The gust of air-conditioning that greeted him when he opened the restaurant door put him solidly back in good spirits. When he saw Nan in her carving uniform, he nearly got down on one knee right there, and he was sure that one look at his dopey face would reveal everything. But Nan merely glanced over and gave him a little wave before returning to her conversation with the other carvers.

  If it were up to him, he would make a big, public production of the proposal. He’d get the staff to serenade Nan, as if it were her birthday. Maybe he’d hide the ring in a slice of cheesecake or, even better, in a duck she was carving.

  But Nan was a quieter person, quick to control a scene that was getting out of hand. She wouldn’t appreciate a loud celebration, especially if she was the center of attention. Ah-Jack couldn’t remember her ever being the loudest person in a room. Even her sneezes were silent.

  He walked through the kitchen, picking up a bowl of mixed noodles from family breakfast. He looked for a private spot he might be able to lure Nan to. On a whim, he cracked open the walk-in fridge and looked inside. His breath turned visible. Back at the Mayflower, and in the early days of the Duck House, he used to find her in the fridge sometimes, perched on a crate of produce.

  “I’m cooling off a bit,” she always said. “I’ll be out in a second.” A few times, he’d spotted a trail of tears that had dried shiny on her cheek.

  Something about this memory struck him as poetic. The walk-in was the perfect place to propose! They would both cry freezing tears of joy while the frigid temperatures saved their hearts from exploding. Their embrace
would keep them warm. He even spotted a bare pallet that made the prospect of getting down on one knee less daunting.

  Pushing out of the walk-in, he spotted Pat, who looked no less terrible than he had hours earlier. Ah-Jack in his youth, after a night of heavy drinking, needed only to throw up or take a shit to bounce back to his usual handsome self, and he wasn’t unsatisfied to see that Pat couldn’t handle the same level of abuse. They didn’t make young people like they used to.

  “No improvement?” Ah-Jack slurped his noodles as he approached.

  “Stay there.” Pat crossed his arms, careful not to touch any part of his stomach.

  “You’re missing a delicious breakfast,” he said. “The Glory cooks really know what they’re doing.”

  Pat had been about to drift toward the other waiters. “What’re you so happy about?” he asked, squinting at Ah-Jack. “I thought you’d be a little … quieter.”

  A part of Ah-Jack shrank back in shame. Pat was the only one who might put the puzzle together, which was that the ring was a bid not only for Nan’s love but also her presence. Pat happened to be fighting for the same things. A larger part of him, however, stood up taller. Pat was nearly grown; he didn’t need his mother anymore. What Ah-Jack and Nan had was singular and special. Worth saving, even through desperate ways. He wasn’t marrying her to keep her from going to California. He was marrying her because they loved each other and had for thirty years. What he’d told that pawnshop owner was the truth. Nan had waited long enough.

  Ah-Jack shifted and the ring box moved in his pocket. He had yet another flash of inspiration.

  “I have something to ask you.” He put down his noodles. “Can you come outside with me for a moment?”

  “I’m going to be late.” Pat looked around for Jimmy. “But I need to smoke. My head is fucking killing me.”

  Outside, a line of boats bobbed a few feet away. Red and blue cloth umbrellas stood below large bronze pillars that doubled as lights. A small yacht pulled out of the marina, spitting up brackish water. Ah-Jack was so jittery that he asked Pat for a smoke. Pat passed him a slim dark cigarette from an engraved box Ah-Jack hadn’t seen before. They smoked and watched the foot traffic, both waiting for the other to start talking. Finally, Ah-Jack took a steadying puff and pulled out the ring box.