Ice Cream Lover

by Jackie Lau

  I’d hoped he would come for opening day last month, but he didn’t.

  At least he’s here now.

  He looks around, confusion on his face, as though he doesn’t know how he managed to find himself in an ice cream shop.

  “You decided to paint the back wall pink,” he says.

  “I did.” It’s a deep raspberry pink, and I think it’s pretty and cheerful.

  Dad doesn’t seem to approve, just like he didn’t approve of me opening an ice cream shop rather than finishing university and applying to dental school.

  Everyone loves ice cream, but most people dread going to the dentist. As a child, however, I didn’t mind the dentist at all. The hygienist was super nice and praised my brushing skills, the dentist always made me a balloon animal, and the receptionist gave me a pack of stickers—usually the scratch-and-sniff kind—after each appointment.

  I decided I wanted to be a dentist when I was seven or eight, and I didn’t waver from that plan for over a decade. I studied life sciences in university.

  But I never graduated, and I never got around to taking the DAT.

  There’s a before and an after in my life. After my mom was killed in a car accident, everything changed. I quit university in the middle of the term, and I’ve never wanted to go back. Dad was supportive of me taking a break, but after a year went by and I showed no interest in returning, he got frustrated. Still, he gave me some money to start the ice cream shop. I’m pretty sure he thinks that after a few months of running my own business, I’ll see it’s a foolish endeavor and decide to go back to school.

  That’s not going to happen, though.

  Once upon a time, I wanted to prevent cavities, but now, I want to give people cavities.

  Well, no. I don’t actually want people to get cavities; I just want to give them something sweet and satisfying, something that makes them happy.

  “Which flavors would you like?” I ask my father.

  “Green tea and ginger,” he says.

  “How about I put them in a bubble waffle for you?” I point to a plastic frame on the counter, which has a picture of a waffle with large bubbles—sort of like bubble wrap—that’s rolled into a cone and contains two scoops of ice cream. “They’re popular in Hong Kong.”

  He nods.

  I pour the batter into the waffle maker, and my father glances at the photo of my mom and me on the wall. He doesn’t say anything.

  When the waffle is finished and filled with ice cream, I tell Valerie that I’m going to the patio with my father for a few minutes. We head out the door and take a seat on a bench under a pink umbrella.

  “What do you think?” I ask my dad after he tries a bite of the green tea ice cream.

  “I’m not sure how I feel about tea-flavored ice cream.” He leans forward. “This is what I don’t understand about your business. The green tea ice cream, the red bean-coconut ice cream, the waffles from Hong Kong...”

  “It’s an Asian ice cream shop.”

  “I know. But why?”

  I stiffen. “Why not?”

  You’re not Asian, I imagine him thinking, but he doesn’t say that out loud.

  My white father thinks it’s best to ignore race, to pretend it doesn’t exist. He told me last year that he never thought of my Chinese-Canadian mother as being Chinese at all. But her experiences were different from his because of her family history and how she looked. It feels like he can’t acknowledge that.

  I don’t think he truly understands that I’m biracial. He sees me as one of his own, as white, even though many of my facial features are in between his and my mother’s, and I inherited her eye color and complexion.

  I’m thankful for the latter. My father turns pink if he gets even a small amount of sun, and he walks around in an ugly, floppy brown hat for half the year—like now. I find the hat rather endearing, though. Very Dad. Since my mother is dead and I don’t have any siblings, he’s my only surviving close relative.

  I would do anything to make him happy, except the one thing he wants me to do.

  “The ginger is really good,” he says. “Yes, I quite like that one.”

  “I’ll give you some other samples to try afterward.” I should have done that earlier.

  “How much ice cream do you eat, now that you own an ice cream shop?”

  “Not every day, but more than I should, probably.”

  He proceeds to give me a lecture on nutrition, telling me that I need to make sure I get enough vegetables and protein.

  I don’t mind these lectures, the ones that aren’t about my career. I like being reminded that I still have someone to parent me, even though I’m twenty-five.

  We go back inside, and he tries the strawberry-lychee sorbet, the taro ice cream, and the red bean-coconut ice cream. He likes the first two, but not the red bean one, which doesn’t surprise me. He never liked red bean mooncakes, which my mother always bought for the Mid-Autumn Festival.

  Dad reminds me of my grandmother’s eightieth birthday party next Sunday, then gives me a hug.

  “Love you,” he says.

  “I love you, too, Dad.”

  You never know when it’ll be your last chance to say those words.

  They’re the opposite of what I said to my mother the last time I saw her alive.

  * * *

  We close at six o’clock, and I look at the sales numbers after Valerie goes home. They’re not bad, but not great. Ginger Scoops will need to do better than this on hot summer weekends if it’s going to succeed.

  And it has to succeed. I’ve put so much into this. All the money I saved from my various jobs. Money from my family. I took a couple courses to help me learn how to run a business. Until a few months ago, I lived with my father to minimize my expenses, despite the awkwardness between us.

  But most importantly, I did this in memory of my mother. I know that seems like a frivolous way to honor my mother, but it feels right.

  For that reason, more than anything, I have to make this work.

  Chapter 3

  Drew

  “It’s so pretty, Uncle Drew!” Michelle says. “Take a picture, please.”

  Dutifully, I take out my phone and snap a picture of our salmon poke bowl. In addition to salmon, it has avocado, nori, edamame beans, and some kind of sauce in a zig-zag pattern, all on top of rice. Since the bowls are too big for Michelle to have her own, we ordered one to share, and now I put her portion in an empty bowl.

  We’re sitting in Hogtown Poke on Baldwin Street, and I am, unfortunately, soaking wet. It was supposed to be nice weather today, but instead, the sky decided to take a piss on us, and then Michelle jumped in an enormous puddle in her sparkly purple rain boots, leaving my pants soaked. I can’t wait to go home and change into some dry clothes, but first, I have to finish my poke bowl and take my niece out for ice cream.

  Michelle has a bite and chews thoughtfully.

  “What do you think?” I ask.

  “It’s good,” she says, “but you know what would make it better? Wakame salad.”

  “They have it as a topping for some of the other bowls. Let me see if I can get you some.”

  I head to the counter and return a minute later with a small serving of wakame salad. Michelle dumps it in her bowl and takes a bite.

  “Perfect,” she says.

  Most five-year-olds wouldn’t say that about seaweed salad, but Michelle is not a normal kid when it comes to food.

  She didn’t get it from her mother, that’s for sure. Adrienne is the exact opposite of a food snob, and she’s the world’s most useless cook. She’s the kind of person who’d eat a bag of potato chips for dinner. My niece, however, is already pretty good at cooking, and I fully expect her to win some kind of Mini Iron Chef competition by the time she’s ten.

  We eat in silence, and when we’re finished, we head out into the pouring rain. Fortunately, Ginger Scoops is right across the street.

  Unfortunately, it looks like a unicorn threw up inside
the ice cream shop.

  One wall is solid pink. The chairs and tables are white and pastel green, and there are fairy lights strung across the walls. In one corner sits a rocking horse, a rainbow painted on the wall above it.

  Oh, boy. Who would decorate a business like this?

  I jolt back when I see the woman behind the counter. She has dark brown hair and eyes, and I think she might be biracial like Michelle. She’s wearing a fussy apron with ruffles, and okay, I’ll admit, she’s very pretty, and that’s probably why I jolted back in surprise. She’s smiling, so I try to smile back at her, though I probably end up looking like Shrek.

  “Read me the flavors, Uncle Drew!” Michelle says.

  I read her the list and ask what she wants.

  “I don’t know. They all sound good.”

  “You can try them first.” The woman is still smiling.

  Michelle is super excited. “Okay, I’d like to try the green tea-strawberry, the passionfruit, the black sesame, the matcha cheesecake—”

  “That’s too many,” I say.

  “It’s no problem,” says the woman behind the counter. “It’s not busy.” She scoops out a small amount of pink ice cream and hands it to me over the counter. I give it to Michelle.

  My niece tries the ice cream and thinks for a moment. “It’s good, but it could use a little more green tea.”

  The woman cocks her head to the side. “Yes, I agree. I plan to make some minor changes for the next batch.”

  “You make it yourself?” Michelle asks.

  “I do.”

  “That’s so cool.”

  The woman hands me another spoon, this one with yellow ice cream—presumably the passionfruit—and our fingers brush. It feels like I’m being zapped with the rainbows and stardust flowing through her veins.

  After Michelle has tried all four flavors, she orders passionfruit and matcha cheesecake.

  “Wait a second,” I say, playing the role of responsible adult. “You’re not getting a double scoop. You can have the smallest size.”

  “But Uncle Drew—”

  “She can have two flavors in a kiddie size.” The woman starts to scoop out the matcha cheesecake, then looks up at me. “What would you like?”

  I observe a coffeepot. Thank God. “One coffee. No cream, no sugar.”

  “You’re not having ice cream?” Michelle asks, horrified.

  “You know I don’t like ice cream.”

  “I thought you were joking! How can you not like ice cream? It’s good ice cream, not like that ice cream truck you took me to when I was little.”

  I’m surprised she remembers that, since she wasn’t even three.

  I’m also surprised that the lady behind the counter doesn’t expire in horror when I say I don’t like ice cream. Instead, she goes into business mode.

  “If you’re lactose intolerant,” she says, “the ginger-lime sorbet and the strawberry-lychee sorbet are dairy free.”

  “I’m not lactose intolerant.”

  “If you usually find ice cream too sweet, the ginger-lime sorbet—”

  “I have no problem with sugar.”

  “Oh. I figured, since you asked for your coffee without sugar...”

  “I like my coffee black, that’s all. I just don’t like ice cream.”

  She shakes her head. “I don’t understand people like you.”

  And frankly, I don’t understand people who wear ruffled aprons and work in ice cream shops that look like My Little Pony.

  “If you like coffee,” she says, “are you sure I can’t tempt you with Vietnamese coffee ice cream?”

  “Very sure.”

  “Is the problem that you don’t like cold things? Does it give you a headache? I could microwave it for you.”

  “Then it wouldn’t really be ice cream anymore, would it?”

  “I wouldn’t have to melt it. I could make it the consistency of pudding, maybe?”

  “No.”

  Although I’m the freak who drinks beer at room temperature—imperial stouts, in my opinion, have more flavor when they’re not ice cold—I’m not eating microwaved ice cream.

  No, not happening.

  “Chocolate-raspberry?” she suggests.

  “No.”

  “Taro? It’s nice and...purple-y.”

  She’s so earnest. It’s kind of cute.

  I hold back a laugh. “No, thank you.”

  “The matcha cheesecake ice cream is really quite excellent, trust me.”

  “If it was an actual cheesecake, not in ice cream form, I would eat it.” I like the matcha cheesecake at the Japanese cheesecake place near where I live. “But as I said, I just don’t like ice cream.”

  She peers at me as though trying to determine whether I’m a serial killer.

  “Fine,” she says with a sigh. “One black coffee, nothing else.” After handing Michelle her cup of ice cream, she pours my coffee. She looks a bit deflated, and I consider ordering a small cup of ice cream just to see her smile again.

  What the hell?

  Nope, no way is that happening.

  Why did that thought even occur to me?

  I wonder if this woman has read Embrace Your Inner Ice Cream Sandwich. She probably doesn’t need that book, though. I suspect she’s already hopped up on sprinkles and positivity and knows exactly what her inner ice cream sandwich is.

  There are no ice cream sandwiches on the menu here, however.

  “Anything else you’d like?” she asks.

  “No, that’ll be all, thank you.”

  I pay for our order, then Michelle and I sit down at a table near the window. She looks very pleased with her cup, and she proceeds to eat in silence. She usually eats quietly, as though the wheels in her head are spinning, analyzing all the flavors.

  “I love this place,” she says when she finishes.

  “I’m glad,” I say. “Why don’t we stay here a little longer, until the rain lets up?”

  “Can I have more ice cream, please?”

  I give her a look. “You know you’re only allowed one treat. Why don’t you try the rocking pony?”

  “It’s not a pony. It’s a unicorn! Don’t you see its horn?”

  “The rocking unicorn. Right. I misspoke.”

  Michelle climbs onto the unicorn, and I sip my coffee.

  Okay, I admit maybe I wanted to stay a bit longer because I wanted to take another look at the woman behind the counter. Right now, she’s reaching for something on a high shelf, and I can’t help admiring the great view of her ass. I’m about to ask if she needs help, but nope, she’s got it.

  Once upon a time, I might have asked her out. But not now. I’ve already been left at the altar once; I’ve already inspired one journey of self-discovery that led to a bestselling book. I don’t need to do it again.

  Of course, I could try to change who I am as a person, but the two days I spent attempting to be cheerful and charming last fall were a disaster. Everyone looked at me funny, probably thinking I was on drugs, and it felt so forced and uncomfortable.

  No, I am who I am, and I have exactly what I want out of life right now.

  At least, that’s what I keep telling myself.

  “Come on, time to go,” I say to Michelle.

  “Take a picture of me riding the unicorn first!”

  I pull out my phone again and snap the requested photo. Then I take my little niece’s hand and lead her out into the rain. I swear I can feel the eyes of the woman behind the counter on me as we leave.

  But that’s probably just my imagination.

  Chapter 4

  Chloe

  It’s too bad about the permanent scowl on his face. Otherwise, the East Asian man who just walked out the door with his niece would be incredibly handsome. At one point he attempted to smile, and he looked like a demented puppet.

  It’s too bad about the scowl and his attitude toward ice cream.

  Honestly, what kind of person hates ice cream?

  Not that it
matters. I’ll probably never see him again.

  The chimes above the door tinkle, and Valerie walks in, along with Sarah Winters. Sarah owns Happy As Pie across the street, which makes both sweet and savory pies. Ice cream has always been my dessert of choice, but her strawberry-rhubarb pie is to die for, as is her berry crumble pie and her lemon-lime tart and her butter tarts...

  Okay, I just really like Sarah’s pies.

  The savory ones are good, too. Valerie sits down at a table and opens a box with a steaming braised lamb and rosemary pie—I can tell by the smell—and I groan.

  “Don’t worry, there’s some for you, too.” She sets down another box.

  Sarah and I join her at the table. There’s no one else here right now, and it’s pouring rain outside, so I can take a break. I moan as I put the first bite of pie into my mouth. The filling is rich and delicious, surrounded by a flaky crust.

  “How’s business today?” I ask.

  “Slow.” Sarah sighs.

  “Same here.”

  Valerie stuffs another bite into her mouth. “What about the hot dad I just saw walking out the door?”

  I give her a look. “For starters, that was his niece, not his daughter.” Though of course that doesn’t mean he couldn’t also have children of his own, but “Uncle Drew” was what the little girl called him. “Second of all, he ordered a black coffee and refused to try any ice cream. Says he hates it.”

  Sarah and Valerie let out faux gasps, as though I said he was the devil.

  “With that attitude,” I say, “I bet he has little success with women. Or men.”

  “Perhaps he’s a very nice person other than his hatred for ice cream,” Sarah says.

  “If he hates ice cream, he probably hates lots of other lovely things, too. Like puppies and rainbows and gingersnaps and”—I look at Sarah—“your decadent chocolate tart.”

  She gasps again. “No. He couldn’t!”

  I point at the box in her hands. “God, I hope there’s some chocolate tart in there.”

  Sarah opens it up. There is indeed a slice of chocolate tart, as well as slices of spiced apple pie and strawberry-rhubarb pie. “You know how we talked about having pie à la mode specials? Let’s try a few things now.”